Belshazzar (or
Balthazar;
AkkadianAkkadian is an extinct Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian, an unrelated language isolate...
Bel-sarra-usur) was a prince of
BabylonBabylon was a city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...
, the son of
NabonidusNabonidus was the last king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, reigning from 556-539 BCE.-Historiography on Nabonidus:...
, the last king of Babylon according to the Book of Daniel. In the
Book of DanielThe Book of Daniel is a book in both the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic, it is set during the Babylonian Captivity, a period when Jews were deported and exiled to Babylon following the Siege of Jerusalem of 597 BC...
(chapters 5 and 8) of the
JewishJudaism is a set of beliefs and practices originating in the Hebrew Bible , as later further explored and explained in the Talmud and other texts...
TanakhThe Tanakh is a name for the Bible used in Rabbinic Judaism, also known as the Masoretic Text. The name "Tanakh" is a Hebrew acronym formed from the initial Hebrew letters of the Masoretic Text's three traditional subdivisions: The Torah , Nevi'im and Ketuvim —hence...
or
ChristianChristianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as presented by the revelations in the New Testament....
Old TestamentIn Christianity, the Old Testament is the collection of books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions. In the Eastern Orthodox Church the comparable texts are known as the Septuagint, from the...
, Belshazzar is the King of
BabylonBabylon was a city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...
before the advent of the
MedesThe Medes were an ancient Iranian people who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. This area is known as Media...
and Persians.
Contemporary Babylonian sources
Belshazzar was the son of
NabonidusNabonidus was the last king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, reigning from 556-539 BCE.-Historiography on Nabonidus:...
, who after ruling only three years, went to the oasis of
TaymaTayma is a large oasis with a long history of settlement, located in northeastern Saudi Arabia at the point where the trade route between Yathrib and Dumah begins to cross the Nefud desert...
and devoted himself to the worship of the moon god,
SinSin or Nanna was the god of the moon in Mesopotamian mythology. Nanna is a Sumerian deity, the son of Enlil and Ninlil, and became identified with Semitic Sin . The two chief seats of Nanna's/Sin's worship were Ur in the south of Mesopotamia and Harran in the north.- Name :The original meaning of...
. He made Belshazzar co-regent in 553 B.C., leaving him in charge of Babylon's defense.
In the year 540 B.C. Nabonidus returned from Tayma, hoping to defend his kingdom from the Persians who were planning to advance on Babylon. In 538 B.C.[Error: this is impossible if he died the nite the city was captured in 539 BC] Belshazzar was positioned in the city of Babylon to hold the capital, while Nabonidus, marched his troops north to meet
CyrusCyrus the Great , also known as Cyrus II of Persia and Cyrus the Elder, was the first Zoroastrian Persian Shāhanshāh...
. On October 10, 539 B.C. Nabonidus surrendered and fled from Cyrus. Two days later, October 12, 539 B.C., the Persian armies overthrew the city of Babylon.
Classical sources
HerodotusHerodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greek historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture. He was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
refers to the last king of Babylon as
Labynetos and claims that this was also the name of his father. Herodotus says that the mother of the younger Labynetos was the queen Nitocris whom he portrays as the dominant ruler. She is commonly thought to have been the daughter of
NebuchadnezzarNebuchadnezzar II was a ruler of Babylon in the Chaldean Dynasty, who reigned c. 605 BC – 562 BC. According to the Bible, he conquered Judah and Jerusalem, and sent the Jews into exile. He is credited with the construction of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. He is featured in the Book of...
.
Labynetos is generally understood to be a garbled form of the name Nabonidus and the younger Labynetos is often identified with Belshazzar. Opinions differ however on how best to reconcile Herodotus with the Babylonian sources and an alternative view is that the younger Labynetos is Nabonidus.
JosephusJosephus , also known as Yosef Ben Matityahu and, after he became a Roman citizen, as Titus Flavius Josephus, was a first-century Jewish historian and apologist of priestly and royal ancestry who survived and recorded the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70...
gives an account of Belshazzar largely paralleling the
Book of DanielThe Book of Daniel is a book in both the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic, it is set during the Babylonian Captivity, a period when Jews were deported and exiled to Babylon following the Siege of Jerusalem of 597 BC...
but remarks that he was known to the Babylonians by the name
Naboandelus. Bible scholars have viewed this as a corruption of "Nabonidus" which if correct may be taken either as confusion on the part of Josephus or a corroboration of the interpretation of the younger "Labynetos" of Herodotus as Belshazzar. Josephus, however, knew of Nabonidus and calls him "Nabonnedus" relating an account of his capture by Cyrus taken from
BerossusBerossus was a Hellenistic-era Babylonian writer, a priest of Bel and astronomer writing in Greek, who was active at the beginning of the 3rd century BC...
