Daniel 1:8 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

But Daniel purposed that he would not defile himself The defilement here alluded to might arise either from the food being such as was prohibited in the law of Moses, or else what was offered to the idols of the Chaldees, or entreated to be blessed in their names: see 2 Corinthians 8:10; 2 Corinthians 8:20. With the portion of the king's meat It was the custom of most nations, before their meals, to make an oblation of some part of what they ate and drank to their gods, as a thankful acknowledgment that every thing which they enjoyed was their gift; so that every entertainment had something in it of the nature of a sacrifice. This practice, generally prevailing, might make Daniel and his friends look upon the provisions coming from the king's table as no better than meats offered to idols, and therefore to be accounted unclean, or polluted: see the margin. Nor with the wine which he drank Though wine was not prohibited in the Levitical law, yet Daniel might wish to abstain from it, chiefly from motives of temperance; or because it came from an entertainment wherein a libation was made of it to idols, he might think himself obliged to abstain from motives of conscience: see Wintle and Lowth.