And in all matters of wisdom and understanding, that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm.
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George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Diviners, or fortune-tellers.
Wise men. Septuagint, "philosophers. "(Calmet)
Hebrew Asha him, may come from the Greek sop hoi. (Grotius)
They had been educated three years, ver. 5. (Haydock)
For "soothsayers" and "magicians" the Vulgate edition [i.e., of the Septuagint] translated "sophists" and "philosophers"----terms to be understood not in the sense of the philosophy and sophistic erudition which Greek learning holds forth, but rather in the sense of the lore of a barbarian people, which the Chaldeans pursue as philosophy even to this day.
