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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Children = Youths.
cunning = skilful.
in the king's palace. The Inscriptions show that there was a palace school with elaborate arrangements for special education. See below on "Chaldeans", and notes on Dan_2:2.
learning = character, or books. See Prof. Sayce's Babylonian Literature: which shows the existence of a huge literature and famous libraries, in which were arrangements for procuring books from the librarian as in our own day. These books related to all subjects, and were classified according to their subjects (pp. 12-14).
tongue. This was a special and important department.
Chaldeans. A name not peculiar to Daniel. From Genesis onward it is met with, especially in Jeremiah. They were distinct from the Babylonians (Jer_22:25. Eze_23:23), and belonged to South Babylonia. Used here of a special class, well known as such at that time (Compare Dan_2:2, Dan_2:4, Dan_2:5, Dan_2:10), and distinct also from other learned classes (Dan_2:4). The word (Hebrew. Chasdim) is used also in the wider sense of a nationality (Dan_5:30). See Dr. Pinches on The Old Testament, p. 371; Rawlinson's History of Herodotus, vol. i; pp 255, 256; and Lenormant's The Ancient History of the East, i. pp. 493-5.