Mazmur 125:3

125:3 Indeed, ¹  the scepter of a wicked king ²  will not settle ³ 

upon the allotted land of the godly.

Otherwise the godly might

do what is wrong. ⁴ 

Yeremia 15:21

15:21 “I will deliver you from the power of the wicked.

I will free you from the clutches of violent people.”

Daniel 3:28

3:28 Nebuchadnezzar exclaimed, ⁵  “Praised be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent forth his angel ⁶  and has rescued his servants who trusted in him, ignoring ⁷  the edict of the king and giving up their bodies rather than ⁸  serve or pay homage to any god other than their God!

Daniel 6:22

6:22 My God sent his angel and closed the lions’ mouths so that they have not harmed me, because I was found to be innocent before him. Nor have I done any harm to you, O king.”

Daniel 6:27

6:27 He rescues and delivers

and performs signs and wonders

in the heavens and on the earth.

He has rescued Daniel from the power ⁹  of the lions!”

Daniel 6:2

6:2 Over them would be three supervisors, one of whom was Daniel. These satraps were accountable ¹⁰  to them, so that the king’s interests might not incur damage.

Daniel 2:8-12

2:8 The king replied, “I know for sure that you are attempting to gain time, because you see that my decision is firm. 2:9 If you don’t inform me of the dream, there is only one thing that is going to happen to you. ¹¹  For you have agreed among yourselves to report to me something false and deceitful ¹²  until such time as things might change. So tell me the dream, and I will have confidence ¹³  that you can disclose its interpretation.”

2:10 The wise men replied to the king, “There is no man on earth who is able to disclose the king’s secret, ¹⁴  for no king, regardless of his position and power, has ever requested such a thing from any magician, astrologer, or wise man. 2:11 What the king is asking is too difficult, and no one exists who can disclose it to the king, except for the gods – but they don’t live among mortals!” ¹⁵ 

2:12 Because of this the king got furiously angry ¹⁶  and gave orders to destroy all the wise men of Babylon.

Daniel 3:2

3:2 Then King Nebuchadnezzar sent out a summons to assemble the satraps, prefects, governors, counselors, treasurers, judges, magistrates, ¹⁷  and all the other authorities of the province to attend the dedication of the statue that he ¹⁸  had erected.

Daniel 3:1

Daniel’s Friends Are Tested

3:1 ¹⁹ King Nebuchadnezzar had a golden ²⁰  statue made. ²¹  It was ninety feet ²²  tall and nine feet ²³  wide. He erected it on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon.

Yohanes 5:18

5:18 For this reason the Jewish leaders ²⁴  were trying even harder to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was also calling God his own Father, thus making himself equal with God.

Wahyu 13:8

13:8 and all those who live on the earth will worship the beast, ²⁵  everyone whose name has not been written since the foundation of the world ²⁶  in the book of life belonging to the Lamb who was killed. ²⁷ 

[125:3]  ¹ tn Or “for.”

[125:3]  ² tn Heb “a scepter of wickedness.” The “scepter” symbolizes royal authority; when collocated with “wickedness” the phrase refers to an oppressive foreign conqueror.

[125:3]  ³ tn Or “rest.”

[125:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “so that the godly might not stretch out their hands in wrongdoing.” A wicked king who sets a sinful example can have an adverse moral and ethical effect on the people he rules.

[3:28]  ⁵ tn Aram “answered and said.”

[3:28]  ⁶ sn The king identifies the “son of the gods” (v. 25) as an angel. Comparable Hebrew expressions are used elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible for the members of God’s angelic assembly (see Gen 6:2, 4; Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7; Pss 29:1; 89:6). An angel later comes to rescue Daniel from the lions (Dan 6:22).

[3:28]  ⁷ tn Aram “they changed” or “violated.”

[3:28]  ⁸ tn Aram “so that they might not.”

[6:27]  ⁹ tn Aram “hand.”

[6:2]  ¹⁰ tn Aram “giving an account.”

[2:9]  ¹¹ tn Aram “one is your law,” i.e., only one thing is applicable to you.

[2:9]  ¹² tn Aram “a lying and corrupt word.”

[2:9]  ¹³ tn Aram “I will know.”

[2:10]  ¹⁴ tn Aram “matter, thing.”

[2:11]  ¹⁵ tn Aram “whose dwelling is not with flesh.”

[2:12]  ¹⁶ tn Aram “was angry and very furious.” The expression is a hendiadys (two words or phrases expressing a single idea).

[3:2]  ¹⁷ sn The specific duties of the seven types of officials listed here (cf. vv. 3, 27) are unclear. The Aramaic words that are used are transliterations of Akkadian or Persian technical terms whose exact meanings are uncertain. The translations given here follow suggestions set forth in BDB.

[3:2]  ¹⁸ tn Aram “Nebuchadnezzar the king.” The proper name and title have been replaced by the relative pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[3:1]  ¹⁹ sn The LXX introduces this chapter with the following chronological note: “in the eighteenth year of.” Such a date would place these events at about the time of the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. (cf. 2 Kgs 25:8). However, there seems to be no real basis for associating the events of Daniel 3 with this date.

[3:1]  ²⁰ sn There is no need to think of Nebuchadnezzar’s image as being solid gold. No doubt the sense is that it was overlaid with gold (cf. Isa 40:19; Jer 10:3-4), with the result that it presented a dazzling self-compliment to the greatness of Nebuchadnezzar’s achievements.

[3:1]  ²¹ sn According to a number of patristic authors, the image represented a deification of Nebuchadnezzar himself. This is not clear from the biblical text, however.

[3:1]  ²² tn Aram “sixty cubits.” Assuming a length of 18 inches for the standard cubit, the image would be 90 feet (27.4 m) high.

[3:1]  ²³ tn Aram “six cubits.” Assuming a length of 18 inches for the standard cubit, the image would be 9 feet (2.74 m) wide.

[3:1]  sn The dimensions of the image (ninety feet high and nine feet wide) imply that it did not possess normal human proportions, unless a base for the image is included in the height dimension. The ancient world knew of other tall statues. For example, the Colossus of Rhodes – the huge statue of Helios which stood (ca. 280-224 B.C.) at the entrance to the harbor at Rhodes and was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world – was said to be seventy cubits (105 ft or 32 m) in height, which would make it even taller than Nebuchadnezzar’s image.

[5:18]  ²⁴ tn Or “the Jewish authorities”; Grk “the Jews.” See the note on the phrase “Jewish leaders” in v. 10.

[13:8]  ²⁵ tn Grk “it”; the referent (the beast) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:8]  ²⁶ tn The prepositional phrase “since the foundation of the world” is traditionally translated as a modifier of the immediately preceding phrase in the Greek text, “the Lamb who was killed” (so also G. B. Caird, Revelation [HNTC], 168), but it is more likely that the phrase “since the foundation of the world” modifies the verb “written” (as translated above). Confirmation of this can be found in Rev 17:8 where the phrase “written in the book of life since the foundation of the world” occurs with no ambiguity.

[13:8]  ²⁷ tn Or “slaughtered”; traditionally, “slain.”