The Prophecies of Daniel-Chapter 3

This chapter contains a dream from the king of Babylon and its interpretation. I have put the dream in bold, the interpretation in blue, and my comments in plain text.



Verse 31- You looked, O king, and there before you stood a large statue- an enormous, dazzling statue, awesome in appearance.



36 This was the dream, and now we will interpret it to the king.



32 The head of the statue was made of pure gold, …



37 You, O king, are the king of kings. That God of heaven has given you dominion and power and might and glory;



38 in your hands he has placed mankind and the beasts of the field and the birds of the air. Wherever they live, He has made you ruler over them all. You are that head of gold.



Nebby was wondering, just as he was falling asleep, what would happen to his kingdom after he died. This dream is the answer. (This dream would have been about 579 BC)



Gold was very common in Babylon at this time and the people had a very high standard of living.



…its chest and arms of silver,



39 After you, another kingdom will rise, inferior to yours. …



Medo/Persia- the Medes are building their army at this moment in history. (Cyrus rises to power in 553 BC). Silver was the currency in Persia. Taxes paid in gold were even converted to silver.



…its belly and thighs of bronze,



…Next, a third kingdom, one of bronze, will rule over the whole earth.



Alexander the Great. At the time of this prophecy, Greece is nothing but a bunch of unconnected city-states. (Alexander died in 323 BC). Greece was the first army to use almost exclusively bronze shields and helmets.



33 Its legs of iron, …



40 Finally, there will be a fourth kingdom, strong as iron- for iron breaks and smashes everything- and as iron breaks things to pieces, so it will crush and break all the others.



This is a history of the region of Babylon after Nebby. It would not be a very good history to leave out the entire Syrian rule. After the death of Alexander, Egypt took control of Israel, but a different general took Babylon. Later, the Egyptian ruler gave the territory just north of Israel to his favorite general. That general conquered all the way to Babylon as well as taking Israel away from Egypt. His capital was in the country of Syria and his empire was known by that name. (Syria began somewhere between 323 and 310 BC). Syria used iron weapons.



Greece at the time of Syria is just a small country with NO control or influence over this region. It is fighting for its life with Rome and the countries to the north and east (Thrace, the fourth part of Alexander’s kingdom.)



Rome is a republic, not an empire, and is also fighting for its life right now. Its influence is growing.



…its feet partly of iron and partly of baked clay.



41 Just as you saw that the feet and toes were partly of baked clay and partly of iron, so this will be a divided kingdom; yet it will have some of the strength of iron in it, even as you saw iron mixed with clay.



42 As the toes were partly of baked clay and partly of iron, so this will be partly strong and partly brittle.



43 and just as you saw the iron mixed with baked clay, so the people will be a mixture and will not remain united, any more than iron mixes with clay.



This is a perfect description of the Roman Empire, which began with Julius Caesar in 46 BC and was the next major power in the Babylonian and Israelite region. It was partly strong and partly weak, always had trouble controlling its very mixed people, constantly had to fight of the Gauls and other invaders from the north, had a system of appeals and allowed each people to govern itself and worship its own gods.

Rome also used iron weapons.



34 while you were watching, a rock was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and smashed them.

35 Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were broken to pieces at the same time and became like chaff on a threshing floor in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a trace. But the rock that struck the statue became a huge mountain and filled the whole earth.



44 In the time of those kings, (the kings of the final kingdom, Rome) the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever.



45 this is the meaning of the vision of the rock cut out of a mountain, but not by human hands- a rock that broke the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold to pieces. “The Great God has shown the king what will take place in the future. The dream is true and the interpretation is trustworthy.”



The rock that crushed the whole thing by landing on the feet was Jesus and the church. The countries listed here are the nations that controled God’s church from Daniel until Christ. After the cross, no political government would be able to contain nor control God’s church. It would grow to fill the whole planet. No longer would god’s people be confined to one nation, one locality. The Kingdom of God will never end.



Paul tells us that God continues to put politicians into power and that He brings up and destroys kingdoms. God does still deal with nations, as our own history tells us. But His people are no longer identified by or confined to one nation or one country.