But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days: but, lo, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me; for I had remained there with the kings of Persia.
All Commentaries on Daniel 10:13 Go To Daniel 10
Aquinas Study Bible
AD 2017
prince of the kingdom of the Persians: And we can not possibly doubt that this prince of the kingdom of the Persians was a hostile power, which favored the nation of the Persians an enemy of God’s people; for in order to hinder the good which it saw would result from the solution of the question for which the prophet prayed the Lord, by the archangel, in its jealousy it opposed itself to prevent the saving comfort of the angel from reaching Daniel too speedily, and from strengthening the people of God, over which the archangel Gabriel was: and Gabriel said that even then, owing to the fierceness of his assaults, he would not have been able to come to him, had not Michael the archangel come to help him, and met the prince of the kingdom of the Persians, and joined battle with him, and intervened, and defended him from his attack, and so enabled him to come to instruct the prophet after twenty-one days. (St. John Cassian) chief princes: By chief princes we are of course to understand archangels. (St. Jerome)
