Chapter 97

¹ So in this way he then worked also in the officers and satraps, that through them he might accomplish his own will and cast the blessed Daniel into the den of lions.

² Having watched him closely and seen him praying three times in the day, they came and said to the king: “King Darius, did you not establish a decree that any person who for thirty days should ask a petition of any god or man rather than of you, O king, would be cast into the den of lions?” And he said: “The word is sure, and the law of the Medes and Persians shall not pass away.”

³ And they said to him: “See, Daniel, one of the sons of the captivity of Judah, has not submitted to your decree, and three times in the day he asks his petitions of his God.” Then the king, when he heard the word, was greatly grieved over him, and he struggled on Daniel’s behalf to deliver him.

⁴ For having recognized their scheme—that out of enmity toward Daniel, inasmuch as he was wiser and more honored than all of them, they had concocted this plot against him, wishing by trickery to hand him over to the beasts—he disputed with the satraps, whether by interceding for him he might be able to save him from the danger.

⁵ But so that he might not be rescued by a man, and it be reckoned the favor of a king, but rather that it might appear a work of God accomplished upon him: when it was already evening and the king was conferring with the satraps on his behalf, they spoke and said: “Know, O king, that it is the law for the Medes and Persians that no decree or ordinance which the king may establish ought to be altered”—wishing by this argument to shame the king, on the ground that if the decree ordained by him were not made authoritative and firm, the rest of the things ordained by him would also be reckoned void.