Daniel 5:16

Dan 5:16 And I have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and dissolve doubts: now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to me the interpretation thereof, thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and [have] a chain of gold about thy neck, and shalt be the third ruler in the kingdom.

Ver. 16. And I have heard of thee.] As far off as he maketh it, Belshazzar could not be so ignorant of Daniel, as he would seem to be, since he understood punctually the dreams, honours, and troubles of his grandfather. {Dan 5:22} But this he took for a piece of his silly glory, to make it very strange, as if he had never heard of Daniel till now.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Dan_5:16

And dissolve doubts.

The Dissolving of Doubts

Doubts and questions are not peculiar to Nebuchadnezzar, but they are the common lot and heritage of humanity. We live just now in a specially doubting age. Science puts everything in question, and literature distils the questions, making an atmosphere of them. The cultivated and mature have their doubts ingrown they know not how, and the younger minds encounter their public visitations when they do not seek them. Note that the three principles sources and causes whence our doubts arise, and from which they get force to make their assault

1. All the truths of religion are inherently dubitable. They are only what are called probable, never necessary truths like the truths of geometry or of numbers. This field of probable truth is the whole field of religion, and of course it is competent for doubt to cover it in every part and item.

2. We begin life as unknowing creatures that have everything to learn. We grope, the groping is doubt; we handle, we question, we guess, we experiment, beginning in darkness and stumbling on towards intelligence.

3. It is a fact, disguise it as we can, or deny it as we may, that our faculty is itself in disorder. A broken or bent telescope will not see anything rightly. A filthy window will not bring in even the day as it is. As long as these three sources, or originating causes of doubt continue, doubts will continue, and will, in one form or another, be multiplied. I do not propose, therefore, to show how they may be stopped, for that is impossible, but only how they may be dissolved, or cleared away. The first thing to be said is negative, viz., that the doubters never can dissolve or extirpate their doubts by inquiry, search, investigation, or any kind of speculative endeavour. They must never go after the truth to merely find it, but to practice it and live by it. To be simply curious is only a way to multiply doubts; for in doing it their are, in fact, postponing all the practical rights of truth. They imagine, it may be, that they are going first to settle their questions, and then at their leisure to act. As if they were going to get the perfect system and complete knowledge of truth before they move an inch in doing what they know! And they come out wondering at the discovery, that the more they investigate the less they believe! Their very endeavour mocks them--just as it really ought. For truth is something to be lived. How shall a mind get on finding more truth, save as it takes direction from what it gets? There is no fit search after truth which does not, first of all, begin to live the truth it knows. To come to positive matter. There is a way for dissolving any and all doubts--a way that opens at a very small gate, but widens wonderfully after you pass. Every human soul, at a certain first point of its religious outfit, has a key given to it which is to be the open sesame of all right discovery. Every man acknowledges the distinction of right and wrong, feels the reality of that distinction, knows it by immediate consciousness even as he knows himself. He would not be a man without that distinction. It is even this which distinguishes him from the mere animals. Here is the key that opens everything. The only reason why we fall into so many doubts, and get unsettled in our inquiries, instead of being settled by them, as we undertake to be, is that we do not begin at the beginning. A right mind has a right polarity, and discovers right things by feeling after them. The true way, then, of dissolving doubts, is to begin at the beginning, and do the first thing first. Say nothing of investigation till you have made sure of being grounded everlastingly, and with a completely whole intent in the principle of right doing as a principle. Unreligious men are right only so far as they can be, they may not be at all right in principle. Lessons:

1. Be never afraid of doubt.

2. Be afraid of all sophistries, and tricks, and strifes.

3. Getting into a scornful way is fatal.

4. Never put force on the mind to make it believe.

5. Never be in a hurry to believe. (Horace Bushnell, D. D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Verse 16. Dissolve doubts] Untie knots - unbind what is bound. An expression used in the east to signify a judge of eminent wisdom and skill.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

16. make] better give (R.V.); lit. interpret.

dissolve doubts] loose knots. See on Dan_5:12.

