Notes and Questions for February 22, 2009

Notes and Questions for February 22, 2009

Last week we saw how God used even the non-believer Neb to reveal His sovereignty. He also used Daniel and the situation He created to show Himself.

This week begins the interpretation of the dream. Step back for a minute and understand what happened before the interpretation. Don’t forget that Daniel specifically told Neb what the dream was. The dream’s interpretation is almost moot unless you can really sit back and take in the enormity of this. The interpretation then is something to pay close attention to. If the God of the universe is telling us something we must listen closely.

This week we will review what Daniel told Neb the dream means and how Neb reacted in verses 36 through 49 of Chapter 2. In the notes we will talk about the scholarly review of these items and what they relate to. I, as I have hopefully been very open about before, am NOT a bible scholar. In that, I will do my absolute best to study through this and understand what it means to us and will differ to much more learned scholars in our Church if necessary.

Let’s not be afraid to disagree or have debate and know that even the Pharisee’s who studied much of this were pretty much blind. Humbleness should, therefore, overtake us.

Please read the section – Daniel 2:36-49

1. What are the main points of this passage and why? Take your time here. Digest what is being said and think of what you would do after just being told your dream that no one else knew.


This section presents the foreordained succession of world powers that are to dominate the Near East till the final victory of the Messiah in the last days. There is so much material around the theories and how each has flaws or inconsistencies that if you would like, I will send you some links to review as well as have printed materials for borrowing. Bottom line, I have tried to ask questions of relevance and application and given you some basic history and interpretation ON the interpretation.

Read verses 36-38

2. Who is going to interpret the dream in verse 36?

3. What is the different between what Daniel says in verse 37 and what the soothsayers said to him when Neb first asked them to tell him the dream?

4. What is the main theme of verse 38?

5. What has God placed in your hands? List all things you can think of… spouse, children, job, apartment, what?

6. Do you see yourself responsible for what God has given you? Do you see that He has given it to you? Why or why not?


Verses 37-38 identify the golden head of the dream-image with Neb and the Babylonian Empire. The head comes first in the explanation (rather than the feet) probably because “head” (resah) is often used to mean “beginning” (at least in the form of Heb. Congnate ros); from this root the regular word for “beginning” (resit) is derived. For a despot like Neb, his government was the ideal type and was therefore esteemed as highly as gold. He exercised unrestricted authority over life and death throughout all Babylon. His word was law; no prior written law could challenge his will (v 38). Yet Daniel was careful to remind him that even this autocracy of his was under the almighty God. For only by his sufferance could Neb continue to draw breath; only by God’s decree could he exercise political power.

The first of four world-empires, then, was the Ne-Babylonian Empire of the Chaldeans that Neb, whose reign began in 605 B.C., was to rule over for about forty more years – till 562 or 560 B.C. But his empire did not last more than twenty-one years after his death. His son Evil-Merodach (Amel-Marduk in Akkadian) reigned two years only (560-558). Nerglissar (Nergal-shar-usur) reigned for years (560-556) and Labashi-Marduk only one (556). Nabondius engineered a coup d’etat in 555 and ruled until Babylon fell to the Persians in 539.

Read verse 39

7. What will happen after Neb is gone?

8. What will happen after you are gone? What ‘kingdom’ will rise after yours?

Daniel turned next to the other empires. About the second one (represented by silver) he said little except that it was “inferior” (ara minnak, literally, “beneath you”) to Babylon. From Neb’s standpoint the restriction on the monarch’s authority to annul a law once he had made it (6:12) was less desirable than his own unfettered power. The silver empire was to be Medo-Persia, which began with Cyrus the Great, who conquered Egypt but died in 523 or 522. After a brief reign by an upstart claiming to be Cyrus’s younger son, Darius son of Hystaspes deposed and assassinated him and established a new dynasty. Darius brought the Persian Empire to its zenith of power but left unsettled the question of the Greeks in his western borer, even though he did not conquer Thrace. Xerxes (485-464) his son, in his abortive invasion of 480-479, failed to conquer the Greeks. Nor did his successor Artaxerxes I (464-424) do this but rather contented himself with intrigue by setting the Greek city-states against one another. Later Persian emperors – Darius II, Artaxerxes II; Artaxerxes III, Arses, and Darius II declined still further in power. This silver empire was supreme in the Near and Middle East for about two centuries.
As for the third empire (represent by bronze), it was even less desireable from Neb’s standpoint; though Greece was to “rule over the whole earth,” its political tradition was more republican than its predecessor. The bronze empire was the Greco_Mecedonian Empire established by Alexander the Great, who began his invasion of Persia in 334, crushed its last resistance in 331, and established a realm extending from the border of Yugoslavia to beyond the Indus Valley in India – the largest empire of ancient times. After his death in 323, Alexander’s territory soon split up into four smaller realms, ruled over by his former generals (Antipater in Mecedon-Greed, Lysimachus in Thrace-Asia Minor, Seleucus in Asia, and and Ptolemy in Egypt, Cyrenaica, and Palenstine). This situation crystallized after the Battle of Ipsus in 301, when the final attempt to maintain a unified empire was crushed through the defeat of the imperial regent Antigonus. The eastern sections of the Seleucid realm revolted from the central authority at Antioch and were gradually absorbed by the Parthians as far westward ad Mesopotamia. But the remainder of the former Greek Empire was annexed by Rome after Antiochos the Great was defeated at Magneisa in 190 B.C. Macedon was annexed by Rome in 168, Greece as permanently subdued in 146, the Seleucid domains west of the Tigris were annexed by Pompey the Great in 63 B.C. Thus the bronze kingdom lasted for about 260 years before it was supplanted by the fourth kingdom prefigured in Neb’s dream-image.