. Josephus refers to the queen at the time (corresponding to the Nitocris of Herodotus) as the
grandmother of Belshazzar which corroborates the alternative view that the younger "Labynetos" (son of Nitocris) is Nabonidus.
Book of Daniel
Daniel 5:1-4 describes "Belshazzar's Feast" in which the sacred vessels of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem, which had been brought to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar at the time of the Captivity were profaned by the company. The narrative unfolds against the background of the impending arrival of the Persian armies.
- "King Belshazzar gave a great banquet for a thousand of his nobles and drank wine with them. 2 While Belshazzar was drinking his wine, he gave orders to bring in the gold and silver goblets that Nebuchadnezzar his father had taken from the temple in Jerusalem, so that the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines might drink from them. 3 So they brought in the gold goblets that had been taken from the temple of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines drank from them. 4 As they drank the wine, they praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone."
In consequence of this, during the festivities, a hand was seen
writing on the wallWriting on the Wall is an album by British pop group Bucks Fizz. It was released in 1986 and featured the comeback single "New Beginning " and was the first album to feature member Shelley Preston.- Overview :...
of the chamber a mysterious sentence
mene mene tekel upharsin, which defied all attempts at interpretation. Some Rabbinic interpretations (notably the mention in the Babylonian Talmud) say that the words were written in code, one possibility was that it was an atbash cipher. Still, their natural denotations of weights and measures were superficially meaningless: "two minas, a
shekelShekel , also rendered sheqel, refers to one of many ancient units of weight and currency. The first known usage is from Mesopotamia around 3000 BC. One explanation is given for the origination of this word as to have originally applied to a specific mass of barley, and the first syllable of the...
and two parts.". In the verb form, they were: mene, to number; tekel, to weigh; upharsin, to divide - literally "numbered, weighed, divided". When the Hebrew Daniel was called in, he read and interpreted the words. The last word (
prs) he read as
peres not
parsin. His free choice of interpretation and decoding revealed the menacing subtext: "Thou art weighed in the balance and art found wanting". The divine menace against the dissolute Belshazzar, whose kingdom was to be divided between the Medes and Persians, was swiftly realized: in the last verse we are told that Belshazzar was slain in that same night, and that his power passed to Darius the Mede.
The Greek historians Herodotus and Xenophon also record that there was a festival in the city of Babylon the same night it fell to the Persians.
This Biblical story is the source of the popular phrase "the writing on the wall" as a euphemism for impending doom that is so obvious only a fool would not see it coming. It also provides the origin for the similar expression "your days are numbered."
Daniel 5:1-4 calls Nebuchadnezzar the
father of Belshazzar. The same claim is made in the deuterocanonical
Book of BaruchThe Book of Baruch, occasionally referred to as 1 Baruch, is called a deuterocanonical book of the Bible. Although not in the Hebrew Bible, it is found in the Septuagint and in the Vulgate Bible, and also in Theodotion's version. There it is found among the prophetical books which also include...
, which most scholars believe to have been written around the same time, in the second century BC. This may simply have been a mistake on the part of the authors. Some Biblical commentators argue that the statement can be reconciled with extra-Biblical sources by interpreting the term to mean
forefather or
predecessor, as used elsewhere in Biblical texts, notably referring to the Patriarch Abraham as the father of King David. (The Hebrew word for father
av is commonly used in the sense of
forefather.)
For a list of artistic and musical references to the feast, see the article
Belshazzar's FeastBelshazzar's Feast is described in the Book of Daniel. The Babylonian king Belshazzar profanes the sacred vessels of the enslaved Israelites. As prophesied by the writing on the wall, and interpreted by Daniel, Belshazzar is killed and Darius the Mede succeeds to his kingdom.There are many...
.
Rabbinic literature
Belshazzar appears in many works of classical
JewishThe Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
rabbinic literatureRabbinic literature, in its broadest sense, can mean the entire spectrum of rabbinic writings throughout Jewish history. But the term often refers specifically to literature from the Talmudic era, as opposed to medieval and modern rabbinic writing, and thus corresponds with the Hebrew term Sifrut...
.
The chronology of the three Babylonian kings is given in the
TalmudThe Talmud is a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, customs, and history. It is a central text of mainstream Judaism....
