Daniel 5: Those Who Don't Learn From History... (The Handwriting on The Wall)

"And you his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled

your heart, though you knew all this..." Daniel 5:22

Let us repeat the common American proverb together: those who don't learn from history...are doomed to repeat it. In Daniel 5, this is exactly what we see happening. In Daniel 4, we saw a prideful man by the name of Nebuchadnezzar be humbled. And what do we see decades later in Daniel 5? Another prideful man, even the son* of Nebuchadnezzar. However, for Belshazzar, Neb's son, the ending wasn't as bright...

The narrative goes like this. On a bright day in the kingdom of Babylon, Belshazzar the King decided to throw a party for him, his wives, his concubines, and anyone else who wanted to join the party. After drinking some wine, Belshazzar had an idea: let's gather the vessels (a fancy biblical word for a wine glass) that used to be in the Israelites temple, and drink from those. Now, this may seem insignificant to us, but what Belshazzar was doing here was forsaking the God of Israel and worshiping the false "gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone" (v. 4). In other words, they were looking to false gods to deliver them while simultaneously shaming the true God, whose name was Yahweh.

Nevertheless, the story continues. Out of nowhere, Belshazzar sees a hand writing on a wall. Scripture says that he was so terrified that his "color changed" (in other words, his face got pale) and "his limbs gave way" (v. 6). In utter horror, Bel calls for his wise men to interpret the writing for him, but (for the one-hundredth time in the book of Daniel), they fail. Who will interpret the dream? You guessed it: Daniel!

After reminding Belshazzar of his father Nebechaddnezzar's history, he condemns him for not learning from the lesson: "And you his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled

your heart, though you knew all this, but you have lifted up yourself against the Lord of heaven" (v. 22-23a). Daniel then interprets the handwriting on the wall to mean that Bel's kingdom was about to be taken over by the Medes and the Persians. Belshazzar is thankful for Daniel's interpretation (yet, it certainly implied that he is in much terror of it as well) and thus promotes Daniel in his kingdom. However, none of that lasted long, because that very night, Belshazzar was murdered within the walls of his own kingdom, leaving Darius the Mede to take over.

Great story, right? But what does it mean for us? Rather than drawing many small applications today, I want to look at the big one, that is, the main point of this passage. When we approach scripture, we must realize that every text has a main point, that is, a central implication that the original author was desiring to tell the original audience. Now, there are many ways of determining exactly what this is, but let us notice that some of them are fairly obvious. If I were to tell you that this chapter of scripture is all about how we ought to go out and interpret random writings on walls or go stealing silver cups and drinking out of them, you would tell me that I'm out of my mind, because it's obvious that that isn't the main point of the passage. Rather, the main point of the passage is that the Lord will end those who refuse to worship him in their own pride.

Let us contrast Neb and Bel for a quick moment. Both of them started out prideful, yet they had different endings. Neb was humbled and ultimately repented and called Yahweh his Lord. However, Bel went too far, and the Lord destroyed him after giving him a chance to learn from Neb's life. From this, we see that no one who is prideful will ever stand. The Lord is too jealous for his glory to let any pride continue. If you are prideful, he will either humble you, like Neb, or end you, like Belshazzar.

So, let us seek to be humble men and women, just as Jesus was when he came to the earth as a baby, giving up his heavenly throne for a temporary time so that he could dwell amidst his people. Let us not be like Belshazzar, who refused the Lord's call to repent, but like Nebachnazzar, who ultimately obeyed the Lord after the Lord humbled him. Amen!

*It is most likely that Belshazzar was Neb's grandson and not his son. Although the Bible refers to him as his "son," the Hebrew word could refer to a direct descendant ("son") or a more distant one ("grandson"). Either way, a grandson is still a son.