The traditional response is during the sixth century BC when Daniel himself said it was written. He writes in the present tense that he lived during the Babylonian and Persian empires, during the reigns of such historical figures as King Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus the Great. Why is there a question about when Daniel was written? That’s what we’ll go over in detail in this article.
Note: The largest source for this article is “Daniel: Prophet to the Nations,” by John Oakes. I highly recommend this book. While there are only a few direct references, many paragraphs could have a general references.
In summary though, many theologians (probably the majority nowadays) believe Daniel was actually written by someone well removed from Daniel or his contemporaries four hundred years later in the second century BC. Search the internet for “book of Daniel written”, and the top hits all say the second century BC. It’s not until further down that one finds hits which discuss the second versus sixth century BC, akin to this article.
Evidence for Second Century authorship
1. Two kings don’t match history which would be unlikely mistakes if the book were written in the 6th century during the time of these kings–but would be more understandable were it written 400 years after the fact.
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- The rule of Cyrus is placed after Darius in the order of kings, which is a clear inconsistency.
- Belshazzar, is not even on the accepted historical list of kings.
2. There’s no evidence of severe religious persecution of the exiled Jews in Babylon, whereas there was such persecution in the second century BC under the Seleucid Empire. Therefore, the idea is that a the second-century author modified a real sixth-century account of Daniel, but rewrote history in an apocalyptic, prophetic style to incorporate second century BC details into the prophecies.
3. Book of Daniel was never grouped with the Hebrew Nevi’im (the Prophets) but has always belonged to the Ketuvim (the writings) in the Hebrew Bible. The idea is that if the Hebrews saw Daniel as a major prophet, they would have put the book with the other major prophets.
4. The Apocalyptic style of writing was not developed until the second century BC.
5. The apocalyptic style of writing allows the author a lot of freedom, like intertwining history and pseudo-prophecy into one narrative.
Rebuttal of 2nd century authorship
1. The king line of Babylon to the Medo-Persian Empire is not as clear-cut as one might think.
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- Daniel refers to Darius as “Darius the Mede”, not as Darius I. This is because he is a different person from Darius I. Darius I came after Cyrus, was a Persian, and his father was Hystaspes. Darius the Mede, on the other hand, was a Mede (obviously), came before Cyrus, and his father was a man named Xerxes (Dan 9:1). There are several possibilities as to who Darius was. He may have been Gubaru, the general of Cyrus, who defeated Babylon on October 12, 539 BC, and then would have ruled it until Cyrus took leadership in 530 BC. He may also have been Astyages, the king of Media. Whoever he was, one can see listing the leaders in a distant age isn’t as simple as looking up a list of kings Google; rather, the list of kings and rulers in Daniel is evidence the writer had intimate knowledge of the times.
- Like Darius the Mede, Belshazzar (Dan 5) is not on the standard kings list either. However, a recent discovery on the Ziggurat of Ur says that Belshazzar was a co-regent under Nabonidus, who had stolen the kingship from Nebuchadnezzar’s son Evil-merodach. It seems Nabonidus was into the occult and became disinterested in leading Babylon. Therefore he appointed Belshazzar, Nebuchadnezzar’s grandson, and he did the actual the ruling. [1]
2. Who defines “severe persecution”? Remember Nebuchadnezzar was ready to kill all of his seers and their families in Dan 2 just for not being able to do the impossible: interpret a dream hadn’t told them. Daniel does not describe systemic persecution against the Jews because they were Jews—more so general harshness and tyrannical tribalism of the time.
3. It is true that Daniel is grouped with Ketuvim (Hagiographa in Greek), which contains other books like Psalms, Proverbs, and Job. The idea is that since it’s not grouped with the prophetic books (Nevi’im in Hebrew) like Isaiah and Jeremiah, the Jews understood it to be be a story and not real prophecy. There are several reasons why this is a weak argument: 1) In early Greek manuscripts, Daniel was grouped with the prophets, but so was the historical books Chronicles 1 and 2; therefore, the grouping is somewhat arbitrary [2]. 2) Psalms contains some of the most poignant prophecies about the Messiah, yet has never been grouped with prophetic books. 3) Daniel does differ from the other major and minor prophets in his prophecies are not judgments against Israel and he did not prophecy from Israel. This could have affected its categorization [3].
4. It is difficult to know when the Apocalyptic style was developed. One thing is certain: it did not happen in a day or even a generation. Another thing to remember is that the modern definition of apocalypse, “the destruction of civilization at the end of days”, is not the same as apocalyptic style. Although the style is often associated with the end of an era and destruction, the Greek word from which it is transliterated means, “a revelation or to unveil”. Therefore the apocalyptic style is more about prophecy. The books of Joel, Zechariah and several sections of Isaiah are written in the style. These books were written in the seventh through fifth centuries BC [4]; therefore, Daniel’s mature apocalyptic form should not exclude it from sixth century authorship.
