Daniel 7

Daniel 7:1-28

DANIEL’S FIRST GREAT DREAM! Daniel 7:1-28. GREAT students of the Word of God have pretty generally agreed that the Book of Daniel broadly divides itself under four heads:—The Personal history of Daniel from the conquest of Jerusalem to the second year of Nebuchadnezzar, chapter 1: The visions of Nebuchadnezzar and their interpretations, chapters 2—4: Daniel under Belshazzar and Darius, chapters 5—6: and the Visions of Daniel himself, chapters 7—12. Our further studies in this Book will involve Daniel even more fully than have those already completed.If one undertook a verse study of these six chapters it would require many volumes, but a bird’s-eye view of the same gives prominence to the following themes for chapter 7:— The Contending Nations, Antiochus the Prototype, and The Conquering Christ.THE NATIONSThis chapter opens with these words:“In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon Darnel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed: then he wrote the dream, and told the sum of the matters. “Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, and, behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea. “And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another” (Daniel 7:1-3). The figure of the sea, troubled by the winds from Heaven, has been interpreted for us by the pen of inspiration, “The waters which thou sawest, * * are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues” (Revelation 17:15). The thoughts growing out of the sight of the troubled sea give occasion to make three remarks concerning Daniel’s dream about the nations: 1. The prophetic vision of them was bestial: 2. Their behavior toward one another was bestial: 3. The nations of the earth still insist upon bestial insignias.The prophetic vision of them was bestial!“Four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another. “The first was like a lion, and had eagle’s wings”. Beyond all doubt, the Babylonian empire under Nebuchadnezzar is here described, and the coming eclipse of its glory is predicted by the Prophet’s words: “I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked”.The second beast, like to a bear, raised on one side, with three ribs in its mouth, is Daniel’s vision of the Medo-Persian empire; its attitude denoting, as “Jamieson, Fausset and Brown” suggest, “A kingdom that had been at rest, but is now raising itself for conquest! Media is the lower side—passiveness; Persia, the upper—active; and the three ribs in its mouth Babylonia, Lydia and Egypt, territory conquered by Medo-Persia.” “After this I beheld, and lo another, like a leopard, which had upon the back of it four wings of a fowl; the beast had also four heads; and dominion was given to it”. The prophecy of Graeco-Macedonia. Here prophecy becomes the mould of history. The battle of Marathon will forever remain one of the marvels of the past. Men sat in solemn council, and the Athenians were so divided that it finally rested with a single vote to determine whether they should make war against the Medes and Persians. The Grecian soldiers were few in number, perhaps not exceeding ten thousand and certainly not equalling twenty thousand. Their enemy easily brought against them not less than ten times that number, and when Callimachus cast his deciding vote in favor of war, it must have represented to many, a forlorn hope.And yet, so quickly and fiercely did the Grecian forces, under the young but matchless Miltiades, strike, that the very breath went from the body of the opponents.

Thousands of their dead were shortly found on the field of battle; and the same men who conquered against the land force, by the swiftest march known to ancient times, if indeed, ever equaled in history, made their way back to Athens before the Persian fleet could double the cape of Lunium, and stood, so ready to give battle again, that all hope of success died out of the hearts of their opponents, and their retreat was instant.Think of a march of one hundred and fifty miles in three days, and that after a battle so terrific that nearly 7,000 Persians lay upon a single battlefield, while the Athenians’ loss numbered but 192. That was the work of “the leopard with four wings,— the four-head beast.” Truly the Medo-Persian power was struck in fury; smitten.But Daniel’s vision was not yet complete. The text is“After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns” (Daniel 7:7). This is the vision of Rome, indescribable in character, terrible in power, fierce in conflict:— the universal monarchy.“Jamieson, Fausset and Brown” call our attention to the fact that from that moment “all history moves within the Romanic, Germanic and Slavonic nations, and so it will continue until Christ’s Second Advent.”“Rome is but Babylon fully developed. It is the world-power corresponding in contrast to Christianity, and consequently contemporaneous with it.”Possibly one reason why God gave to Daniel this dream existed in the circumstance that the mind, when thoroughly awake and alert, is incapable of imagining creatures that fitly represented the ferocity of warring nations, and had need, therefore, to be brought into sleep that the last cord, binding imaginative faculties, might be loosened, and creatures such as the world had never seen in the flesh, but such as were destined to be seen in national character, were clearly outlined.Their behavior toward one another was bestial. Think of the Heavenly Visitor’s interpretation of these great beasts, that “four kings * * shall arise out of the earth”. And, think also of his description of their destructive work. Truly every figure of fury and force, known to that ancient time, was employed to describe what would occur. It was a battle to the death; no quarter was shown anywhere.

Brute beasts that had nothing in common one with another; brute beasts that by nature were foes; brute beasts that never met save to fight, were employed to depict the behavior of men toward one another, because, forsooth, they belonged to different nations; and each in turn was seized with that ever-living greed of conquest which always proposes to crush the weaker and appropriate his possessions.Let no man imagine that this is a Prophet’s picture of a barbarous and untrained people; or that this is the presentation of the onslaught of one savage tribe against another, or the barbarous reign of ignorance and brutality and consequent blood;—the conflict of men, who according to Darwinian contention, had come up but a little way from the ape and orangoutan!Creasy, in his “Decisive Battles,” declares that this very territory of Asia was the “original seat of human societies, and long before any trace can be found of the inhabitants of the rest of the world having emerged from the rudest barbarism, we can perceive that mighty and brilliant empires flourished in the Asiatic continent. They appear before us through the twilight of primeval history, dim and indistinct, but massive and majestic, like mountains in the early dawn.”And yet again, let no man imagine that the days of the brute beast in man, when he comes to battle against his brother, belong to the far past.The nations now insist upon bestial insignias.

