Daniel Lesson 3

Principles of Separation from the Kingdom of Man – Daniel 1:8-16

I will answer some of the feedback cards. The Scofield Bible refers to the name of Daniel to mean “God is my judge.” You say “God has judged.” Which is right? The name Daniel in the Hebrew looks like this, and it’s also written at other time like this, and you can see there’s a difference of one mark, that little yodh, when Jesus said, “the law will not pass away until one jot or tittle…” that’s the jot, it’s the smallest consonant in the Hebrew language. The word “He has judged” looks like this, Dan El, El dan, El has judged, this is “God has judged.” This in another spelling of Daniel, this may be an linguistic filler, or it may mean El, and this would be the noun form, is my judge. It’s one where it’s hard to be dogmatic but most of the scholars that have studied the question do not accept “God is my judge,” they consider that yodh to be a filler and the original and correct is Dan El, and incidentally, this is the way the name is known in other cultures also. Scholars that support the “God had judged” would be E. J. Young, James Montgomery, Kyle and so forth.

Another question: can you really assume that Shadrach was a garbled version of Marduk? The context is the only clue, plus your presuppositions. Surely it means something we don’t know for sure yet. It’s something we don’t know for sure but we have a lot more to go on than just context. When I teach I don’t have time to go into all the reasons why I say something is true, it’s good that you bring up these questions, but as an illustration let me just show you the kind of study that went into making that remark. The word “Shadrach” looks like this in the Hebrew; the word Marduk looks like this. Now here are the evidences why this may be a misspelling of that. We have various Akkadian materials and Sumerian materials plus the linguistic principles that are developed from these materials. The two endings are the same; the “r” and the “d” are inter-changed. This is a frequent confusion. It is a four-lettered word and therefore it’s non-Jewish, it is a borrowed word, so it is external to the corpus of Hebrew vocabulary. These are probable because “r” and “d” are frequently intermixed; as you can see they look pretty much the same. The “s” and the “d” are also frequently interchanged, as in 2 Kings 19:37 when Marduk is called Nisroch, and there’s the “s” just like here, and there’s the “r”. And so the word “Marduk” has flexibility in it. In fact, there have been many studies made on this word, I could list them if you wanted, but sufficient to say that there’s more than context; context is useless in this situation. You have to go on the basis of Akkadian, Sumerian and Semitic type languages, and when you do this, then that statement appears reasonable.

Let’s look at Daniel and see where we’ve come and then look at where we’re going. In Daniel 1 we have the major idea of Daniel entering Gentile politics. This is the section that introduces and sets the tone for all the prophecy in the book of Daniel. Christians who fail to read Daniel 1 and jump into the middle of things in chapter 2 because they’re prophecy freaks fail to get oriented to why Daniel was written. Daniel was written to give you as a believer wisdom in living in this world. That’s why the book of Daniel is not part of the Nabiim or the Prophets section of the Old Testament. It’s not in the second section; it is in the third section, along with Proverbs, Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes, and the wisdom books. From God’s point of view Daniel is not a book of prophecy, it’s a book of chokmah, or wisdom, which sounds strange because most people think of Daniel as prophetic. Daniel does have prophecy but the prophecy is in Daniel for the purpose of increasing chokmah on the part of believers living in the kingdom of man. For that reason, Daniel is in the third section. So Daniel, entering Gentile politics in chapter 1, is going to become a model for us as to how we live inside the kingdom of man. We don’t live in the kingdom of God, the world is not politically controlled by Jesus Christ, and because the world is not controlled by Jesus Christ we face problems. Satan is the god of this world.

Daniel was divided into sections: in Daniel 1:1-2 we have the historical background; this reminds us that Daniel lived during the fifth degree of discipline under the Mosaic Covenant, Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. This was the era, 587-586 BC when the southern kingdom fell. This was the era when the kingdom of God ended, and it ended with two characteristics. One, the Shekinah glory was removed from the temple, Ezekiel 8-11, and the second characteristic of the end of the kingdom of God in history was that power, supreme political international power, was delivered up into the hands of the Gentiles. Up to this point Israel had the potential for world domination; after Daniel 2 Gentiles only have the dominating power. In fact the modern state of Israel exists only because of Gentile power; it was Gentile power that sustains Israel as a protectorate under the United Nations. Israel is unique in its origin among countries, that her legal status hinges on the UN decrees, which obviously is Gentile power. So even the modern state of Israel continues under Daniel 2 authority.

