What Does Daniel 6:20 Mean?
And when he came to the pit, he called out to Daniel with a voice of pain, and the king spoke and said to Daniel, O Daniel, servant of the living God, is your God, whom you serve continually, able to bring you out from the lions?
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.
King James wording
King James Version
And when he came to the den, he cried with a lamentable voice unto Daniel: and the king spake and said to Daniel, O Daniel, servant of the living God, is thy God, whom thou servest continually, able to deliver thee from the lions?THE KEY
The king asks about deliverance from inside the den’s danger, so the verse does not confuse rescue with a life untouched by peril.
THE MEANING
The question reaches you where danger is real: can the living God bring you out from inside it? The verse leaves the lions visible and deliverance possible, without making the outcome clear.
THE ROOT
שֵׁיזָבוּת
shēzāḇûṯ
GROWS FROM
שזב
sh-z-b
To rescue or deliver from danger.
“bring you out from” in this verse is shēzāḇûṯ. The Aramaic root gathers rescue into the danger itself: the king asks whether Daniel can be delivered from among the lions. The word leaves peril visible while making rescue a live possibility.
ALSO GROWS
shēzîḇ: To deliver or rescue.
שֵׁיזִיב
This verbal form appears in Daniel 3:17, where deliverance is spoken of while the fiery furnace remains a real threat.
məšēzîḇ: One who delivers or rescues.
מְשֵׁיזִב
Daniel 6:27 uses this form to name God as deliverer, answering the question raised here.
THE PATTERN
Deliverance is named while the threat is still visible, so danger does not settle whether rescue is possible.
The aligned cry out, and the LORD hears, and snatches them out of all their narrow places.Who brought us out of so great a death, and brings us out; in whom we hope that he will yet bring us out.THE THREAD
If it is so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.The question at the den echoes the same Aramaic root in these words. Here, too, deliverance is named while the threat remains in view.
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