Questions on the Book of Daniel

One of the things about the Book of Daniel that puzzles me is it’s placement in the Protestant canon differs from the Jewish canon. In the Protestant canon, Daniel is among the Latter Prophets section. In the Jewish canon, Daniel is in the Writings section that makes up the last part of the Hebrew Bible. Why is there such a divergence on its placement?

The question revolves around whether Daniel was a prophet or not. Protestant Christians do view Daniel as seeing the future of the kingdom and predicting the coming of the Messiah (Daniel 9:24-27). Jews, on the other hand, believe the Spirit of the Holy One dwelled in Daniel and enabled his human mind to perceive divine realities. There would be nothing heard or seen by Daniel to distinguish him as a prophet to the Rabbis. Daniel is seen as a sage not a prophet to the Jewish mind.

Another portion where there is no agreement is when the book was written. Many Protestants hold that that book is written sometime around 540 BCE. Jews adhere to the time of 168 BCE. How do we account for the disparity here?

What makes this a difficult book for many to read is the apocalyptic genre that this book is written. The corpus of images of rams, goats, bears, leopards and lions fighting and coming out of the sea, do make it hard to follow what is happening. This may be where we want to start though. Let the form of the book take shape on our mind and sit down and read it in one sitting (12 chapters in total).

What are your thoughts on the Book of Daniel? How do you read it? What has been helpful for you?

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