Darius the Mede

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”Darius the Mede” (=Cyaxares II), last king of Media
predecessor	Astyages
reign	ca. 550 BC to Dec. 538 BC
successor	Cyrus the Great
father	Astyages
mother	unknown
birth	c. 601 BC
death	December, 538 BC
spouse	unknown

Darius the Mede is a character appearing thrice in the biblical Book of Daniel. Meanwhile the exact identity of Darius the Mede remains the subject of heated debate representing "the last great hurdle to the contextually historical authenticity of book": leading skeptics to claim Darius the Mede is nothing more than an easily dismissed fictional character, while reversely the class of "historical harmonizers" suggesting that Darius the Mede is simply another name for an existing historical figure.

This subject is further complicated by Josephus simply stating that Darius the Mede was the son of Astyages king of the Medes and that he was known to the Greeks by another name, without qualifying what that name was.

Meanwhile the broadly used "Father of History" also oft called "the Father of Lies" in his dramatic recount, records that Astyages had no son, but rather tells how the kingdom passed directly to Cyrus by force of arms ^[1].

Thus Herodotus' account stands in direct opposition to Josephus' statement and Xenophon's far more extensive and detailed book on the subject which extensively relates how Astyages' son was Cyaxares II, which when combined with Josephus provides a natural solution on the subject.

But with the only extant clay tablets, the Uruk King List and Ptolemy's Canon (of which, both of the latter are known not to be perfect) seeming to support the direct passage of power to Cyrus II, the grounds for debate have been established. Meanwhile the most authoritative Behistun Inscription of Darius I does reference "Cyaxares" twice, but it remains questionable if these refer to Astyages father Cyaxares I or son Cyaxares II. Therefore the academic community remains divided.

It must also be noted that while a host of other individuals have been proposed for the identity of Darius the Mede, the case for synergy with Cyaxares II remains the most historically plausible outcome.

Arguments for Fictional[edit]

It is sufficient to say on this subject that without a clear clay tablet on the subject, skeptics hold the character of Darius the Mede is either "literary fiction, appropriate to the genre of a court contest tale"^[2] or similarly a literary composite of several individuals as sumarized by Hill^[3] and therefore the entire chapter as fiction. This as Barnes notes^[4] is generally presented as evidence that possibly the entire book is not considered to be of any historical value and is to be disqualified entirely.

Arguments for Cyaxares II[edit]

In Xenophon's historical narrative, some time after the natural death of his grandfather Astyages, Cyrus II the Great, while still a youth and not yet king of Persia, entered into the employ of his uncle Cyaxares II as general of the army in a mutual defence pact against Assyria (Babylon). In this capacity Cyrus campaigns with Cyaxares II at the first and then by himself until his eventual conquest of Babylon. In this narrative, it must be noted that all conquests are officially in the name of the alliance which was ultimately at the expense and direction of the king of the Medes. After which Cyrus the Great returns to the capital city of Ecbatana in Media and presents Cyaxares II with a palace in Babylon as a token of victory and receives Cyaxares II's daughter as his wife with the kingdom of Media as her dowry. Xenophon's account then details Cyrus' trip home to Persia where he receives the title of King upon the death of his father Cambyses I.

This position when combined with Josephs' assertion that Darius the Mede was the son of Astyages but known to the Greeks by another name, it makes it only natural to conclude that:

• Darius the Mede is Cyaxares II.
• "Darius the Mede received (Aramaic: qabel) the kingdom" (Dan. 5:31) despite being actually conquered by Cyrus" (Dan. 5:31) as
• Cyrus at that point was simply heir of Persia and the greatly loved General of the Coalition Army.

As discussed at the start, while the character of Cyaxares II is not generally accepted amidst the classical histories such as Herodotus, the reconstructed fragments of Ctesias, the Uruk King Lit, the Cannon of Ptolemy^[5] or even on a currently available clay tablet (other than two possible references in the Behistun Inscription), Cyaxares II presents the most natural solution to the problem and is the summary position of several Bible commentaries such as: Benson Commentary^[6][7][8] Barnes Notes^[9] & the Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentaries.

Finally even Saint Jerome asserts that Darius the Mede is Cyaxares II, son of Astyages,^[10] leaving Benson to conclude "so that it appears to have been the generally received opinion in Jerome's time, as it probably was also in the time of Josephus, which was not more than five or six hundred years after Cyrus."^[11] Furthermore Alexander's known love and constant study of the Cyropaedia (and thereby Aristotle's recommendation) show peer acceptance of the identity of Cyaxares II by both academia and heads of state not 100-200 years from the events they record.

