Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

DARIUS

(Heb. dārĕyāweš; O. Pers. darayavahuš)

1. Darius I, king of Persia 522-486 b.c.e. Darius, of uncertain lineage, came to the throne of Persia through suspect circumstances. His famed Behistun inscription claims a pretender attempted to take the throne from Cambyses, the son of Cyrus the Great, who had successfully conquered Egypt in 525. While returning to Persia, Cambyses died with mysterious suddenness and Darius, with the help of several Persian noble families, suppressed the pretender’s revolt. Following a favorable oracle denoting him as king, Darius proceeded to consolidate his rule over an empire plagued with unrest over succession to the throne. He was successful largely due to the support of the Persian nobility. In return, Darius is credited with establishing satrapies, large administrative clusters of smaller political entities, and installing members of the Persian nobility as governors (satraps) over these larger units. Provided with a measure of independence, the satraps nonetheless seemed comfortable in remaining loyal to the Persian court throughout Darius’s reign and beyond.

One of the Persian Empire’s more skilled administrators, Darius is credited by the Greeks with being a lawgiver. This may well be a reflection of Darius’ efforts at codifying existing legal customs in the various subject territories as he undertook the reorganization of an empire that had been created by the military prowess of his predecessors Cyrus and Cambyses, but whose legal and administrative status had been neglected. A well-known example of Darius’ concern for the social order of subject territories is the mission of the Egyptian collaborator Udjahorresnet, who records he was commissioned by Darius to attend to the reorganization of scribal schools among other significant tasks. In addition, Darius undertook an extensive campaign of public works in Egypt, including completion of the precursor of the Suez Canal.

Darius’ own military expansion of the empire was largely directed westward, and by 493 the Persians controlled all the Greek city-states of Asia Minor. Realizing that the free cities of the Greek mainland presented a continuing source of agitation against Persian rule in Asia Minor, Darius undertook extensive preparations prior to launching an extended campaign against the Greeks. In 490 a sizable force of perhaps 15 thousand Persian troops gathered on the plains of Marathon to do battle with a coalition of Greek forces. The battle was won by the Greeks, and the Persians withdrew with heavy losses, only to return several decades later under Xerxes I to renew the conflict with Greece. Marathon stood in the Greek consciousness as a symbol of Greek determination to remain free of foreign tyrants, though to the Persians it may have simply represented a minor reversal.

For the postexilic community of Yehud, the Persian administrative district surrounding Jerusalem, Darius served as a supportive figure in efforts to rebuild the temple. Ezra recounts how, despite returning to Jerusalem under Cyrus, work on the temple in Jerusalem did not begin in earnest until the second year of Darius’ reign, ca. 520 (Ezra 4:24). During that year, the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, working with Zerubbabel the governor and Jeshua the high priest, initiated a successful community effort to rebuild the temple which had been in ruins since the Babylonian conquest of 587. Local opponents of this effort petitioned Darius to have the work stopped (Ezra 5:6-17), to which Darius responded with a clear order upholding Cyrus’ earlier decree allowing for the rebuilding efforts and calling on his imperial officials to support the work (6:1-12). While the authenticity of portions of these accounts have been questioned, the general concern for proper procedure seems to be in keeping with Darius’ larger role of using legislation to administer an increasingly complex and varied empire.

Among Darius’ innovations was the introduction of imperial coinage, what the Greeks called the “daric.” He also established several new forms of taxation, placing the empire on a firm financial base. Darius engaged in building extensive palace complexes at Susa and Persepolis, emphasizing his complete control of royal power within the heartland of the Persian Empire. Following the defeat of the Persian forces in the Battle of Marathon, he apparently undertook extensive preparations for a new military effort against the Greeks. Darius’ death after 36 years of rule (and at an age beyond 60) brought these preparations to a halt until his son and successor Xerxes I could undertake a renewed attempt to defeat the Greeks.

Bibliography. J. M. Cook, The Persian Empire (New York, 1983), 50-182; M. A. Dandamaev, A Political History of the Achaemenid Empire (Leiden, 1989), 83-178.

Kenneth G. Hoglund

2. Darius II Ochus (423-404), son of Artaxerxes I; also called Nothus (“the bastard”) because his mother was a Babylonian concubine. Manipulated during much of his reign by Parysatis, his half-sister and wife, Darius managed to regain Greek cities in Asia Minor by siding with Sparta during the Peloponnesian War (431-404). He is mentioned in the Jewish Aramaic papyri from Elephantine.

3. Darius III Codommanus (336-331), grandnephew of Artaxerxes III. The last Achaemenid monarch, he suffered repeated defeats at the hands of Alexander the Great and the Macedonian forces (cf. 1 Macc. 1:1-8).

4. Darius the Mede, mentioned only in the book of Daniel. He is depicted as gaining rule over the Neo-Babylonian Empire in the wake of the capture of Babylon and the death of Belshazzar (Dan. 5:30-31). Called the son of a certain Ahasuerus and a Mede by birth (Dan. 9:1), he divided the kingdom into 120 satrapies administered by three “presidents” (6:1). It was this king who ordered Daniel into the lions’ den (Dan. 6:16). However, Greek and Babylonian sources indicate that it was the Persian Cyrus I who conquered Babylon, and extrabiblical accounts mention neither a Median king named Darius nor Median invasion of Babylonia. Some would identify this Darius with Nabonidus, the last king of Babylon and coregent with Belshazzar; or Cyrus I, perhaps confused with Darius I.

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

DARIUS

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)