Read verses 40-43

9. What is the main point of these verses?

10. What is the main point of verse 43? Why would it be important to us now and in this time in history?


Verse 40 describes this fourth empire, symbolized by the legs of iron. From a despotic standpoint, the Roman Republic was of far less value than gold, silver, or bronze; yet iron was the most suited to crush the opposing powers. Iron connotes toughness and ruthlessness and describes the Roman Empire that reached its widest extent under the reign of Trajan (98-117 A.D.), who occupied Rumania and much of Assyria for at least a few brief years.

Verse 41 deals with a later phrase or outgrowth of this fourth empire, symbolized by the feet and ten toes – made up of iron and earthenware, a fragile base for the huge monument. The text clearly implies that this final phase will be marke by some sort of federation rather than a powerful single realm. The iron may possibly represent the influence of the old Roman culture and tradition, and the potter may represent the inherent weakness in a socialist society based on relativism in morality and philosophy. Out of this mixture of iron and clay come weakness and confusion, pointing to the approaching day of doom. Within the scope of verse 43 are disunity, class struggle, and even civil war, resulting from the failure of the hopelessly divided society to achieve an integrated world-order. The iron and pottery may coexist, but they cannot combine into a strong and durable world-order.

An alternative view of the identity of the fourth empire has been proposed by Otto Zoeckler in his commentary on Daniel. Identifying the third empire as that of Alexander the Great, he took the fourth empire of Neb’s dream image to be that of the Seleudics – on of the four divisions Alexander’s empire was partitioned into (that of Seleucus I, c 311 B.C.). This would mean that the third kingdom (that of Alexander) lasted only 11 or 12 years, with an additional 12 years during which Perdiccas and Antigonus tried vainly to maintain the unity of the empire. Thus, it was from this fourth empire that the little horn , Atniochus IV, emerged. But such an identification of the fourth empire can hardly be reconciled with the description of the fourth kingdom as greater and stronger than the third. Could one segment of Alexander’s empire by considered more extensive than his entire realm? Or could it’s power be considered more formidable than that of Alexander himself – Alexander who never lost a battle? This is not a serious theory.

Read Verses 44-45 but just the first part of 45.


11. What is the mountain?

12. What does it mean the rock is carved out of the mountain?

13. Who is the rock?

14. What is destroyed?

15. What mountain is formed? Are the mountains connected?


These verses present the final scene. The rock cut form a mountain, the rock that becomes the fifth kingdom, rolls down from a mountain and smashes against the brittle feet of the great image and topples it over. It then reduces the entire monument – including the four metals – to dust, which the wind sweeps away, after which the rock becomes a mountain (kingdom) that fills the earth. In contract to the limited number of centuries the four man-made empires lasted, this fifth God-established kingdom is destined to endure forever – a realm never to be destroyed. Not only Daniel 7, but parallel passages leave us in no doubt that this fifth realm is the kingdom of God, ruled over by Christ and enduring eternally, even after its earthly, millennial phase, is over.


Read Verses 45 to 47

16. What thoughts do you have about God each day?

17. How REALLY do you respond to God each day?

18. What are God’s plans for you in the future? What if He did know your future? Would you live any differently?


Daniel closed his interpretation of the dream by assuring Neb that it was divinely inspired and absolutely trustworthy. Thus the God of heaven had graciously granted the king the knowledge of the future he had asked for. The baffling mystery had at last been unraveled by the spokesman of the one true God. The king could only acknowledge Yahweh as “God of gods”, the absolute sovereign over all the powers of heaven (even including the king’s own patron gods, Marduk and Nabu), and “Lord of kings” on earth, the true Lord of history. Moreover, the king acknowledged Yahweh’s supremacy in wisdom as being alone able to reveal the mysteries of the future, something no pagan god could do.
In token of his submission to Daniel’s God, Neb then bowed before Daniel and offered incense to him as if he were Deity. What a remarkable scene! The despot who but an hour before had ordered the execution of all his wise men was prostrating himself before the foreign captive from a third-rate subject nation! Even though he opposed the wisdom of the Chaldeans, this absurd monotheist (Daniel) had somehow found the right answer. Surely, therefore, his God was worthy of honor above all the other deities, who had completely failed to reveal the dream. The king’s praise to the Lord does not mean that he doubted the existence of other gods, much less that he had experienced any sort of conversion.


Read verses 48-49


1. What is your response when God reveals Himself to you? Name a specific situation in which God has revealed himself to you…

Since Daniel had so decisively proved himself a true prophet with access to the great God he worshipped, it was only logical for Neb to put him in charge of all the diviners at the court of Babylon. Hence he officially became “ruler” (literally “chief of appointed officials) over the whole bureau of wise men. It was also understandable that the king fulfilled his original promise in chapter 2 verse 6 and loaded him with gifts and royal honors. But that he went on to appoint Daniel civil governor of the entire capital province of Babylon – a post of highest importance in the political structure – was indeed noteworthy. Normally this position would be reserved for a Chaldean nobleman, a member, like Neb, of the master race. For a Jew from the Captivity to be so honored was unprecendented and shows how deeply his intelligence and integrity had impressed the king.

Daniel’s loyalty to his three friend was shown by his request that they too might be given high appointments. Of course, it strengthened Daniel’s hand to have his three trusted friends help him in his administrative duties.