Arguments for Other Identities[edit]

Darius the Mede as Astyages[edit]

At first glance, the identification of Daniel’s Darius as Astyages has some strong points in its favor. He was a Mede; further, a Median king. Xenophon, Herodotus, and Ctesias agree that he was the maternal grandfather of Cyrus the Great, which could explain the authority over Cyrus that is implicit in Darius the Mede’s command in Daniel 6:6–9 that could only have been exercised by the highest authority in the empire. This view was taken by some early Christian writers, and seems to have been last maintained by Bernard Alfrink in 1928.^[12]

This view runs into several difficulties. Xenophon stated that Astyages died several years before Cyrus began his multi-year campaign against the Babylonians. Neither Herodotus, who portrays Astyages as an enemy of Cyrus, nor the cuneiform inscriptions given any indication that Astyages was reinstalled as king after Cyrus (allegedly) deposed him. According to Herodotus, Astyages began his reign 64 years before the death of Cyrus in 530 BC.^[13] If he was about 62 years old when Babylon was captured in 539 BC (Daniel 5:31), this would make him about seven years old when he became king in 594 according to Herodotus’s figures; becoming king at such an early age is unlikely. For these and other reasons such as its lack of attestation in any ancient source, identifying Darius the Mede as Astyages has few if any supporters at present.

Darius as Gobryas/Gubaru, governor of the Gutians[edit]

Gubaru (Greek Gobryas, as in Xenophon) was governor of the Gutians, whom some scholars suggest may be the ancestors of the modern Kurds.^[14] According to Xenophon, Gobryas/Gubaru, along with Gadatas, was leader of the forces that captured Babylon,^[15] a statement that finds verification in the Nabonidus Chronicle.^[16] The Chronicle also states that Cyrus appointed Gobryas as governor of the city, and then Gobryas installed sub-governors in Babylon. “This could explain why Daniel states that Darius “received the kingdom (6:1 [English Translations 5:31]) and “was made king” (9:1), according to this view, by Cyrus.”^[17]

This view was rather popular among conservative Bible commentators in the first three-quarters of the twentieth century. Its fall from popularity is explained by several points which mitigate against it. 1) Gobryas was not a Mede, whereas Daniel 9:1 says Darius was “of the seed of the Medes.” He was a Gutian, also called an Assyrian (=Babylonian) by Xenophon^[18] because, until they joined Cyrus, Gutia was a Babylonian province. 2) According to the Nabonidus Chronicle, Gobryas died 25 days after the capture of Babylon,^[19] which does not allow enough time to accommodate the various activities ascribed to him in Daniel chapter 6. 3) As governor (not king) under Cyrus, Gobryas would not have had the authority to issue a decree that no prayers were to be made to any other king or to any god except to him for 30 days.

Darius as Ugbaru, Persian-appointed governor of Babylon[edit]

John Whitcomb advocated that Daniel’s Darius was not Gobryas (Gubaru), governor of the Gutians, but a certain Ugbaru, a governor of Babylon whose name is found in several cuneiform texts.^[20] However, this identification was abandoned after Lester Grabbe pointed out that Ugbaru did not become governor of Babylon until the fourth year of Cyrus, which does not fit the statements in Daniel that make Darius the king immediately after the capture of the city in 539 BC.^[21] Whitcomb’s identification is therefore now generally discredited.

Darius as Cyrus[edit]

The view that “Darius” was just another name of Cyrus was advocated by D.J. Wiseman.^[22] To support this identification, Wiseman and those who have followed him have argued that Daniel 5:31 should be translated as “So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius, that is, in the reign of Cyrus the Persian.” This contrasts with the usual translations which give “. . . in the reign of Darius, and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian.” The difference centers on one word, the Aramaic (and Hebrew) conjunction waw, (pronounced vav in modern Hebrew), which is usually translated “and.” Andrew Steinmann, who accepts Wiseman’s interpretation, points out the following Scriptures where the meaning “that is” must be taken for this conjunction: 1 Chronicles 5:26, Daniel 2:28, and Daniel 3:2.^[23] One advantage of Wiseman’s interpretation is that it is in harmony with the authority that Darius must have had in order to issue a decree that no one could pray to any other king or god except to him for 30 days (Daniel 6:6–9), necessarily implying that he was the highest authority in the empire at that time. Another advantage is that, with this interpretation, Darius the Mede has not “disappeared from history” outside of the book of Daniel and works depending on it; his personage is remembered in all the ancient literature referring to Cyrus the Great.

