OG Daniel 11:37 – Mighty nations subject to him?
The Old Greek adds a detail to this verse which is not found in the Hebrew version of Daniel.
It adds:
‘and mighty nations will be subjected to him’.
It’s not clear whether this was added to the Old Greek, or whether it was lost from the Hebrew. We can speculate, though.
It’s not obviously true that ‘mighty nations’ came under Antiochus IV’s control. Yes, he ruled over several kingdoms, but these were all small. He did have some temporary wins, most famously over Egypt, but that’s all it was, temporary. He also subjugated Armenia. But that’s really it.
Just to the west we have the massive Roman Empire, which could arguably be describes as ruling over ‘mighty nations’. The Seleucid Empire, in comparison, was a regional power at best.
When we combine this with the fact that the same words don’t appear in the Hebrew, nor in Theodotion’s 2nd century translation, we can reasonably suspect that these words may not be original. Perhaps this is a later addition to the Old Greek text, perhaps even a marginal note that got interpolated into the text. Maybe some later group interpreted the prophecy very differently, and added this detail to the margin, which was later accidentally copied into the text.
We don’t know.