5. The Apocalyptic style does give the author a lot of freedom to tell his story by way of drama, symbols, and vivid imagery; but does that give the author of Daniel (were it not Daniel himself) the freedom to pretend to be someone else from past claiming known history to be revelations from God? To be clear, what theologians are claiming is that a second-century author with knowledge of the prior four hundred years wrote as if he were Daniel in the sixth century—writing history as if it were prophecy. There’s no doubt of its prophetic intent as it uses phrases such as: “will take place in the future”, “for it concerns the distant future”, and “to seal up vision and prophecy”. Most theologians will say that Daniel was a real historical figure, and perhaps that a pre-Daniel book existed; but then some unnamed second century author took the story and adapted it to the persecution and suffering of the second century Jews under Antiochus (an-tai-uh-kuhs) IV. This stretches Biblical authenticity too far, and given the counter arguments, is unneeded.
Evidence for 6th century authorship
As mentioned earlier, that fact that the author included obscure elements like little-known leaders lends credence to sixth century authorship. However, in my opinion, it’s not the reasons listed and rebutted above; instead, theologians doubt the date of authorship because of the accuracy of the prophecies and the implications thereof [5].
While there are many interpretations of the later prophecies of Daniel (who lived from around 620 BC to 538 BC), there is decent consensus on the first four hundred years (539 BC to 146 BC). This is why I believe many argue for second century authorship: the accuracy of the prophecies between the sixth and second centuries is uncanny. They correctly predicted the fall of Babylonian empire (539 BC), the rise and fall of the Medo-Persian empire (539 BC to 334 BC), and rise and fall the Greek empire (334 BC to 146 BC).
What are the implications of sixth century authorship? Simply put, it gives credence and authority to the whole of Scripture. Daniel himself clearly and humbly gives all of the credit to God, the source and ultimate author of the Bible.
Why wouldn’t theologians want this? Mostly it’s the progressive, intellectual (and ironically often atheistic) theologians who are the activists behind the date of the authorship. I believe for many other theologians, they simply follow along, and together they become the consensus. Of course this is just my opinion, but the idea of second-century authorship seems purposely forced and artificial, relying on more presumptions than the original sixth century authorship.
What do the second-century-authorship theologians think about the post-second century prophecies? Some think the stories were fulfilled in the lifetime of the second-century author, in which case they would refer to the Maccabean wars, and, therefore, would not be prophetic at all. Others think they could still be real prophecies of the coming Messiah. The main thing is once you’re open to the idea that a second century author can pose as a sixth century prophet, “the skies the limit.”
Jesus weighs in on the issue
In Mat 24:15–17, Jesus references Daniel’s prophecy about the “abomination that causes desolation, spoken of through the prophet Daniel”, which can be found in Dan 9:27, 11:31, and 12:11. For myself, this ends the debate.
First of all, Jesus explicitly uses the words, “spoken of through the prophet Daniel”. Jesus says Daniel is a prophet, and the book the Jews had for Daniel was the same book we have today. There’s no evidence the first-century Jews had some other book from the sixth-century historical Daniel which is lost to us today, leaving only a rewritten account from the second century. Therefore Jesus is referring to and quoting from the book of Daniel that is in our modern Bible.
Secondly, Jesus says, “when you see…” This means Daniel’s prediction of the desolation of the Temple has not yet occurred. This is very significance because the Temple had been severely desecrated by Antiochus IV in 168 BC, cooking pork on the alter and turning it into a brothel, and this could very well have been what Daniel’s prophecy/historic account (depending on the date of authorship one accepts) was referring to. Since Jesus confirms it is not the 168 BC event and that the event still had not occurred at around 30 AD, this leaves only one other possibility: the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD by Rome.
These two facts mean Daniel’s prophecies extended over two centuries past the second century. And, at least in my opinion, it makes no sense that a bona fide prophet of God writing in the second century BC would write the history of the four hundred years prior to his authoring as if it were prophecy, and then write true prophecies for the next two hundred years.
[1] http://www.ibiblio.org/freebiblecommentary/pdf/EN/kings_events.pdf
[2] Daniel Prophet to the Nations, Chapter 5, Oakes
[3]Daniel Prophet to the Nations, Chapter 2, Oakes
[4] Charles, Robert Henry (1911). “Apocalyptic Literature“
[5] Daniel Prophet to the Nations, Chapter 1, Oakes