There are different kinds of worship; not all worship is divine worship—i.e., the type of worship that someone gives to God or a god. This is less apparent to those of us who speak modern English, because in our idiom the word “worship” now refers almost exclusively to the reverence given to a deity; unless we are using “worship” in an ironic or hyperbolic way, like saying that a young boy “worships the ground” a particular basketball player walks on. In older English, however, it was common to use “worship” in ways that clearly indicated reverence given merely to humans and not to God. In court, a judge could be addressed as “Your Worship;” and in the vows of a traditional Anglican marriage ceremony, the man pledged his fidelity to his wife with the phrase “with my body, I thee worship.”

This same phenomenon is also present in scripture. 1 Chron 29:20 records an instance where people worshipped God and king David simultaneously: “And all the congregation blessed Jehovah God of their fathers, and bowed down their heads, and worshipped Jehovah and the king.” Israel fell into idolatry many times in their history, but this was not one of them. This act of worship occurred right after Israel had donated thousands of talents of gold and silver to build the temple (29:6-8), and scripture says that “they offered [these things] willingly with a perfect heart” (29:9).

The Hebrew word for “worship” in this passage is שחה, which the LXX translates with the Greek verb προσκυνέω. Both of these words imply bowing or prostrating oneself in front of someone else as a sign of respect.¹ Although they can be used to describe bowing in worship before God/a god (Gen 24:26, Ex 34:14), these words also often refer to bowing in honor before a human—with no implication of divine worship at all (e.g., Gen 23:7, 33:3, Ex 18:7, Ruth 2:10, possibly Rev 3:9). So, it is possible to worship a mere human in one way (i.e., with reverence/respect)—and to worship God in another way (i.e., with divine worship)—while describing these two different types of honor with the same word “worship.”

For our purposes, different types of worship are relevant to Jesus’s status as God. On the one hand, the NT frequently shows people worshipping Jesus (often describing these acts with the word προσκυνέω); but this fact alone does not prove that Jesus is God, because many people in the Bible were “worshipped” in a purely human, reverential/honorific way. On the other hand, if we can show that Jesus received divine worship—the type of worship that only belongs to God—then this is a strong proof that Jesus is divine.

In a previous post I discussed how Hebrews 1 gives Jesus divine worship by applying passages from Psalm 97 and Psalm 102 to him. In this post I want to talk about Jesus’s status as the Son of Man—and what that means in the light of the book of Daniel.

Jesus as the Son of Man

Throughout the Bible, the phrase “son of man” is usually a poetic way to refer to a human being (e.g., Ps 8). That said, when the authors of the NT refer to Jesus—or when Jesus refers to himself—as the Son of Man, they are not using this phrase in its usual poetic fashion. Rather, they are making reference to a specific prophecy in Daniel 7:

• Mt 16:27-28—For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.
• Mt 26:64—Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. (See Mk 14:62)
• Lk 21:27—And then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. (See Mt 24:30 & Mk 13:26)
• Dan 7:13-14—I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

In Mt 16:13, Jesus refers to himself as “I, the Son of Man;” and in John 8:28 Jesus says, “When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye know that I am he.”² Christians should read Daniel 7 with Jesus in mind—because it is a prophecy about Jesus, and has things to teach us about him.

“Serve” in the book of Daniel

Most of the OT was written in Hebrew; but a couple small sections were written in Aramaic, and Dan 2:4b-7:27 is one of those sections. When Dan 7:14 says that all people, nations, and languages would “serve” the Son of Man, Daniel uses the Aramaic word פלח. Every other time that this Aramaic word is used in the OT, it refers to a particular type of “serving”—i.e., service given to a deity, whether that be to a false god or to Jehovah.

• Ezr 7:24—Also we certify you, that touching any of the priests and Levites, singers, porters, Nethinims, or ministers of this house of God, it shall not be lawful to impose toll, tribute, or custom, upon them.
• Dan 3:17-18—If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up. (See Dan 3:12, 14)
• Dan 6:16—Then the king commanded, and they brought Daniel, and cast him into the den of lions. Now the king spake and said unto Daniel, Thy God whom thou servest continually, he will deliver thee. (See Dan 6:20)
• Dan 7:27—And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.

This is strong proof that Jesus is God, because he receives the “service” that one gives to God or a god. Dan 7 does not describe generalized “worship” which human beings can also receive; rather, this passage is describing something that rightly belongs to God alone. If Jesus is not God, then “serving” the Son of Man would constitute idolatry, just as “serving” Nebuchadnezzar’s gods would have been idolatry for Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. But we know that Jesus is not a false god—and therefore he must be the true one!

The meaning of פלח is further clarified by the way this Aramaic verb is translated into Greek. In ancient Greek translations of Daniel, פלח is usually translated with the verb λατρεύω.³ According to BDAG, “In our literature” this word is used “only of the carrying out of religious duties, especially of a cultic nature.” Both in the LXX and in the Greek NT, λατρεύω consistently refers to worship that is given to God or a god. Ex 20:5 uses λατρεύω when it forbids serving idols; and Jesus uses it in Mt 4:10 when he rebukes the devil, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” The verb that Jesus uses to describe service belonging “only” to “the Lord thy God” is the very word that the Greek versions of Daniel consistently use to translate פלח.

All of this is uncomfortable for those who deny the deity of Jesus, and so they are at pains to explain these facts away. In what follows I will answer some objections to the above interpretation of Dan 7. I will use Troy Salinger’s blog article “Why Daniel 7:14 Is Not A Proof-Text For The Deity Of Christ” as a representative example of the sorts of objections that unitarians bring against the deity of Christ in this passage.

Objections regarding פלח

Troy (I hope Mr. Salinger won’t mind me using his first name) starts his rebuttal by pointing out that פלח technically does not mean “worship” per se, but is more correctly translated as “serve.” He notes that only a few translations render פלח as “worship,” while most translations prefer “serve.” Troy concludes, “if pelach [פלח] is a specialized word used only in reference to a deity, then it should be understood as service rendered to a deity, not worship rendered to a deity.”

From my perspective this is a bit semantic. The Christian claim is that Dan 7 shows Christ receiving a particular type of devotion; the argument does not stand or fall on the precise definition of פלח. Even granting that פלח does mean “serve” rather than “worship,” if we can demonstrate that Dan 7 is describing a type of “service” that belongs to God alone, then this still testifies to the deity of Christ. The “service” that one receives at a restaurant is different from the “service” God receives at church. The argument is ultimately over what type of serving פלח denotes—regardless of whether or not “worship” is an acceptable English translation of פלח.

Next Troy argues that the OT does not give us enough occurrences of פלח—or indeed, a large enough sample size of Aramaic—to determine the meaning of the term. “The Aramaic sections [of the OT] are Ezra 4:8-6:18; 7:12-26; Dan 2:4-7:28 and Jer 10:11, for a total of 268 verses. It is within this very limited setting that pelach appears ten times, once in Ezra and nine times in Daniel. But this is hardly sufficient to determine the meaning of the word.” Troy has a point here, but it does not successfully undercut the deity-implications of פלח in Dan 7.

On the one hand, less than 300 verses is admittedly not a sufficient corpus to determine a word’s semantic domain in any kind of detailed, lexicographical way. If we were arguing about the meaning of פלח per se, Troy would have landed a solid objection. On the other hand, the OT consistently uses פלח in contexts that entail serving God / a god. Surely this consistency must count for something. I grant that more instances of פלח would be ideal; but all the examples that we do have follow a consistent pattern. The argument is not necessarily about the meaning of פלח, but about how Daniel uses פלח. In other words, the Christian claim is not that פלח, as a word, always and only refers to divine service—but merely that this is how the OT unfailingly uses it. If Troy is going to argue that פלח means something different in Dan 7:14 than it does in the rest of the book, he should provide a contextual reason for this change. Otherwise, Daniel’s consistent use of פלח for divine service is ultimately left unaddressed—merely ignored. Without a contextual reason to support a different definition, why would we assume פלח means anything different in Dan 7:14 than it does everywhere else in the OT?

