Brethren in Christ Jesus, greetings to you in the name of our Lord Jesus. We bless God for the opportunity to present to you another episode of our daily study of the Scriptures. We thank God for the gift of life and for His benefits on us each new day. Praise be to God.
In our today’s episode 577, we shall be examining the book of Daniel Chapter 7 titled:
What You Should Know About These 4 Powerful World Powers; This Is A Must Read
Recall that in the beginning of the study of the book of Daniel, we divided the book into two parts for the purpose of understanding the themes.
The first part contains the account of Daniel and his friends, their captivity experience, preparation, testing period, and then their promotion. You will find all these in Chapters 1 to Chapter 6.
Also, we learned that God gave the four of them knowledge and skill in literature and philosophy. But in addition, Daniel was given the skill of interpreting visions and dreams. Daniel 1:17-20
Each time the king had a dream, no one could interpret it except Daniel, even without telling him the details of the dream, he knows everything and he himself had had a lot of visions as well, which formed the major components of the second part of the Book of Daniel starting with Chapter 7.
So, today, we shall be examining one of these visions, where he saw four beasts coming out of a turbulent ocean. Other versions call it the Great Sea. Digging deeper into the Scriptures reveals that the Great Sea is no other place than the Mediterranean sea, because each of the empires mentioned in his vision had their geographical locations connected to the Mediterranean Sea (Please read Numbers 34:6-7; Joshua 1:4 and Ezekiel 47:10).
Daniel saw this vision in the first year that Belshazzar became the King of Babylon. This means that the Babylonian Empire had not yet been taken over by the Medo-Persia (Silver Empire) according to Nebuchadnezzar’s dream.
Remember, just like other books of prophets that we have examined so far, the book of Daniel does not follow chronological order. It was rather arranged to follow thematic sequence. Hence, the reason it was divided into two parts.
Now, let’s examine the Four beasts one after the other.
The first beast he saw was like a lion that has eagle’s wings.
However, while he was still gazing at the lion wondering how it developed eagle’s wings, all of a sudden, he noticed the wings were plucked off. The beast was raised up and made to stand up straight. And then a human mind was given to it.
The second beast looked like a bear standing on its hind legs. It was holding three ribs between its teeth, and a voice said to it, “Go on, eat as much meat as you can!”
The third beast looked like a leopard, but on its back, there were four wings, like the wings of a bird, and it had four heads. It had a look of authority about it.
The fourth beast was powerful, horrible, terrifying. It has huge iron teeth and with that it crushed its victims, and then it trampled on them. Unlike the other beasts, this beast had ten horns. But in the middle of these ten horns, a little horn was formed, it grew and tore out three of the horns that were already there. This little horn had human eyes and a mouth that was boasting proudly.
Now, let’s examine what each of these beasts represents
Reading verse 17 provides us with the information that the four beasts represent four kingdoms ruling over the earth at that time. Remember, the four of them came out from a stormy or turbulent Mediterranean sea. This means that these four beasts emerged out of the wars and commotions of the world; and they were called great in comparison of other states and kingdoms and are designated beasts because of their dictatorial and ruthless subjugation.
Interpretation of the first Beast
The first beast which looks like a lion with an eagle wings represents the Babylonian Empire under the rulership of king Nebuchadnezzar. Read more here in Jeremiah 4:7; Isaiah 5:29.
In fact, when Prophet Jeremiah was pronouncing judgement upon the land of Moab because of their sins, he said he saw a nation swooping down on Moab like an eagle with its outstretched wings (Jeremiah 48:40). He was referring to Nebuchadnezzar, the King of Babylon.
Also, Prophet Ezekiel referred to Nebuchadnezzar in Ezekiel 17:3 as the first giant eagle with beautiful wings. Now, combining the features of a lion with that of an eagle will show us how powerful Nebuchadnezzar was during that time, because the lion is considered to be the king of the beasts, and the eagle the king of the birds.
