Daniel 10:2
in Daniel 10In those days I, Daniel, was mourning for three full weeks.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
In those days I, Daniel, was mourning three whole weeks.
KJV
In those days I Daniel was mourning three full weeks.
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This verse in Daniel 10
Commentary
13 notes on this verseA commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
Compare Mt 9:14, "fast," answering to "mourn" (Da 10:15). 1Ti 4:3, which prove that "fasting" is not an indispensable Christian obligation; but merely an outward expression of sorrow, and separation from ordinary worldly enjoyments, in order to give one's self to prayer (Ac 13:2).
This site's exposition
In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia
on Daniel 10:1-3
The last vision is dated to the third year of Cyrus, and its message is called true and concerned “a great conflict”. Daniel mourns “for three full weeks,” taking no rich food, meat, wine or oil, while Ezra 4 records opposition to the rebuilding.
This site's exposition
mourning for three full weeks
Theodoret traced Daniel's mourning to the people who stayed in Babylon, though Cyrus king of Persia had let them return. Ephrem and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown take the mourning as fasting, as in the Lord's reply in Matthew 9. Barnes dates it two years after the decree.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers5 voices
In this way, after speaking these things, the prophet describes to us again another vision. For the blessed Daniel meditated on no other vision, lest he not be accurately taught all the things to come and he not teach and reveal these things to us again. Indeed he says, "In the third year of Cyrus king of the Persians a word was revealed to Daniel, who was called the name Baltasar, and the word was true and great power and understanding was given to him in the vision. 'In those days, I, Daniel, was mourning three weeks of days, I did not eat desirable bread and meat and wine did not enter my mouth and I did not anoint myself with oil for three full weeks of days. On the twenty and fourth day of the first month.'" [Daniel 10:1-4] "I was humbled," he says, "twenty one days praying to the living God requesting from him the revealing of mysteries." And then, after the Father heard, he sent his Word, thus pointing out what is about to happen through him and then that it would happen along the Great River. For the event is necessary to have happened there where the Son was demonstrated, where also he was about to forgive sins.
A commentator
Philoxenus of Mabbug13 Ascetic Discourses, Discourse 11 -- On Abstinence · Written before 523.
proposed
And thou must also understand from the testimony of the Prophets, that they too, whenever they were held worthy to receive a vision of God or of the angels, led a life of much fasting, and then were they worthy to receive the vision of …
He says that the mourning had been protracted "for three weeks," because he had fasted for all that space of time. He calls fasting "mourning" in the same sense used by our Lord, when he defended himself and his disciples from the detractions of the …
We must seek the source of his grief.… Although the king permitted all who wanted their freedom and permission to return [to their homeland and rebuild the temple], most had built homes in Babylon and were held back by their bond to these houses and, …
Verses 2, 3. "In those days I, Daniel, mourned for the days of three weeks; I ate no desirable bread, and neither flesh or wine entered into my mouth; neither was I anointed with ointment until the days of three weeks were accomplished." By this example we are taught to abstain from the pleasanter types of food (I think that the term "desirable bread" is that inclusive) during a period of fasting, and that we neither eat flesh nor drink wine, and especially that we desire no anointing with ointments.
5 more voices on this verse
The Puritans and the Awakening3 voices
Was mourning - Because he foresaw the many calamities that would befall the Jews for their sins, especially for destroying the Messiah, and rejecting his gospel.
In those days I Daniel was mourning,....
He did not eat the pleasant bread he used to eat, but that which was course and unpalatable, which he would not be tempted to eat any more of than was just necessary to support nature. As ornaments, so delicacies, are very disagreeable to a day of humiliation.
