Chapter 29

¹ But perhaps someone will say that this is stated without scriptural warrant and cannot be known—whether Daniel cried out, “I am clean from the blood of this woman,” because he saw the angel.

² If you wait a little, O man, Daniel himself will teach you fully.

³ For when the people heard the cry and marveled, he answered them: “Are you so foolish, you sons of Israel? Without examining, nor learning the plain truth, have you condemned a daughter of Israel? Now then, return to the place of judgment; for these men have testified falsely against her.” And the people returned in haste. But the lawless men, mocking Daniel and despising him as a mere young lad, not perceiving the power of the Word in him, said: “Come, sit in our midst and declare to us, since God has given you the eldership.”

⁴ But he said: “Separate them far from one another, and I will examine them.” And when they had been separated, one from the other, he summoned the one and said to him: “O you who have grown old in evil days, now have your sins come home, which you committed of old, giving unjust judgments and condemning the innocent while acquitting the guilty, though the Lord says, ‘You shall not slay the innocent and the righteous.’ Now then, if indeed you saw this woman, tell me: under what tree did you see them keeping company with each other?” And he said: “Under a mastic tree.” And Daniel said: “Rightly have you lied against your own head; for already the angel of God has gone forth, having received the word from God, to split you in two.”

⁵ So Daniel dismissed the one under examination. For the saying, “Already the angel of God has gone forth, having received the word from God to split you in two,” makes clear that at the very moment when Susanna prayed to God and was heard, then was the angel sent forth to help her.

⁶ In the same manner it came to pass also with Tobias and Sarah. For when they had prayed, at that very hour and on that very day the petition of them both was heard, and the angel Raphael was sent to heal the two of them.

⁷ Thus then the Scripture foretold through the prophet Amos to the house of Israel, saying: “Will the Lord God do a thing unless he first reveal it to his servants the prophets?” A vision came to Daniel, and the Holy Spirit was stirred up in him, so that, the examination being conducted by him, the angel might dispatch these men as evil false witnesses.