(19) One seven times.--It is doubtful whether "seven" is used here as a round number or not. According to the Babylonian mythology, there were seven demons, named "Maskim," who were the most formidable of the infernal powers. Perhaps the number "seven" has a reference to them, for the religious nature of the punishment favours the view that the overheating of the furnace was regarded as a religious act.

Than it was wont.--More correctly, than it was fitting. The improper heating of the furnace led to the death of the mighty men (Daniel 3:22).

Verse 19. - Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury, and the form of his visage was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego: therefore he spake, and commanded that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated. The text of the LXX. is practically the same as the Massoretic, with only this exception, that "one" is omitted as unsuited to the Greek idiom. Theodotion differs more from the Massoretic - "the furnace" was to be heated "sevenfold, till it was perfectly heated (ἕως οὐ εἰς τέλος ἐκκαῆ)." The Peshitta, retaining the "one," translates, "one in seven times" - a rendering which seems to have little sense, as the Syriac idiom is the same as that before us. The change of countenance, from that of gratification at seeing a favourite, to that of rage, is a perfectly natural phenomenon, but one possibly even more marked among these races then dominant over the East than among ourselves. It was certainly not unnatural that, heathen as he was, filled with the belief in the mysterious power for good or ill that might be exercised over the empire were any of the gods offended, Nebuchadnezzar should be enraged. The result is that the calmness with which he had previously spoken with the three deserts him, and the form of his face changes, his visage becomes distorted with rage. It may be noted, in passing, that the word here used, ish'tanni (אִשְׁתַּנִּי), is the only case where the ethpael occurs in Daniel; in all other cases the form is hithpael, with the ה instead of the א. Since this is so, one is inclined to credit the peculiarity to scribal change. There is a difference here between the Q'ri and K'thib, the latter reading ishlannu, which agrees by attraction with anapolu, "face," which, as in Hebrew, is plural. In order to express his wrath, he orders that the furnace be heated sevenfold hotter than ever before. The word here translated "wont to be" is really part of the verb חְזָה (hezuh), "to see." Behrmann renders it, "Siebenmal so stark zu heizen als man ihn heizen gesehen hatte" - "commanded it to be heated seven times as hot as ever one had seen it heated." We cannot suppose the Babylonians halt any means of measuring heat of that amount; it is simply a round number, Hitzig remarks on the recurrence of "seven," as if it helped to raise a presumption against the authenticity of the book. The fact that the Babylonians recognized seven planets, and seven gods of the planets, one for each, might as readily be taken as a proof of its authenticity. The probability is that vaguely many times more fuel was placed in the furnace than had ever been done before.

3:19-27 Let Nebuchadnezzar heat his furnace as hot as he can, a few minutes will finish the torment of those cast into it; but hell-fire tortures, and yet does not kill. Those who worshipped the beast and his image, have no rest, no pause, no moment free from pain, Re 14:10,11. Now was fulfilled in the letter that great promise, Isa 43:2, When thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned. Leaving it to that God who preserved them in the fire, to bring them out, they walked up and down in the midst, supported and encouraged by the presence of the Son of God. Those who suffer for Christ, have his presence in their sufferings, even in the fiery furnace, and in the valley of the shadow of death. Nebuchadnezzar owns them for servants of the most high God; a God able to deliver them out of his hand. It is our God only is the consuming fire, Heb 12:29. Could we but see into the eternal world, we should behold the persecuted believer safe from the malice of his foes, while they are exposed to the wrath of God, and tormented in unquenchable fires.Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury,.... Nettled at the answer given him; perceiving his threats made no impression on these three men, and that they were resolutely determined at all events not to obey his will:

and the form of his visage was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; not only to what it was in times past, when they were his favourites, and he smiled upon them; but with respect to what it was while they were under examination, and he was trying to bring them to his will; when finding it impracticable, fury rose up, and showed itself in the furrows and frowns of his forehead; in the sharpness of his nose; in his sparkling eyes, foaming mouth, and gnashing teeth, and that general redness his face was covered with:

therefore he spake, and commanded that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated; this seems to be a furnace for this purpose, and where it was usual to burn malefactors; it being a common punishment with the Chaldeans; see Jeremiah 29:22 the order was to put seven times more fuel in the furnace, that it might be so much the hotter, and burn so much the fiercer; which order of the king shows indeed the greatness of his wrath and fury, but at the same time that it had transported him out of his sense and judgment; since so fierce a fire was the better for the three men, supposing them to have died as he intended; who would have been the sooner dispatched by it, and so not suffer so much pain and torment as in a slow fire, or less heat; but this was overruled by the providence of God, that so it should be, that the miracle of their walking in it unsinged and unhurt, and their deliverance out of it, might appear the greater.