Due to considerations of space and overall coherence of this article, we will have to split it up into two parts. In the first part, we shall review the prophetic symbols used in Daniel's dream, and also look at the first three beasts. In the second part, we shall devote ourselves solely to the Fourth Beast.
In the first year of Babylon's King Belshazzar's reign, the prophet Daniel had a frightening dream. The old prophet saw a strange vision in which: "...four strong winds were striving upon the great sea..." (Daniel 7:2). As Daniel watched, four great beasts, each different from the other, emerged out of the stormy sea. The first was like unto a lion and had the wings of a great eagle upon its back. The second was like a bear, was lifted up on one side, and had three ribs in its mouth. The third was like a four-headed leopard and had four wings of a bird upon its back. Lastly, there came up the fourth and last beast. It was totally different from the others and had ten horns upon its head. The beast had large iron teeth and bronze claws. It crushed and devoured its victims, trampling underfoot whatever was left! As the prophet watched, another horn emerged from the beast's head, uprooting three of the first horns. This little horn had eyes and a mouth that spoke both boastfully and blasphemously. Daniel watched until the beast was slain. He was deeply troubled by the vision and sought to know the meaning of what he had seen (cf Daniel 7:1-8).
A beast, in prophetic language, may symbolize a political power such as a kingdom or empire (cf Daniel 7:17, 23). Today, for example, it is quite common to see animals on the coat of arms of various nations (the eagle for the USA, the lion for Kenya, the giraffe for Tanzania, the oryx for Qatar, the crested crane for Uganda, the dragon for China, the bear for Russia, etc). Also, because of their warlike bloodthirsty mien, these empires of our text are compared to ravenous beasts.
On the other hand, in prophecy, the sea always represents: "...peoples, multitudes, tribes, nations and languages..." (Revelation 17:15). That is why Yahshua told Peter and his fisher-folk colleagues: "Come and I will make you fishers of men..." (Matthew 4:19). In the parable of the net, he compared the Kingdom of God to a net let down into a lake (the world) and caught all kinds of fish, that is, believers of different races and stations in life (cf Matthew 13:47 - 48).
Wind, on the other hand, is a symbol for war, strife and upheaval (cf Jeremiah 25: 30 - 32). So a stormy sea such as Daniel had seen, represents a situation where nations are at war, the result of which is the fall of one kingdom as another arises.
So the prophet was essentially being shown a snapshot of the world's political history in advance. True to the divine perspective, history has wonderfully responded to the call of prophecy. We who live at the tail end of human (mis)adventures here on earth, with the advantage of hindsight, can now attest to the accuracy of the prophetic word.
First on the world stage was the Babylonian kingdom (the winged lion). Their winged lion can be seen on many excavated sculptures and bas relief carvings on their ancient city walls. They ruled from about 606BC to 538BC. It is also true that the world's first civilization, Nimrod's kingdom of Genesis 10:8-10, was centered around the same geographical position as the later Babylonian Empire set up by Nebuchadnezzar. This empire was responsible for setting up many of the institutions governing human society today. False religion, writing, the concept of walled cities, constitution-making, many different crafts, agriculture, livestock rearing, and warfare, among other things all stemmed from ancient Babylon. That is why this empire is compared to the head in King Nebuchadnezzar's dream of Daniel chapter two. All the subsequent kingdoms have merely been implementing and improving upon what the Babylonian head had thought up.
It was the Babylonians who took the Jews into exile during the days of the prophet Jeremiah (cf Jeremiah 52:12-16). Later, King Belshazzar had the temerity to use the holy vessels used in the worship of Adonai, the God of Israel, in one of his pagan religious festivals! Divine retribution was served swiftly and without recourse. That very night, Belshazzar, king of the Babylonians was slain! Babylon fell.
It was then that the Medo-Persians, led by Darius took over (cf Daniel 5:28-31). They ruled from 538 to about 331BC. The Medo-Persians are likened to the bear. The bear is the largest land predator on earth. The polar bear, for example, is almost three times the size of a lion! And so it was that the Medo-Persian empire stretched from the Indian subcontinent all across the Middle East and deep into the African continent (cf Esther 1:1). The three ribs in the bear's mouth represent the kingdoms of Babylonia, Egypt and Libya which fell sway to Medo-Persian rule as that empire expanded. The bear's being raised on one side is an indication that the Persians were more powerful than the Medes who preceded them. In due time the bear's dominance was conclusively ended when over one million Persian soldiers met in battle with Alexander the Great's lean but invincible Macedonian phalanx on the plains of Arbela in 331BC. The great bear was humbled!
The third kingdom to arise was the Grecian empire under Alexander the Great. They are likened to the four-headed leopard. Small, agile, fast, beautiful, but very deadly! With only 47,000 soldiers, Alexander met the Persians on the battlefields of Arbela (aka Gaugamela) in 331BC and soundly defeated them! It is probably the biggest military upset in the annals of human warfare! The mighty bear, mauled by the intrepid leopard!
Alexander then proceeded on to take his conquests all the way to the foothills of the Himalayas in India! It was these formidable, soaring mountain ranges that stopped him from crossing over into China! His weary soldiers persuaded him to initiate a retreat heading home. Sadly however, Alexander died of marsh fever (some say of alcoholism or both) in Babylon.
The four heads of the Greek leopard are indicative of the divisions in that empire immediately after Alexander's death. His four close generals divided his vast domains amidst themselves. Cassander took Greece and Asia Minor, Ptolemy-Soter took Egypt, Lysimachus took Macedonia, and Seleucus-Nicator took Babylonia. The four wings are a symbol of the lightning speed with which Alexander conquered the known world. Taking over the Macedonian kingdom after the death of his father Philip, this military genius, then aged about 20, brought all kingdoms in his warpath to their knees in only 12 short years! The much admired Greek contributions to the human civilization, such as pentellic stone architecture, the arts, philosophy, literature, democracy, political science, etc, are well represented in the beautiful, yellow-gold rosette coat of the leopard. It is common knowledge that our binomial nomenclature, as used in biology, gives flora and fauna names in Greek. Here are some examples: African elephant (Loxodonta africana), lion (Felis leo), blackjack (Bidens pilosa) etc. Expressions such as: "the sword of Damocles", "Achilles heel", "a Eureka moment", "a Herculean task", "Oedipus complex", etc, all come to us from the Greeks. The same can be said for "Olympic games", "Marathon". The influence of the third beast on the world stage cannot be dismissed offhand. They however had to eventually leave the stage for the Romans, the fourth and last beast.
End of Part One
Pst JK Changandu, Oloitoktok,
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