The times of the captivity were made illustrious by the prophecies and deeds of the prophets, and most of all by Daniel's remarkable perseverance in preserving the law, and in the acquittal of Susanna by divine counsel, and in the other things done by him, which we shall now relate in order. He was captured under king Jehoiakim and carried off to Babylon while still quite a small boy; afterward, on account of the elegance of his appearance, he was taken among the royal attendants, and along with him Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. But when the king had commanded that they be provided with more delicate foods, and had given this charge to the eunuch Asphenaz, Daniel, mindful of his ancestral traditions, lest he should partake of the Gentile foods from the king's table, asked the eunuch that they might use only vegetables.
When Asphenaz objected, fearing lest the leanness ensuing should betray that the king's command had been disregarded, Daniel, relying on God, promised that his countenance would be of greater comeliness from vegetables than from the royal foods. And faith attended his words, so that the faces of those who were provided for at imperial expense were by no means comparable. And so, admitted by the king into honor and favor, by their prudence and learning they were in a short time preferred above all who were nearest to the king.
About this same time Susanna, married to a certain Joacim, a woman of conspicuous beauty, was solicited by two elders; and when she would not consent to the shameless men, she was assailed with a false charge, these same elders alleging that a young man had been caught with her in a remote place, but that he, by youthful agility, had escaped the hands of the old men. So credit was given to the elders, and by the judgment of the people Susanna was condemned. And when, according to the law, she was being led to execution, Daniel, then twelve years old, rebuking the Jews because they had condemned an innocent woman to death, demanded that she be brought back into judgment and the case heard again.
Indeed the multitude of the Jews who were then present, judging that not without God had a boy of so despised an age broken forth into such firmness, with favor inclined toward him, returned to the council. The judgment is begun anew; it was granted to Daniel to sit among the elders. So he ordered the accusers to be separated, and questioned each of them under what kind of tree he had caught the adulteress. By the discrepancy of their answers the falsehood was detected; Susanna was acquitted, and the elders, who had brought peril upon an innocent woman, were condemned to death. At that time Nebuchadnezzar saw a dream, wondrous with the mystery of things to come.
When he could not by himself unravel its interpretation, having summoned to interpret it the Chaldeans and those who by magic arts and by the entrails of victims seemed to know hidden things and to foretell the future, he soon, fearing lest after the manner of men they should conjecture from the dream not what was true but what would please the king, suppressed the things he had seen, and demanded of them that, if there were true divination in them, they should tell him the dream itself; that he would then at last believe their interpretation, if first, by declaring the dream, they had given proof of their art. But they, refusing so great a task, confessed that this was not within human power. The king, moved that men should deceive him with errors by a false profession of divining, since, bound by the present task, they confessed they knew nothing —
so by the king's edict punishment was inflicted upon them, and all of this art were openly being put to death. When this became known to Daniel, he addressed the man nearest to the king, and promised the declaration of the dream and its interpretation. The matter was brought to the king, and Daniel was summoned. Now, the mystery having been revealed to him by God, he reports and unfolds the king's vision. But the matter requires that we set forth the king's dream and the prophet's interpretation and the faithfulness of what followed. The king had seen in his sleep an image with a head of gold, breast and arms of silver, belly and thighs of bronze, legs of iron, which ended in feet partly of iron, partly of clay; but the iron and the earthenware, being mingled together, could not cohere.
At last a stone, cut out without hands, ground the image to pieces, and all of it, reduced to dust, was carried away by the wind. So, according to the prophet's interpretation, the image seen bears the figure of the world. The golden head is the empire of the Chaldeans, since we have received that it was the first and most opulent. The breast and silver arms announce the second kingdom; for Cyrus, having conquered the Chaldeans and the Medes, transferred the empire to the Persians. By the belly of bronze a third kingdom is declared to be portended, and we see it fulfilled, since Alexander claimed for Macedon the empire wrested from the Persians. The legs of iron are understood as the fourth empire, and that the Roman, the strongest of all kingdoms before it.