Verses 1-2 were the historical backgrounds. Then Daniel 1:3-7, Nebuchadnezzar in these chapters tried to absorb Daniel into Babylonian culture with his brainwashing. Verses 3-7 were some of the ways that this young teenage boy, probably aged about 14, faced as a lone believer, torn away from his loved ones, hundreds and hundreds of miles away from his parents, had to exist on what resources he had in his soul and how he could lean moment by moment through these resources upon the Lord. Daniel is a testimony to what parents can do with their children. Daniel’s parents must have been two of the most tremendous believers in Israel. They taught Daniel as a young boy the Bible doctrine, they taught him how to apply it, how to pray, they gave him a lot of background and it all paid off because when he was 14 he was ripped away from his home, had to go on his own, and Daniel becomes the epitome of a wise man in politics. Where did he get his wisdom? Only as God taught him, first through his parents and then through the Word of God directly.

This means that we have a surviving person, a believer who is able to survive the contest beginning at verse 3 and continuing on through Daniel’s three years of education, is simply this: can external educational program destroy the internal strength of the human soul? Which is stronger, Daniel’s soul or Nebuchadnezzar’s educational indoctrination? Which is going to survive? You recall that their names were changed in verse 7 to wipe out any identity, anything that would remind the Babylonians that these boys were part of an exclusivist culture, that they would not be one of the one-world dream of Babylon, that as they had assimilated the Assyrians and they had assimilated the Scythians, they had assimilated Medes, they had assimilated a lot of people, but they were not going to assimilate the souls of Daniel and his three companions. And the difference and the thing that kept these boys going in time of trouble was the Word of God. So it’s an interesting contest that’s shaping up, who will survive? Nebuchadnezzar’s educational program or these young men.

It’s also a testimony to the one-world idea that permeated Babylonian thought, they were trying to erase all the religious differences and Daniel refused to be assimilated.

Daniel 1:8-16, the next section. In this section we are given some chokmah principles, some wisdom principles of Biblical separation. There’ll be some principles you can apply to different situations in your life, varying, it depends on what the situations are and there’ll be more of these wisdom principles later. But here begins a series of wisdom principles on Biblical separation, how you can survive as a believer in a human viewpoint culture.

Daniel 1:8, “But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with a portion of the king’s meat [food], nor with the wine which he drank; therefore, he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself.” We have to stop with the “purposed in his heart.” This is a hithpael stem and it means that Daniel made a decision in his soul all by himself, it was strictly his decision. He made it without external pressure. He did not do it because of his girlfriend, he didn’t do it because of some external thing; he did it strictly by his own volition out of his loyalty to the God of the Bible. So he “purposed in his heart,” he made a decision, and it was from this decision that everything else flowed, all the overt activity that Daniel is about to engage in, and there’s a lot of it, all of this overt activity stems from an inner mental attitude, a mental attitude that defied the human viewpoint culture to change him. He made a basic decision that he was going to remain loyal to the Word, period, regardless of the pressure brought to bear.

What we have to ask, though, is why he is making the decision at verse 8, and not making the decision at verse 4, or verse 7. Why did Daniel not make his stand about signing up for the educational program? He could have gone on a hunger strike, or he could have defied Nebuchadnezzar at the point of education. He could have defied Nebuchadnezzar at the point of giving him a new name in verse 7, which would have been an insult to any Hebrew youth. Daniel tolerated the education, and he tolerated the misidentification, but all of a sudden when we get to verse 8 the toleration stops; the accommodation stops. It comes to a screeching halt, and Daniel now begins defiance.

Why does Daniel choose to defy the state at verse 8 rather than at verse 7 and previously. What is the issue of the food? Is it that the meat would be Gentile meat, not in accordance with the Mosaic Law? We don’t think so. The Mosaic Law had nothing to do with wine; he could have drunk the wine under Mosaic Law. So it’s not a clear cut issue that it was a non-Mosaic problem; it apparently was not due to that, it wasn’t a dietary thing that he was making the issue of in verse 8.

