The Prayer of Nabonidus (4Q242)
Four Aramaic fragments tell how Nabonidus suffered seven years at Teima and was healed after an exiled Jewish diviner taught him to honor the Most High God, closely paralleling but not duplicating Daniel 4.
- Artifact date
- Late first century BC copy
- Findspot
- Qumran Cave 4
- Current location
- Israel Antiquities Authority collections
What archaeologists can actually examine
4Q242 preserves fewer than eighty complete or partial Aramaic words from a first-person prayer attributed to Nabonidus, the last Neo-Babylonian king. He reports a seven-year affliction at Teima, prayer to gods of precious materials, and instruction by a Jewish diviner or exorcist from the exiles. These motifs strongly resemble Daniel 4's royal affliction, restoration, and confession of divine sovereignty, but the king, location, disease, and mediator differ. The manuscript witnesses a related Jewish story tradition; it does not prove direct copying in either direction.
Nabonidus and Teima are explicit
The preserved names align the tale with a real Babylonian king and his historically known Arabian residence.
Daniel 4 has close but nonidentical parallels
Royal affliction, seven years, Jewish mediation, and confession overlap while king, disease, place, and plot differ.
The text is extremely fragmentary
Four fragments preserve under eighty words, making major reconstructions editorial hypotheses rather than continuous text.
Historical setting is not historical proof
Independent evidence for Teima does not confirm the prayer's disease, healer, or conversion narrative.
Follow the evidence from discovery to debate
Move through the find in a deliberate order: establish its provenance, examine the surviving object, place it in time, and then weigh the scholarly interpretation.
How the find came to light
The fragments were recovered from Qumran Cave 4 and first published by Józef Milik before John Collins prepared the official DJD edition. Four pieces were arranged into a partial opening, yet joins and line reconstructions remain debated because so little survives. Identification of Nabonidus and Teima immediately invited comparison with cuneiform evidence for the king's long Arabian residence and with Daniel 4. Subsequent studies have repeatedly reexamined a handful of damaged letters, demonstrating how grammatical restoration can change the imagined illness, speaker, and narrative sequence.
What you are looking at
The object is a fragmentary leather manuscript in Aramaic, not a royal inscription issued by Nabonidus. Its first-person literary voice presents a king's retrospective confession. Surviving words refer to Nabonidus, Teima, seven years, an evil disease, prayer, gods of gold and silver and related materials, and a Jewish exile who explains forgiveness or healing. Missing edges interrupt nearly every line. Brackets in editions represent restoration, and translations that read a complete polished narrative can conceal how much wording and syntax have been supplied by editors.
Where it belongs in history
The copy is normally dated palaeographically to the late first century BCE, while the composition may be older. Nabonidus ruled Babylon in the sixth century BCE and spent roughly a decade at Teima, a historical setting independently known from cuneiform sources, but those sources do not record the seven-year disease narrated here. The prayer belongs to Second Temple Jewish retelling of foreign kings brought to recognize Israel's God. Its Qumran preservation does not establish that the yahad composed it or treated it as Scripture.
Consensus, questions, and debate
Most scholars accept a meaningful relationship between 4Q242 and Daniel 4, but proposals range from common oral tradition to literary dependence in either direction. The historically appropriate Nabonidus and Teima have encouraged claims that the prayer preserves an earlier story later transferred to Nebuchadnezzar, yet manuscript date does not date the tale automatically. Takuma Sugie argues for branching developments of an affliction tradition. Recent fragment studies warn that disease terminology, divine agency, and the Jewish figure's action remain sensitive to disputed restorations.
The biblical record beside the artifact
Daniel 4:19-37 tells of Nebuchadnezzar's divinely imposed humiliation for seven periods, subsequent restoration, and praise of the Most High. 4Q242 instead names Nabonidus, locates his affliction at Teima, describes an evil bodily condition, and introduces a Jewish exile who interprets the episode. Shared sevenfold duration, royal confession, idolatrous materials, and Jewish mediation demonstrate literary kinship. The differences matter equally: the scroll neither names Daniel nor preserves the tree dream and bestial transformation central to the canonical chapter.