But the feet, partly of iron, partly of clay, prefigure that the Roman kingdom is to be divided, so that it should never cohere among itself; which has been likewise fulfilled, since the Roman state is administered not by one emperor, but by several, ever at variance among themselves whether by arms or by partisanship.
Finally, by the mingling of earthenware and iron, with the materials never coalescing among themselves, are signified the future intermixtures of the human race that are at odds with one another, since it is established that Roman soil has been occupied by foreign or rebel nations, or handed over by those surrendering under the appearance of peace, and we see barbarian nations intermingled with our armies, cities, and provinces — and especially the Jews — dwelling among us, yet not passing over into our ways. And the prophets announce these to be the last things. But in the stone cut out without hands, which crushes the gold, silver, bronze, iron, and earthenware, there is the figure of Christ.
For He, brought forth not by human condition — since He was born not of the will of man, but of God — will reduce to nothing this world in which are the kingdoms of the earth, and will establish another kingdom, incorruptible and everlasting, that is, the age to come, which has been prepared for the saints. Concerning this one thing alone the faith of some is still in doubt, for they do not believe concerning things to come, though they are convinced concerning things past. So Daniel, endowed by the king with many gifts, set over Babylonia and the whole empire, was held in the highest honors. By his vote Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael were likewise advanced to the highest dignity and power.
About the same time the remarkable prophecy of Ezekiel arose, the mystery of things to come and of the resurrection being revealed to him. There exists a book of great work, to be read with care. But in Judaea, over which, after the destruction of Jerusalem, we mentioned above that Gedaliah had been set, the Jews, taking it ill that a leader of non-royal stock had been given them by the choice of the conqueror, with a certain Ishmael as leader and instigator of a wicked conspiracy, slew him by an ambush prepared at a banquet. But those who had been free of the crime, eager to go avenge the deed, hastily took up arms against Ishmael. But when he learned that destruction was hanging over him, abandoning the army he had gathered, with no more than eight companions he fled to the Ammonites.
So fear pervaded the whole people, lest the king of Babylon should go to avenge the crime of a few with the destruction of all; for besides Gedaliah they had slain many of the Chaldeans along with him. And so they form a plan of fleeing into Egypt, but first they go in throngs to Jeremiah, inquiring the divine response. But he, by the words of God, exhorted them all to remain in their native soil; if they did so, they would be protected by God's guard and there would be no danger from the Babylonians; but if they sought Egypt, all would perish there by sword and famine and by various kinds of death. But the common people, insolent through their accustomed evil and unused to obeying salutary counsels and the divine command, set out into Egypt. What was afterward done concerning them is passed over in silence by the sacred writings; nothing is known to us.
In this stretch of time Nebuchadnezzar, exalted by his successes, set up for himself a golden statue of immense magnitude and commanded it to be worshiped as a sacred effigy. When this was done with rivalry by all, the minds of all being corrupted by flattery, Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael abstained from the profane service, not ignorant that this honor was due to God alone. So by the king's edict they were arraigned, and the condition of penalties was set before them, a burning furnace, that by present fear they might be compelled to worship the statue. But they chose rather to be devoured by the flames than to commit a sacrilege. And so, bound with fetters, they were cast into the midst of the flames. But the ministers of the unspeakable work, while they were the more eagerly driving the condemned into the fire, the flame swallowed up;
the Hebrews — wondrous to tell and incredible to those who did not see it — the fire did not touch, when by the onlookers they were seen walking in the furnace and singing a psalm to God, and a fourth was seen with them amid the fires, in the likeness of an angel, whom Nebuchadnezzar, gazing more closely, confessed he had seen to be the Son of God. Then the king, in no doubt that a divine power had been present in the matter, sent edicts throughout his whole kingdom and published abroad the miracle of the deed, confessing that honor was to be rendered to God alone. And not long after, a dream being set before him, and soon admonished also by a voice sent from heaven, his royal power being cast off and himself removed from all human company, sustaining life on herbs alone, he is recorded to have done penance;
the dominion being preserved for him by God's will, until, the time being fulfilled and God being at last acknowledged, after seven years he was restored both to his kingdom and to his former state. He is recorded, after having conquered Zedekiah, as we said above, whom he carried captive to Babylon, to have reigned twenty-six years, although I have not found this written in the sacred history. But it chanced that, while I was perusing many things, I found this notation in a little book already corrupted by age and without the author's name, in which the times of the king of the Babylonians were contained;
which I did not think should be passed over, since it both agreed with the Chronicles, and the reckoning of it so fitted our own that, through the order of the kings whose times it contained, down to the first year of king Cyrus, it filled out seventy years — for so many are reported by the sacred history to have been from the captivity to Cyrus. After Nebuchadnezzar his son obtained the kingdom, whom I found in the Chronicles to have been called Evilmerodach. He, dying in the twelfth year of his reign, made way for his younger brother, who was called Belshazzar.