thou shalt be clothed with purple, &c.] As Dan_5:7.

and rule as one of three in the kingdom] See on Dan_5:7.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And I have heard of thee,.... That is, by the queen, which he repeats for the sake of observing what she had said of him, and which gave him encouragement to send for him:

that thou canst make interpretations; of dreams, and of things hard to be understood:

and dissolve doubts; untie knots, solve difficulties, and answer hard and intricate questions:

now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to me the interpretation thereof; that which is upon the wall before thee, and which the wise men of Babylon could not:

thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain of gold about thy neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom; the same reward he had proposed to the astrologers and soothsayers, Dan 5:7 but what was no temptation or motive to Daniel, as appears by what follows:

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

And I have heard of thee ... - Dan 5:11.

Canst make interpretations - Margin, “interpret.” Chaldee, “interpret interpretations.” The meaning is, that he was skilled in interpreting or explaining dreams, omens, etc.

And dissolve doubts - See the notes at Dan 5:12.

Now, if thou canst read the writing ... thou shalt be clothed with scarlet ... - This was the reward which at the first he had promised to any one that was able to do it, and as all others had failed, he was willing that it should be offered to a Jew.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Difficult. Literally, "things which are tied," or perplexing. (Haydock) --- The Persians still used the like expressions, to imply an intelligent governor. (Chardin.)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

These things were spoken to before, Dan 5:7,8.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The dissolving of doubt.

have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and dissolve doubts," etc. A most important subject (not growing exegetically out of the passage, nevertheless) is suggested by the text, which is admirably treated by Horace Bushnell, in "Sermons on Living Subjects." For the sake of any who may not have access to the book, we give a brief outline, for the most part in Bushnell"s words.

I THE PREVALENCE OF DOUBT. The prevalence of doubt is exhibited and illustrated at considerable length. "Science puts everything in question, and literature distils the questions, making an atmosphere of them.

II CAUSES OF DOUBT. "They never come of truth or high discovery, but always of the want of it.

1. All the truths of religion are inherently dub/table. They are the subjects of moral evidence, not of absolute demonstration.

2. We begin life as unknowing creatures that have everything to learn.

3. Our faculty is itself disorder; e.g. a bent telescope; a filthy window.

III THE DISSOLUTION OF DOUBT.

1. Counsel negative. Not "by inquiry, search, investigation, or any kind of speculative endeavour. Men must never go after the truth to merely find it, but to practise it and live by it.

2. Counsel positive. Bushnell asserts and illustrates at length that man has universally the absolute idea of right and its correlative wrong; and then enforces, with power and manifoldness of illumination, this: "Say nothing of investigation till you have made sure of being grounded everlastingly, and" with a completely whole intent, in the principle of right doing as a principle. " (No condensation can give any idea of the grasp and fatness with which this is exhibited and applied.)

IV THE RESULT. A soul thus won to its integrity of thought and meaning will rapidly clear all tormenting questions and difficulties. They are not all gone, but they are going. " "The ship is launched; he is gone to sea, and has the needle on board.

V SUPPLEMENTARY DIRECTION.

1. Be never afraid of doubt.

2. Be afraid of all sophistries and tricks and strifes of disingenuousargument.

3. Getting into any scornful way is fatal.

4. Never settle upon any thing as true, because it is safer to hold it than not.

5. Have it as a law never to put force on the mind or try to make it believe.

It spoils the mind"s integrity.

6. Never be in a hurry to believe; never try to conquer doubts against time. "One of the greatest talents in religious discovery is the finding how to hang up questions and let them hang without being at all anxious about them What seemed perfectly insoluble will clear itself in a wondrous revelation." And here is a thought: "It will not hurt you, nor hurt the truth, if you should have some few questions left to be carried on with you when you go hence, for in that more luminous state, most likely they will soon be cleared, only a thousand others will be springing up even there, and you will go on dissolving still your new sets of questions, and growing mightier and more deep-seeing for eternal ages. R.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Now if you can [as translated,] Now if you can.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.