Well then, what was the issue? Turn to 1 Corinthians 8, could it be that maybe the food was offered to idols and just for that reason alone he wouldn’t eat it? In 1 Corinthians 8:7 Paul says, “However, there is not in every man that knowledge; for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat it as a thing offered unto an idol, and their conscience, being weak is defiled.” Now this is talking about a believer who is weak, who doesn’t know that the idols are nothing. He thinks the idols really are something, and for that reason he shouldn’t eat. But that would make Daniel a weak believer, so it can’t be just that the food was offered to idols. Daniel was a strong believer, and Paul says basically there’s nothing, verse 4, “As concerning, therefore, the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is no other God but one. [5] For though there be many that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth…. [6] But to us there is but one God, the Father….” So Paul’s saying that’s not an issue there. It becomes an issue for the weak believer but for the strong believer that’s not the issue. So it’s not just that the food was offered to idols; that doesn’t explain it.

But we do have an explanation in 1 Corinthians 10, here apparently was the reason that Daniel used to make his stand. It wasn’t necessarily because of the Mosaic Law; it wasn’t just because of the idols. In 1 Corinthians 10:14 Paul addresses believers and he says, “Wherefore, y dearly beloved, flee from idolatry. [15] I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say.” In other words, this is instruction given to believers who are mature, who face certain problems and they need chokmah, exactly the kind of believer’s for whom Daniel was written, believers that need chokmah as to when to separate and when to accommodate, how do you know where to draw the line? If you wanted be real purist you could draw the line all around you as the Pharisees tried to do. But you can’t, you wind up not living in this world. There are places and places and places in our life, in the details of life, where we accommodate all the time. So we have to separate selectively.

So how does Daniel select where he separates. 1 Corinthians 10:15, Paul says “I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say.” In other words, evaluate it and use it. [16] “The cup of blessing which we bless,” now he’s referring to a religious service, communion, “is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” Now what Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 10 is not what he talked about in 1 Corinthians 8. In chapter 8 it was merely food; in chapter 10 it’s food in a religious service. That’s the difference. In chapter 8 it was a believer walking into the food market in Corinth buying meat that had been consecrated to idols before it was put on the market for sale. Then when he went into the market to purchase his meat, it wasn’t an issue because he wasn’t going in and buying it as part of a religious service, he was just simply going to the meat market and the heathen had the good meat market. But in chapter 10 Paul introduces the concept of food in a religious worship service, and this is a whole new ballgame, with a whole new set of rules.

1 Corinthians 10:17, “For we being many are one bread, and one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread. [18] Behold Israel after the flesh,” and here’s the principle, “Are not they who eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar?” Now it’s eating all right, food is involved, but it’s not just any food involved, it is food that is involved as part of a continuing religious rite. Verse 19, “What say I, then? That the idol is anything, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is anything?” Verse 19 is talking about the idols are nothing; verse 19 teaches exactly the same theology as chapter 8 that we just saw; the idols are nothing, Paul says. They are not real gods, there’s no reality in this religion.

1 Corinthians 10:20, “But,” and here’s the difference, and here’s where the discernment comes in, “But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God; and I would not that you have fellowship with demons. [21] You cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of demons; you cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of demons.” Now who are the demons that are mentioned in verses 20-21? The demons are the demons who are behind the false religion of the Greeks. If you’ve done some reading you know of The Oracles of Delphi, you know there there was obvious demonic manifestation, and the New Testament and the Old Testament join in saying that false religion, anti-Biblical religion is basically a product of demon work.

1 Timothy 4, 1 John 4 and other passages testify that even heresy brought into the Christian church is the result of demonic activity. And so it’s not surprising that when he comes to deal with the Greek religions he’s dealing with demonic things. There is something, and we can’t probe into the human depths of human psychology, we can’t probe around the atmosphere of this building and make contact with the spiritual forces hanging in this building right at the moment, but they are here, both good and evil. And somehow in acting out in a worship service puts the human spirit in linkage with either the Holy Spirit or demonic spirits. This is why in communion we always pause before we partake of the elements and I always say something to the effect that now is the time when you can personally confess any sin so you won’t be out of fellowship when you partake of the elements, because 1 Corinthians 11, which is the next chapter here, will teach that to partake of communion elements when you are out of fellowship is to invite particularly, beyond other kinds of sin that you can commit, that particular one invites rapid physiological discipline upon your body. Now why the sin of partaking of communion happens to be elevated in the New Testament above other sins we don’t know; all we can say is the simple act of taking the bread and taking the wine or the grape juice, that simple act is a worshipful act that brings your human spirit into a position where it’s submitting to the spirit behind the service. This is why, when you are involved in religious worship services, you may go just to be a spectator, watch out what kind of religious worship service you’re going to because in partaking of that religious worship service you can contact demonic powers.

