Young men who were strong and healthy, good-looking, and trained in all wisdom, having a good education and much knowledge, and able to take positions in the king's house; and to have them trained in the writing and language of the Chaldaeans.

And the captain of the unsexed servants said to Daniel, I am in fear of my lord the king, who has given orders about your food and your drink; what if he sees you looking less happy than the other young men of your generation? then you would have put my head in danger from the king.

Then take a look at our faces and the faces of the young men who have food from the king's table; and, having seen them, do to your servants as it seems right to you.

So the keeper regularly took away their meat and the wine which was to have been their drink, and gave them grain.

And the king said to them, I have had a dream, and my spirit is troubled by the desire to have the dream made clear to me.

Then the Chaldaeans said to the king in the Aramaean language, O King, have life for ever: give your servants an account of your dream, and we will make clear to you the sense of it.

But if you make clear the dream and the sense of it, you will have from me offerings and rewards and great honour: so make clear to me the dream and the sense of it.

That if you do not make my dream clear to me there is only one fate for you: for you have made ready false and evil words to say before me till the times are changed: so give me an account of the dream, and I will be certain that you are able to make the sense of it clear.

I give you praise and worship, O God of my fathers, who have given me wisdom and strength, and have now made clear to me what we were requesting from you: for you have given us knowledge of the king's business.

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.

And the fourth kingdom will be strong as iron: because, as all things are broken and overcome by iron, so it will have the power of crushing and smashing down all the earth.

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.

They made answer and said to Nebuchadnezzar the king, O King, have life for ever.

You, O King, have given an order that every man, when the sound of the horn, pipe, harp, trigon, psaltery, bagpipe, and all sorts of instruments, comes to his ears, is to go down on his face in worship before the image of gold:

There are certain Jews whom you have put over the business of the land of Babylon, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego; these men have not given attention to you, O King: they are not servants of your gods or worshippers of the gold image which you have put up.

Nebuchadnezzar made answer and said to them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, that you will not be servants of my god or give worship to the image of gold which I have put up?

Now if you are ready, on hearing the sound of the horn, pipe, harp, trigon, psaltery, bagpipe, and all sorts of instruments, to go down on your faces in worship before the image which I have made, it is well: but if you will not give worship, that same hour you will be put into a burning and flaming fire; and what god is there who will be able to take you out of my hands?

But if not, be certain, O King, that we will not be the servants of your gods, or give worship to the image of gold which you have put up.

But keep its broken end and its roots still in the earth, even with a band of iron and brass; let him have the young grass of the field for food, and let him be wet with the dew of heaven, and let his part be with the beasts.

It is you, O King, who have become great and strong: for your power is increased and stretching up to heaven, and your rule to the end of the earth.

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.

The queen, because of the words of the king and his lords, came into the house of the feast: the queen made answer and said, O King, have life for ever; do not be troubled by your thoughts or let the colour go from your face:

And I have had news of you, that the spirit of the gods is in you, and that light and reason and special wisdom have been seen in you.

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 I have had news of you, that you have the power of making things clear, and of answering hard questions: now if you are able to make out the writing and give me the sense of it, you will be clothed in purple and have a gold chain round your neck and be a ruler of high authority in the kingdom.

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

But you have been lifting yourself up against the Lord of heaven, and they have put the vessels of his house before you, and you and your lords, your wives and your women, have taken wine in them; and you have given praise to gods of silver and gold, of brass and iron and wood and stone, who are without the power of seeing or hearing, and without knowledge: and to the God in whose hand your breath is, and whose are all your ways, you have not given glory;

Tekel; you have been put in the scales and seen to be under weight.

Then these chief rulers and the captains came to the king and said to him, O King Darius, have life for ever.

All the chief rulers of the kingdom, the chiefs and the captains, the wise men and the rulers, have made a common decision to put in force a law having the king's authority, and to give a strong order, that whoever makes any request to any god or man but you, O King, for thirty days, is to be put into the lions' hole.

Then they came near before the king and said, O King, have you not put your name to an order that any man who makes a request to any god or man but you, O King, for thirty days, is to be put into the lions' hole? The king made answer and said, The thing is fixed by the law of the Medes and Persians which may not come to an end.

Then Daniel said to the king, O King, have life for ever.

My God has sent his angel to keep the lions' mouths shut, and they have done me no damage: because I was seen to be without sin before him; and further, before you, O King, I have done no wrong.

Then it was my desire to have certain knowledge about the fourth beast, which was different from all the others, a cause of great fear, whose teeth were of iron and his nails of brass; who took his food, crushing some of it to bits and stamping on the rest with his feet;

And he will say words against the Most High, attempting to put an end to the saints of the Most High; and he will have the idea of changing times and law; and the saints will be given into his hands for a time and times and half a time.