When in the fourteenth year he was giving a public banquet to his princes and prefects, he ordered the sacred vessels to be brought forth — those which had been carried off from the temple of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and not employed for royal uses, but kept stored away in the treasuries. And when, through the luxury and license of the royal feast, all indiscriminately, of male and female sex, his wives and concubines, made use of these, suddenly the king beheld upon the wall fingers writing, and letters were seen drawn out in a line; but no one could be found who could read what was written. So the king, terrified, summoned the magi and the Chaldeans.
When these muttered and made no answer at all, the queen reminded the king that there was a certain Hebrew named Daniel, who had once revealed to Nebuchadnezzar the dream of a hidden mystery, and had even then, on account of his illustrious wisdom, been endowed with the highest honors. And so, being summoned, he read it through and interpreted that, because of the king's offense, who had profaned the vessels sacred to God, destruction was hanging over him and his kingdom was given to the Medes and Persians. Which soon followed; for that same night Belshazzar perished, and Darius, a Mede by nation, seized his kingdom, and set Daniel, found by his illustrious repute, over the whole empire, following the judgment of the former kings.
For both Nebuchadnezzar had set him over the kingdom, and Belshazzar had endowed him with a purple robe and a golden chain and constituted him the third ruler of the kingdom. So those who, together with him, were in power, vexed by envy that a foreigner of a captive nation had been made equal to them, urge the king, corrupted by flattery, that for the next thirty days divine honors be rendered to himself, and that it be lawful for no one to pray to God save the king. This was easily persuaded to Darius, by the folly of all kings who claim divine things for themselves. So Daniel, not untaught nor ignorant that prayers are to be rendered to God, not to man, is arraigned as one who had not obeyed the king's edict.
And though Darius much refused, to whom he had always been dear and acceptable, the princes prevailed, so that he was let down into a pit. But, exposed to the beasts, there was no peril. When the king had learned this, he ordered the accusers to be consigned to the lions; who did not come off by a like example, for they were straightway devoured and satisfied the wild beasts' hunger. Daniel, illustrious before, was held more illustrious; the king, his own edict being annulled, set forth a new one, that, errors and superstitions being abandoned, the God of Daniel should be worshiped. There exist also his visions, by which he revealed the order of the ages to follow, embracing even the number of years within which, as in fact happened, Christ would descend to the earth; and he openly set forth that Antichrist would come.
(6) But if anyone is more diligent, he will find these matters more accurately treated there; our own aim is merely to weave together the order of events. Darius is reported to have reigned eighteen years; at that time Astyages ruled the Medes. 8 (1) Cyrus, his grandson by a daughter, drove him from the kingdom by force of Persian arms, whereby the supreme power was transferred to the Persians. The Babylonians too passed under his power and dominion. (2) Therefore at the beginning of his reign, by edicts published openly, he gave the Jews leave to return to their native land, and he also restored the sacred vessels which Nebuchadnezzar had carried off from the temple of Jerusalem. And so few then returned into Judaea; whether the rest lacked the will or the means to return, we have not sufficiently ascertained.