So Paul warns them that you can’t worship demonically and worship with the Holy Spirit. In verse 21, obviously it’s the focus of all Christian worship, it’s not singing, it’s actually partaking of communion, that’s the highpoint of Christian worship. He says you can’t do both. Verse 22, “Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy?” In other words to do so is to tempt God to discipline us. “Are we stronger than He? [23] All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient; all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. [24] Let no man seek his own, but every man another’s wealth. [25] Whatsoever is sold,” now he’s going to get into the application of all of this; he’s made his point that you can’t eat when it’s consciously part of a worship service.

So he says in 1 Corinthians 10:25, “Whatsoever is sold in the shambles,” they used the word shambles for the marketplace, “Whatsoever is sold in the market place,” which in this case is food that has been offered before the idols, “Whatsoever is sold in the market place, that eat,” go ahead and eat that, it’s all right, “asking no question for conscience’ sake.” In other words, because you know the doctrine of divine essence, that God alone is righteous, just, sovereign, omniscient, omnipotent, omniscient, immutable and so on, and there’s no other beside him, because you know the doctrine of creation, that that meat is part of an animal that has been created for your use under the covenant of Noah, because of that doctrine it’s all right for you to eat, regardless of what the heathen are doing. Verse 26, “For the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.” You’re on solid doctrinal ground for going ahead and eating.

Now there’s a little amendment to all this, and here’s the thing that gets involved with Daniel and the problem that this teenage boy had back in Babel. 1 Corinthians 10:27, “If any of them that believe not bid you to go to a feast,” in other words, you get an invitation to come to a time of supper, and this is not just a dinner, in the ancient world when they had a supper it wasn’t just a dinner and discussion, it would be a dinner and could become itself a religious service. Now when you got the invitation you didn’t know in advance what kind of a meal this would turn into, whether it would turn into a pagan festival or whether it would just be a quiet dinner party. So in verse 27 he says if any of you receive a dinner invitation, there’s the invitation from the non-Christian, any “that believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go, whatever is set before you, eat, asking on question for conscience’ sake.” So if it’s just a simple dinner party, go ahead.

Now the issue, 1 Corinthians 10:28, “But if any man say unto you,” this is after you’ve gotten to the party, “If any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice unto idols,” which would be the announcement that you are partaking of a communion of sorts, because to partake of the food is part of let’s share my religious faith, would you eat this food offered to Marduk, would you eat this food offered to Apollo, in other words, I invite you as a non-Christian and I want to share my religious faith with you, and in verse 28 it’s the unbeliever that raises the issue. He’s the one that seeks to impose his religious values upon you. If he says that “This is offered in sacrifice unto idols,” so that when you eat it you’re partaking of a sacrifice, then “eat not for his sake that showed it, and for conscience’ sake,” two points. Eat not to produce an issue with the unbeliever and second, don’t do it for your own conscience sake. “…for the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof—” in this case it’s the same doctrine but the point is this.

In verse 27 you have a simple situation of an evening dinner; in that case you have the meat, the meat is unchanged, same meat in both cases, the meat in verse 27 is offered to idols; the meat in verse 28 is offered to idols. What the difference is, is how the meat is served at the table. One meat is served as a simple meal; that’s all, the religious issue hasn’t been dragged into the picture. But in verse 28 the meat becomes a formal ceremony and to partake of that is to state clearly that you are submitting to the authority of the gods to whom it has been sacrificed. So he says if the unbeliever who invites you to dinner makes an issue, at that point you have to take your stand and separate; you cannot go along with that for two reasons. Number one, for the issue of the unbeliever; the unbeliever and your conscience both testify that there’s only one God, the one Biblical God, and because of this God instead of many gods, because of that, the doctrine of divine essence, now that doctrine has become hazy and confused because of verse 28.

