Daniel 1:12

Good News Translation

"Test us for ten days," he said. "Give us vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
“Please test your servants for ten days. Let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Hebrew Names Version
Prove your servants, I beg you, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

King James Version
Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

English Standard Version
"Test your servants for ten days; let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink.

New American Standard Bible
"Please put your servants to the test for ten days, and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink.

New Century Version
Daniel said to the guard, "Please give us this test for ten days: Don't give us anything but vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Amplified Bible
"Please, test your servants for ten days, and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Geneva Bible (1587)
Proue thy seruants, I beseeche thee, ten dayes, and let them giue vs pulse to eate, and water to drinke.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
"Please test your servants for ten days, and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Berean Standard Bible
"Please test your servants for ten days. Let us be given only vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Contemporary English Version
"For the next ten days, let us have only vegetables and water at mealtime.

Complete Jewish Bible
"Please! Try an experiment on your servants — for ten days have them give us only vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Darby Translation
Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink;

Easy-to-Read Version
He said, "Please give us this test for ten days: Don't give us anything but vegetables to eat and water to drink.

George Lamsa Translation
Test your servants for ten days; and let them give us vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Lexham English Bible
"Please test your servants for ten days, and let them give us some of the vegetables, and let us eat and let us drink water.

Literal Translation
Please, test your servants ten days. And let vegetables be given to us that we may eat, and water that we may drink.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
O proue but ten dayes with thy seruauntes, and let vs haue potage to eate, and water to drynke:

American Standard Version
Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

Bible in Basic English
Put your servants to the test for ten days; let them give us grain for our food and water for our drink.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
'Try thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

King James Version (1611)
Proue thy seruants, I beseech thee, ten dayes, and let them giue pulse to eat, and water to drinke.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
O proue but ten dayes with thy seruauntes, and let vs haue pulse to eate, and water to drinke.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Prove now thy servants ten days; and let them give us pulse, and let us eat, and let us drink water:

English Revised Version
Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

World English Bible
Prove your servants, I beg you, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Y biseche, asaie thou vs thi seruauntis bi ten daies, and potagis be youun to vs to ete, and water to drynke; and biholde thou oure cheris,

Update Bible Version
Prove your slaves, I urge you, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

Webster's Bible Translation
Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink.

New English Translation
"Please test your servants for ten days by providing us with some vegetables to eat and water to drink.

New King James Version
"Please test your servants for ten days, and let them give us vegetables to eat and water to drink.

New Living Translation
"Please test us for ten days on a diet of vegetables and water," Daniel said.

New Life Bible
"Test your servants for ten days. Give us only vegetables to eat and water to drink.

New Revised Standard
"Please test your servants for ten days. Let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
I pray thee - prove thy servants, ten days, - and let them give us vegetable food, that we may eat, and water that we may drink:

Douay-Rheims Bible
Try, I beseech thee, thy servants for ten days, and let pulse be given us to eat, and water to drink:

Revised Standard Version
"Test your servants for ten days; let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink.

Young's Literal Translation
`Try, I pray thee, thy servants, ten days; and they give to us of the vegetables, and we eat, and water, and we drink;

Contextual Overview

⁸ Daniel made up his mind not to let himself become ritually unclean by eating the food and drinking the wine of the royal court, so he asked Ashpenaz to help him, ⁹ and God made Ashpenaz sympathetic to Daniel. ¹⁰ Ashpenaz, however, was afraid of the king, so he said to Daniel, "The king has decided what you are to eat and drink, and if you don't look as fit as the other young men, he may kill me." ¹¹ So Daniel went to the guard whom Ashpenaz had placed in charge of him and his three friends. ¹² "Test us for ten days," he said. "Give us vegetables to eat and water to drink. ¹³ Then compare us with the young men who are eating the food of the royal court, and base your decision on how we look." ¹⁴ He agreed to let them try it for ten days. ¹⁵ When the time was up, they looked healthier and stronger than all those who had been eating the royal food. ¹⁶ So from then on the guard let them continue to eat vegetables instead of what the king provided.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

pulse to eat: Heb. of pulse that we may eat, etc. Pulse, zeroim denotes all leguminous plants, which are not reaped but pulled or plucked; which, however wholesome, was not naturally calculated to render them fatter in flesh than the others. Daniel 1:16, Genesis 1:29, Genesis 1:30, Deuteronomy 8:3, Romans 14:2

Reciprocal: Daniel 12:11 - a thousand

Cross-References

Genesis 1:10
He named the land "Earth," and the water which had come together he named "Sea." And God was pleased with what he saw.