Building on his point about the small sample size of Aramaic in the OT, Troy suggests that we “must look beyond the limited use of [פלח] in the OT and the best place to look is in the Targums, which are Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible.” When we look at the Targums, Troy points out, we can adduce many examples where פלח refers to serving human beings. “This evidence clearly shows that the meaning of pelach is not limited to service rendered to a deity, but includes service rendered to men.”

Troy anticipates an objection to his use of the Targums, and so he attempts to defuse this objection in advance: “Now someone is sure to respond to this data by saying that the Targumic usage of pelach is irrelevant to the discussion because in the inspired Scriptures it has a specialized meaning, and we know this because in all of it’s occurrences in the OT it refers to a deity. But this is simply special pleading.” Troy has good debater’s instincts, trying to fend off this objection; because readers should object to his use of the Targums, but not for the reason he expects.

Troy says that the Targums are “the best place to look” for more information about פלח, and then assumes that what he sees in the Targums is representative of how פלח was used by Daniel (“in everyday usage within the culture and time in which it was written”). Setting aside Scripture’s ability to give a term a specialized meaning (a possibility I think Troy dismisses too casually), Troy has fallen into the trap of anachronism—i.e., using something that is chronologically out of place.

Modern critical scholarship dates the composition of the book of Daniel to the 2nd century BC. Because I believe that the book of Daniel was actually written by Daniel during the Babylonian captivity (a presupposition I suspect Troy shares), I would date the composition of the book of Daniel to the 6th century BC. Targum Onkelos, by contrast, was likely composed in the 2nd century AD and continued to be revised until the 3rd century.⁴ This means that there is at least a three-century gap between the composition of Daniel and Targum Onkelos; and it is more like a seven-century gap if we accept the biblical timeframe for the composition of Daniel.⁵

Troy asks, “Why should we believe that pelach acquired a special limited meaning within Scripture that it didn’t have in everyday usage within the culture and time in which it was written?” But his question is faulty, because it assumes a continuity of culture and of unchanging linguistic use that runs from the time of Daniel to the time of the rabbis. The examples he cites from the Targums simply don’t constitute “everyday usage within the culture and time” in which Daniel was written. Languages inevitably change over time; this much chronological distance should make us very cautious when using the Targums to uncover what פלח meant in Daniel’s day. The Targums can tell us what פלח meant in the 100s AD; but they are much less useful for determining what פלח meant seven centuries earlier—and they certainly don’t disprove the possibility that Daniel could use פלח to refer exclusively to service given to a deity.

The strength of the Christian interpretation rests in the fact that Daniel only uses פלח to describe service given to God / a god. Troy attempts to undercut this consistent pattern by pointing out an ambiguity in Dan 7:27. According to Troy, in this verse “pelach could refer to either the ‘Most High’ or the ‘people of the Most High.’” Consequently, “if we take v. 27 to be referring to the “people” of the Most High, then there is no reason to assume that pelach has a specialized meaning [of divine service only] in the OT.”

At first glance this objection seems strong, because there is arguably an ambiguity in the text. Dan 7:27 says that “all dominions shall serve and obey” לה; this masculine singular pronoun⁶ could be translated as “he” or as “it,” depending on its antecedent. The Christian interpretation understands לה as referring to the Most High. But עם (the Aramaic word for “people”) is also masculine singular, and so one could argue that עם is the proper antecedent for לה. If this is the case, then Dan 7:27 actually means “all dominions will serve it” (i.e., the people/nation)—not “all dominions will serve him” (i.e., the Most High). Such a scenario would prove that Daniel does not use פלח to exclusively describe divine service, thus breaking the consistent pattern of use on which the Christian interpretation rests. The Old Greek version of Daniel doesn’t help us here, being equally ambiguous: the masculine singular αὐτῷ could refer equally well to λαός (people) or ὔψιστος (Most High).⁷

Nevertheless, there is good reason to take לה as referring back to “the Most High,” not “the people.” Even though עם is syntactically singular, it is semantically plural—much like our English word “people.” When we refer to “a people,” we are talking about a single nation / people-group. But this one people-group is made up of many individual persons. One people is many people—if my reader will pardon the pun. Because of this, the word עם is regularly followed by plural verbs and pronouns. Although there are only one or two instances where this happens in the (admittedly small) Aramaic portions of the OT,⁸ Hebrew shares the word עם with Aramaic and uses it in exactly the same way.

