Long, long ago, when King Jehoiachim lived in Jerusalem, there lived a young man called Daniel. Daniel was young and clever and handsome, and he was a prince as well; or if he wasn't quite a prince, then he was something like a Lord. If he were alive today he'd have driven a Ferrari, or at least an MG.
He lived at the King's palace in Jerusalem with all his friends. Then one day, tragedy struck. The country was invaded by the Babylonians; and Daniel and all his friends were either killed, or taken to Babylon as prisoners.
But Daniel was lucky in a way, because the King of Babylon was so impressed by him - because he was so clever, and handsome, and well-educated, and basically the coolest thing on the planet, that he treated him, and his three friends, very well indeed. Except that they weren't free. And except for one other thing.
One day the vizier of the court at Babylon came to Daniel and said "What your name?"
"Daniel." said Daniel.
"Ha. What stupid name." said the vizier, who was called Ashpenaz.
"I give you sensible name instead. From now on you no longer called... Damien."
"Daniel." said Daniel.
"Yes yes. From now on you no longer called... Dominic ."
"Daniel!" said Daniel.
"Matters not." said Ashpenaz, his eyes looking dangerously mean and narrow.
"No more silly names. From now on you called sensible Babylon name. You called Belteshazzar. Got it?"
Daniel realized that Ashpenaz was dangerous as well as stupid, and agreed to humour him.
After three years, the King sent for Daniel and his friends, [who'd all been given Sensbile Babylon Names, like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego:] to see how they'd been getting on; and he was very pleased with them; especially because Daniel - sorry Belteshazzar - had the special gift of dreams and visions, and so he was very useful to the King, who had previously had had to rely on his own magicians, who weren't very reliable, because they only knew about horoscopes and palmistry and reading tea-leaves, that sort of thing.
Now one night, the King, whom you may recall had the very sensible name of Nebuchadnezzar, had a dream which frightened him very much [people then used to believe that dreams foretold the future.] So he called all his soothsayers, and magicians, and astrologers, and tea-cup readers, and said
"Have had very frightening dream. You tell me meaning of dream." And they all said that they would, and waited for the King to tell them the dream.
"Oh no." said the King. "I tell you dream, you make up meanings. Pah. Easy-peasy. If you any good, you know already what my dream. No need to tell."
Now it just goes to show what a useless lot they were that not one of them could tell the King what he'd been dreaming about. So the King gave orders for all the wise men etc. to be killed. But when Daniel heard about it, he sent a message to the King, and said that he could interpret his dream for him.
So the King called for him, and said:
"Right, Smarty Pants. What my dream about?"
And Daniel said "No one on earth could possibly know that. Only God knows." The soothsayers smirked into their tea-cups. But Daniel went on;
"And God has told me what your dream is...." Then he told King Nebuchadnezzar how his dream was about a great golden statue, with feet made of clay; and how a stone shattered the statue....and that all this meant that his kingdom was going to be smashed to pieces, and get taken over by another King.
Well the King was so pleased to have his dream explained that he didn't mind the bit about his kingdom getting nicked. In fact he was so pleased that he made Daniel his Prime Minister, and gave senior cabinet posts to his three friends.
Ever such a lot more exciting things happened to Daniel and his friends. The bit with the lions is specially good; but if you want to hear that, you'll have to come back ...another time.
Author: Roger Quick