As always, here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:
4And
the Chaldeans said to the king [in] Aramaic, “O king, live to ages. Tell the
dream to your servants and we will declare the interpretation.” 5The
king answering said to the Chaldeans, “The word/thing from me is gone/assured.
If you do not make known the dream and its interpretation, you will be taken
[by] limbs and your houses will be made a dunghill. 6And if you
declare the dream and its interpretation, you will receive gifts and a present
and great honor from before me. Therefore, declare [to] me the dream and its
interpretation.” 7They answered again and saying, “O king, tell the
dream to your servants and we will declare its interpretation.” 8Answering
and saying the king, “From certain I knowing that the time you
buying because you see that assured/departed from me the word/thing. 9But
if the dream you will not make known to me, one [is] your law and lying and
corrupted words you have conspired together to say before me until the time be
changed. Therefore, the dream tell to me and I will know that its
interpretation you declare to me. 10The Chaldeans answered before
the king and saying, “There is not a man upon the earth who the matter of the
king is able to declare because every king, chief, and lord a matter like this
not has he asked to any of magician and astrologer and Chaldean. 11And
the matter which the king asking [is] difficult and other not there is who can
declare it before the king except gods whose dwelling, it is not with flesh.” 12Therefore
was the king angry and very enraged. He was saying to destroy to the all of the
wise men of Babel. 13And the law proceeded and the wise men [were]
being killed and they sought Daniel and his friends to be killed.
There is so much that could be noted in these verses.
However, what strikes me most is what a common but sad picture it is -- people living
in a world without God.
Here is Nebuchadnezzar, trying to be a king over a vast
empire. He has this dream and knows it needs to be interpreted, but he cannot
do that himself, so he calls for the people he thinks should be able to help
him – but they can’t. Then there are the wise men. Like Daniel, they’ve been
through extensive training and now depend on their “skills” to provide
themselves and their families a living. Suddenly the king is demanding of them
things they cannot do and threatening to murder them if they do not.
Right in the middle of it all, the wise men lament, “No one
can reveal it to the king except the gods, and they do not live among men.”
Therein is the problem with it all. The true and living God does
“live among men!” “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld
His glory …” (John 1:14). Jesus Himself is the very embodiment of God’s
personal presence among us. He is our “very present help in trouble” (Ps 46:1).
But not to know Him, not to know He is present, leaves us humans cast upon an
ocean too wide and mountains too high.
Now, it is true that to some extent we can “make things
work.” People all over the world do it all day every day. But we also face too
many situations where we simply do not have the power to do what we want to do
or get what we want to get or achieve whatever is expected of us. And that is
when things get ugly. Nebuchadnezzar is a very powerful king. But he can’t
interpret his own dream. So how does he respond when the guys can’t help him?
He flies into a violent murderous rage. He has come to the end of himself and
finds himself powerless to get what he wants. So he makes unreasonable demands
on the people around him, only to find they can’t do what he wants either.
I would suggest he isn’t so different from the rest of us.
Yes, he is a raging, cruel, and totally unreasonable tyrant, and it seems
almost unbelievable he could actually murder an entire people-group because
they can’t meet his unreasonable demands. But I fear most of us are only
restrained from such cruelty by the fact we don’t possess his power. I have to
sadly admit if I had the power to “right click delete,” there are a lot of
people who might not live very long. But I don’t. So what do I do when I come
to the end of myself? What do I do when the doctor can’t cure my problem? When
the mechanic can’t fix my car? When the IT guy can’t fix my computer? When I’m
looking for solace and my spouse doesn’t seem to “be there” for me? When I need
a raise and the company won’t give me one? When the lawn mower won’t start?
What do I do?
And think about the wise men. If they had the power to know
the king’s dream, they would certainly do it. But they don’t. They too have
come to the end of themselves. And what does it mean? That they are about to be
murdered. One item of exegetical interest is the statement in v13, “So the
decree was issued to put the wise men to death.” I translated it, “And the law
proceeded and the wise men [were] being killed.” There is room for debate whether
we should understand the words to imply the decree was simply issued “to put
the wise men to death” (leaving the possibility no one had yet died when Daniel
steps in) or whether “the wise men were being killed” (that Daniel actually
stayed the executions which were already in progress). The Aramaic will allow
either understanding, but I would suggest the most natural translation is that,
in fact, “they were being killed.” In support of that, the Septuagint
translated it with a Greek imperfect, which also would be most naturally
translated, “they were being killed.” I would suggest too that in light of the
violent rage Nebuchadnezzar was in, the executioners would jump on the task,
fearing they themselves might incur his murderous wrath. Probably the group of
men standing before the king were executed immediately – perhaps right in front
of Nebuchadnezzar’s eyes – then the executioners headed out to round up and
murder the others.