And in the later years of their kingdom, when their evil doings have become complete, there will come up a king full of pride and expert in dark sayings.

And I made prayer to the Lord my God, putting our sins before him, and said, O Lord, the great God, greatly to be feared. keeping your agreement and mercy with those who have love for you and do your orders;

We are sinners, acting wrongly and doing evil; we have gone against you, turning away from your orders and from your laws:

We have not given ear to your servants the prophets, who said words in your name to our kings and our rulers and our fathers and all the people of the land.

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.

With the Lord our God are mercies and forgiveness, for we have gone against him;

And have not given ear to the voice of the Lord our God to go in the way of his laws which he put before us by the mouth of his servants the prophets.

And all Israel have been sinners against your law, turning away so as not to give ear to your voice: and the curse has been let loose on us, and the oath recorded in the law of Moses, the servant of God, for we have done evil against him.

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.

O Lord, because of your righteousness, let your wrath and your passion be turned away from your town Jerusalem, your holy mountain: because, through our sins and the evil-doing of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a cause of shame to all who are round about us.

O my God, let your ear be turned and give hearing; let your eyes be open and see how we have been made waste and the town which is named by your name: for we are not offering our prayers before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercies.

O Lord, give ear; O Lord, have forgiveness; O Lord, take note and do; let there be no more waiting; for the honour of your name, O my God, because your town and your people are named by your name.

And teaching me and talking to me he said, O Daniel, I have come now to give you wisdom.

At the first word of your prayer a word went out, and I have come to give you knowledge; for you are a man dearly loved: so give thought to the word and let the vision be clear to you.

Seventy weeks have been fixed for your people and your holy town, to let wrongdoing be complete and sin come to its full limit, and for the clearing away of evil-doing and the coming in of eternal righteousness: so that the vision and the word of the prophet may be stamped as true, and to put the holy oil on a most holy place.

Have then the certain knowledge that from the going out of the word for the building again of Jerusalem till the coming of a prince, on whom the holy oil has been put, will be seven weeks: in sixty-two weeks its building will be complete, with square and earthwork.

And at the end of the times, even after the sixty-two weeks, one on whom the holy oil has been put will be cut off and have no ...; and the town and the holy place will be made waste together with a prince; and the end will come with an overflowing of waters, and even to the end there will be war; the making waste which has been fixed.

Then he said to me, Have no fear, Daniel; for from the first day when you gave your heart to getting wisdom and making yourself poor in spirit before your God, your words have come to his ears: and I have come because of your words.

Now I have come to give you knowledge of the fate of your people in the later days; for there is still a vision for the days.

Then one whose form was like the sons of men put his finger on my lips; and opening my mouth, I said to him who was before me, O my lord, because of the vision my pains have come on me, and I have no more strength.

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 he said to me, O man greatly loved, have no fear: peace be with you, be strong and let your heart be lifted up. And at his words I became strong, and said, Let my lord say on, for you have given me strength.

Then he said, It is clear to you why I have come to you. And now I will give you an account of what is recorded in the true writings:

And now I will make clear to you what is true. There are still three kings to come in Persia, and the fourth will have much greater wealth than all of them: and when he has become strong through his wealth, he will put his forces in motion against all the kingdoms of Greece.

So the king of the north will come, and put up earthworks and take a well-armed town: and the forces of the king of the south will make an attempt to keep their position, even the best of his army, but they will not have strength to do so.

And his forces will be completely taken away from before him and broken; and even the ruler of the agreement will have the same fate.

Against fertile places, and will make waste a part of the country; and he will do what his fathers have not done, or his fathers' fathers; he will make distribution among them of goods taken in war and by force, and of property: he will even make designs against the strong places for a time.

For those who go out from the west will come against him, and he will be in fear and will go back, full of wrath against the holy agreement; and he will do his pleasure: and he will go back and be united with those who have given up the holy agreement.

And those who do evil against the agreement will be turned to sin by his fair words: but the people who have knowledge of their God will be strong and do well.

Now at the time of their downfall they will have a little help, but numbers will be joined to them in the town, and in their separate heritages.

And some of those who are wise will have wisdom in testing themselves and making themselves clean, till the time of the end: for it is still for the fixed time.

He will have no respect for the gods of his fathers or for the god desired by women; he will have no respect for any god: for he will put himself on high over all.

But he will have power over the stores of gold and silver, and over all the valued things of the south: and the Libyans and the Ethiopians will be at his steps.

And those who are wise will be shining like the light of the outstretched sky; and those by whom numbers have been turned to righteousness will be like the stars for ever and ever.

Till a number are tested and make themselves clean; and the evil-doers will do evil; for not one of the evil-doers will have knowledge; but all will be made clear to those who are wise.