(3) At that time there was among the Babylonians a bronze statue of Bel, a most ancient king whom even Virgil mentions (Aen. 1.729), which, consecrated by the superstition of men, Cyrus too was accustomed to worship, being deceived by the trickery of its priests, who declared that the image ate and drank, whereas they themselves secretly consumed the daily offering that was set before the idol. (4) So Cyrus, being on familiar terms with Daniel, asked him why he did not worship the statue, since it gave a clear sign of being a living god, consuming what was offered to it. (5) Daniel, laughing at the man's error, denied that it could happen that this bronze, that is, brute matter, should make use of food or drink.
Therefore the king ordered the priests to be summoned (for they were about seventy in number), and confronting them with terror he upbraided them, asking who was consuming the provisions, since Daniel, a man of remarkable prudence, maintained that this could in no way be done by a senseless image. (6) Then they, relying on the trick they had prepared, demanded that the usual offerings be brought in and that the temple be sealed by the king, so that, unless on the next day everything were found consumed, they should pay the penalty with death, provided the same condition remained for Daniel. (7) And so the temple was sealed with the king's seal, after Daniel had first, unknown to the priests, sprinkled the floor with ashes, so that the footprints of those entering might betray their hidden passages. Therefore on the next day the king, entering the temple, observed that what he had ordered set before the idol had been consumed.
(8) Then Daniel, with the footprints betraying it, uncovered the hidden fraud: that the priests with their wives and children, entering through a tunneled hole, had devoured what had been placed before the idol. Thus by the king's order all were put to death, and the temple and the statue were given over to Daniel's power and were demolished at his discretion. 9 (1) Meanwhile the Jews, who as we mentioned above had returned to their homeland by Cyrus' permission, undertook to restore the city and the temple; but being few and poor, they made little progress, until nearly in the hundredth year, while Artaxerxes was ruling as king over the Persians, they were deterred from building by those who were set over those regions; (2) for at that time Syria and all Judaea were governed under Persian rule through magistrates and prefects.
So their plan was to write to king Artaxerxes, saying that leave ought not to be given to the Jews to restore their city, lest, with their stubborn disposition, having recovered their strength—being a people once accustomed to rule over other nations—they should refuse to dwell under a foreign dominion. (3) Thus, the prefects' counsel being approved by the king, the building of the city was forbidden and deferred until the second year of king Darius. But in this stretch of time we shall insert which kings ruled over the Persians, so that the sequence of years woven into order may be more easily set forth. (4) After Darius the Mede, whom we have indicated reigned eighteen years, Cyrus held power for thirty-one years.
While making war on the Scythians he fell in battle, in the second year after Tarquinius Superbus had begun to reign at Rome. (5) Cambyses, his son, succeeded Cyrus; he reigned nine years. He, while pressing Egypt and Ethiopia with war and having subdued them, and returning victorious into Persia, wounded himself by chance, and from that blow he perished. (6) After his death two magi, brothers, Medes by nation, held the Persian kingdom for seven months. To kill these, seven of the noblest Persians conspired, whose chief was Darius, son of Hystaspes, born of a cousin of Cyrus; and by the consent of all the kingdom was conferred on him; he reigned thirty-six years.
(7) He, four years before he died, fought at Marathon, a battle most celebrated in Greek and Roman histories. This was waged about the two hundred and sixtieth year after the founding of Rome, in the consulship of Macerinus and Augurinus, and—if indeed the investigation of the Roman consuls has not deceived me—eight hundred and eighty-eight years ago; for I have directed the whole reckoning of time toward the consul Stilicho. (8) After Darius came Xerxes, and he is reported to have reigned twenty-one years; although in most copies I have found that his reign was twenty-five years. To him succeeded Artaxerxes, whom we mentioned above. (9) When he had ordered the building of the city of Judaea and of the temple to be checked, the work hung suspended until the second year of king Darius.