The problems with this identification may be listed as follows.

1. Darius was of “the seed of the Medes” (Daniel 9:1), and he is also called a Median in 5:31 and 11:1. In contrast, Cyrus is called a Persian or king of the Persians in 6:28 and 10:1 and also 2 Chronicles 36:22, Ezra 1:1, and 4:5. Although Cyrus’s mother was Mandane, daughter of Astyages the king of the Medes, ethnicity in the ancient Near East was reckoned through the father’s line, not the mother’s.
2. The equation Cyrus=Darius makes it difficult to understand why the author of Daniel would repeatedly make distinctions between “Darius the Mede” and “Cyrus the Persian.”
3. In Cyrus’s inscriptions, and in other ancient references, Cyrus is never referred to as a Mede or as a king of the Medes; he is always “Cyrus the Persian,” “Cyrus King of Persia,” or “Cyrus King of Anshan” (a capital of Persia).
4. According to Xenophon,^[24] Cyrus was about 27 years of age when he assumed the generalship of the combined Median and Persian armies in preparation for war with the Babylonians under their chosen general, Croesus of Lydia. This was apparently a year or two before the eventual defeat of Croesus and his forces in 547 BC, which would make Cyrus about 29 in 547 and about 37 when his forces captured Babylon in 539 BC. This is consistent with the “Dream Text” of Nabonidus that calls Cyrus a “young servant” of Marduk when he became leader of the Medes and Persians.^[25] Darius “the Mede”, however, was about 62 years of age in 539 BC (Daniel 5:31).

Darius as Cambyses II, son and successor of Cyrus[edit]

This identification was proposed by the Anglican clergyman Charles Boutflower.^[26] It was based in part on some cuneiform texts suggesting that Cambyses II may have been appointed coregent by his father soon after the capture of Babylon. He could therefore properly be called “king,” and might fill the role of the Darius who “received the kingdom” (Daniel 5:31).

There are many problems with Boutflower’s view. 1) Although Cambyses’s grandmother and great-grandfather were Medes, Cambyses and Cyrus were always called Persians, not Medes. 2) Cambyses could not have issued the decree of Daniel 6:6–9 while his father Cyrus was still the supreme ruler. 3) Daniel’s Darius was about 62 years of age when Babylon fell to the combined forces under the Medes and Persians (Daniel 5:31). In the section above, it was shown that Cyrus himself was only about 37 years of age at this time, and his son would naturally be several years younger. These objections show why Boutflower’s view has never found acceptance among other scholars.

How Did Darius the Mede Disappear from History? Or Did He?[edit]

Typical of the skepticism that much of critical scholarship expresses towards Daniel’s “Darius the Mede” is the claim from John J. Collins: “No such person as Darius the Mede is known to have existed apart from the narration of Daniel . . . No such figure as Darius the Mede is known to history.”^[27] The latter statement is particularly interesting, because it implicitly denies that the Bible is a source of history. Similarly, Carol Newsom writes of “the wholly fictitious character of Darius the Mede,”^[28] and George Buchanan confidently declares, “Darius the Mede never existed.”^[29] Such dogmatic statements lose their force when it is realized that for over 1700 years, historians and biblical scholars found no problem in accepting that the name “Darius” used by Daniel was an alternate name or “throne name” for the Cyaxares II who plays a major role in Xenophon’s Cyropaedia. It is well known that Near Eastern monarchs, when they took the throne, adopted a throne name in addition to their given name. Rüdiger Schmitt provides the given names of Achaemenid rulers who succeeded Cyrus II whose better-known throne names were Artaxerxes I, Darius II, Artaxerxes II, Artaxerxes III, and Darius III.^[30] It should be expected, then, that Cyaxares II would have another name besides the one name that is given to him by Xenophon. That this was the case is indicated by Josephus. When referring to the Darius of Daniel, Josephus wrote that this Darius (“Darius the Mede”) “was called by another name among the Greeks” (Antiquities 10.248). In the same passage, Josephus says that Darius was a son of Astyages and a kinsman of Cyrus. Both of these statements show that Josephus was in agreement with Xenophon’s portraits of Astyages and Cyaxares II in the Cyropaedia, where Cyaxares is presented as the son of Astyages and the maternal uncle of Cyrus.

