Wednesday: The Image, Part Two
Read again the dream and its interpretation (Dan. 2:31-49). What does this teach us about God’s foreknowledge of world history?
The prophecy conveyed by Nebuchadnezzar’s dream provides a general prophetic outline and functions as the yardstick with which to approach the more-detailed prophecies of Daniel chapters 7, 8, and 11. Also, Daniel chapter 2 is not a conditional prophecy.
Image © Lars Justinen at Goodsalt.com
It is an apocalyptic prophecy: a definitive prediction of what God foresaw and would actually bring to pass in the future.
- The head of gold represents Babylon (626-539 B.C.). Indeed, no other metal could better represent the power and wealth of the Babylonian empire than gold. The Bible calls it “the golden city” (Isa. 14:4) and “a golden cup in the LORD’s hand” (Jer. 51:7; compare with Rev. 18:16). The ancient historian Herodotus reports that an abundance of gold embellished the city.
- The chest and arms of silver stand for Media-Persia (539-331 B.C.). As silver is valued less than gold, the Medo-Persian empire never attained the splendor of the Babylonian. In addition, silver was also a fitting symbol for the Persians because they used silver in their taxation system.
- The belly and thighs of bronze symbolize Greece (331-168 B.C.). Ezekiel 27:13 portrays the Greeks as bartering bronze vessels. Greek soldiers were noted for their bronze armor. Their helmets, shields, and battle-axes consisted of brass. Herodotus tells us that Psammetichus I of Egypt saw in invading Greek pirates the fulfillment of an oracle that foretold “men of bronze coming from the sea”.
- The legs of iron aptly represent Rome (168 B.C.-A.D. 476). As Daniel explained, the iron represented the crushing power of the Roman Empire, which lasted longer than any of the previous kingdoms. Iron was a perfect metal to represent the empire.
- The feet partly of iron and partly of clay represent a divided Europe (A.D. 476-Second Coming of Christ). The mixture of iron with clay provides a fitting picture of what happened after the disintegration of the Roman Empire. Although many attempts have been made to unify Europe, ranging from marriage alliances between royal houses to the present European Union, division and disunity have prevailed and, according to this prophecy, will remain so until God establishes the eternal kingdom.
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I don’t need to remind you of the traditional Seventh-day Adventist interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. The four kingdoms, Babylon, Achaemenid/Persia, Greece, Rome, and the divided nations of Europe succeeded one another pretty much as predicted. What is somewhat surprising is that the Babylonian period was so short. The Neo-Babylonian period (the period recorded in Daniel) lasted from about 626 to 539BC. Clearly, in the sweep of history, it was a fairly short-lived kingdom.
The Achaemenid/Persian (Medes and Persians in biblical language) alliance in the meantime grew and essentially took over Babylon. The loss of Babylon is described in Belshazzar's feast in Daniel. This event was a pivotal point in of a long-running battle. It should be noted that the Achaemenid take-over of Babylon recognized the usefulness of the wise men of the court and Daniel's life was preserved.
The Achaemenid/Persian Kingdom had a long-running battle with the Greek city-states. The Delain League was an association of Greek city-states that combined together in 478BC to stan up against the Persian Empire. Unfortunately, they fought among themselves as well. The real period of Greek dominance was actually a Macedonian revolt led by Alexander the Great, who expanded the kingdom into Asia (beating the Achaemenid/Persians in the process) and into Egypt (Where we still have Alexandria his namesake city to this day). After Alexander, The Greek Kingdom was spit into four with Palestine being part of the Ptolemaic (Egyptian) kingdom.
In the meantime Rome grew in power and became a significant empire from about the 1st Century BC to the 4th Century AD. This was the world as Jesus knew it when he lived on earth.
We are inclined to take the succession of Kingdoms as the big picture of this dream, but perhaps there is another picture as well.
The four kingdoms/empires depicted represent the main thread of civilization that are at the roots of our western culture today. We owe these Kingdoms our maths, science, history, socialisation, civil law, culture, art, music in ways that are too many to enumerate. The last view of this image is of it being destroyed by a rock cut without hands. It is not just richness and power that are ephemeral but our whole system of civilization. God is perhaps trying to tell us that his Kingdom is not about richness and power, but about underlying spiritual values that go beyond time and space.
Here is part of a conversation Jesus had:
… and perhaps that is the most important interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream.
The lesson lists the successive kingdoms of the image, but Daniel 2 only actually specifies Babylon as the head of gold.
How do we know the others?
Two more are listed in the parallel prophecy of Dan 8:20-22, namely Medio-Persia and Greece.
We learn the name of the legs of iron from the NT as Rome was still ruling in Jesus day.