But that the order of times may be connected up to him: Artaxerxes reigned forty-one years, Xerxes two months. And after him Sogdianus held power for seven months. 10 (1) Then Darius, under whom the temple was restored, obtained the kingdom; his name at that time was Ochus. He, having three Hebrew youths of tested fidelity as his bodyguards, and one of them having turned the king's admiration upon himself by a proof of his prudence, was given the choice of asking whatever he had conceived in his mind; and groaning over the ruins of his homeland, he begged for the means to restore the city, and he obtained from the king that he should command the under-kings and prefects to hasten the building of the sacred house, the costs being supplied.
(2) Thus the temple was completed in four years, in the sixth year after Darius had begun to reign, and this seemed enough to the Jews; and because it was a task of great magnitude to restore the city, distrusting their strength they did not dare to begin so laborious a work, and confined themselves to the temple. (3) About the same time Ezra, the scribe of the law, nearly twenty years after the temple had been completed—Darius being now dead, who had held power for nineteen years—set out from Babylonia by permission of Artaxerxes the Second (not the one who was between the two Xerxes, but this one who had succeeded Darius Ochus); and many followed him and brought to Jerusalem vessels of various workmanship and gifts which the king had sent to the temple of God, together with twelve Levites; (4) for scarcely this number, it is reported, was found from that tribe.
When he had discovered that the Jews were mingled in marriages with Gentiles, he rebuked many and ordered them to renounce marriages of this kind and to cast out the sons begotten of them, and all obeyed his word. The people, being purified, conducted themselves according to the rite of the old law. (5) For the rest, I find that Ezra did nothing concerning the rebuilding of the city—I believe because he judged it a higher concern to reform the people corrupted in their morals. 11 (1) There was at that time in Babylonia Nehemiah, a royal servant, a Jew by birth, dearest to Artaxerxes by the merit of his services.
(2) He, having inquired of the Jews what was the state of their ancestral city, when he learned that his homeland lay in those same ruins, was disturbed in all his senses, and with groaning and many tears is reported to have prayed to God, recounting the sins of his nation and earnestly imploring divine mercy. (3) Therefore, when the king had noticed him sorrowful beyond his custom amid the banquet, he demanded that he set forth the cause of his griefs. Then he lamented the adversities of his nation and the ruin of his city, which now for nearly two hundred and fifty years had been laid level with the ground, offering a testimony of misfortunes and a spectacle to enemies; and he asked that the power be given him of going and restoring it.
(4) The king yielded to his pious prayers, and at once sent him off with an escort of cavalry, so that he might journey more safely, with letters given to the governors that they should supply what was necessary. When he had arrived at Jerusalem, he distributed the work of the city to the people man by man, and all eagerly attended to his orders. (5) And already they had advanced to the middle of the structures, when, inflamed with envy of the nations, the neighboring cities conspired to interrupt the works and to deter the Jews from building. But Nehemiah, having posted guards against the assailants, in no way terrified, carried out what he had begun; and when the wall was completed and the gate-leaves finished, he laid out the city by families for the building of houses within.
And he reckoned the people by no means equal to the city, for no more than about fifty thousand of mixed sex and rank were found; (6) so much had been consumed by frequent wars or held in captivity out of that once enormous number. For formerly these two tribes, of whom this was the remnant, when they were separated from the other ten tribes, had armed three hundred and twenty thousand men. Given over by God to slaughter and captivity for their sin, they had come down to this small number. (7) But this, as I said, was the people of two tribes; the ten, however, having earlier been led away, scattered among the Parthians, Medes, Indians, and Ethiopians, never returned to their native land, and to this day are held under the dominions of barbarian nations.
