So he gave ear to them in this thing and put them to the test for ten days.

The king made answer and said to the Chaldaeans, This is my decision: if you do not make clear to me the dream and the sense of it, you will be cut in bits and your houses made waste.

Because of this the king was angry and full of wrath, and gave orders for the destruction of all the wise men of Babylon.

So that they might make a request for the mercy of the God of heaven in the question of this secret; so that Daniel and his friends might not come to destruction with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.

For this reason Daniel went to Arioch, to whom the king had given orders for the destruction of the wise men of Babylon, and said to him, Do not put to death the wise men of Babylon: take me in before the king and I will make clear to him the sense of the dream.

As for you, O King, the thoughts which came to you on your bed were of what will come about after this: and the unveiler of secrets has made clear to you what is to come.

As for me, this secret is not made clear to me because of any wisdom which I have more than any living man, but in order that the sense of the dream may be made clear to the king, and that you may have knowledge of the thoughts of your heart.

You, O King, were looking, and a great image was there. This image, which was very great, and whose glory was very bright, was placed before you: its form sent fear into the heart.

As for this image, its head was made of the best gold, its breast and its arms were of silver, its middle and its sides were of brass,

This is the dream; and we will make clear to the king the sense of it.

And the king made answer to Daniel and said, Truly, your God is a God of gods and a Lord of kings, and an unveiler of secrets, for you have been able to make this secret clear.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, answering Nebuchadnezzar the king, said, There is no need for us to give you an answer to this question.

And it is my decision that any people, nation, or language saying evil against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, will be cut to bits and their houses made waste: because there is no other god who is able to give salvation such as this.

O Belteshazzar, master of the wonder-workers, because I am certain that the spirit of the holy gods is in you, and you are troubled by no secret; this is the dream which I saw: make clear to me its sense.

Crying out with a loud voice; and this is what he said: Let the tree be cut down and its branches broken off; let its leaves be taken off and its fruit sent in every direction: let the beasts get away from under it and the birds from its branches:

This order is fixed by the watchers, and the decision is by the word of the holy ones: so that the living may be certain that the Most High is ruler over the kingdom of men, and gives it to any man at his pleasure, lifting up over it the lowest of men.

This dream I, King Nebuchadnezzar, saw; and do you, O Belteshazzar, make clear the sense of it, for all the wise men of my kingdom are unable to make the sense of it clear to me; but you are able, for the spirit of the holy gods is in you.

This is the sense of it, O King, and it is the decision of the Most High which has come on my lord the king:

For this cause, O King, let my suggestion be pleasing to you, and let your sins be covered by righteousness and your evil-doing by mercy to the poor, so that the time of your well-being may be longer.

All this came to King Nebuchadnezzar.

The king made answer and said, Is this not great Babylon, which I have made for the living-place of kings, by the strength of my power and for the glory of my honour?

The king, crying out with a loud voice, said that the users of secret arts, the Chaldaeans, and the readers of signs, were to be sent for. The king made answer and said to the wise men of Babylon, Whoever is able to make out this writing, and make clear to me the sense of it, will be clothed in purple and have a chain of gold round his neck, and will be a ruler of high authority in the kingdom.

And now the wise men, the users of secret arts, have been sent in before me for the purpose of reading this writing and making clear to me the sense of it: but they are not able to make clear the sense of the thing:

And you, his son, O Belshazzar, have not kept your heart free from pride, though you had knowledge of all this;

Then the part of the hand was sent out from before him, and this writing was recorded.

And this is the writing which was recorded, Mene, tekel, peres.

This is the sense of the words: Mene; your kingdom has been numbered by God and ended.

Then this Daniel did his work better than the chief rulers and the captains, because there was a special spirit in him; and it was the king's purpose to put him over all the kingdom.

For this reason King Darius put his name on the writing and the order.

When this thing came to the king's ears, it was very evil to him, and his heart was fixed on keeping Daniel safe, and till the going down of the sun he was doing everything in his power to get him free.

So this Daniel did well in the kingdom of Darius and in the kingdom of Cyrus the Persian.

After this I saw another beast, like a leopard, which had on its back four wings like those of a bird; and the beast had four heads, and the power of a ruler was given to it.

After this, in my vision of the night, I saw a fourth beast, a thing causing fear and very troubling, full of power and very strong; and it had great iron teeth: it took its food, crushing some of it to bits and stamping down the rest with its feet: it was different from all the beasts before it; and it had ten horns.

I was watching the horns with care, and I saw another coming up among them, a little one, before which three of the first horns were pulled up by the roots: and there were eyes like a man's eyes in this horn, and a mouth saying great things.

As for me, Daniel, my spirit was pained because of this, and the visions of my head were troubling me.

I came near to one of those who were waiting there, questioning him about what all this was. And he said to me that he would make clear to me the sense of these things.

This is what he said: The fourth beast is a fourth kingdom which will come on earth, different from all the kingdoms, and it will overcome all the earth, crushing it down and smashing it.

And as for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings will come to power; and after them another will come up: he will be different from the first ones and will put down three kings.

And while I was giving thought to this, I saw a he-goat coming from the west over the face of all the earth without touching the earth: and the he-goat had a great horn between his eyes.

And it came about that when I, Daniel, had seen this vision, I had a desire for the sense of it to be unfolded; and I saw one before me in the form of a man.

And the voice of a man came to my ears between the sides of the Ulai, crying out and saying, Gabriel, make the vision clear to this man.

O Lord, righteousness is yours, but shame is on us, even to this day; and on the men of Judah and the people of Jerusalem, and on all Israel, those who are near and those who are far off, in all the countries where you have sent them because of the sin which they have done against you.

As it was recorded in the law of Moses, all this evil has come on us: but we have made no prayer for grace from the Lord our God that we might be turned from our evil doings and come to true wisdom.

So the Lord has been watching over this evil and has made it come on us: for the Lord our God is upright in all his acts which he has done, and we have not given ear to his voice.

And now, O Lord our God, who took your people out of the land of Egypt with a strong hand and made a great name for yourself even to this day; we are sinners, we have done evil.

So I was by myself, and I saw this great vision, and all my strength went from me; and the colour went from my face.

And he said to me, O Daniel, you man dearly loved, take in the sense of the words I say to you and get up on to your feet: for to you I am now sent; and when he had said this to me I got on to my feet, shaking with fear.

For how may this servant of my lord have talk with my lord? for, as for me, straight away my strength went from me and there was no breath in my body.

And the king of the south will be moved with wrath, and will come out and make war on him, on this same king of the north: and he will get together a great army, but the army will be given into his hand.

And it will be his purpose to come with the strength of all his kingdom, but in place of this he will make an agreement with him; and he will give him the daughter of women to send destruction on it; but this will not take place or come about.

After this, his face will be turned to the islands, and he will take a number of them: but a chief, by his destruction, will put an end to the shame offered by him; and more than this, he will make his shame come back on him.

But in place of this he will give honour to the god of armed places, and to a god of whom his fathers had no knowledge he will give honour with gold and silver and jewels and things to be desired.

Then I, Daniel, looking, saw two others, one at the edge of the river on this side and one at the edge of the river on that side.