So, when these wise men come to the end of themselves, it is
not just an unfortunate inconvenience. It’s the end of their lives! Is that not
often how we feel? To come to the end of myself isn’t just unfortunate. There’s
always something at stake, something I want or need very badly (at least in my
own mind). But I can’t get it. I can’t make it happen. In this case, one could
suggest the wise men got themselves into this – claiming to be able to discern
the will of the gods, to foretell the future – and building an entire
occupation on this deception. But we often “get ourselves” into a lot of
trouble too. What matters at that point is that we have, in fact, come to the
end of ourselves.
But what does all of this prove? What does it mean when we
“come to the end of ourselves?” It tells us we
need God. We need a power that rises above our problem, that rises above
the people who can’t (or don’t care to) help us, that rises above people who
have the power to hurt us. We need God and we need Him to be a God who does in
fact “dwell among men.”
Nebuchadnezzar and his wise men have come to the end of
themselves but they don’t know the God who “dwells among men.”
In this case, sadly, they turn on each other. It is
interesting to note how in verse 8, the king says, “From certain I knowing that the time you buying …” The
reason why I underline the “I” and “you” is because, in Aramaic (as in Hebrew
and Greek), they don’t normally actually state the pronouns. The “I” and “you”
are usually part of the verb – unless they want to emphasize them. In the
Aramaic they are in fact stated. The conversation has clearly turned
adversarial at this point and even the original language tells us it has come
down to “me against you.” Both sides have come to the end of themselves and
what do they do? Turn on each other.
But stop for a minute and think it is actually good to come to the end of yourself(!).
If I get to that point and, like these guys, turn to lies and murder, that’s
bad – but, if at that point, I do in fact turn to this God who dwells among
men, then the end accomplished is the best
of all. Rather than turning on each other, we need to turn to God. Without
a doubt, I can say that’s what brought me to the Lord to begin with – as a
young man, I thought I had it all figured out, that I knew what I wanted and
needed, but the longer I lived the more I realized it wasn’t working. I was
headed for some kind of desperate conclusion when one day the Lord turned on
the lights and I knew it was Him I needed. Jesus stepped into my life to be my
God who “dwells among men.” And since then it has been a daily experience of
constantly coming to the end of myself and turning to Him. At present I can
actually say I am learning to embrace this reality all day every day – that I exist “at the end of myself,” that all
day every day I need Him to do what I cannot. Everything I need to do,
everything I need to accomplish, everything I need to be, is somehow beyond me.
There is much I can do, but I already
know it isn’t enough – and that’s actually
how it is supposed to be. I need God.
To exist as a human being is actually to live my life doing all I can do, while
depending on God to do what I cannot. That is life. We live it “at the end of ourselves.”
Here’s a quote from the Southern Pulpit that expresses this
same thought:
“What a striking picture is here
presented us of Nebuchadnezzar and his wise men trying, by human devices, to
arrive at the mind of God! How we yearn for man when we behold his boundless
aspirations confronted by his impotent nothingness! But it was well that human
skill should first exhaust its resources in endeavouring to know the mind of
God. It was a proper prelude to God’s revelation, this confession of impotence:
‘There is none other that can show it before the king, except the gods, whose
dwelling is not with flesh.’ It is a law of God’s providence that He will not
intervene until man has discovered his own absolute inability, and felt his
imperative need.”
Nebuchadnezzar and his wise men have come to the end of themselves.
And so they turn on each other. They should have turned to the true and living God,
but they don’t know Him. But Daniel does. Fortunately for them, it is also not
true that “There is not a man upon the
earth who the matter of the king is able to declare …” Yes, there is a man.
But not because the man is able, but because he knows the God who is able,
because he knows how, when he comes to the end of himself, to turn to the God
who can do what he cannot.
May we all embrace the fact that our very existence is “at
the end of ourselves,” that we need God all
day every day. And rather than turning on each other, may we turn to Him. “Seeing
we have such a High Priest, Jesus, … let us come boldly unto the Throne of
Grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb 4:14-16).
I can’t resist closing with the words of the old hymn:
I need Thee every hour,
Most gracious Lord;
No tender voice like Thine
Can peace afford.
I need Thee, oh, I need Thee;
Every hour I need Thee;
Oh, bless me now, my Savior!
I come to Thee.
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