In verse 27 it was all right, you could use the same doctrine, a different situation, a different application. Notice this, in verse 28 God is one, God is the Creator, therefore I can eat anything on earth that I wish. Verse 28, God is one, the meat on the earth is the same, it’s His creation, but I won’t eat it in this case because in this case the meat is being made into a label that promotes many gods. And because the meat is promoting a doctrine of many gods, polytheism in mythology, I take my stand, I will not eat. So here same doctrine, different situation and the difference in the situation between verse 27 and 28 is a religious one.

Now back to Daniel. This is why Daniel would not defile himself. To eat at the king’s table or to eat the food meant that he would be partaking of a religious service to Marduk. It’s here where we get our first principle of Biblical separation. Why did Daniel choose to separate at this point when there were 1842 other things he could have protested against? There are numerous things to protest against, but Daniel’s finite; God doesn’t ask him to protest against everything in Satan’s world but select carefully the targets for protest. The target selected here… let’s look at Daniels decision. Here he is, 14 year old boy, and right now he has three things he can take a stand on. He can take a stand on his education; the education curriculum is the First Humanist University and he could say I’m not going to partake of this education, I don’t care whether you give me a scholarship or not, that university is controlled by humanists and I won’t go. Or he could protest the name; he and his companions could say I refuse to accept that social security number because that is to misidentify me. Or he could protest the point of the religious feast.

Now those are the three possibilities for separation. Daniel chooses to make his stand at point three, not at points one and two. Why? Suppose he made his stand at point one; Daniel probably reasoned this way: look, I know the education is bad but with true character on the inside I can discriminate the good and the bad in the course. If I have Bible doctrine in my soul, I can make the decision in my soul, even though the professor says this and that and I have to pass a final, I’ll just spit back what he wants, etc. I can play his little game with him, and that little game won’t change my soul. That doesn’t change my soul because in that matter I can discriminate because I have Bible doctrine. So Daniel said I won’t bother with that one. In this situation as a 14 year old boy he couldn’t do anything else, so he chose at this point not to protest there, it’s not crucial, I can hack it.

Let’s go to the second one; what about the name. You can’t cover up true character by a lousy name, so again the issue as far as Daniel’s soul and Bible doctrine in his soul; he isn’t going to compromise that Bible doctrine with a bad name. Look at how many friends you have that have screwy names and you get to know them and they’re nice people. The name didn’t hurt them, the name doesn’t warp their personality, unless they’re bent out of shape from other reasons and they let it warp their personality. But he won’t make his stand there because a bad name won’t destroy a good character, so that isn’t what he’s protesting.

He’s going to save his energy and apply a principle of war called a principle of concentration. You don’t fight the enemy at all points at once; if you’re limiting your resources and you’re overwhelmed you concentrate your force at one point and hit them there. Daniel can’t fight everything, he’s only a 14 year old kid, he can’t protest all up and down the border so what he’s got to do is concentrate his forces on a key target, and that’s the key target because that is the target where if he compromises there he has ruined his soul; he’s ruined it because he has permitted God’s name to be defiled in front of other people, and he has permitted his own conscience to be violated because he has participated in a worship service that was designed by demons. So at that point Daniel makes his stand; that is worth separating over.

So the first principle of separation, the first chokmah principle that we learn from the book of Daniel is that there are innumerable points of controversy between human viewpoint and divine viewpoint but you have to take your stand at key points. You can’t protest everything; you’ve got to take your stand at certain key points. You don’t have to walk around with a martyr complex and protest everything, but you should protest something at critical points, and that Daniel said was a critical point and he would be out of fellowship if he didn’t separate at that point.

Now as we continue this verse, “Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s food, nor with the wine which he drank; therefore, he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself.” Notice “he requested of the prince of the eunuchs.” Daniel 1:9, “Now God had brought Daniel into favor and tender love [compassion] with the prince of the eunuchs.” This is interesting because verse 9, the way it’s translated in the King James sounds like what we call a circumstantial clause. That’s the kind of clause that should be in parenthesis, and it describes a state of affairs in which the story is heard. But here knowledge of the original language is crucial at verse 9, that is not a circumstantial clause. Apparently the translators thought it had to be and it isn’t and you get a very interesting point of doctrine out of verse 9. It means that after he requested of the prince of eunuchs, God brought Daniel into favor with the prince of eunuchs.

