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information regarding the destruction of Babylon is very scanty and self-contradictory. Yet these difficulties are by no means so inexplicable or so great as to make the authorship of the book of Daniel a matter of doubt. For instance, that is a very insignificant matter in which Bleek finds a “specially great difficulty,” viz., that in Daniel 5: “so many things should have occurred in one night, which it can scarcely be believed could have happened so immediately after one another in so short a time.” For if one only lays aside the statements which Bleek imports into the narrative, - (1) that the feast began in the evening, or at night, while it began really in the afternoon and might be prolonged into the night; (2) that the clothing of Daniel with purple and putting a chain about his neck, and the proclamation of his elevation to the rank of third ruler in the kingdom, were consummated by a solemn procession moving through the streets of the city; (3) that Daniel was still the chief president over the magi; and (4) that after the appearance of the handwriting lengthened consultations took place, - if one gives up all these suppositions, and considers what things may take place at a sudden disastrous occurrence, as, for example, on the breaking out of a fire, in a very few hours, it will not appear incredible that all the things recited in this chapter occurred in one night, and were followed even by the death of the king before the dawn of the morning. The historical difficulty lies merely in this, that, as Staehelin (p. 35) states the matter, Belshazzar appears as the last king of Babylon, and his mother as the wife of Nebuchadnezzar, which is contrary to historical fact. This is so far true, that the queen-mother, as also Daniel, repeatedly calls Nebuchadnezzar the father (אב) of Belshazzar; but that Belshazzar was the last king of Babylon is not at all stated in the narrative, but is only concluded from this circumstance, that the writing on the wall announced the destruction of king Belshazzar and of his kingdom, and that, as the fulfilling of this announcement, the death of Belshazzar (Dan 5:30) occurred that same night, and (Dan 6:1) also the transferring of the kingdom of the Chaldeans to the Median Darius. But that the destruction of the Chaldean kingdom or its transference to the Medes occurred at the same time with the death of Belshazzar, is not said in the text. The connecting of the second factum with the first by the copula  ו(Dan 6:1) indicates nothing further than that both of these parts of the prophecy were fulfilled. The first (Dan 5:3) was fulfilled that same night, but the time of the other is not given, since Dan 6:1 (Dan 5:31)