Daniel or Danel [closed]

Question

These days I saw an exegete argue that the Daniel in Ezekiel 14:14 and 28:3 does not refer to the Daniel of the homonymous book but to Danel of the Epic of Aqhat, who according to the Book of Jubilees would be the father-in-law of Enoch. He supports this thesis on the basis that in Ezekiel 14:14 Danel appears among non-Israelite characters, Noah and Job. He also maintains that the Hebrew text has two constructions, a defective writing דנאל and a full דניאל because of the "Yud" and that the text in question is a qere, that is, written is Danel but the Masoretes want us to read Daniel being a proposal to camouflage mythological aspects present in the text by inserting a more historical figure, this is his thesis, this he decoded from the BHS that refers to Masorah Parva that appears in the qere. This being, what would this impact on the text since there is this character appearing in Jewish tradition as Enoch's father-in-law?

Answer 1

As this question is still open, I will attempt to explain the issue. In the comments, you expressed relief when I mentioned that I knew of religious (Orthodox) Jews who saw no problem with Daniel of Ezekiel being identified with the Ugaritic Danel. However, I will emphasize again that this does not solve the problem. Unfortunately, I can refer to several religious Jews who hold several theologically-problematic views, particularly with regards to Tanach. I do not know what their answers will be once confronted with the theological question. In some cases, they might perhaps state that the 13 basics of faith are simply the Rambam's view and that not all rabbis agreed with him (cf. Rabbi Yosef Albo who thought that Mashiach is not a basic of faith).

So, what exactly is the problem with Danel?

As I stated in the comments and as stated also by Rabbi Klein in the essay referred to by @Shmuel and stated by others as well, such as Rabbi David Shapira in his book "The Torah of Moshe and the Prophets" (תורת משה והנביאים), p. 268, Danel is nothing more and nothing less than the average Canaanite idolater. He worships Canaanite deities. And this is supposedly the person Ezekiel wants the king of Tyre and later readers to look up to? Very strange conclusion.

There are other flaws in this view as well. For example, the story of Danel has only been found on a single stone tablet so far. How does that prove that the story was popular enough that the king of Tyre, some 800-850 years later, knew it? Another flaw is that Danel is not described as a wise person. Only a single line may perhaps link him to wisdom, in that he was a fair and law-abiding judge who cared for the widows and the orphans. But law-abiding needn't necessarily equal wisdom.

As for the apocryphal Daniel, Rabbi Shapira wrote that the problem with the names that appear in the apocrypha is that many times they were invented by the writers. I don't know how he knows that, though. In any case, this Daniel seems equally irrelevant: He was Enoch's father-in-law, and that's it. We know nothing about his wisdom or any other character traits. Was he even a righteous person? How do we know the king of Tyre knew who he was?

And with regards to the specific person you're referring to, I have no idea what this person actually said/wrote about the Masoretes, but the Masoretes did not invent tradition. They assisted in setting a unified standard out of variant traditions. We may therefore assume that דנאל was the most common spelling in the Book of Ezekiel and דניאל was the most common pronunciation. So this is not some dark Masoretic conspiracy. It's something older. Perhaps it is difficult to argue that the דנאל referred to here is Daniel of the Book of Daniel, but it is also difficult and even problematic to argue that it is the Danel of Ugarit. Some have proposed that it's Daniel/Kilav, one of David's sons, but this is a very midrashic-based understanding and is also flawed. There are a couple of other Daniels mentioned in Tanach, though neither with the spelling דנאל. Either of these could also work just as well as the apocrphyal Daniel, given that they are only mentioned in one verse each and we only know a crumb of biographical info about them.
Who knows, it may very well be none of these and simply a person we are not familiar with from anywhere else in Tanach.

In short, both of these suggestions are flawed, as is the apparent claim that the Masoretes changed the way the text was to be read (strange that they didn't change the way the text was to be spelled!).

Answer 2

Let me give you an detailed look into some things you mention in the original question. This might not be an complete answer to your question, but I hope it will help getting there.

You observe:

Danel appears among non-Israelite characters, Noah and Job

Rashi explains in his commentary (ad loc.) that these three names are being stated here, because all three of them, were being saved because of their righteousness.

Back to the topic, one of the reasons why there is a difference between דניאל and דנאל, where it is missing a "yud". Rav Yehudah HaChossid, known for his work "Sefer Chasidim" in siman 194 writes:

אם נכרים יקראו לשום יהודי כשם אלהיהם אל יניח אליהם לקרא שמו כך שהרי כתב החכם אתה מדניאל מדנאל כתיב חסר יו"ד. לפי שמיחה דניאל לנבוכדנאצר מלעשותו אלוה ולא מיחה בו מלקרותו בלטשצאר כשם אלהיו:

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein explains in his thesis on this subject that:

the Bible wrote Daniel’s name as if it was spelled Danel because, although Daniel objected to Nebuchadnezzar making him into a god, he did not protest Nebuchadnezzar calling him Beltshezzar (Dan. 1:7). The name Beltshezzar includes a theophoric element which refers to the name of the Babylonian deity Bel, so Daniel was expected to reject that name, yet we never find that he did. As a result, explains R. Yehudah ha-Hasid, the Bible expresses its dissatisfaction with Daniel’s inaction by erasing the letter yod from his name whenever he appears in Ezekiel

(source: IDENTIFYING THE DANIEL CHARACTER IN EZEKIEL by Rabbi REUVEN CHAIM (RUDOLPH) KLEIN)

Rabbi Reuven Klein quotes R. David Cohen of Brooklyn and explains that Sefer Ezekiel was written in Hebrew, Sefer Daniel was written in Aramaic. In Hebrew, Daniel was written (is written) without an yud and in Aramaic, Daniel is written with an yud. (see: Ohel David, vol. 6):

ת צרה מנוקד הנ״ך בכל דניאל... חכם ״הנה כח-ג ביחזקאל מלבד היו״ד אל״ף. תחתה שהצרה מדנאל״ אתה נדון להיות רוצה אדם שאין ונראה הנקודה באה לא ומש״ה הקב״ה ע״י דיחזקאל וקרא ככה שהמובן באופן על שמרמז רש״י שם מש״כ פי על יל״פ לדניאל לעשות רצה שנבוכדנצר מעשה וא״כ שם עיין נתרצה לא ודניאל אלוה רצה שנבוכדנצר באופן בא דנאל ה

So, would the apochryphal statements be a problem to our tradition(s) and explanations? Well:

The Apocrypha isn’t Divinely inspired, and is therefore not part of the canon, and some of its works are even antithetical to Judaism. Other works may indeed contain some valuable information, but they aren’t given any more credence than any other book, and be aware that there have been various additions and deletions made throughout the ages.

Please note that your source isn't considered Jewish at all.