StrongerBible

din

דִּין

AramaicH1780judgment, court, ...

Appears 5 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Ezr 7:26Dan 4:37(34)Dan 7:10Dan 7:22Dan 7:26
Word studyDEENnoun

What din means

judgment in a courtroom sense: the court that sits to hear a case, the sentence it hands down, and the justice behind both.

TranslatabilityPartialCertaintyStrong

In the Aramaic parts of Ezra and Daniel this word belongs to the courtroom. It can point to the court itself as it convenes, to the decision that court hands down and enforces, or to justice as the standard behind a ruler's dealings. The three hang together: a case is heard, a decision is reached, and the decision shows what is right.

Daniel 7 gives the word its most famous setting. Thrones are put in place, the Ancient of Days takes his seat, and then "the court sat, and the books were opened" (Daniel 7:10). The Aramaic is compact: judgment itself is said to sit down, the way a judge does. The same wording returns in Daniel 7:26, where the court sits again and the boastful power loses its rule for good.

Ezra 7:26 is imperial rather than heavenly. Anyone who ignores the law of God and the law of the king is to have judgment carried out on him, and the penalties are spelled out: death, banishment, confiscation of goods, imprisonment. Here the word is the sentence and its enforcement, standing right beside the Aramaic word for the law already on the books (דָּת).

Daniel 4:37 stretches the word furthest. A pagan king ends his story by saying that all God's works are true and all his ways are judgment, which English versions turn into "just" or "right". The courtroom picture is still in the background: God's dealings are the kind that would stand up in court.

Nuances

1athe court in session: the judging body seated to hear a case
TranslatabilityApproximate
Dan 7:10Dan 7:26
1bthe decision handed down and carried out: a verdict or sentence
TranslatabilityApproximate
Ezr 7:26Dan 7:22
1cjustice as the settled standard by which someone acts
Dan 4:37(34)

What scholars say about din

The lexica treat Biblical Aramaic דִּין as the noun matching the verb דִּין / דּוּן, with a range running from judgment as an act to the resulting verdict or sentence and, by extension, to the tribunal in session (HALOT's Aramaic volume; BDB's Aramaic section; Vogt, s.v.). The same noun is well attested in Imperial and Elephantine Aramaic legal documents for a lawsuit or judicial decision, which supports the forensic reading of Ezra 7:26, where דִּינָה stands beside דָּתָא, the promulgated law. In Daniel 7:10 and 7:26 the phrase דִּינָא יְתִב is standardly rendered "the court took its seat", the noun standing for the judging body by metonymy; Collins and Goldingay connect the scene to older divine-assembly imagery from the wider ancient Near East. Daniel 7:22 is the one genuinely contested occurrence: whether דִּינָא יְהִב לְקַדִּישֵׁי עֶלְיוֹנִין means that the verdict was rendered in favor of the holy ones (the reading of most modern commentators, including Collins and Goldingay, and of most modern versions) or that the right to judge was conferred on them. The second reading is early: the New Testament echo in 1 Corinthians 6:2, and later Revelation 20:4, assume that the holy ones themselves judge. Daniel 4:37 is the one occurrence outside a judicial setting proper, where the noun functions as a predicate quality of God's conduct, close to the Hebrew usage of the cognate noun in the wisdom books.

Sources

  • HALOT, s.v. דִּין (Aramaic)lexicon
  • BDB, Aramaic lexicon, s.v. דִּיןlexicon
  • E. Vogt, A Lexicon of Biblical Aramaic, trans. and rev. J. A. Fitzmyer (Rome: Gregorian and Biblical Press, 2011), s.v. דִּיןlexicon
  • J. J. Collins, Daniel, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), on Daniel 7commentary
  • J. E. Goldingay, Daniel, Word Biblical Commentary 30 (Dallas: Word, 1989), on Daniel 7:9-14commentary
  • G. J. Botterweck, "dîn; dayyān," TDOT 3:187-194theological-dictionary

All attested forms of דִּין

c s determined

דִּינָא, דִּינָה

Dan 7:10, Dan 7:22, Dan 7:26, Ezr 7:26

c s absolute

דִּין

Dan 4:37