(
MegillahMegillah is the tenth Tractate of Mishnah in the Order Moed. It and its Gemara deal with the laws of Purim and offers exegetical understandings to the Book of Esther. It also includes laws concerning the public reading of the Torah and other communal synagogue practices...
11a-b) as follows: Nebuchadnezzar reigned forty-five years, Evil-merodach twenty-three, and Belshazzar was monarch of Babylonia for two years, being killed at the beginning of the third year on the fatal night of the fall of Babylon (Meg. 11b).
The references in the Talmud and the
MidrashMidrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....
to Belshazzar emphasize his tyrannous oppression of his Jewish subjects. Several passages in the
ProphetsNevi'im is the second of the three major sections in the Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh. It falls between the Torah and Ketuvim .Nevi'im is traditionally divided into two parts:...
are interpreted as though referring to him and his predecessors. For instance, the passage, "As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him" (
AmosThe Book of Amos is one of the books of the Nevi'im and of the Christian Old Testament. Amos is one of the minor prophets....
v. 19), the lion is said to represent Nebuchadnezzar, and the bear, equally ferocious if not equally courageous, is Belshazzar. (The book of Amos., nevertheless, is pre-Exilic.)
The three Babylonian kings are often mentioned together as forming a succession of impious and tyrannical monarchs who oppressed Israel and were therefore foredoomed to disgrace and destruction. The verse in
IsaiahIsaiah is the main figure in the Biblical Book of Isaiah, and is traditionally considered to be its author. He was an 8th-century BC Judean prophet. Part of his message was: "The land will be completely laid waste and totally plundered. The LORD has spoken this word."...
xiv. 22,
And I will rise up against them, saith the Lord of hosts, and cut off from Babylon name and remnant and son and grandchild, saith the Lord, is applied by these interpretations to the trio: "Name" to Nebuchadnezzar, "remnant" to Evil-merodach, "son" to Belshazzar, and "grandchild"
VashtiVashti is mentioned in the Book of Esther, a book included in the Hebrew Bible .-In the Book of Esther:In Esther, Vashti is the wife of king Ahasuerus who is replaced by Esther...
(ib.). The command given to
AbrahamAbraham is the founding patriarch of the Israelites, Ishmaelites, Midianites and Edomite peoples, as described in the book of Genesis. He is widely regarded as the patriarch of Jews, Christians, and Muslims....
to cut in pieces three heifers (
Genesis 15:9) as a part of the covenant established between him and his God, was thus elucidated by readers of
Daniel as symbolizing Babylonia, which gave rise to three kings, Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-merodach, and Belshazzar, whose doom is prefigured by this act of "cutting to pieces" (Midrash Genesis Rabbah xliv.).
The Midrash literature enters into the details of Belshazzar's death. Thus the later tradition states that Cyrus and
DariusThe boy's name Darius \d-rius\ is pronounced da-RYE-us, DARE-ee-us. Etymologically it is an Iranian word with Greek s, and its meaning is "he possesses; rich, kingly"....
were employed as doorkeepers of the royal palace. Belshazzar, being greatly alarmed at the mysterious handwriting on the wall, and apprehending that some one in disguise might enter the palace with murderous intent, ordered his doorkeepers to behead every one who attempted to force an entrance that night, even though such person should claim to be the king himself. Belshazzar, overcome by sickness, left the palace unobserved during the night through a rear exit. On his return the doorkeepers refused to admit him. In vain did he plead that he was the king. They said, "Has not the king ordered us to put to death any one who attempts to enter the palace, though he claim to be the king himself?" Suiting the action to the word, Cyrus and Darius grasped a heavy ornament forming part of a candelabrum, and with it shattered the skull of their royal master (Cant. R. iii. 4).
The Sacred Royal Feast
Though the narrative and its details stand outside history, the setting of the feast at which the temple vessels from Jerusalem were desecrated has been remembered from actual Neo-Babylonian cult practice. In Babylon, the image of
MardukMarduk was the Babylonian name of a late-generation god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of the city of Babylon, who, when Babylon became the political center of the Euphrates valley in the time of Hammurabi , started to slowly...
was served meals daily in a style befitting the divine king, including musical accompaniment and beautifully-arranged desserts of fruits. After the god's meal, water in a basin was brought and offered to the idol to wash its fingers. According to several extant descriptions, the dishes of food that had been presented to the image were then sent to the king for his consumption. The food had been blessed by its proximity to the god, and the blessing was now transferable to the king. One exception is recorded, on a tablet from
UrukUruk was an ancient city of Sumer and later Babylonia, situated east of the present bed of the Euphrates river, on the ancient dry former channel of the Euphrates River, some 30 km east of modern As-Samawah, Al-Muthannā,...
