Daniel 4:27

"Wherefore, O king, let my counsel be acceptable unto thee, and break off thy sins by righteousness, and thine iniquities by showing mercy to the poor; if there may be a lengthening of thy tranquility."

DANIEL'S GOOD COUNSEL TO THE KING

The thought here is not that the king's changing from his sins might avert the experience that had been decreed for him, but that the onset of it might be delayed, referred to here as, "a lengthening of thy tranquility."

Of course, "If righteousness is merely almsgiving or charity, then it is not Biblical righteousness."[36] Keil vigorously complained of a mistranslation here, declaring that:

Nowhere in the Old Testament does the expression used here refer to mere almsgiving or charity. It can only mean to throw away sins and to set oneself free from sins."[37]

The only way in which men may actually do such a thing is revealed in the New Testament, where is revealed to men for the first time the Sin Bearer, even Jesus Christ the Righteous, in whose name alone is salvation possible. Surely, as Young said, "It is a perversion of the text to force it to teach the doctrine of salvation by human merit."[38]