Commentary on Daniel

Ammonius of Alexandria

The prophet teaches us that fasting is a great virtue and so too is affliction with prayer. Through these things sometimes a person is deemed worthy even of visions.

[The Hebrew word] baddim means an intricately woven cloak, just as believers, whom Christ wears as a robe, are eminent in the weave of virtues. God puts on the faithful and girds them with the precious and pure gospel so that they might believe in the resurrection. For Orphaz means "pure."

"I was left alone." The unbelievers do not know Christ and flee, while the faithful will see him, since they are illuminated by him, even as faithful Daniel was.

The hand indicates partial knowledge of the truth of the gospel. For Christ is the one who will raise the whole human race.

"Like the Son of man." He foresees the incarnation of the Only Begotten and calls him the Son of man, the one who was to be born of holy Mary and made human. "And my insides churned." Since life is compared with a wheel, the one who lives among the saints, that is, the soul being directed in this life, ought to leave behind the evils here below and ought to bring up good things, that is, good deeds, from the earthly realm to the sublime and heavenly.

See also

• More works by Ammonius of Alexandria

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