Daniel 5:1-9

King Belshazzar gave a big banquet for a thousand royal guests and drank wine with them. As Belshazzar was drinking his wine, he gave orders to bring the gold and silver cups that his ancestor Nebuchadnezzar had taken from the Temple in Jerusalem. This was so the king, his royal guests, his wives, and his slave women could drink from those cups. So they brought the gold cups that had been taken from the Temple of God in Jerusalem. And the king and his royal guests, his wives, and his slave women drank from them. As they were drinking, they praised their gods, which were made from gold, silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone. Suddenly the fingers of a person’s hand appeared and began writing on the plaster of the wall, near the lampstand in the royal palace. The king watched the hand as it wrote. King Belshazzar was very frightened. His face turned white, his knees knocked together, and he could not stand up because his legs were too weak. The king called for the magicians, wise men, and wizards of Babylon and said to them, “Anyone who can read this writing and explain it will receive purple clothes fit for a king and a gold chain around his neck. And I will make that person the third highest ruler in the kingdom.” Then all the king’s wise men came in, but they could not read the writing or tell the king what it meant. King Belshazzar became even more afraid, and his face became even whiter. His royal guests were confused.