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The Night Belshazzar Read His Death Sentence on the Wall

A feast in Babylon becomes a tribunal when a hand writes on the wall. Daniel delivers the verdict. That same night, the king is killed with his own sword.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. The Sacred Vessels at the Feast
  2. The Writing on the Wall
  3. The Rebuke Before the Verdict
  4. The Same Night

The Sacred Vessels at the Feast

The hand appeared while the party was still going.

Belshazzar of Babylon had taken the golden cups and bowls that had been captured from the Temple in Jerusalem and served wine in them to his princes, his wives, his concubines. He was drinking out of the holy vessels of a conquered people and toasting his own gods with them. It was, even by the standards of ancient imperial display, a deliberate desecration. He was not merely using the vessels. He was making a theological statement with them: your God lost, and these are trophies.

The Writing on the Wall

A hand appeared on the plaster wall and wrote in Hebrew characters. The music stopped. Belshazzar's knees knocked together. He called for his wise men and offered the purple robe, a gold chain, and the position of third ruler in the kingdom to whoever could read the inscription. None of them could. His queen suggested sending for Daniel.

Daniel was brought in. He refused the gifts before he said anything else. Keep your rewards or give them to someone else, he told the king. Then he read what was written.

The words were Aramaic, written in Hebrew letters: Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin. God had numbered the years of Belshazzar's kingdom and found them complete. The seventy years of Israel's captivity had ended. The king had been weighed and found wanting. His kingdom would be taken and given to the Medes and Persians.

The Rebuke Before the Verdict

Daniel did not stop at translation. The Chronicles of Jerahmeel records what he said before he gave the meaning of the words. He reminded Belshazzar of his grandfather Nebuchadnezzar, who had been struck with madness and eaten grass in the fields for seven years, until he lifted his eyes to heaven and acknowledged that God rules over the kingdoms of men. That story, Daniel told him, was known. Belshazzar had heard it. He had humbled himself before no one.

The desecration of the Temple vessels was not ignorance. It was the act of a man who knew the history and chose to mock it anyway. That distinction mattered for the verdict.

The Same Night

Belshazzar gave Daniel the purple robe and the gold chain and the position of third ruler in the kingdom, as he had promised. Daniel received them. That same night, the Medes and Persians entered Babylon. Belshazzar was killed with his own sword by his own servant.

The Chronicle records the sword as a detail. A king killed with his own weapon by his own man, on the night he received his verdict from a prophet he had kept in his kingdom but never listened to. The Medes and Persians did not breach the walls by force. They came in through an open gate. The city did not resist.

DanielBelshazzarBabylonAngelsFloodHabakkuk
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From the tradition

Sources

3 sources

The texts this telling draws on, in full. Open a card to read inline, or expand it for a wider, quieter read.

Chronicles of Jerahmeel LXVIIIChronicles of Jerahmeel (Gaster, 1899)

Daniel stood before King Belshazzar of Babylon and delivered the verdict no ruler wants to hear. According to the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, a 12th-century Hebrew chronicle compiled by Jerahmeel ben Solomon and translated by Moses Gaster in 1899, Daniel rebuked the king for defiling the sacred vessels of the Temple. God had sent an angel to inscribe a message on the palace wall in Hebrew characters but Aramaic words: "Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin."

The meaning was devastating. God had "numbered" the years of Belshazzar's kingdom and found them complete. The seventy years of Israel's captivity had ended. The king had been "weighed" and found wanting. His kingdom would be "taken away" and handed to the Medes and Persians.

Daniel did not stop there. He reminded Belshazzar that his grandfather Nebuchadnezzar had been humbled by God, forced to wander among wild beasts until he acknowledged the power of heaven. Belshazzar had learned nothing from this. After defeating Darius and Cyrus in battle, he thanked his idols of silver and gold rather than his Creator. Then he compounded the insult by drinking wine from the holy Temple vessels alongside his princes, wives, and concubines.

