What Does Daniel 5:25 Mean?

And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.

Daniel 5:25 · SDV

Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.

Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.

THE KEY

The inscription carries its verdict in the language of weight: numbered, weighed, divided, and also the names of a mina, a shekel, and split portions.

THE MEANING

The inscription presents a complete movement: reckoning, measure, division. Its repeated MENE makes the count emphatic; TEKEL places what is counted on a scale, and UPHARSIN names the split.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

A kingdom can look permanent and beyond measure; this inscription declares it countable, weighable, and divisible.

THE ROOT

מְנֵא

mene

GROWS FROM

מנה

m-n-h

count, number, allot

The Aramaic word means “numbered” and also resonates with the weight-name mina, so accounting and physical measure overlap. Repeated twice, MENE gives the reckoning a settled quality before the weighing and division follow.

ALSO GROWS

mene: numbered, counted

מְנֵא

This is the inscription’s repeated act of reckoning.

manah: to count or allot

מָנָה

The root can name both a count and an assigned portion, joining number to what is apportioned.

תְּקֵל

teqel

GROWS FROM

תקל

t-q-l

weigh

“weighed” in this verse is teqel. TEKEL places the reckoning on a scale: the word carries the act of weighing within it. Its unit-name echoes Hebrew ⁨שֶׁקֶל⁩ (sheqel), “shekel,” a related Semitic weight-word with a different consonant form.

ALSO GROWS

teqal: to weigh

תְּקַל

This is the action that gives the inscription its image of a scale.

teqilta: you have been weighed

תְּקִילְתָּ

Daniel 5:27 uses this form to unfold TEKEL as a weighing with a verdict.

וּפַרְסִין

upharsin

GROWS FROM

פרס

p-r-s

split, divide

“UPHARSIN” in this verse is upharsin. The final word turns measurement into separation: what is counted and weighed is now divided. In the next line, PERES echoes Pāras, “Persia”; this is wordplay tying the division to the name of its recipient, not a claim that the two share an etymological root.

ALSO GROWS

peras: split, divide

פְּרַס

This form names the dividing action carried by the final word.

peris: divided

פְּרִיס

Daniel 5:28 uses this form to state what happens to the kingdom.

THE PATTERN

The span, substance, and holdings of a life are exposed to a measure beyond their owner’s estimate.

So show us how to count our days, that we may come into a heart of wisdom.

Psalm 90:12 · SDVThe count of days becomes a measure that shapes how life is understood.

All the ways of a person are clean in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the breaths.

Proverbs 16:2 · SDVWhat appears right to its owner remains weighable beyond that owner’s own judgment.

But God said to him, Mindless one, this night your living soul will be demanded back from you. Then whose will those things be that you have made ready?

Luke 12:20 · SDVThe possessions that seem secure can pass out of the hands that hold them.

THE THREAD

TEKEL; you are weighed on the scales, and found short.

Daniel 5:27 · SDV

This line opens TEKEL as an act: the one addressed is weighed in balances and found wanting. The inscription’s compressed word for weighing carries a verdict within it.

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