• Dan 3:7—all the people (עם) heard (masc. pl. participle שמעין) the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and all kinds of music
• Jer 2:13—For my people (עם) have committed two evils; they have forsaken (pl. verb עזבו) me the fountain of living waters, and hewed cisterns for themselves (pl. suffix with preposition להם), broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
• Jer 5:14—I will make my words in thy mouth fire, and this people (עם) wood, and it shall devour them (pl. suffix).
• Jer 7:16—Therefore do not pray for this people (עם), neither lift up cry nor prayer for them (pl. suffix with preposition בעדם).
• Ezek 37:12—Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people (עם), I will open your (pl. suffix) graves, and cause you (pl. suffix) to come up out of your (pl. suffix) graves, and bring you (pl. suffix) into the land of Israel.
• Ezek 44:23—And they shall teach my people (עם) the difference between the holy and profane, and cause them (pl. suffix) to discern between the unclean and the clean.

I have drawn my Hebrew examples from the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, because like the book of Daniel they were composed some time in the 6th century BC⁹—so they are contemporary evidence for grammatical constructions surrounding the use of עם. But this is a common construction that can be found throughout the Hebrew Bible.

Admittedly this construction is not universal; there are times in the OT where עם is followed by singular verbs and pronouns. But the relative frequency of the above construction shows that it is reasonable to interpret Dan 7:27 as describing divine service given to the Most High, not human service given to people. In a later section, I will argue that contextual factors within the book of Daniel make “the Most High” more likely interpretation.

Thus far I have been responding to Troy’s rebuttals related to the Aramaic word פלח; in what follows, I will respond to his statements about the Greek word λατρεύω.

objections regarding λατρευω

In his discussion of λατρεύω, Troy begins with a concession: “I will admit that latreuo does seem to have attained a specialized meaning of service rendered to God. All 21 occurrences of the word in the NT are in reference to God, and in the LXX, all but one of the 89 uses of latreuo seem to be in reference to deity, unless, of course, Dan 7:14 be excepted.” Below I will return to the one exception he lists. For now, I want to dwell on the implications of the data Troy has just summarized nicely for us. Although Troy rejects the suggestion that פלח has a specialized meaning, he grants that λατρεύω does. This is a big admission.

I noted above that words can change meaning over time, and so we cannot assume (as Troy seems to) that פלח means the same thing in Daniel’s 6th c. BC as it does in the Targums’ 2nd c. AD. A consistent diachronic definition must be demonstrated, not assumed. But it is equally true that some words do maintain a consistent usage throughout time, and λατρεύω seems to be one of those words. In the 3rd c. BC, portions of the OT began to be translated into Greek; this process continued until the 1st c. BC, until what we now call the Septuagint (LXX) was complete. The NT was completed by the end of the first century. This entails three centuries of consistent use for λατρεύω; and we can expand that period a little further if we consider how λατρεύω is used in the so-called Apostolic Fathers.¹⁰ The LXX’s use of λατρεύω is so consistent that Chamberlain’s lexicon of the LXX does not even have an entry for it, but simply directs readers to BDAG—because the way the LXX uses λατρεύω is “essentially no different” from NT usage, but is “precisely comparable” in its sense.¹¹ BDAG, as I quoted above, defines λατρεύω as referring exclusively to “the carrying out of religious duties, especially of a cultic nature;” and Muraoka defines λατρεύω as “to perform religious, cultic services.”¹²

The use of λατρεύω in Dan 7:14 thus strongly implies that the Son of Man is God, because he receives divine worship which belongs properly to God alone. But in spite of his initial concession, Troy continues to reject the deity of Jesus and seeks to neutralize these implication in several ways.