There’s a sequence in verses 8 and 9, they are not simultaneous, they are sequential. God blessed Daniel because of something Daniel did just then. And this thing that Daniel did just then introduces the second wisdom principle of the Biblical doctrine of separation. Daniel sought to arrange his separation and peaceably as he could; he didn’t deliberately start a big uproar for the sake of starting a big uproar. Daniel tried to separate as peaceably as he could. And when it says he “requested of the prince of the eunuchs,” it means he recognized the authority of that man, he made an official request. It was open to him. Now there are certain points where it’s not open and we’ll see how Daniel handles that later. But at this point he had official channels open to do something about it. Just like Christians have channels open now in this state to do something about textbooks, but only one parent in a hundred thousand does anything about it and it’s sad. While you have official channels open, use them. Daniel did.

Daniel “requested of the prince,” he went to the authority. Now what did God do? Verse 9 is a testimony that God appreciated Daniel’s problem, He recognized this boy had to make a stand, He recognized that the boy might be inclined as a teenager to go on a hunger strike; Daniel didn’t do that, he didn’t pick absolute defiance. He very, very wisely submitted to authority and God blessed him and a result, He “brought Daniel into favor and tender love [compassion],” now what does that mean? The word “favor” is the word chesed, and that is the word in the Hebrew for love; there are two words in the Hebrew for love, one ahav, which means election love, this word chesed means love after you’re married, it’s love back to a covenantal agreement; so it then came to mean loyalty. That’s what it meant.

When this young 14 year old boy, with this weighty an issue on his soul, approached this man who was a man who could recognize character, for one thing, see, he’s an officer, and he knew people’s soul, and when he sat there and had this 14 year old boy come up to him and say, Sir, I request that such and such be changed for the following reasons…., this guy was impressed. He said I deal with men all over this palace, and this young 14 year old boy has character and I recognize it. And God opens the man’s eyes to Daniel’s soul and the man could see that it wasn’t just a little kid being a brat; it was a kid that had something fantastic in his soul. So right here, this man is open to being witnessed to. This man is going to inquire, hey, what makes that little fellow tick; we’ve got hundreds of kids, some from Assyria, some from various city states, and these four boys from Israel, what is it about them that makes them different from all the other boys. All right, here’s his testimony coming through.

And “tender love [compassion]” means that the man had an emotional reaction to Daniel, in other words on a purely secular soulish way, he liked Daniel. We would say today they hit it off well together. Who did this? God is given the credit in verse 9, Daniel did something, verse 8; he went unto the second principle of submission, submission to authority, to seek to arrange separation as peaceably as possible and God rewarded his effort by opening the man’s soul up to Daniel’s character. We never hear about the prince of the eunuchs, whether he was led to the Lord or not.

In Daniel 1:10, the answer shows you that Daniel has made an impact, because he just doesn’t say no kid, forget it. “And the prince of the eunuchs said unto Daniel,” and he gives a reason to Daniel, he says look, I’ve got a problem, “I fear my lord, the king, who has appointed your meat and your drink; for why should he see your faces worse looking than the children [youths] who are of your age? Then shall ye make me endanger my head with the king.” Nebuchadnezzar had discipline over his administration and anybody that didn’t carry out his orders was decapitated. So therefore this man faces a problem; he says I like this kid, an unbeliever was responding to Daniel, he said this boy deserves a break but I can’t give him a break because if I give him a break my head goes down the drain.

This shows you something that you’ll encounter again and again in business, you’ll encounter it again in the service, in any circle where you go; people always worry about their boss. The modern business is structured the same way; don’t think verse 10 just happened in the ancient world, that’s modern business, everybody trying to worry about the guy above them. [tape turns] …I constantly fear my lord, day in and day out, day in and day out, this administration is built on fear, not loyalty, fear! Like a lot of business organizations, built completely on fear, fear about losing the job, fear about something else, fear about being reassigned, fear about not getting promoted, fear, fear, fear. And it wasn’t any different here and Daniel ran smack into the establishment; here’s the guts of the whole thing. Now watch what happens.