, which mentions that the crown prince— this was Belshazzar— enjoyed the royal privilege.
The ritual importance of the god's sacred leftovers is illustrated in an inscribed claim of
Sargon IISargon II was an Assyrian king. Sargon II became co-regent with Shalmaneser V in 722 BC, and became the sole ruler of the kingdom of Assyria in 722 BC after the death of Shalmaneser V. It is not clear whether he was the son of Tiglath-Pileser III or a usurper unrelated to the royal family...
:
- "the citizens of Babylon [and] Borsippa
Borsippa was an important ancient city of Sumer, built on both sides of a lake about 17.7 km southwest of Babylon, on the east bank of the Euphrates. The site of Borsippa is now called Birs Nimrud, identifying the site with Nimrod...
, the temple personnel, the scholars [and] the administrators of the country who [had] looked upon him (Merodach-baladan) as their master now brought the leftovers of BelBel can mean:* Bel , a unit of ratio used in acoustics, electronics, etc. A derived unit of 1 decibel = 0.1B is often used.* Bel , a Semitic deity * Belenus aka Bel; a Celtic deity...
[and] Sarpanitu [of Babylon and] NabuNabu is the Babylonian god of wisdom and writing, worshipped by Babylonians as the son of Marduk and his consort, Sarpanitum, and as the grandson of Ea. Nabu's consort was Tashmetum....
[and] Tasmetu [of Borsippa] to me at Dur-Ladinni and asked me to enter Babylon"
-
- (Oppenheim, pp 188ff)
Idols of conquered cities were ordinarily brought to Babylon and set in positions of reverence to Marduk within his temple. The Jews, having no idol of YHWH, had been forced to give up the vessels of Solomon's Temple, which, it appears, were used to serve Marduk's sacred repast, ritually shared by Belshazzar.
Belshazzar in popular culture
George Friderich
HändelHANDEL was the code-name for the UK's National Attack Warning System in the Cold War. It consisted of a small console consisting of two microphones, lights and gauges. The reason behind this was to provide a back-up if anything failed....
's
BelshazzarBelshazzar is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel. The libretto was by Charles Jennens, and Handel abridged it considerably. Jennens' libretto was based on the Biblical account of the fall of Babylon at the hands of Cyrus the Great and the subsequent freeing of the Jewish nation, as found in the...
is an
oratorioAn oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. The oratorio was somewhat modeled after the opera. Their similarities include the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...
composed in the late summer of 1744.
Robert FrostRobert Lee Frost was an American poet. He is highly regarded for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloquial speech. His work frequently employed settings from rural life in New England in the early twentieth century, using them to examine complex social and...
's poem, "The Bearer of Evil Tidings", is about a messenger from Belshazzar's court. After learning of Belshazzar's imminent overthrow, the messenger flees to the
HimalayasThe Himalaya Range or Himalayas for short , meaning "abode of snow", is a mountain range in Asia, separating the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau...
rather than facing the monarch's wrath.
Emily DickinsonEmily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet. Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, to a successful family with strong community ties, she lived a mostly introverted and reclusive life...
's poem "Belshazzar had a letter," #1459 from the Poems of Emily Dickinson is about Belshazzar's immortal correspondence. Her poem was written in 1879.
William WaltonSir William Turner Walton OM was a British composer and conductor.His style was influenced by the works of Stravinsky and Prokofiev as well as jazz music, and is characterized by rhythmic vitality, bittersweet harmony, sweeping Romantic melody and brilliant orchestration...
wrote an oratorio entitled
Belshazzar's FeastBelshazzar's Feast is an oratorio by the English composer William Walton. It was first performed at the Leeds Festival on 8 October 1931. The work has remained one of Walton's most celebrated compositions and one of the most popular works in the English choral repertoire...
.
The Space
LinerAn ocean liner is a ship designed to transport people from one seaport to another along regular long-distance maritime routes according to a schedule. Liners may also carry cargo, mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes .Cargo vessels running to a schedule are sometimes referred to as...
Belshazzar, with the player character aboard, was disabled and boarded by Space Pirates in the early
CD-ROMCD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback, the 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data. CD-ROMs are popularly used to...
adventure game
Spaceship WarlockSpaceship Warlock was an adventure game created by Mike Saenz and Joe Sparks. The game featured arcade action and interactive dialogue, which enabled the player to type whatever he chose. The game was released in 1991 for the Macintosh and in 1994 for Windows. It was graphically ahead of its time...