Firstly, Troy suggests that λατρεύω can occasionally refer to serving human beings, and therefore does not always indicate divine service. To support this assertion, Troy cites Deut 28:48 as a lone example: “Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies (λατρεύσεις τοῖς ἐχθροῖς σου) which the LORD shall send against thee.” Even though this is the one and only example in the whole Bible (so far as I’m aware) of λατρεύω being used to describe serving humans, Troy emphasizes this verse: “This one undeniable exception, within the biblical data, to what seems to be the rule, should not be discounted; if there is one exception why couldn’t there be another?” But this objection is easily answerable.

For the sake of argument let us grant, at least initially, that Deut 28:48 really does describe ordinary service validly given to humans, with no implication of divine worship at all. Even if this is the case, this still does not necessarily cancel the deity-implications of λατρεύω in Dan 7. On the one hand, not every section of what is now the LXX was translated equally well; some books, in fact, are very rough Greek indeed. It is possible that the translator made a mistake. It takes nothing away from Dan 7 to recognize that the translator of Deuteronomy made an error. On the other hand, as noted above, the meanings of words change over time. It is also possible that λατρεύω had not yet developed its specialized divine-service-only meaning in the 3rd c. BC when the Pentateuch was translated—but this meaning had definitely solidified by the time Daniel was translated (probably in the 1st c. BC). The consistent use of λατρεύω throughout the Greek Bible makes this unlikely, but it isn’t unthinkable. If this is the case, I can grant that λατρεύω denotes human service in Deut 28:48 while validly insisting that λατρεύω denotes divine service in Dan 7.

These two possibilities—that the translator of Deuteronomy made a mistake or that λατρεύω had not yet solidified into its divine-service-only meaning when Deuteronomy was translated—both sufficiently explain Troy’s objection. But I prefer a simpler explanation.

Troy’s objection only works on the assumption that λατρεύω doesn’t denote divine service in Deut 28:48; but this is an assumption. Yes, humans are the direct object of λατρεύω in this verse—but how do we know Deut 28:48 doesn’t mean “You will serve your enemies as gods”? Humans were sometimes worshipped as gods in ancient paganism; pharaoh-worship in Egyptian religion furnishes a convenient example. Indeed, another example can be found in the apocrypha. Judith 3:8 says, “for he had decreed to destroy all the gods of the land, that all nations should worship (λατρεύσωσι) Nebuchadnezzar only, and that all tongues and tribes should call upon him as god (ἐπικαλέσωνται αὐτὸν εἰς θεόν).” This proves that λατρεύω can refer to divine worship even when a human being is the direct object.

Given the consistent use of λατρεύω in the Greek Bible, I think this is the most likely option. Troy assumes that λατρεύω in Deut 28:48 describes something other than divine worship, but he has not proven it; but this must be conclusively proven before this objection has any merit.¹³ This takes away Troy’s one and only example of λατρεύω allegedly describing human service. When Troy asks, “if there is one exception why couldn’t there be another?”—it is perfectly reasonable to respond, “Who says there’s even one?”

To help support his contention that λατρεύω can refer to human service, Troy quotes a few lexicons (LSJ, Thayer, TDNT) which define λατρεύω as referring to doing manual labor or working for hire for someone. But this is beside the point. As with פלח, the Christian claim is not that λατρεύω must definitionally always refer to serving God; rather, the Christian claim is that scripture unanimously uses λατρεύω for divine service. The contention is not over intrinsic definition, but over usage. I grant that “to work for wages” is one of the meanings λατρεύω can have; but this is irrelevant, because scripture never uses this definition. Troy has already acknowledged at the outset that λατρεύω has a specialized meaning in scripture; so why is he appealing to a definition of the word that scripture never uses? If scripture used λατρεύω even semi-regularly to refer to ordinary human service, then Troy would have a point here. But, as we have seen, scripture gives λατρεύω a secular meaning maybe once—or more likely, not at all.