Daniel 1:11, “Then Daniel said to Melzar,” this apparently is a common noun, not a proper noun, it means the guardian. This is a lesser official than the prince of the eunuchs; a lesser official. And Daniel said to Melzar, the lesser official, “whom the prince of the eunuchs had set over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, [12] Prove [test] thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days, and let them give us pulse [vegetables] to eat, and water to drink.” Now when he does this there’s a separation in time between verses 10 and 11. In verse 10 he’s made his official request, he’s got an answer, but the answer isn’t a flat rejection. Now notice what he’s thinking; watch this little fellow as he works with the situation. He’s applied the first principle which is to make your stand on an issue that counts. He’s done that. Second principle, he’s gone in an authoritative way, submissively to try to request a change. Now at this point he could have gotten a yes or a no or a maybe; those are the only three possibilities. Same thing with you and me; if he had gotten a no he would have gone on another strategy which we’ll see later on in the book of Daniel; there’s a way of responding to a “no” answer when you follow these first two principles. But that’s out because he doesn’t say no, he doesn’t say yes, he says maybe. Well if it’s yes you can stop the Biblical principle of separation right here because you’ve got your permission. So those two principles completely take care of the situation, with a yes answer.

But now the maybe and here’s the “maybe” problem. What do you do when you try to separate and from the authority over you get a maybe, not a no, not a yes, but a maybe. That introduces Daniel’s third principle of separation. Notice the text. He apparently goes away and thinks about it for a while, and then he proposes the experiment, the ten day experiment of verse 12. He proposes a change in the diet, and the word “pulse” means vegetables. Imagine that, “let us have vegetables to drink and water to drink.” No kid in his right mind would do something like that. But Daniel realizes that this is the safest thing to do because usually they didn’t consecrate vegetables to the gods, in this particular situation. Apparently he felt safe that he wouldn’t have to sweat the religious ceremony bit if he confined his diet to just vegetables and water for ten days. He said I know what’s on this guy’s mind. He thinks that if we get off the meat and wine it’s going to make us physically less attractive, so since the “maybe” was contingent upon a condition of fear, Daniel says I propose an experiment to get rid of that contingency behind the “maybe.”

So the third principle that Daniel uses is this: When you deal with separation issues and you get a “maybe,” sell your proposal on a pragmatic basis. Sell your proposal on a pragmatic basis, not a moral one. The unbeliever is not prepared for your morals, God’s morals or anyone’s morals; Daniel proposes nothing moral in verse 12, it is purely pragmatic. He’s saying just see if it works, and he sells his proposal pragmatically to the non-Christian. It’s creative and its pragmatic.

For example, today we wouldn’t go out and sell the Christians solution to inflation necessarily on a moral basis; we could sell it to them pragmatically, look at the sorrow and heartache that comes out of an inflating economy instead of a non-inflating economy, and the package would be wrapped up in pragmatic terms and it would be sold that way. So the Christian can sell in a certain situation, he’s dealing with the kingdom of man, he can use pragmatism to sell. This doesn’t mean the Christian’s position is pragmatic; be careful. Daniel is not saying what’s right and what’s wrong is based on whether it works, he’s just saying I know what’s right and what’s right will work in this situation, but I know you don’t care so for you all I’m talking about is whether it works or not. You’ll find situations like this where you have to proceed pragmatically.

We find the result of the experiment. Daniel 1:13 his proposal, “Then let our countenances be looked upon before thee, and the countenance of the children that eat of the portion of the king’s food; and as thou seest, deal with thy servants.” In other words, I leave the judgment to you, a beautiful experiment. [14] “So he,” that’s the lesser official, “consented to them in this matter, and tested them ten days. [15] And, at the end of the ten days, their countenances appeared fairer and fatter in the flesh than all the children who did eat the portion of the king’s meat. [16] Thus Melzar” or the guardian “took away the portion of their meat and the wine that they should drink, and gave them vegetables.”

So Daniel won his first confrontation with the kingdom of man; he presented it, he selected it carefully, he presented it, he submitted to authority, and the third thing, he sold his proposal pragmatically. Those are the three principles, and to conclude I’d like to turn to Romans 12:18 where the New Testament confirms the same concept and the same kind of approach.

Romans 12:18, this is the principle that Daniel is using. “If it be possible, as much as lies in you, live peaceable with all men.” That’s the principle, that was the second principle. And the first principle and third principle rotated around that one, Daniel sought to separate, sought not to compromise, but he also sought to live peaceable as much as he could.

This will probably act as a balance to some; we’ve got enough people irritated about divine viewpoint/human viewpoint which is good. Now the next step is to develop wisdom in how to be more effective in standing for divine viewpoint against the human viewpoint.