Then all the king's wise men came in, but they could not read the writing or tell the king the interpretation. The narrative confirms the expected failure: despite being summoned to interpret, the wise men cannot even read the writing, let alone explain it. This universal inability—all the king's wise men came in, but they could not—establishes the writing as resistant to human interpretation. The writing may be in a language the wise men do not know, or it may be deliberately obscured so that only God's chosen interpreter can understand it. The failure of all Babylon's wise men creates jeopardy for them (what happens to those who cannot deliver the promised interpretation?) and creates the opportunity for Daniel's intervention.

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