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Daniel

About this book
Chapter 12

1 “At that time Michael, the great prince who watches over your people,⁠ will arise.⁠ There will be a time of distress unlike any other from the nation’s beginning up to that time.⁠ But at that time your own people, all those whose names are found written in the book, will escape.⁠ 2 Many of those who sleep in the dusty ground will awake—some⁠ to everlasting life, and others to shame and everlasting abhorrence.⁠ 3 But the wise will shine like the brightness of the heavenly expanse.⁠ And those bringing many to righteousness will be like the stars forever and ever.⁠ 4 “But you, Daniel, close up these words and seal the book until the time of the end.⁠ Many will dash about, and knowledge will increase.”⁠ 5 I, Daniel, watched as two others stood there, one on each side of the river. 6 One said to the man clothed in linen who was above the waters of the river, “When will the end of these wondrous events occur?” 7 Then I heard the man clothed in linen who was over the waters of the river as he raised both his right and left hands to the sky and made an oath by the one who lives forever:⁠ “It is for a time, times, and half a time.⁠ Then, when the power of the one who shatters the holy people has been exhausted, all these things will be finished.” 8 I heard, but I did not understand. So I said, “Sir, what will happen after these things?” 9 He said, “Go, Daniel. For these matters are closed and sealed until the time of the end. 10 Many will be purified, made clean, and refined, but the wicked will go on being wicked. None of the wicked will understand, though the wise will understand. 11 From the time that the daily sacrifice is removed and the abomination that causes desolation is set in place, there are 1,290 days. 12 Blessed is the one who waits and attains to the 1,335 days. 13 But you should go your way until the end. You will rest, and then at the end of the days you will arise to receive what you have been allotted.”

Texts in conversation

Compare Daniel 12:2 and Psalms of Solomon 3:12

Hebrew Bible · Pseudepigrapha, Wisdom and Poetry

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Summary

Psalms of Solomon 3 echoes Daniel 12 by describing the resurrection in similar language, a future awakening in which the righteous receive eternal life in contrast to the unrighteous.

Passages

Daniel 12:2

Hebrew Bible
1 “At that time Michael, the great prince who watches over your people, will arise. There will be a time of distress unlike any other from the nation’s beginning up to that time. But at that time your own people, all those whose names are found written in the book, will escape. 2 Many of those who sleep in the dusty ground will awake—some to everlasting life, and others to shame and everlasting abhorrence. 3 But the wise will shine like the brightness of the heavenly expanse. And those bringing many to righteousness will be like the stars forever and ever. 4 “But you, Daniel, close up these words and seal the book until the time of the end. Many will dash about, and knowledge will increase.”
200–101 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Daniel

Psalms of Solomon 3:12

Pseudepigrapha, Wisdom and Poetry
10 He adds sin to sin while he lives (?); He falls, his fall is truly terrible, and he never rises again. 11 The destruction of the sinner is forever, and he will not be remembered when God attends to the righteous person. 12 This is the fate of sinners forever. But those who fear the Lord shall rise to eternal life, And their life (shall be) in the light of the Lord, and will never end.
65–30 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Psalms of Solomon

References

"... John was familiar with sayings about the kingdom of God. He presumably also knew the tradition that 'the kingdom of God' was the central theme of Jesus’ preaching (compare Mark 1:14–15; Matthew 10:7–8 / Luke 10:9). If so, then the Fourth Evangelist deliberately displaced 'the kingdom of God' with 'life eternal'. Put otherwise, he did systematically what Matthew did once: he turned “kingdom of God” into “(eternal) life.” So, when John’s Jesus, in 3:3–16, unfolds the meaning of his own statements about “the kingdom of God” (verses 3, 5), it does not startle us that his subject becomes “eternal life” (verses 15–16). Nor is one surprised that what is true of the kingdom in the Synoptics is true of “eternal life” in the Fourth Gospel: it is both a promise for the future as well as a present reality (5:24, 29; 6:40; 11:25); it is like a possession (3:15, 16; 5:40; 6:47; 10:10); it is a gift of God (5:21; 6:27, 33, 63; 10:28); it is something that one can “see” (3:36); and it is the antithesis of eschatological death (3:16, 36; 5:24). How does this bear on one’s understanding of 'the kingdom of God' in the Jesus tradition? 'Life eternal' was a standard Jewish expression for the future lot of the righteous, for the state that the redeemed will enjoy after death or in the eschatological future (See, for example, Daniel 12:2; 1QS 4:7; Psalms of Solomon 3:12; 1 Enoch 15:4, 6 ...) ..."
Dale C. Allison Jr., Constructing Jesus: Memory, Imagination, and History (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2013), 188.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Daniel 12:2 and Psalms of Solomon 3:12

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