Daniel 4:19–37
19¶ Then Daniel, whose name [was] Belteshazzar, was astonied for one hour, and his thoughts troubled him. The king spake, and said, Belteshazzar, let not the dream, or the interpretation thereof, trouble thee. Belteshazzar answered and said, My lord, the dream [be] to them that hate thee, and the interpretation thereof to thine enemies.
20The tree that thou sawest, which grew, and was strong, whose height reached unto the heaven, and the sight thereof to all the earth;
21Whose leaves [were] fair, and the fruit thereof much, and in it [was] meat for all; under which the beasts of the field dwelt, and upon whose branches the fowls of the heaven had their habitation:
22It [is] thou, O king, that art grown and become strong: for thy greatness is grown, and reacheth unto heaven, and thy dominion to the end of the earth.
23And whereas the king saw a watcher and an holy one coming down from heaven, and saying, Hew the tree down, and destroy it; yet leave the stump of the roots thereof in the earth, even with a band of iron and brass, in the tender grass of the field; and let it be wet with the dew of heaven, and [let] his portion [be] with the beasts of the field, till seven times pass over him;
24This [is] the interpretation, O king, and this [is] the decree of the most High, which is come upon my lord the king:
25That they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field, and they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and they shall wet thee with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass over thee, till thou know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
26And whereas they commanded to leave the stump of the tree roots; thy kingdom shall be sure unto thee, after that thou shalt have known that the heavens do rule.
27Wherefore, O king, let my counsel be acceptable unto thee, and break off thy sins by righteousness, and thine iniquities by shewing mercy to the poor; if it may be a lengthening of thy tranquillity.
28¶ All this came upon the king Nebuchadnezzar.
29At the end of twelve months he walked in the palace of the kingdom of Babylon.
30The king spake, and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?
31While the word [was] in the king’s mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, [saying], O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee.
32And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling [shall be] with the beasts of the field: they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall pass over thee, until thou know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
33The same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar: and he was driven from men, and did eat grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagles’ [feathers], and his nails like birds’ [claws].
34And at the end of the days I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up mine eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the most High, and I praised and honoured him that liveth for ever, whose dominion [is] an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom [is] from generation to generation:
35And all the inhabitants of the earth [are] reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and [among] the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?
36At the same time my reason returned unto me; and for the glory of my kingdom, mine honour and brightness returned unto me; and my counsellors and my lords sought unto me; and I was established in my kingdom, and excellent majesty was added unto me.
37Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, all whose works [are] truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.
A responsible historical conclusion
The Prayer of Nabonidus opens a window onto the workshop of biblical tradition. A recognizable royal-humiliation story circulated with different kings, settings, symptoms, and theological emphases before the surviving Qumran copy. That helps readers treat Daniel 4 as literature embedded in a wider Jewish memory of Babylon rather than as an isolated tale. The scroll also shows how an actual royal absence at Teima could be reshaped into confession of the Most High, while preserving a clear boundary between historical datum and theological narrative.
Authoritative sources
Institutional catalogs, excavation reports, and academic publications let you examine the evidence beyond this summary.
4Q Prayer of Nabonidus
Israel Antiquities Authority, Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital LibraryOfficial catalog and photographic record for the four manuscript fragments.
The Prayer of Nabonidus
Cambridge University PressDedicated scholarly treatment of the text, reconstruction, and relationship with Daniel 4.
Nabonidus and the Curse of the Moon-God: On the Relationship between Daniel 4 and the Prayer of Nabonidus
The Society for Near Eastern Studies in Japan / J-STAGEPeer-reviewed analysis of competing developmental relationships between Nabonidus tradition and Daniel 4.
Making Sense of Fragmentary Qumran Aramaic Texts: Two Case Studies
The Biblical AnnalsRecent technical discussion of how damaged grammar and genre constrain reconstruction of 4Q242.