Five-minute study · Day 9 · Daniel 5
Daniel 5:25
A word worth stopping on: MENE מְנֵא mene
October 12, 539 BC. King Belshazzar is throwing a party for a thousand guests. They are drinking wine from gold cups looted from the Jerusalem Temple. Then a human hand appears and writes four words on the plaster wall. The king's face goes white. His knees give out. He calls for Daniel. The four words are weight measurements. They are also a triple pun in Aramaic, and the archaeology behind them is confirmed down to the exact date.
Word study: MENE
- Aramaic
- מְנֵא
- Pronounced
- mene
- Strong's
- H4484
- Definition
- A mina (unit of weight, about 500 grams). Also a pun on the verb 'to number, to reckon.'
The writing reads: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. On the surface, they are Aramaic weight denominations. A mina, a mina, a shekel, and half-minas. By themselves, just measurements. Each word doubles as an Aramaic verb.
Mene sounds like mena: 'to number.' God has numbered your kingdom. Tekel sounds like teqal: 'to weigh.' You have been weighed on the scales. Upharsin (peres in singular) sounds like peras: 'to divide.' Your kingdom is divided. And peres also sounds like Paras: Persia. The nation standing at the gate.
Babylonian court scribes lived for this kind of wordplay. The wise men at the feast could read the words but could not crack the code. Daniel read what they could not: the weights spell out a verdict, and the verdict spells out a conqueror.
Historical context · October 12, 539 BC
The Night the Empire Fell
The Nabonidus Chronicle, a cuneiform tablet now sitting in the British Museum, records that the Persian army under Cyrus entered Babylon on the 16th of Tishri. That is October 12, 539 BC. The text says Babylon was taken 'without battle.' The city fell while its leaders were busy with other things.
Herodotus adds a detail: the Persians diverted the Euphrates River, which ran under the city walls, and walked in on the dry riverbed while the Babylonians were feasting. Xenophon's account agrees.
Belshazzar himself shows up in the archaeological record. For years, critics said Daniel got it wrong because Babylonian king lists showed Nabonidus as the last king. Then cuneiform tablets surfaced showing that Nabonidus had made his son Belshazzar co-regent while he was away at Tema in Arabia. Daniel's account, dismissed as fiction, was confirmed by the very tablets critics expected would disprove it.
For reflection
Belshazzar was weighed and found wanting on a night he thought he was untouchable. What feast in your life might be distracting you from something God is trying to say?
Think about comforts or securities you lean on instead of listening.
Sources: BDB Lexicon; Wiseman, 'Chronicles of Chaldean Kings'; Goldingay, 'Daniel' (WBC)