First refutation of idea that “Darius the Mede is not known to history”[edit]

This historical identification, that Daniel’s Darius was identical to Xenophon’s Cyaxares II, continued for many centuries after Josephus and was espoused by eminent Jewish and Christian scholars. Steven Anderson lists the following writers who accepted this identification: Jerome (3rd century AD), John Calvin (16th century), James Ussher (17th century), Charles Rollin and William Lowth (18th century), and in the 19th century Thomas Hartwell Horne, Wilhelm Gesenius, Humphrey Prideaux, E. W. Hengstenberg, C. F. Keil in the Keil and Delitzsch commentary, and Otto Zöckler in Lange’s Commentary.^[31] For these authors, the resemblance of Daniel’s Darius with Xenophon’s Cyaxares was so compelling that Keil wrote, “The account given by Xenophon regarding Cyaxares so fully agrees with the narrative of Daniel regarding Darius the Mede, that, as Hitzig confesses, “the identity of the two is beyond a doubt.””^[32] A discussion of why this position, held for many centuries by such a distinguished list of authors, fell into disfavor beginning in the late 19th century is presented on the Cyaxares II page. For now, the relevant point is that, contrary to the statement of Collins, once the traditional view is taken that Daniel’s Darius = Xenophon’s Cyaxares, it is by no means true that “No such figure as Darius the Mede is known to history.”

Second refutation of the idea that “Darius the Mede is not known to history.”[edit]

Three of the great conservative commentators of the 19th century, Hengstenberg, Keil (Keil and Delitzsch commentary), and Zöckler (Lange’s Commentary), cited references to a king Darius who was preceded Darius I Hystapses (522–486 BC).^[33][34][35] These authors cite references in two early authors, Berossus (3rd century BC) and Harpocration (2nd century AD) for evidence of this King Darius who was earlier than Darius I. The Berossus passage is preserved in Josephus (Against Apion 1.153) and in the Chronicle of Eusebius, a work that survives only in an Armenian translation. Josephus/Berossus relates the defeat of Nabonidus by Cyrus, after which Nabonidus “was humanely treated by Cyrus, who dismissed him from Babylonia, but gave him Carmania for his residence.” The extract from Eusebius agrees with Josephus’s citation, but adds to it: “(But) Darius the king took away some of his province for himself.”^[36] This is referring to the time of the defeat of Nabonidus (539 BC), not the time of the later Darius I Hystapses. If this earlier Darius was able to override the disposition of Cyrus for Nabonidus, it means that he had a higher authority than Cyrus, which is compatible with Xenophon’s portrayal of Cyrus being under the suzerainty of Cyaxares until the death of the latter. It is also compatible with the “Darius the Mede” of Daniel, who had authority to issue an edict that no one could pray to any other god or king but to him for thirty days, an edict that could not have been issued if there was an authority higher than him in the realm (Daniel 6:7-9). Notice that the events of Daniel 6 take place after the forces under Cyrus captured Babylon; Cyrus was still alive, but at this point he was not yet the supreme authority in the empire.

Harpocration was associated with the great library in Alexandria, and so he had access to many ancient works that were lost when the library was burned. In his work The Lexicon of the Ten Orators, under the entry “Daric,” (being a coinage) Harpocration wrote, “But darics are not named, as most suppose, after Darius [i.e. Darius I Hystapses, 522-486 BC] the father of Xerxes, but after a certain other more ancient king.” This is thus a second historical reference to the existence of an earlier Darius, who must have been the supreme authority in his time, since he had authority to issue coinage in his name. These two references from ancient authors of this earlier king Darius can be taken as independent of the remembrance of Cyaxares II in Xenophon, although the force of evidence implies that Xenophon’s Cyaxares was the same person as this “earlier” Darius, and both were the personage identified as “Darius the Mede” in the book of Daniel.

In Daniel 5[edit]

Herein Darius the Mede seizes the kingdom and rules as king at the fall of Babylon. This narrative has historically presented problems for Biblical scholars as it is an undisputed historical fact that Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon. While many positions exist on the subject, we shall examine each below in separate sections.

In Daniel 10 through 11[edit]

External Links[edit]

https://www.bitchute.com/video/r9npZoqtD4HA/

Resources[edit]

• J. B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament (3rd ed.; Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1969). Abbreviated ANET.
• [1]Steven D. Anderson, Darius the Mede: A Reappraisal (Steven D. Anderson: Grand Rapids, 2014).
• [2]Translation of the Cyrus Cylinder.
• [3]Xenophon, Cyropaedia: the education of Cyrus, translated by Henry Graham Dakyns and revised by F.M. Stawell.
• [4]The Nabonidus Chronicle.

