Provenance

Provenance, what a delightful word. I heard an interesting story recently presented by a preacher and was in the process of confirming that it was legitimate. That is known as confirming the provenance or reliability of data. Just to be sure, here are a couple of definitions:
the place of origin or earliest known history of something,
and
the beginning of something's existence; something's origin.

The exact story is a retelling of Alexander the Great in his quest to control the eastern Mediterranean. The local cities had refused to aid his conquest and once he had swept up the coast, he was systematically marching back down through the cities that had refused to help him. He was destroying them. When he approached Jerusalem, another rebel, the high priest went out to meet him, carrying a copy of the book of Daniel.

The priest showed him in the scroll that his conquest of Persia and all of the intervening area had been prophesied over two hundred years before he showed up. The soldier was so impressed with that fact, and the God Who could do that, that he relented, and off all the cities in Israel, only Jerusalem was spared.

This was reported by the Jewish historian, Josephus, and thus seemed reliable. One web site I encountered flatly declared the story to be a fabrication due to the fact that the book of Daniel was not authored until about 167 to 165 BC. For the historically challenged, the date of this conquest was 332 BC.  Perhaps Josephus merely fabricated the story. “Fake news.”

I carefully crafted a response, including generating my own illustrative story to clarify the point. (I will include it at the end, so that you will not be deprived of my creative genius, nor my time not well spent.) I was going to research the provenance of the entire book of Daniel, including the final six chapters that are filled with such unsettling predictions of the future that our friend and some other critics question. This is not a new process as one of the original critics was Porphyry, who lived between AD 234 and 305.

I might add that old Porph was not a believer, and in fact hated Christianity and the Bible, so we should not be to startled to find him attempting to undermine the veracity of both. Unfortunately for him, the reasarch tools available to us were not at his disposal. It would seem that a minimal amount of effort would have surfaced the bit of proof that I will offer presently. In fact our current “expert,” and several others I discovered on the internet, would also do well to polish their critical thinking and research skills.

All of the critics claim that Daniel had to have been written near the Maccabean period around 167-165 BC. They conveniently omit any proof. And, being an avid debater, I jump on that.

Rabbit trail: My partner and I were debating for our college and the opponents concluded their final rebuttal with this tantalizing statement. “We have cited numerous experts who agree with our analysis, and in conclusion, request that you join us in rejecting this ill conceived proposition.”

The door was wide open and which ever one of us had the final rebuttal stepped right in. We hoped that the judge had been paying attention. “The negative final rebuttal mentioned several “cites” but conveniently omitted reading even one of them to you to prove their point. And if their analysis of these sources was no better than the three they previously offered, and we refuted, this list is probably misconstrued as badly as the first ones were.

“To be frank, we suspect that the list is just that, a compilation of potential sources written on a note card in their evidence box, to be brandished in the final rebuttal as if it contained probative force. ‘A cite,’ our coach advises us, ‘ does not conclusive proof produce–without reading it.’

“You, like we, have probably read most of those, and that is why we do not use them in our negative rounds.”

Such fun. Memories. I do not recall losing a debate. But that was a couple of uh,...decades or more in the dim past. But that judge was listening and we prevailed. End digression.

Back to the topic at hand. Our opponent has propounded a late date for the production of Daniel. This is literally without foundation, as the Septuagint, a Greek version of the Hebrew Bible (or Old Testament), was produced mid third century BC, in the neighborhood of 250 BC. And this is a translation of an earlier document. The book of Daniel is virtually identical to the one found in our Bibles today.

The pronouncement that Daniel was written “late” is merely wishful thinking from unbelievers who refuse to accept the concept of prophesy. The Old Testament is so filled with prophesy that were we to “Exacto knife” out every prophesy, the text would have less substance than Swiss cheese. Prophesy begins in Genesis 3:15 and suffuses the Scripture all the way to Revelation.

God did not give it to us merely to tickle our curiosity or even to prove that He really exists. Prophesy demonstrates that He is in control of the entire world and history itself. His message, the same as in Genesis, is that forgiveness and redemption is available to any who will accept it. Adam and Eve did. Cain refused and murdered his brother. The dichotomy has continued down through history until today.

We do not “hurt” God by refusing to believe and accept His gracious provision. We merely demonstrate our own deficiency, morally, intellectually, and academically. It is not too late to repent, but a time is coming, as prophesied, that it will be. Do not miss the boat.

Here is the illustration that I generated on my bed over night.


The book of Daniel is criticized by many skeptics because it contains so many specific, minute details that they claim it must have been written much later and dated as if it were an ancient document. And chapter 8 was the focus of an article that I read this week. Well, not really read, just looked at a few lines and put it down.

Imagine that a historian wrote a detailed account of WWII, including the blitzkrieg, Dunkirk, D-Day at Normandy, VE day, and the bombing of Japan with an atomic bomb. Then I told you that the book was dated, not 1950, but 1450, would you believe it? Probably not.

But, if we had a letter written by George Washington, stating that he had found this book in an old library in Virginia, our attitude would have to be reconsidered. Right?

Many skeptics have taken their “Exacto knife” of literary criticism and “cut” passages of the Bible out of the text because they contain details that were not known when the book was supposedly written. Daniel is not the only book to be attacked. In fact a large portion of the Bible has been subjected to such treatment. This is serious, because the same Bible warns, “...and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book.” Revelation 22:19

This does not seem to be a very good trade. And for those who may wonder, this warning is repeated several times in other passages, so it is not just restricted to the book of Revelation.


So our self proclaimed critical expert was full of bull-loney. I prefer belief to stupidity.