Daniel 8:18

18 While he was speaking, I fainted and lay there with my face to the ground. But Gabriel roused me with a touch and helped me to my feet.

Daniel 8:18 Meaning and Commentary

Daniel 8:18

Now as he was speaking with me
Addressing him in the above manner: I was in a deep sleep on my face toward the ground;
through fear he fell prostrate to the ground, and swooned away, which issued in a deep sleep; and so was unfit to attend to the explanation of the vision the angel was sent to give him; and which was not through indifference to it, or neglect of it; but through human weakness, his nature not being able to bear up under such circumstances, which struck him with such fear and dread: but he touched me, and set me upright;
he jogged him out of his sleep, and took him, and raised him up, and set him on his feet; or, "on his standing" ^F13; which Ben Melech explains, as he "was standing at first"; and so in a better posture to attend to what was about to be revealed unto him.

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FOOTNOTES:

F13 (ydme le) "super stare meum", Montanus, Gejerus; "super stationem meam", Michaelis.

Daniel 8:18 In-Context

16 And I heard a human voice calling out from the Ulai River, “Gabriel, tell this man the meaning of his vision.”

17 As Gabriel approached the place where I was standing, I became so terrified that I fell with my face to the ground. “Son of man,” he said, “you must understand that the events you have seen in your vision relate to the time of the end.”

18 While he was speaking, I fainted and lay there with my face to the ground. But Gabriel roused me with a touch and helped me to my feet.

19 Then he said, “I am here to tell you what will happen later in the time of wrath. What you have seen pertains to the very end of time.

20 The two-horned ram represents the kings of Media and Persia.