Why is Daniel referred to as Daniel, even by King Nebuchadnezzar and not as Beltashazzar? Why are Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego not referred to as their jewish names? (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah) Is it because Daniel is special and the other three could have been any three believers who chose not to worship the golden idol? I feel like I may be missing something important.
Book Of Daniel
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QUOTE (For Life @ Feb 20 2009, 07:37 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=69520
Why is Daniel referred to as Daniel, even by King Nebuchadnezzar and not as Beltashazzar? Why are Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego not referred to as their jewish names? (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah) Is it because Daniel is special and the other three could have been any three believers who chose not to worship the golden idol? I feel like I may be missing something important.
Yes Daniel is special, but that probably isn't the reason he is called Daniel. It is probably something to do with the translation as the Bible has been translated so many times.
Why is Daniel referred to as Daniel, even by King Nebuchadnezzar and not as Beltashazzar? Why are Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego not referred to as their jewish names? (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah) Is it because Daniel is special and the other three could have been any three believers who chose not to worship the golden idol? I feel like I may be missing something important.
Yes Daniel is special, but that probably isn't the reason he is called Daniel. It is probably something to do with the translation as the Bible has been translated so many times.
Basically, all of the above contain theophoric elements. For example, Daniel roughly means "Judged by God" or "God is my Judge" which contains a name for God, which is El. Belteshazzar uses the theophoric element bel, for the god that bares the same name, likewise for the other names. The one true God is removed from all of them, as compared with their original names which all contained either -el or -yah sounds for YHVH. So yes, Daniel did not bow to the golden idol and I think he retains his name because he is an instrument of God that never loses sight of the goal.
Hananiah - Yahweh is graciousMishael - Who is what God isAzariah - Whom Jehovah helpsWhile looking up these names I saw an article that said Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego were probably Chaldean names. I was under the impression from reading Ezekiel that the Chaldeans and Babylonians were from different countries. Were the Chaldeans part of Babylon? If not then I don't see why King Nebuchadnezzar would give them Chaldean names.
Chaldeans and Babylonians are for the most part one in the same. I suppose the best analogy I could put on it is that the Chaldeans were a part of Babylon in a sense like southerners and northerners make up the United States of America. In this case you'd have Chaldeans as one of the groups (really perhaps the primary) that made up the Babylonians.
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