As I said before with פלח: if Troy wants to argue that λατρεύω means something different in Dan 7:14 and Deut 28:48 than it does the other 110 times this word occurs in the Greek Bible, he needs to provide contexual arguments why this is the case.

Before going further, I need to clarify some points about Greek translations of the book of Daniel. Technically, there are two Greek versions of the book of Daniel: the so-called “Old Greek” translation (OG), and the translation made by Theodotion (Θ). As the name suggests, the “Old Greek” version is the older of the two and was completed some time before / during the 1st c. BC; whereas Theodotion lived in the 2nd century AD and probably produced his translation some time around 150. Although these two versions contain many similarities, they translate Dan 7:14 & 27 differently. The OG version translates Dan 7:14 with λατρεύω and 7:27 with ὑποτάσσω, whereas the Θ version renders both verses with δουλεύω.

Troy attempts to use the OG’s translation to undercut the meaning of λατρεύω: “Since v. 27 is the interpretation of v.14, then we should see the two verses as parallel. Therefore, the LXX translator is using latreuo and hupotage¹⁴ as synonyms, and since hupotage carries no connotation of worship or service rendered to a deity, then we should conclude that the translator used latreuo in the sense of submission, according to the lexical definitions shown above.” I agree that these verses should be taken as parallel, but Troy has his interpretation the wrong way round.

Troy assumes that ὑποτάσσω carries no connotation of divine worship; but this is not necessarily the case, as a moment’s reflection will demonstrate. When a person submits to God, this submission is different from the submission a person gives to another human being. So ὑποτάσσω can carry connotations of divine worship or divine service, depending on the context. Troy is assuming that ὑποτάσσω refers to mundane submission, and that this mundane submission should color our interpretation of λατρεύω. But once again, this is an assumption. It is equally possible that λατρεύω should inform our understanding of ὑποτάσσω; and given the consistent use of λατρεύω throughout the Greek Bible (a consistency Troy has already acknowledged), this is the more likely option. V. 27’s use of ὑποτάσσω doesn’t prove that λατρεύω refers to mundane service: v. 14’s use of λατρεύω proves that ὑποτάσσω refers to divine service.

Troy also attempts to leverage Θ’s rendering δουλεύω: “Theodotion’s use of douleuo also shows that latreuo is not the necessary translation of pelach, and unless one considers the LXX to be inspired and inerrant in its readings, its use of latreuo in v. 14 is not authoritative. The noun form doulos (Str. # 1401) refers to a slave or a servant, one who is in subjection to the will of another. This means that the better way to understand Dan. 7:14 (as well as v. 27) is not that the nations are rendering religious worship to the ‘son of man’ figure, but that they are made subservient to him, which fits well with what the OT says elsewhere of the Messiah {see Gen. 49:10; Ps. 2:8-9}.” A lot of what Troy says here is true, but it does not necessarily lead to the conclusion he draws. I am happy to grant that λατρεύω is not the only possible translation for פלח. It strikes me as the most reasonable choice, since the OT consistently uses פלח in the same way that the Greek Bible consistently uses λατρεύω—namely, to denote service to a deity. But yes, δουλεύω is another valid translation of פלח. That said, this does not support Troy’s case.

Θ’s use of δουλεύω would conclusively disprove the Son of Man’s deity if this verb referred exclusively to serving men. But it doesn’t, as Troy acknowledges: “This verb is used with reference to serving both God and men.” Since δουλεύω can refer to serving God (e.g., Matt 6:24//Lk 16:13, Acts 20:19, 1 Thess 1:9), we cannot simply assume—as Troy does—that it indicates mundane service in Dan 7. It is one thing to be a man’s δοῦλος, but it is something different to be God’s δοῦλος. Rev 22:3 states this truth powerfully but succinctly by using δοῦλος and λατρεύω together: “the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him (οἱ δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ λατρεύσουσιν αὐτῷ).” We serve God differently than we serve man, because serving God involves giving him divine service. Since δουλεύω can refer to divine worship in certain contexts, Troy needs to provide a contextual argument that it doesn’t refer to divine worship in Dan 7—but he doesn’t do this. He merely assumes mundane service, but this is circular reasoning.