.
Belshazzar was featured in season one episode two of the Nickelodeon game show "Legends of the Hidden Temple" entitled "The Golden Cup of Belshazzar". The Red Jaguars ran out of time in the Temple and was unable to win the game. The Golden Cup was located in the Shrine of the Silver Monkey.
Singer/Songwriter
Johnny CashJohnny Cash , born J. R. Cash, was an American singer-songwriter and one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century...
wrote a song titled "Belshazzar", based on the Biblical story. It was recorded at
Sun StudioSun Studio was opened by rock pioneer Sam Phillips at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee, on January 3, 1950. It was originally called Memphis Recording Service, sharing the same building with the Sun Records label business...
in Memphis, Tennessee in 1957.
The Jewish songwriter Harold Rome wrote, for the musical "Pins and Needles" in 1937, a gospel song, "Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin," which made the analogy between Belshazzar and Hitler, saying the former "didn't pay no income taxes:/The big shot of the Babylon-Jerusalem Axis." Interpreting the writing on the wall, Daniel sums it up tersely: "King, stop your fightin' and your flauntin'./You been weighed, and you're found wantin'."
During the
1884 United States presidential campaignThe United States presidential election of 1884 featured excessive mudslinging and personal acrimony. On November 4, 1884, New York Governor Grover Cleveland narrowly defeated Republican former United States Senator James G. Blaine of Maine to become the first Democrat elected President of the...
,
RepublicanThe Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the Grand Old Party or the GOP, despite being the younger of the two major parties. In the U.S...
candidate
James G. BlaineJames Gillespie Blaine was a U.S. Representative, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, U.S. Senator from Maine, two-time United States Secretary of State, and champion of the Half-Breeds...
dined at a
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
restaurant with some wealthy business executives including
"Commodore" VanderbiltWilliam Henry Vanderbilt was an American businessman and a member of the prominent United States Vanderbilt family.-Childhood:William Vanderbilt was born in New Brunswick, NJ...
,
Jay GouldJason "Jay" Gould was an American financier who became a leading American railroad developer and speculator...
, etc. This was featured in newspapers, with a drawing illustrating "The Feast of Belshazzar Blaine..." On the wall in the background was written "Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin."
In the early 1970s,
EsquireEsquire is a men's magazine, published in the U.S. by the Hearst Corporation. Founded in 1932, it flourished during the Great Depression under the guidance of founder and editor Arnold Gingrich.-History:...
magazine, in its "Dubious Achievement Awards" section one year, showed a photo of nuns wearing
habitsA religious habit is a distinctive set of garments worn by members of a religious order. Traditionally some plain garb recognisable as a religious habit has also been worn by those leading the religious eremitic and anachoritic life, although in their case without conformity to a particular uniform...
with short skirts, commenting "MENE MENE TEKEL UPHARSIN."
Robert E. HowardRobert Ervin Howard was an American author who wrote pulp fiction in a diverse range of genres. His most famous character — created in the pages of the Depression-era pulp magazine Weird Tales — is Conan the Barbarian.With Conan and his other heroes, Howard created the genre of...
, creator of
Conan the BarbarianConan the Barbarian is a fictional character in books, comics and movies. He is a hero, a well known and iconic figure in American fantasy, and the most famous barbarian in fiction.Conan is often associated with the fantasy subgenre of sword-and-sorcery and heroic fantasy...
, liked to incorporate historical names into his pseudo-historical stories. He wrote a (non-Conan) adventure story, "Blood of Belshazzar" which Roy Thomas adapted into a Conan story in Marvel Comics' Conan the Barbarian #27 as "The Blood of Bel-Hissar". Howard also used the name of 'Nabonidus' (father of Belshazzar) in the Conan tale "Rogues in the House" which appeared in Marvel's
Conan the BarbarianConan the Barbarian was a Marvel Comics title starring the sword-and-sorcery character created by Robert E. Howard. It debuted in Oct. 1970 and ran for 275 issues until Dec...
#11.
See also
- Biblical archaeology (excavations and artifacts)
- Cylinder of Nabonidus
The Nabonidus Cylinder from Sippar is a long text in which king Nabonidus of Babylonia describes how he repaired three temples: the sanctuary of the moon god Sin in Harran, the sanctuary of the warrior goddess Anunitu in Sippar, and the temple of Šamaš in Sippar...
- List of artifacts significant to the Bible
External links