But the completed restoration of the city is reported in the thirty-second year of the reign of Artaxerxes. (8) From that time until the cross of Christ, that is, to the consuls Fufius Geminus and Rubellius, there are three hundred and ninety-eight years; and further, from the restoration of the temple to its overthrow—which was accomplished under Vespasian, consul and Augustus, by Titus Caesar—there are four hundred and eighty-three years. (9) This was foretold long ago by Daniel, who had declared that from the renewal of the temple to its overthrow there would be sixty-nine weeks. And from the day of the captivity of the Jews until the time of the restored city there were two hundred and sixty years. 12 (1) Within this stretch of time we judge that Esther and Judith lived;
but to which kings precisely I should attach their deeds, I cannot easily make out. For since Esther is referred to as living under a king Artaxerxes, and moreover I have found that there were two Persian kings of this name, there is much hesitation as to whose times this should be applied to. (2) Yet it has seemed to me to connect the history of Esther to this Artaxerxes under whom Jerusalem was restored, because it is not likely that, if she had lived under the earlier Artaxerxes, whose times Ezra has covered, he would have made no mention of so illustrious a woman—especially since it is established that the building of the temple was checked by that Artaxerxes, as we mentioned above; nor would Esther have allowed it, had she then been in marriage to him. (3) Now I shall relate what was done.
At that time the king had in marriage a certain Vashti, a woman of marvelous beauty. When he was proclaiming her beauty to all, on a certain day, while he was giving a public banquet, he ordered the queen to be present for the sake of displaying her beauty. (4) But she, being wiser than her foolish king and ashamed to offer the spectacle of her body to the eyes of men, refused his command. The barbarian's mind, stirred by this affront, drove the wife from the marriage and from the palace. (5) Therefore, when a girl was sought for the king's wedlock in her place, Esther was found to surpass the others in appearance. She was a Jewess of the tribe of Benjamin, bereaved of both parents, reared by Mordecai her cousin.
(6) When she was led to the royal nuptials, at the bidding of her guardian she concealed her lineage and her homeland, having been admonished that, even though as a captive she was entering into marriage with a foreigner, she should not be forgetful of her ancestral traditions nor partake of Gentile foods. (7) So, joined to the king, in a short time, as happens, by the force of her beauty she easily captured his whole heart, so much that he made her equal to his power and bestowed on her a distinguished royal garment of purple. 13 (1) At that time Mordecai was among those closest to the king, manager of his household affairs to the best of his ability. He had betrayed a plot laid against the king by two eunuchs, and from that he became dearer and was endowed with the highest honors. (2) At that time there was a certain Haman, very intimate with the king, whom he had ordered to be worshiped as equal to himself, after the manner of kings.
Mordecai, alone of all men disdaining to do this, had grievously kindled the hatred of the Persian against himself. (3) Therefore Haman, bending his mind to the destruction of the Hebrew, approached the king and asserted that there was in his kingdom a kind of men, hateful to God and to men by their depraved superstitions, living by foreign laws, deserving of destruction; that it was right to give over all of this nation to slaughter, and from their goods he promised immense wealth. (4) This was easily persuaded to the barbarian; an edict was issued that the Jews should be killed, and men were at once sent out to proclaim it throughout the whole kingdom from India to Ethiopia. When this was learned by Mordecai, with his garments rent he wrapped himself in sackcloth, and sprinkled with ashes he proceeded to the palace, and there with much wailing filled all places with his laments;
that it was an unworthy crime that an undeserving nation should perish, and that no cause for their perishing was given. (5) Esther, roused by the voice of one lamenting, learned the matter as it was. Then indeed she was doubtful of counsel, because there was no power of approaching the king—for after the manner of the Persians a queen is not permitted to enter to the king unless summoned, and not even then, when it has pleased the king, but is admitted at an appointed time—and it had by chance happened just then that for the last thirty days Esther was kept separated from the sight of the king. (6) Therefore, judging that something must be ventured for her fellow-citizens, even though certain destruction were at hand, prepared to fall in a noble enterprise, having first called upon God, she entered the king's court.