Parse error when run illuminate/database/capsule with bootEloquent() in PHP - php

Question

I'm trying to make a mysql connection within a php environment using Slim and the package illuminate/database. Following the documentation I have created a new $capsule instance, I have passed the array with connection data through the addConnection method and then I have run bootEloquent() method:
<?php
use Illuminate\Database\Capsule\Manager as Capsule;
$capsule = new Capsule;
$capsule->addConnection([
'driver' => $app->config->get('db.driver'),
'host' => $app->config->get('db.host'),
'database' => $app->config->get('db.database'),
'username' => $app->config->get('db.username'),
'password' => $app->config->get('db.password'),
'charset' => $app->config->get('db.charset'),
'collation' => $app->config->get('db.collation'),
'prefix' => $app->config->get('db.prefix')
]);
#here the output seems correct...
#var_dump($capsule);
$capsule->bootEloquent();
?>
Unfortunately when I run bootEloquent() it goes through an error:
Parse error: parse error in
/Sites/auth/vendor/illuminate/database/Eloquent/Model.php
on line 597
The problem seems related to the Eloquent Model.
I have already tried to update the composer.json file with different versions. I have also installed again each package, but the parse error still remains.
Currently the project is running on: PHP Version 5.6.30.
My current composer json file with all dependencies
{
"autoload": {
"psr-4": {
"Business\\": "app/Business"
}
},
"require": {
"slim/slim": "~2.0",
"slim/views": "0.1.*",
"twig/twig": "~1.0",
"phpmailer/phpmailer": "~5.2",
"hassankhan/config": "0.8.*",
"illuminate/database": "~5.0",
"alexgarrett/violin": "2.*",
"ircmaxell/random-lib": "~1.1"
}
}
Can someone explain me why I'm getting this strange bad situation?
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Have a look at your composer.lock to see which version of illuminate/database got installed. The later ones are not compatible with PHP 5.6.30, but require PHP 7. You could try to enforce that version constraint through "illuminate/database": "~5.4.0"