A FEAST GETS OUT OF CONTROL

The 5th chapter of Daniel opens with a banquet.  "As regards  Belshazzar the king, he made a big feast for a thousand of his grandees, and in front of the thousand he was drinking wine." (Daniel 5:1) As you can imagine, it must have taken a vast  hall to seat all these men, along with the king's secondary wives and concubines.  One scholar notes: "The Babylon banquets were magnificent, though they usually ended in  drunkenness.  Wine, imported from abroad, and luxuries of every kind loaded the table.  Perfumes filled the hall; vocalists and instrumental performers entertained the assembled guests." Presiding where all could see him, Belshazzar drank his wine-and drank, and drank.

 It seems strange that the Babylonians were in such a festive mood on this night-October 5/6, 539 B.C.E. Their nation was at war, and things were not going well for them.  Nabonidus had recently suffered defeat at the hands of the invading Medo-Persian forces and had taken refuge in Borshippa, to the southwest of Babylon. And now the armies of Cyrus were encamped right outside Babylon.  Yet, it does not seem that Belshazzar and his grandees were worried. After all, their city was the impregnable Babylon!  Her colossal walls loomed over deep moats filled by the great Euphrates River as it flowed through the city. No enemy had taken Babylon by storm in over a thousand years.  So why worry? Perhaps Belshazzar reasoned that the noise of their revelry would display their confidence to the enemies outside and would dishearten them.

 Before long, excessive drinking took its toll on Belshazzar. As Proverbs 20:1 says, "wine is a ridiculer."  In this case, wine indeed led the king to commit folly of a most serious sort. He ordered that the sacred vessels from the temple of Jehovah be brought into the feast.  These vessels, taken as spoils during Nebuchadnezzar's conquest of Jerusalem, were to be used only in pure worship. Even the Jewish priests who had been authorized to use them in Jerusalem's temple in time past had been warned to keep themselves clean. -Daniel 5:2; compare Isaiah 52:11.

However, Belshazzar had a still more insolent act in mind.  "The king and his grandees, his concubines and his secondary wives . . . drank wine, and they praised the gods of gold and of silver, copper, iron, wood and stone." (Daniel 5:3, 4)  So Belshazzar meant to exalt hi false gods above Jehovah!  They held their Jewish captives in contempt, ridiculing their worship and offering no hope of a return to their beloved homeland.  (Psalm 137:1-3; Isaiah 14:16, 17)  Perhaps this inebriated monarch felt that humiliating these exiles and insulting their God would impress his women and the officials, giving him an  appearance of strength.  But if Belshazzar  did feel some thrill of power, it did not last long.

Next time: THE HANDWRITING ON THE WALL

From the book: PAY ATTENTION TO DANIEL'S PROPHECY! 1999