Re: CHAT: pacifism

Staving Muke Tever:
>On Sat, 20 Dec 2003 19:42:01 +0000, Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> wrote:
>>>     [Aramic,
>>
>>Is it?  Then it's a bit that, according to the story, none of the king's
>>sages could read it. I mean, Aramaic wasn't exactly an unknown language!
>
>Well, it was not only the meaning of the phrase, but its interpretation
>that were opaque to the king's advisors.
>
>I mean, a hand appeared from nowhere and written on the wall; the king
>wants to know what it means; and those that could read Aramaic (or
>whatever it may have happened to be written in) probably are not going to
>volunteer that it looks like a set of weights, with no further
>information--mysterious hands are presumably to be expected to divulge
>more pithy information, so they might have considered it to be a text with
>a double meaning, the more meaningful meaning in a language unknown.
>
>Of course this is not the first time anyway in the book of Daniel that
>meaning is hidden from those searching for it, so...
>
As I remember, the interpretation was, "The Lord has numbered the number of
your days and brought them to an end. You have been weighed in the balance
and found wanting. Your kingdom will be divided between the Medes and the
Persians." Note the resemblance of "Persians" to "uparshin".

Pete