Daniel 6:15. Know, O king, that the law of the Medes and Persians is, That no decree nor statute which the king establisheth may be changed.
See also verses 8 and 12.
1. Lowth (W.) calls attention to an illustration of court etiquette contained in this text as compared with Esther 1:19. Here the expression “Medes and Persians” is used, the Medes being named first because Darius was a Mede. In the other instance, in the book of Esther, the expression is “Persians and Medes,” Persians being named first out of compliment to Ahasuerus, who was a Persian.
2. The strict etiquette of the Persian court obliged the king never to revoke an order once given, however much he might regret it, because in so doing he would contradict himself, and, according to Persian notions, the law could not contradict itself. A curious instance of the unchangeable character of the Medo-Persian law is here seen in the fact that, after Ahasuerus had issued the order directing the cruel slaughter of the Jews, (Esther 3:13) he would not reverse it, even at the urgent request of his queen (Esther 8:5), but he issued another edict in which he granted the Jews permission “to gather themselves together, and to stand for their life” (Esther 8:11). Thus the first irreversible edict was ‘completely neutralized by another just as irreversible as itself; and the king continued to act his part as a character but little short of divinely: infallible, immutable, and wholly free from the weakness of repentance!