The Bible, Douay-Rheims Part 574

Michael your prince... The guardian general of the church of G.o.d.

Daniel Chapter 11

The angel declares to Daniel many things to come, with regard to the Persian and Grecian kings: more especially with regard to Antiochus as a figure of Antichrist.

11:1. And from the first year of Darius, the Mede, I stood up, that he might be strengthened, and confirmed.

11:2. And now I will shew thee the truth. Behold, there shall stand yet three kings in Persia, and the fourth shall be enriched exceedingly above them all: and when he shall be grown mighty by his riches, he shall stir up all against the kingdom of Greece.

Three kings... Viz., Cambyses, Smerdes Magus, and Darius, the son of Hystaspes.-Ibid. The fourth... Xerxes.

11:3. But there shall rise up a strong king, and shall rule with great power: and he shall do what he pleaseth.

A strong king... Alexander.

11:4. And when he shall come to his height, his kingdom shall be broken, and it shall be divided towards the four winds of the heaven: but not to his posterity, nor according to his pwoer with wheich he ruled. For his kingdom shall be rent in pieces, even for strangers, besides these.

11:5. And the king of the south shall be strengthened, and one of his princes shall prevail over him, and he shall rule with great power: for his dominions shall be great.

The king of the south... Ptolemeus the son of Lagus, king of Egypt, which lies south of Jerusalem.-Ibid. One of his princes... that is, one of Alexander's princes, shall prevail over him: that is, shall be stronger than the king of Egypt. He speaks of Seleucus Nicator, king of Asia and Syria, whose successors are here called the kings of the north, because their dominions lay to the north in respect to Jerusalem.

11:6. And after the end of years they shall be in league together: and the daughter of the king of the south shall come to the king of the north to make friendship, but she shall not obtain the strength of the arm, neither shall her seed stand: and she shall be given up, and her young men that brought her, and they that strengthened her in these times.

The daughter of the king of the south... Viz., Berenice, daughter of Ptolemeus Philadelphus, given in marriage to Antiochus Theos, grandson of Seleucus.

11:7. And a plant of the bud of her roots shall stand up: and he shall come with an army, and shall enter into the province of the king of the north: and he shall abuse them, and shall prevail.

A plant, etc... Ptolemeus Evergetes, the son of Philadelphus.

11:8. And he shall also carry away captive into Egypt their G.o.ds, and their graven things, and their precious vessels of gold and silver: he shall prevail aginst the king of the north.

The king of the north... Seleucus Callinicus.

11:9. And the king of the south shall enter into the kingdom, and shall return to his own land.

11:10. And his sons shall be provoked, and they shall a.s.semble a mult.i.tude of great forces: and he shall come with haste like a flood: and he shall return, and be stirred up, and he shall join battle with his force.

His sons... Seleucus Ceraunius, and Antiochus the Great, the sons of Callinicus.-Ibid. He shall come... Viz., Antiochus the Great.

11:11. And the king of the south being provoked, shall go forth, and shall fight against the king of the north, and shall prepare an exceeding great mult.i.tude, and a mult.i.tude shall be given into his hands.

The king of the south... Ptolemeus Philopator, son of Evergetes.

11:12. And he shall take a mult.i.tude, and his heart shall be lifted up, and he shall cast down many thousands: but he shall not prevail.

11:13. For the king of the north shall return, and shall prepare a mult.i.tude much greater than before: and in the end of times, and years, he shall come in haste with a great army, and much riches.

11:14. And in those times many shall rise up against the king of the south, and the children of prevaricators of thy people shall lift up themselves to fulfil the vision, and they shall fall.

11:15. And the king of the north shall come, and shall cast up a mount, and shall take the best fenced cit.i.ts: and the arms of the south shall not withstand, and his chosen ones shall rise up to resist, and they shall not have strength.

11:16. And he shall come upon him, and do according to his pleasure, and there shall be none to stand against his face: and he shall stand in the glorious land, and it shall be consumed by his hand.

He shall come upon him... Viz., Antiochus shall come upon the king of the south.-Ibid. The glorious land... Judea.

11:17. And he shall set his face to come to possess all his kingdom, and he shall make upright conditions with him: and he shall give him a daughter of women, to overthrow it: and she shall not stand, neither shall she be for him.

All his kingdom... Viz., all the kingdom of Ptolemeus Epiphanes, son of Philopator.-Ibid. A daughter of women... That is, a most beautiful woman, viz., his daughter Cleopatra.-Ibid. To overthrow it... Viz., the kingdom of Epiphanes: but his policy shall not succeed; for Cleopatra shall take more to heart the interest of her husband, than that of her father.

11:18. And he shall turn his face to the islands, and shall take many: and he shall cause the prince of his reproach to cease, and his reproach shall be turned upon him.

The prince of his reproach... Seipio the Roman general, called the prince of his reproach, because he overthrew Antiochus, and obliged him to submit to very dishonourable terms, before he would cease from the war.

11:19. And he shall turn his face to the empire of his own land, and he shall stumble, and fall, ans shall not be found.

11:20. And there shall stand up in his place one most vile, and unworthy of kingly honour: and in a few days he shall be destroyed, not in rage nor in battle.

One most vile... Seleucus Philopator, who sent Heliodorus to plunder the temple: and was shortly after slain by the same Heliodorus.

11:21. And there shall stand up in his place one despised, and the kingly honour shall not be given him: and he shall come privately, and shall obtain the kingdom by fraud.

One despised... Viz., Antiochus Epiphanes, who at first was despised and not received for king. What is here said of this prince, is accommodated by St. Jerome and others to Antichrist; of whom this Antiochus was a figure.

11:22. And the arms of the fighter shall be overcome before his face, and shall be broken: yea, also the prince of the covenant.

Of the fighter... That is, of them that shall oppose him, and shall fight against him.-Ibid. The prince of the covenant... or, of the league. The chief of them that conspired against him: or the king of Egypt his most powerful adversary.

11:23. And after friendships, he will deal deceitfully with him: and he shall go up, and shall overcome with a small people.

11:24. And he shall enter into rich and plentiful cities: and he shall do that which his fathers never did, nor his fathers' fathers: he shall scatter their spoils, and their prey, and their riches, and shall forecast devices against the best fenced places: and this until a time.

11:25. And his strength, and his heart, shall be stirred up aginst the king of the south, with a great army: and the king of the south shall be stirred up to battle with many and very strong succours: and they shall not stand, for they shall form designs against him.

The king... Ptolemeus Philometor.

11:26. And they that eat bread with him, shall destroy him, and his army shall be overthrown: and many shall fall down slain.

11:27. And the heart of the two kings shall be to do evil, and they shall speak lies at one table, and they shall not prosper: because as yet the end is unto another time.

11:28. And he shall return into his land with much riches: and his heart shall be aginst the holy covenant, and he shall succeed, and shall return into his own land.

11:29. At the time appointed he shall return, and he shall come to the south, but the latter time shall not be like the former.

11:30. And the galleys and the Romans shall come upon him, and he shall be struck, and shall return, and shall have indignation against thecovenant of the sanctuary, and he shall succeed: and he shall returnm, and shall devise against them that haave forsaken the covenant of the sanctuary.

The galleys and the Romans... Popilius, and the other Roman amba.s.sadors, who came in galleys, and obliged him to depart from Egypt.

11:31. And arms shall stand on his part, and they shall defile the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the continual sacrifice: and they shall place there the abomination unto desolation.