For my part, given the parallel between Dan 7:14 and 7:27, I think that Θ’s use of δουλεύω actually bolsters the Christian claim about the deity of Jesus in this passage. As I noted above, the OG version of Dan 7:27 shares an ambiguity with the Aramaic original: the pronoun αὐτῷ (him/it) could technically refer to λαός (people) or ὔψιστος (Most High). But the Θ version does not have this ambiguity: Θ merely says ἁγίοις (saints), not λαῷ ἁγίων (people of the saints). Because ἁγίοις is plural, it does not agree with the singular αὐτῷ—thus leaving ὔψιστος (Most High) as the only antecedent. This lets us know that Θ uses δουλεύω in v. 27 to describe divine service given to the Most High. Since v. 27 parallels and explicates v. 14, and since v. 27 entails divine service, we should understand v. 14 as also denoting divine service given to the Son of Man.

Thus far we have refuted Troy’s objections concerning פלח and his objections concerning λατρεύω. In the next section, I will discuss a stylistic trend in the way Daniel uses terms like “kingdom(s),” “people(s),” “nation(s),” “language(s),” and “dominion(s).”

“Service” as one detail in a larger literary constellation

In this section, I want to highlight the way Daniel consistently clusters terms like “kingdom(s),” “people(s),” “nation(s),” “language(s),” and “dominion(s)” throughout his book in contexts which refer to serving or honoring Jehovah. I suggest that the use of these terms in Dan 7:14 is a literary technique which signals divine worship/reverence directed toward the one true God. Daniel’s consistent clustering of these terms works together with Daniel’s consistent use of פלח to denote that divine service is in view in Dan 7.

Let’s make some comparisons between Dan 7:14 and other passages in Daniel. The phrase “people, nations, and languages” harks back to

• Nebuchadnezzar’s command to worship the golden image in ch. 3
• Nebuchadnezzar’s proclamation that God was King of heaven ch. 4
• Darius’s proclamation that Daniel’s God was the true God in ch. 6

Admittedly, Daniel does use the phrase “people, nations, and languages” to refer to Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom in 5:19. But other parallels are limited to contexts involving God.

• 2:44 and 7:14 both refer to God setting up a “kingdom which shall not/never be destroyed” and use the the adjective עלם (everlasting/for ever)
• 4:3 refers to God’s “everlasting (עלם) kingdom” and his “dominion” and 7:14 refers to God’s “everlasting (עלם) dominion” and his “kingdom” (see also Ps 145:13)
• 4:34 and 7:14 both refer to God’s “kingdom” and say that God’s “dominion is an everlasting dominion”
• 6:26 and 7:14 both refer to God’s “kingdom,” refer to his “dominion,” use the adjective עלם, and describe God’s kingdom with the phrase “which shall not be destroyed”

This consistent usage should catch our attention. By consistently clustering these terms in contexts related to divine service, Daniel stylistically primes his reader to interpret these phrases as references to God. In other words, this repeated vocabulary becomes a literary signal or sign-post, indicating to the reader “what you are reading is about God and worship.”

This consistent literary motif provides a backdrop for Daniel’s equally consistent use of פלח. On the one hand, Daniel consistently uses פלח throughout his book to refer to divine service. On the other hand, Dan 2, 3, 4, and 6 have primed the reader to anticipate discussions about God when they see phrases like “all peoples, nations, and languages,” “everlasting dominion,” and “a kingdom which will never be destroyed.” Even if we grant that פלח doesn’t necessarily refer to divine service, Troy must also grant that it can refer to divine service; and the presence of this cluster of terms in 7:14 clarifies that divine service is definitely in view.