Genesis 1:11
Then he commanded, "Let the earth produce all kinds of plants, those that bear grain and those that bear fruit"—and it was done.

Genesis 1:24
Then God commanded, "Let the earth produce all kinds of animal life: domestic and wild, large and small"—and it was done.

Genesis 1:26
Then God said, "And now we will make human beings; they will be like us and resemble us. They will have power over the fish, the birds, and all animals, domestic and wild, large and small."

Isaiah 61:11
As surely as seeds sprout and grow, The Sovereign Lord will save his people, And all the nations will praise him.

Mark 4:28
The soil itself makes the plants grow and bear fruit; first the tender stalk appears, then the head, and finally the head full of grain.

Luke 6:44
Every tree is known by the fruit it bears; you do not pick figs from thorn bushes or gather grapes from bramble bushes.

2 Corinthians 9:10
And God, who supplies seed for the sower and bread to eat, will also supply you with all the seed you need and will make it grow and produce a rich harvest from your generosity.

Galatians 6:7
Do not deceive yourselves; no one makes a fool of God. You will reap exactly what you plant.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days, e.] Here Daniel manifestly includes his companions, and makes his request for himself and them desiring that they might be tried ten days with different sort of food and drink, and see whether any alteration would be made in them for the worse; which was a proper time for such a trial; for in that time it might be reasonably supposed that their food, if it had any bad effect on them, would appear. Saadiah makes these ten days to be the days between the first day of the year and the day of atonement; but without any foundation:

and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink; instead of the king's meat, pulse, beans, pease, vetches, lentiles, rice, millet, and the like. The word d used signifies anything sown, all kinds of roots, herbs, and fruits; and, instead of wine, water; meat and drink, it may be thought, that persons of such birth and education had not been used to; and yet they preferred these to the king's dainties, by eating and drinking of which their consciences would be in danger of being defiled.

d מן הזרעים απο των σπερματων, Sept.; "de seminibus", Montanus; "de sativis", Cocceius.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Prove thy servants, I beseech thee, ten days - A period which would indicate the probable result of the entire experiment. If during that period there were no indications of diminished health, beauty, or vigour, it would not be unfair to presume that the experiment in behalf of temperance would be successful, and it would not be improper then to ask that it might be continued longer.

And let them give us pulse to eat - Margin, “of pulse that we may eat.” Hebrew, “Let them give us of pulse, and we will eat.” The word “pulse” with us means leguminous plants with thin seeds; that is, plants with a pericarp, or seed-vessel, of two valves, having the seeds fixed to one suture only. In popular language the “legume” is called a “pod;” as a “pea-pod,” or “bean-pod,” and the word is commonly applied to peas or beans. The Hebrew word (זרעים zēro‛ı̂ym) would properly have reference to seeds of any kind - from זרע zâra‛, to disperse, to scatter seed, to sow. Then it would refer to plants that bear seed, of all kinds, and would be by no means limited to pulse - as pease or beans. It is rendered by Gesenius, “seed-herbs, greens, vegetables; i. e., vegetable food, such as was eaten in half-fast, opposed to meats and the more delicate kinds of food.” The word occurs only here and in Daniel 1:16. It is rendered in the Vulgate, “legumina;” and in the Greek, ἀπὸ τῶν σπερμάτων apo tōn spermatōn - “from seeds.” It is not a proper construction to limit this to “pulse,” or to suppose that Daniel desired to live solely on pease or beans; but the fair interpretation is to apply it to what grows up from “seeds” - such, probably, as would be sown in a garden, or, as we would now express it, “vegetable diet.” It was designed as an experiment - and was a very interesting one - to show the legitimate effect of such a diet in promoting beauty and health, and the result is worthy of special notice as contrasted with a more luxurious mode of life.

And water to drink - This, also, was a most interesting and important experiment, to show that wine was not necessary to produce healthfulness of appearance, or manly strength and beauty. It was an experiment to illustrate the effect of “cold water” as a beverage, made by an interesting group of young men, when surrounded by great temptations, and is, therefore, worthy of particular attention.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Daniel 1:12. Give us pulse to eat — הזרעים hazzeraim, seeds or grain, such as barley, wheat, rye, and peas, c. Though a vegetable diet might have produced that healthiness of the system in general, and of the countenance particularly, as mentioned here yet we are to understand that there was an especial blessing of God in this, because this spare diet was taken on a religious account.