This means that Babylon was the head and the greatest of them all. This is the same as the golden head of the great statue Nebuchadnezzar himself saw in a vision in Daniel 2.
The wings of the eagle symbolize the swiftness with which King Nebuchadnezzar conquered his captives. As a matter of facts, he had various provinces under his authority at that time, namely – Lydia, Media, and Persia.
Eventually, they revolted and cast off Nebu’s yoke from their necks and began to exist as an empire of their own. That was when Medes and Persians joined forces together to subjugate Babylon in the end, which fulfilled the prophecy of the handwriting on the wall – Mene, Mene, Tekel, Uphasin.
These former provinces Lydia, Media and Persia were the eagle wings with which Babylonian Empire was flying to conquer nations. Unfortunately, when they cast off the yoke, and put themselves under kings of their own, Babylon’s wings was plucked and lost her influence and authority.
The Medes had Darius as their King, while the Persians had Cyrus as their King, but both were allies. Although some scholars opined that Darius was ruling Babylon on behalf of Cyrus.
When verse 4 says he was lifted up and made to stand upright and human mind given to him, Daniel was simply explaining when Nebuchadnezzar was restored from the forest and from his mental disorder. He gained back his sound mind and became human again.
Interpretation of the second beast – Verse 5
The second beast which looks like a bear represents the Medo – Persian Empire that would displace the Babylonian Empire (meaning of plucking out its eagle wings). I have explained this above stating that there provinces namely Lydia, Media and Persia cut themselves off from Babylon, waged war against it and won.
The Medo-Persian Empire was likened to a bear because they were cruel and they shed blood like their lives depended on it. Remember, bear is an animal that crushes and devours its preys and that’s exactly how this empire handled their captives.
Prophet Jeremiah has something to say about them here in Jeremiah 51:48-56.
Interpretation of the third beast – Verse 6
The leopard represented the Greek Empire ruled by Alexander the Great.
It was when he died that his empire split into four parts represented with the four heads stated in verse 6 and these four heads were Casander, Lysimachus, Seleucus, and Ptolemy. According to a bible scholar called Clarke, he stated that Cassander became King over Macedon and Greece; Lysimachus, over Thrace and Bithynia; Ptolemy, over Egypt; and Seleucus, over Syria.
Interpretation of the fourth beast – Verse 7
The fourth beast was the Roman empire, which was completely different from the first three because Daniel saw it had ten horns, which represented ten Kings. Daniel 7:24.
We were told a little horn emerged in the middle of these ten horns, meaning that a king arose and subdued three kings out of the ten kings. Daniel 7:24-27.
According to Daniel 7:25, this little horn (king), would do the followings:
He will speak against the Supreme God
He will oppress God’s people
He will try to change their religious laws and festivals, and God’s people will be under his power for three and a half years.
However, the good news is that the heavenly court will sit in judgment, take away his power, and destroy him completely.
In verse 27, we learnt that the power and greatness of all the kingdoms on earth will be given to the people of the Supreme God (Believers). Their royal power will never end, and all rulers on earth will serve and obey them.
This means that what God said from the beginning of creation in Genesis 1:28 has been fulfilled in Christ. It’s now left for you as a Believer to start operating in that reality – You are in dominion. You are in charge!
To be continued…stay tuned and stay blessed.
Let us Pray as we declare the following statement of faith together:
I declare I am a prosperous person. I grow spiritually in every dimension. God is prospering me now in my mind, body, spirit and in all my undertakings. God’s ideas constantly unfold within me, bringing to me sound health, wealth and global influence. I am in charge, in Jesus name. Amen!!!
Bible Readings For Today: Ezekiel Chapters 8, 9, 10 & 11 with Isaiah Chapter 37
I call you blessed now and always.
Monday October 26, 2020 (DDMI)
You are well done sir. I pray God give you more knowledge and understanding of His word.
I am hoping through the help of the Holy Spirit that you will explain further the fourth beast.