98 The Fundamentals (7) The Book of Daniel spells Nebuchadnezzar with an “n” in the penultimate instead of an “r”; therefore, the critics argue, it must have been written 370 years later. But Ezra spells it with an “n’Y So do 2 Kings, 1 & 2 Chronicles, and so does Jeremiah seven times out of sixteen. Jeremiah pre- ceded Daniel and if either Kings or Chronicles was written in Babylon we have the same spelling in the same country and about the same time. ( 8 ) As to the Greek words in Daniel, relied on by Driver to prove a late date: when we discover that these are the names of musical instruments and that the Babylonians knew the Greeks in commerce and in war and realize that musical instruments carry their native names with them, this argu- ment vanishes like the rest. (9) But, it is urged, Daniel gives the beginning of the captivity (1:1) in the third year of Jehoiakim, 6 o 6 B. C., whereas Jerusalem was not destroyed till 587 B. C., therefore, etc. Daniel dates the captivity from the time that he and the other youths were carried away. A glance at the history will suggest when that was. Pharaoh Necho came out of Egypt against Babylon in 609 B. C. He met and defeated Josiah at Megiddo. He then marched on northward. In three months he marched back to Egypt, having accomplished nothing against Babylon. The interval, 609 to 605 B, C., was the opportunity for Nebuchadnezzar. He secured as allies or as subjects the various tribes in Palestine, as appears from Berosus. Among the rest “Jehoiakim (2 Kings 24:1) became his servant three years”. During that time he took as guests or as hostages the noble youths. At the end of the three years, in 605, Necho reappeared on his way to fatal Carchemish. Jehoia- kim renounced Nebuchadnezzar, and sided with Necho. A merciful Providence counted the seventy years captivity from the very first deportation and Daniel tells us when that was. The captivity ended in 536 B. C.
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