Daniel: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel

Old Testament Message #15

by John J. Collins, Adela Yarbro Collins

The most comprehensive English-language commentary on Daniel in 65 years. Collins situates the Old Testament in its historical context and offers a full explanation of the text, especially its religious imagery.

Genres: Biblical Studies, Christianity, Religion, Theology, Reference

500 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1981

About the author

John J. Collins is Holmes Professor of Old Testament at Yale Divinity School. A native of Ireland, he has a doctorate from Harvard University, and earlier taught at the University of Chicago, and the University of Notre Dame. He has published widely on the subjects of apocalypticism, wisdom, Hellenistic Judaism, and the Dead Sea Scrolls and served as president of both the Catholic Biblical Association and the Society of Biblical Literature.

Reviews

[Luke Wagner · Rating 4 out of 5]

This small commentary on Daniel goes section by section rather than verse by verse. It is helpful as an introductory overview to the Book of Daniel, with special attention given to the genre, setting, and intention of each main section.

Along with the overview of Daniel, Collins offers a brief introduction to apocalyptic literature at the beginning of the book, which is one of the highlights of this small volume. For those wanting to go deeper into these subjects, Collins’ book “The Apocalyptic Imagination” and his full-scale commentary for Hermeneia on the Book of Daniel would be the places to go.

[Fred Kohn · Rating 5 out of 5]

[Jan 24, 2016] Another excellent entry into this excellent series. The only lack I think these books have is that they do not compile the entire translation at the beginning of the book, as is the custom of some other commentaries.

[Edit May 9, 2025]: So this is the first Hermeneia commentary that I have added to my personal library. I got it mainly as a reference work as I keep getting drawn into conversations about Daniel in the religious Facebook groups I am in, especially about the identities of the four kingdoms in chapters 2 and 7 and the 70 weeks prophecy in chapter 9. But in reading this commentary again many years later I was surprised to find myself being drawn into discussion of the court tales in chapters 1-6 and how they relate to each other and to the rest of the book.

Compared to the Hermeneia commentary I recently read on Jubilees, the introduction to Daniel was comparatively longer. (In absolute terms the introduction to Daniel was only slightly longer but the Daniel commentary was only about 450 pages compared to over 1200 pages for the Jubilees commentary). I attributed this longer introduction to a more complex interpretive history for Daniel as compared to Jubilees, which did not and does not play as significant a role in interpretation. Hence there was a lengthy discussion of Jewish interpretation of Daniel and a very long discussion of Christian interpretation of Daniel. Collins had little to say about modern conservative interpretation of Daniel. In the commentary, he didn’t go out of his way to refute conservative interpretation but he did point out at numerous points that the conservative interpretation was not tenable.

I was surprised to find that this volume included commentary on the additions to Daniel. It just goes to show how unreliable memory is, at least my memory! You would think I would remember something like that.

At any rate I am quite happy to have this book in my library. If I have any complaint it is that the books in this series are rather cumbersome. The book jacket had a tendency to slip off which was rather annoying. I am now grateful for the way libraries that have loaned me books in this series have prepared them, covering the jackets with plastic and taping them. This makes them easier to handle.

[B.G. Brainard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very comprehensive commentary on the Book of Daniel. I especially like his translation work and his detailed description of the setting and function for each chapter. But what I found most valuable for my biblical research is his detailed commentary on each unit and verse.

[Denise · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book provides a thorough insight into the context in which Daniel was written.