When the court heard Daniel's interpretation, terror seized them. The princes fled and trampled each other at the gates. Belshazzar collapsed onto his bed and fell into a death-like sleep. That night, a doorkeeper who had served Nebuchadnezzar drew the king's own sword from beneath his pillows and severed his head. He carried it through the darkness to Darius and Cyrus. The two kings prostrated themselves before the God of heaven, vowed to free His people and rebuild the Temple, then marched into Babylon and reduced it to wasteland like Sodom and Gomorrah. They divided the Chaldean empire between them by lot.

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Chronicles of Jerahmeel LXXChronicles of Jerahmeel (Gaster, 1899)

The jealous princes of Babylon set a trap with surgical precision. According to the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, a 12th-century Hebrew chronicle translated by Moses Gaster in 1899, they crafted a decree forbidding anyone from praying to any god except the king for thirty days. They sealed it with their own signet rings, and Darius confirmed it without realizing it targeted Daniel.

The conspirators found a girl playing outside Daniel's house who told them exactly where he was: in his upper chamber, kneeling at the window that faced the Temple in Jerusalem, praying three times daily as always. They seized him and dragged him before the king. Darius fought for Daniel until sunset, arguing that the decree was born of envy. The princes threatened rebellion. Finally, the king surrendered Daniel to their hands, saying, "The Lord God of the heavens shall close their mouths."

They cast Daniel into a den holding ten lions that were normally fed ten sheep and ten human bodies each day. The lions had been deliberately starved. But when Daniel descended, the beasts showed him a kind face, licked him, and wagged their tails like dogs greeting their master. A stone was rolled over the pit and sealed with the king's ring.

That same day, the prophet Habakkuk was carrying food to his reapers in the land of Judah when God commanded him to bring the meal to Daniel in Babylon. When Habakkuk protested the impossible distance, an angel seized him by the lock of his hair, lifted him together with his food, and set him down in the lions' den. Daniel ate, and the angel returned Habakkuk home before the reapers even noticed he was gone.

At dawn, Darius rushed to the den and heard Daniel singing praises. The seals were intact. Daniel emerged without a scratch. The princes and their families were thrown in instead, and the starving lions crushed their bones to dust before they hit the ground.

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Legends of the Jews 11:4Legends of the Jews

Instant mood killer. That’s precisely what happened to King Belshazzar.

As we read in the Book of Daniel, the writing was on the wall, literally. And it foretold doom.

The prophet Daniel, of course, was the only one who could decipher the Aramaic script. He revealed that the words meant Belshazzar's kingdom was about to be divided and given to the Medes and Persians. According to Legends of the Jews, as retold by Ginzberg, Daniel's interpretation brought the revelry to a screeching halt. Panic ensued. Guests fled, leaving only the doomed king and his closest attendants behind.

The story doesn't end there. The very same night, a loyal, yet disgruntled, servant, one who remembered Daniel from the days of Nebuchadnezzar (Belshazzar's grandfather), assassinated Belshazzar. He saw Daniel's prophecy as undeniable and took matters into his own hands.

This servant then took Belshazzar's head to Darius and Cyrus. What a macabre offering! He recounted to them how Belshazzar had desecrated the sacred vessels from the Temple in Jerusalem – those very vessels Nebuchadnezzar had plundered years before. He told them of the miraculous writing and Daniel’s frightening interpretation.

And here’s where the story takes a turn towards hope. Moved by the servant's tale, Darius and Cyrus made a solemn vow. They promised to allow the Jews to return to their homeland, Palestine, and to return the sacred Temple vessels.

This act of repentance and promise of restoration is powerful. It suggests that even amidst chaos and destruction, there is always the potential for redemption and renewal. The demise of one king, sealed by a mysterious message and a swift act of violence, paved the way for the return of a people to their land and the rebuilding of their sacred space. A new chapter was being written in Jewish history. A chapter of return, of hope, and of rebuilding. And it all started with some very unsettling graffiti.

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