World English Bible · The Persian return
Daniel 12
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
"At that time will stand up, the great prince who stands for the children of your people; and there will be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time. At that time your people will be , everyone who is found written in the book. Many of those who of the earth , some to , and some to and contempt. Those who are will shine as the brightness of the expanse. Those who turn many to will shine as the stars and ever. But you, , shut up the words and seal the book, even to the time of the end. Many will run back and forth, and knowledge will be increased." Then I, , looked, and behold, two others stood, one on the river bank on this side, and the other on the river bank on that side. One said to the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, "How long will it be to the end of these wonders?" I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the river, when he held up his and his left hand to , and by him who lives that it will be for a time, times, and a half; and when they have finished breaking in pieces the of the people, all these things will be finished. I heard, but I didn't understand. Then I said, "My , what will be the outcome of these things?" He said, "Go your way, ; for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end. Many will purify themselves, and make themselves white, and be refined, but will do wickedly; and none of will understand, but those who are will understand. "From the time that the continual burnt offering is taken away and the that makes desolate set up, there will be one thousand two hundred ninety days. is he who waits, and comes to the one thousand three hundred thirty-five days. "But go your way until the end; for you will rest, and will stand in your at the end of the days."
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The Persian return, 539 BC to 332 BC ›
Persia takes Babylon and reverses its policy, sending exiled peoples home to rebuild their temples. Judah returns as a small province, rebuilding under imperial permission rather than independence.
- Persia
- The largest empire the world had yet seen, from the Indus to the Aegean, run through provinces, a royal road, and a postal system. Its policy on conquered peoples was to send them home and fund their temples, in exchange for loyalty and prayers for the king. The Cyrus Cylinder states the policy in Cyrus's own words, and Ezra opens with the same policy applied to Judah.
- Judah
- A small, poor province called Yehud, a fraction of the old kingdom, with a rebuilt temple that made the people who remembered the first one weep. No king, and no prospect of one. Leadership passes to priests and scribes, which shapes everything afterward.
- Greece
- Persia and Greece collide at Marathon and Salamis, Persia loses, and Athens spends the following decades on the Parthenon, tragedy, and Socrates. Herodotus writes the first history in order to explain that war. Then Plato and Aristotle, whose vocabulary the church will still be using at Nicaea eight centuries later.
- Further afield
- Rome throws out its kings and becomes a republic. In India and China this is the age of the Buddha's early followers and of Confucian teaching taking hold. More of what the world still thinks with was invented in this era than in almost any other.