5 - The renditions of Oratio Azariae and Canticum trium puerorum in Daniel

Summary

Among the broad divisions of the Old Testament poems of Junius 11, only the verse assigned to Daniel seems to preserve a single poem treating one main biblical source. The independent origins of Genesis A and B are securely established and, however it came about, the inclusion in Exodus of an excursus on Abraham's binding of Isaac in the poem's treatment of the Red Sea episode points to a multiplicity of scriptural models. The fidelity of Daniel to its biblical counterpart, by contrast, appears to be nearly complete, at least in the tally of major episodes. As we have seen in the preceding chapter, the poem recounts the fall of Jerusalem, Nebuchadnezzar's first dream, the ordeal of the three youths, Nebuchadnezzar's second dream and the fall of Babylon, all in the same general order in which they are encountered in Daniel I–V. The impression of unity in Daniel is encouraged by the poem's stylistic tendencies (notably the elimination of redundant material) as well as certain structural enhancements (for example, the concluding reminiscence of the plundering of Solomon's temple) which span the whole sequence of its verse. By and large, there seems to be little reason to question either the essential integrity of the text of Daniel as we have it or the unitary nature of its biblical exemplar.

There is, however, one conspicuous disruption of the preceding scenario. Daniel includes two distinct accounts of the rescue of the three youths in the fiery furnace. In the first of these accounts, the description of the angelic rescue precedes the prayer ascribed to the confessor Azarias: