The Prayer of Azariah and the Song of the Three Holy Children is a lengthy passage that appears after Daniel 3:23 in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Bibles, as well as in the ancient Greek Septuagint translation. It is listed as non-canonical in Article VI of the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England.[1] The passage is omitted from Protestant Bibles as an apocryphal addition.
The passage includes the penitential prayer of Azariah (Abednego in Babylonian; see Daniel 1:6-7) while the three youths were in the fiery furnace; a brief account of the angel who met them in the furnace; and the hymn of praise they sang when they realized they were delivered.
The "Song of the Three Holy Youths" is part of the hymn called a canon sung during the Matins and other services in Orthodoxy. It can be found in the Church of England Book of Common Prayer as the canticle called the "Benedicite." It is also an optional song for Matins in Lutheran liturgies.
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Texts and Origin
The Prayer and accompanying Song are not found in the Hebrew/Aramaic text of the Book of Daniel, nor are they cited in any extant ancient Jewish writings. However, the passage does appear in certain ancient witnesses, notably the Greek, Syriac, and Latin.
The origins of these writings are obscure. Whether the accounts were originally composed in Hebrew (or Aramaic) or in Greek is uncertain, although many modern scholars conclude on the basis of textual evidence that there was probably an original Semitic edition. The date of composition of these documents is also uncertain, although many scholars favor a date either in the second or first century B.C.
References
See also
External links
- Daniel 3:23-91 in the NAB
- Daniel 3:23-24 in the NIV, a translation lacking this section for comparison.
- Text and commentary in the NETBIBLE
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