It is interesting that as we are living in the time of the toes which are made of clay and iron, when the majority of our large buildings are made of cement and iron girders which seem so strong but we sometimes see these elements separating when the building is stressed, the cement crumbles and only the framework of girders remains.
What do we learn from the decline in value of the materials of the image?
It is similar to the decline of the children of Israel when king after king did not follow the ways of David but became more evil then the one before because they did not remain committed to their covenant with the LORD nor did they follow His ways.
I am not surprised when I read of the decline of the government in my country (and others) because of history and because the Bible predicts that people will get worse and worse until it will be as it was in the days of Noah when all the people's thoughts were only always evil - then they were washed away by the flood, in our day it will be the Second Coming of the LORD 2 Tim 3:1-5
Why weren't the other old cultures of the world in this prophecy? The Chinese, Japanese, Europeans, etc.
Only the nations that oppressed God's people were spoken of?
HOW DO OTHERS INTERPRETE IT.
1.MORDERN SCHOLARS
Head - Babylon
Arms &
Shoulders - the Medes
Thighs &
Legs - Persia
The feet - Seleucid Syria
& Ptolemaic Egypt
Stone - Judean exile
2.TRADITIONAL INTERPRETATION
Head - Babylon
Arms and
Shoulders - Medo-persia
Thighs and
Legs - Greek
The feet - Roman
3.SDA INTERPRETATION
Head - Babylon
Chest and
Arms - Medo-persia
Belly and
Thighs - Greece
2 legs - western & eastern
Roman empire
Feet - Frankish,holy Roman
And Ottoman empire
10 toes - Germany, France
Switzerland,Spain
Portugal, Italy
England, Heruri
Vandals and
Ostrogoths
STONE - God's kingdom
4.JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES
Head - Babylon
Chest and
Arms - media - Persia
Belly and
Thighs - Greece
Legs - Roman
Feet and
Toes - Anglo - American;
authoritarian and
democratic
fragmentation
Rock - God's kingdom
5.MORMONS
Stone - their church restored to the earth by their prophet John Smith in 1830
Confused about your posting of the SDA interpretation of the feet and toes? Could you point to a source? Thank you
To me, this kind o prophecy proves the veracity of the Bible. By checking the dates of Daniel's reports with the History's accounts we see God's omniscience, a 'reminder' of His existence! But eventhough all of the Holy Scriptures and other writings may suggest or prove that God is real, nothing can take away my personal experience with Him. While some may consider this as madness, this became my salvation. Most important yet is that God is real to me because of what He has done in my life, although weak and fragile, my small faith has rescued me from total despair! The reality of our world's state cannot bring us hope in humanity! Greed has overcome nature and self-destruction is forecasted by science. There is no hope in men's knowledge to solve their own puzzle! Only faith in God, Who knows "the end from the begining", can give us peace in such a state of reality that the world now goes through.
Maurice, I very much appreciated the depth and perspective you added to today's lesson.
The lesson shows the use of all the metals during the time of the kingdoms but stops at clay. Why would the pattern be broken at the clay? Gold was used in Babylon and Silver popular in Persia and brass in Greece and Iron in Rome but what of clay in our day?
I detail the whole argument in my book "The Computer Age in Prophecy: Did the Bible Predict the Internet?" available on Amazon.
But the essence is that clay is made up of aluminum silicate whose components are aluminum and silicon. These two elements define our modern day more than any other! Aluminum is the most popular metal along with iron and silicon is the basis for computer circuits.
Bud, I believe you answered your own question correctly.
Good day fellow saints. I wish the interpretation of all other prophecies in the Bible were as explicit as in this one in Daniel 2. We are guaranteed of the meaning of the dream, even though we can speculate as to which kingdoms followed Babylon. It appears that there is much room for different viewpoints and deliberate deception when we a left to attempt to unlock the meaning from other clues in scripture. I know that the Bible is its own interpreter, but the various, sometimes contradictory, interpretations of the prophecies in Daniel and Revelation, which have evolved of time, even among SDAs, would be much far fewer if the interpretation was given directly as in this case. Have a blessed day in the Lord!
The revelation of events, such as the succession of empires up to the climactic coming of the stone, smashing the image to powder, inaugurating God`s eternal kingdom, certainly has its right place in salvation history. However, God`s concern is directed to His church that has to go through all of these successive empires in times of trouble and temptation. The following texts will give an overview of how God is revealing himself in the ups and down of history as the very God with us,Immanuel. (Isaiah 8:8.10; 43:2; Daniel 3:25; 10:14; 12:1; Revelation 17:13-14) We have this hope.