References[edit]

1. ↑ Herodotus, Histories 1.109.3, 1.129.4
2. ↑ Hill, Andrew, Expositor's Commentary, Zondervan, 2009, p.114.[5]
3. ↑ Hill, Andrew, Expositor's Commentary, Zondervan, 2009, p.114.[6]
4. ↑ Barnes Commentary, Daniel 6:1, Section 2 - "Considerable importance is to be attached to the question who was Darius the Mede, as it has been made a ground of objection to the Scripture narrative, that no person by that name is mentioned in the Greek writers." [7]
5. ↑ Ptolemy's Canon[8]
6. ↑ Benson Commentary, Daniel 9:1 [9]
7. ↑ Benson Commentary, Daniel 6:1[10]
8. ↑ Benson Commentary, Daniel 5:30-31 [11]
9. ↑ Barnes Notes, Daniel 9:1[12]
10. ↑ Jerome, Commentariorum in Danielem libri III<IV>, 820-21.
11. ↑ Benson's Commentaries, Daniel 6:1 [13]
12. ↑ Bernard Alfrink, “Darius Medus,” Biblica 9 (1928): 316–40.
13. ↑ Histories 1.130.1, 1.214.3).
14. ↑ Jamie Stokes, ed., Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East (New York: Infobase, 2009), 380; Egon von Eickstedt, Türken, Kurden und Iraner seit dem Altertum (Stuttgart: Gustav Fischer, 1961) as reviewed by D. P. Erdbrink in Central Asiatic Journal 12:1 (1968): 64–65; Alexander Prokhorov, article “Guti” in Great Soviet Encyclopedia (31 vols.; New York: McMillan, 1973), 7:498.
15. ↑ Cyropaedia 7.5.23–32.
16. ↑ ANET, 306b.
17. ↑ Andrew E. Steinmann, Daniel in the Concordia Commentary Series (St. Louis: Concordia, 2008), 291–92.
18. ↑ (Cyropaedia 4.6.2)
19. ↑ ANET, 306b.
20. ↑ John C. Whitcomb Jr., Darius the Mede (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1963).
21. ↑ Lester L. Grabbe, “Another Look at the Gestalt of Darius the Mede,” Catholic Bible Quarterly 50:2 (1988): 206–7.
22. ↑ Donald J. Wiseman, “The Last Days of Babylon,” Christianity Today 2/4 (November 25, 1957): 7–10.
23. ↑ Steinmann, Daniel, 293.
24. ↑ Cyropaedia 1.2.8, 9; 1.5.4.
25. ↑ Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus, King of Babylon 556–539 B.C. (New Haven CT: Yale University Press, 1989), 108.
26. ↑ Charles Boutflower, In and around the Book of Daniel (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1923; reprint; Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1977), 142–45.
27. ↑ John J. Collins, Daniel: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 30, 33.
28. ↑ Carol A. Newsom with Brennan W. Breed, Daniel: A Commentary, Old Testament Library (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2014), 192.
29. ↑ George Wesley Buchanan, The Book of Daniel, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 30.
30. ↑ Rüdiger Schmitt, “Achaemenid Throne-Names,” Annali dell’Istituto Orientale di Napoli 42 (1982): 83–86, 90.
31. ↑ Anderson, Darius the Mede, 3–5.
32. ↑ C. F. Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Daniel, in Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (trans. M. G. Easton; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1872; repr., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955), 198.
33. ↑ [14]E. W. Hengstenberg, Dissertations on the Genuineness of Daniel and the Integrity of Zechariah (tr. B. P. Pratten; Edingburgh: T & T Clark, 1848), 41–42.
34. ↑ Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Daniel, 199–200.
35. ↑ Otto Zöckler, The Book of the Prophet Daniel: Theologically and Homiletically Expounded (tr. & ed. James Strong; vol. 13 of Commentary on the Holy Scriptures: Critical, Doctrinal and Homiletical, ed. John Peter Lange and Philip Schaff (New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co., 1876), 36.
36. ↑ Josef Karst, ed., Die Chronik aus dem Armenischen übersetzt mit textkritischem Commentar, vol. 5 of Eusebius Werke (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1911), 246.