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
I - was mourning three full weeks - The weeks are most probably dated from the time of the termination of the last vision. Calmet proves this by several reasons.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
In those days I Daniel was mourning - I was afflicting myself; that is, he had set apart this time as an extraordinary fast. He was sad and troubled. He does not say on what account he was thus troubled, but there can be little doubt that it was on account of his people. This was two years after the order had been given by Cyrus for the restoration of the Hebrew people to their country, but it is not improbable that they met with many embarrassments in their efforts to return, and possibly there may have sprung up in Babylon some difficulties on the subject that greatly affected the mind of Daniel. The difficulties attending such an enterprise as that of restoring a captured people to their country, when the march lay across a vast desert, would at any time have been such as to have made an extraordinary season of prayer and fasting proper. Three full weeks - Margin, “weeks of days.” Hebrew, “Three sevens of days.” He does not say whether he had designedly set apart that time to be occupied as a season of fasting, or whether he had, under the influence of deep feeling, continued his fast from day to day until it reached that period. Either supposition will accord with the circumstances of the case, and either would have justified such an act at anytime, for it would be undoubtedly proper to designate a time of extraordinary devotion, or, under the influence of deep feeling, of domestic trouble, of national affliction, to continue such religious exercises from day to day.
The words behind it
9 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| בַּיָּמִ֖ים | baiyamim | in the days | H3117 → | 2304 times |
| הָהֵ֑ם | hahem | <the> those | H1992 → | |
| אֲנִ֤י | ʾani | I | H589 → | 874 times |
| דָֽנִיֵּאל֙ | daniyel | Daniel | H1840 → | 24 times |
| הָיִ֣יתִי | hayiti | I was | H1961 → | 3559 times |
| מִתְאַבֵּ֔ל | mitabel | mourning | H56 → | |
| שְׁלֹשָׁ֥ה | sheloshah | three | H7969 → | 432 times |
| שָׁבֻעִ֖ים | shavuim | sevens | H7620 → | 20 times |
| יָמִֽים׃ | yamim | days | H3117 → | 2304 times |
בַּיָּמִ֖יםin the days
baiyamimH3117 →2304 times
הָהֵ֑ם<the> those
hahemH1992 →
אֲנִ֤יI
ʾaniH589 →874 times
דָֽנִיֵּאל֙Daniel
daniyelH1840 →24 times
הָיִ֣יתִיI was
hayitiH1961 →3559 times
מִתְאַבֵּ֔לmourning
mitabelH56 →
שְׁלֹשָׁ֥הthree
sheloshahH7969 →432 times
שָׁבֻעִ֖יםsevens
shavuimH7620 →20 times
יָמִֽים׃days
yamimH3117 →2304 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Jeremiah 9:1Oh, that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and night over the slain daughter of my people.
it leads to
- Jeremiah 13:17
But if you do not listen, I will weep in secret because of your pride. My eyes will overflow with tears, because the LORD’s flock has been taken captive.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Isaiah 22:4
Therefore I said, “Turn away from me, let me weep bitterly! Do not try to console me over the destruction of the daughter of my people.”
- Jeremiah 13:17
Through
Nehemiah 1:4When I heard these words, I sat down and wept. I mourned for days, fasting and praying before the God of heaven.
it leads to
- Daniel 9:3
So I turned my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and petition, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.
- Psalms 137:1
By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.
- Ezra 10:1
While Ezra prayed and made this confession, weeping and falling facedown before the house of God, a very large assembly of Israelites—men, women, and children—gathered around him, and the people wept bitterly as well.
- Daniel 9:3
Through
Romans 9:2I have deep sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.
it leads to
- Philippians 3:18
For as I have often told you before, and now say again even with tears: Many live as enemies of the cross of Christ.
- Romans 10:1
Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is for their salvation.
- Psalms 119:136
My eyes shed streams of tears because Your law is not obeyed.
- Philippians 3:18
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies9
About Daniel
Who and where
1 name in this verse with a page on the site.
This page draws on 13 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes on the Book of Daniel; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Daniel; Ephrem the Syrian, COMMENTARY ON DANIEL 10:1-2; Hippolytus of Rome, Commentary on Daniel 4.36.1-4; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, St. Jerome, Commentary on Daniel, CHAPTER TEN; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible; Philoxenus of Mabbug, 13 Ascetic Discourses, Discourse 11 -- On Abstinence and Theodoret of Cyrus, COMMENTARY ON DANIEL 10:2-3.