Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Daniel 6:18

instruments of musick The meaning of the word thus rendered is unknown. The root in Aram. and Heb. means to thrust, overthrow(Psalms 36:12; Psalms 118:13). In Arab. it means further to spread, spread out, and is also used specially in the sense compressit feminam. The ancient translators and commentators conjectured a meaning suited to the context. Theod. (ἐδέσματα), Pesh., Jerome (cibi), render food; Rashi (12 cent.), a table(cf. A.V. marg.); Ibn Ezra, stringed instruments(supposing, improbably, to thrustto be used in the sense of to strike); Saad. (10 cent.), dancing-girls; many moderns (from the Arab. meaning of the root, mentioned above), concubines. But it is very doubtful whether it is legitimate to explain an Aram. word from a sense peculiar to Arabic, and there, moreover, only secondary and derived. By assuming a very small corruption in the text (דחון for לחנן), we should, however, obtain the ordinary Aram. word for concubines(Daniel 5:2-3; Daniel 5:23): so Marti, Prince. But whatever the true meaning, or reading, of the word may be, the general sense of the verse remains the same: the king did not indulge in his usual diversions.

fled (R.V.) from him lit. fled upon him: in accordance with the idiom explained on Daniel 2:1. For -fled" cf. Genesis 31:40; Esther 6:1.

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Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Daniel 6:18

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