Conclusion

In the conclusion of his article, Troy said that “apologists should, for the sake of integrity, desist from using Daniel 7:14 as a proof-text for the deity of Christ.” Now that his objections have been refuted, I suggest the contrary: for the sake of integrity, deity-deniers should stop rejecting the deity of Jesus as presented in Dan 7. This passage presents a clear description of the Son of Man being worshipped/served as God. Unless Jehovah intends to turn “all peoples, nations, and languages” into idolaters—and to give “an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and a kingdom which shall not be destroyed” to an idol—then we must conclude that the Son of Man is himself God.

In this post I have endeavored to give a scholarly defense of the Christian interpretation of Dan 7, but this issue is anything but academic. One day Jesus will return from heaven as the Son of Man, coming on the clouds with his own glory and the glory of his Father. When that happens, the gospels tell us that it will be like it was in the days of Noah; Jesus will judge every man according to his work. When happens, “The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matt 13:41-42). Our understanding of Jesus will have eternal consequences; and so it is my duty to warn my readers that they must worship Jesus as God, lest they follow “another Jesus” (2 Cor 11:4) who cannot save.

Jesus is the Son of Man. Daniel says that we should serve him; and the service he describes is service that rightly belongs to God alone. It is my hope that all who deny Jesus’s deity will repent of this denial, and worship Jesus as the one true God.

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1. BDB s.v. שחה, “bow down, prostrate oneself, before a monarch or superior, in homage,” “before God, in worship.”
   BDAG s.v. προσκυνέω, “to express in attitude or gesture one’s complete dependence on or submission to a high authority figure, (fall down and) worship, do obeisance to, prostrate oneself before, do reverence to, welcome respectfully.” ↩︎
2. Many Christians assume that “I am he” here refers to the divine name I AM in Exodus 3:14. I tend to think that Jesus is saying something closer to, “After my crucifixion, you will realize that I am the Son of Man.” ↩︎
3. See here for a chart comparing the way פלח is translated in the Theodotion and Old Greek versions of the LXX. ↩︎
4. When Troy refers to the Targums, I assume that he is primarily thinking of Targum Onkelos because all of the examples he cites are from the Torah. ↩︎
5. This same objection would apply to the Peshitta OT (likely translated in the 2nd century) and the Peshitta NT (of which, the earliest extant versions date to the 5th century). ↩︎
6. Technically this is the masculine singular pronominal suffix ה joined to the preposition ל. ↩︎
7. But this is only true for the so-called Old Greek version of Daniel; more on this a little later. ↩︎
8. This is not to say that the construction is less frequent in the Aramaic sections because of some inherent grammatical reason. עם is often not the only subject in the sentence (e.g., Ezra 6:12), and so plural pronouns in those cases are not referring simply to “people” but also to the other subjects. In the above list I only give Dan 3:7 for an Aramaic example; I think Ezra 7:25 is another example, but it is ambiguous whether “those who know the laws” (masc. pl. participle יעדי) refers to “the people” or “magistrates and judges.” ↩︎
9. Technically, (portions of) Jeremiah could have been written in the late 7th century. ↩︎
10. E.g., 1 Clement 45:7 “they did not realize that the Most High is the champion and protector of those who with a pure conscience worship his excellent name (λατρευόντων τῷ παναρέτῳ ὀνόματι αὐτοῦ).” See also Ignatius, Letter to the Smyrnaeans 9:1 and Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians 2:1.
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11. Gary Alan Chamberlain, The Greek of the Septuagint: A Supplemental Lexicon (Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers, 2011), vii–viii. Chamberlain was not referring merely to λατρεύω specifically in these statements, but to all the most common words that the LXX shares with the NT. ↩︎
12. T. Muraoka, A Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint (Peeters, 2009). ↩︎
13. To clarify, I am not arguing that this is what the Hebrew text of Deut 28:48 means; it may well be, but this is not necessary for my case. Whether or not the LXX translated the Hebrew properly, the meaning of the Greek text of Deut 28:48 is the point at issue. ↩︎
14. Troy means ὑποτάσσω; he has mistakenly referred to the noun ὑποταγή from the same root. ↩︎