Of present-day nations, one, our own, selects an eagle, roused and ready to strike; another, Germany, puts on an eagle’s neck a double head, indicative of the fact that he can strike in more directions than one; Germany fought both Eastward and Westward; a third, Mexico, selects an eagle and reinforces him by a serpent crouching upon his breast and lifting his head to the level of that of his destructive confederate; a fourth, Russia, a bear, the most voracious of beasts; a fifth, England, the lion—an animal that demands the heart blood and quivering flesh of his victim; a sixth, Africa, an elephant, whose destructive power when once infuriated, is unsurpassed; and again, the dragon, China,—the creature of imagination, combining all the bestial terrors known to men.And if these beasts were insignias only, it would not be a matter of such supreme moment; but look at the recent conduct of the nations of the world, and understand that they are insignias with significance. What hellish devices have they imagined in their intentions of mischief one against another! While theologians were disputing whether hell was a lake of fire, warriors invented bombs to fling into the midst of the armies of their brother men, to break suddenly into the most deadly fumes that ever collapsed the lungs of men or into the most infernal flames that ever fed upon sensitive, quivering, agonizing human flesh.And even our own nation, so long boasting itself Christian, could not resist the swirling, sucking circle of deadly shot, asphyxiating fumes and consuming flame of war. Our neutrality was at once commercialized and criminalized. Never since the days, when as a babe, leaving my mother’s arms to walk alone, and, while walking, awake to the fact that a civil war was swirling about me, had I seen any movement sweep over my own country with such rapidity, backed by such corporate wealth and quickened by such prospect of multiplied fortunes for the few whose “god is gold” as that movement which named itself “Preparedness!” It impelled certain of our citizens, whose accumulated riches were their curse, to start munition factories that added daily millions upon millions to their plethoric purses, and at the same time gave them, in exchange for these millions on millions, such missiles of death as the devil’s world never did devise until then.If this spirit of war continues to grow; if men, who are more anxious to be political leaders than they are to be patriots, are to remain our spokesmen and to come into places of administrative power; if the factories, hitherto employed in the creation of the implements of peace, are to be turned to the manufacture of the missiles of torture and death; if, worse than all, the peace-loving people are to be hoodwinked by daily newspapers, captured already by men more concerned in commercial advantage than with patriotic sentiments; if designing politicians, in order to defeat their opponents, are to have free access to the ears of the unthinking; if Mr. Edison’s latest device, the moving picture, is to be made the medium of alarm, impossible without its imaginary lies—then, I declare before God and men that the time has come for the Christian Church to voice herself against this whole bestial business, and that in terms that no man need misunderstand.It is a very easy matter for men who represent vested interests, known to be enhanced a hundredfold if only international conflicts can be engendered and kept up, or politicians, out of office, and determined to return to the same at any cost, to call their more conservative—not to say Christian brethren—“traitors to the commonwealth.” But it might also be replied that our first and most binding citizenship is, after all, with another King; and our first Ruler is over and above all, “The Prince of Peace.”The man who could look at the blood-soaked fields of Europe and chuckle with the thought that they were daily increasing his exchequer, was unfit for citizenship! The man who can think upon the diabolical explosives, made, as the late Herbert Booth once said, “in devilish haste” that they might be instantly hurled against certain of their brothers, who happened to have been born under other flags, and of fiendish contrivances that flew through the air in the dark, and dropped bombs on sleeping children, or turned loose ten thousand piercing lances upon the defenseless heads and shoulders of innocent women; the man who can think on the deadly fumes of liquid fire, exploded in the midst of as fine a regiment of men as ever trod the face of the earth, to send the last one of them either to death or insanity in one short hour, and not revolt at it all, is far removed from the spirit of the Nazarene who never lifted His hand against another, nor assumed an attitude toward any man, but that of kindliness, sweetness and assistance.If I had my way I would tear from the flags of the earth these bestial insignias, and introduce instead of these birds and beasts of prey those that would speak of peace, and preach the great truth of Scripture that all nations are made of one blood, for to dwell together upon the face of the earth.However, as we proceed with our study of this chapter, we come suddenly uponANOTHER LITTLE HORN“I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things” (Daniel 7:8). Notice in passing that when Daniel asked the truth of all this, the Heavenly Interpreter said,—“Another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. “And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time. “But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end” (Daniel 7:24-26). At first thought one who is familiar with history imagines that he here meets Antiochus Epiphanes, but such is not the case. That Prototype we shall face in the 8th chapter. He was the product of the Grecian nation.This beast is from the Roman Empire instead, for iron is the symbol of Rome, and the ten horns that were on the head of the fourth beast as a dual suggestion. It refers alike to the fact that ten is God’s number for perfection, and the Roman supremacy was complete, and to the additional circumstance that during the Roman Empire there were ten outstanding emperors, and in the Babylon of the future Rome comes to the fore again.There will be ten kingdoms, answering to the ten toes of the image vision of Daniel 2 : symbols as they were of the ten kingdoms that shall finally be smitten by the stone cut out of the mount without hands.It will be remembered by students of the Bible that John in his vision—“Stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. “And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. “And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. “And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beastf who is able to make war with him? “And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. “And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme His Name, and His Tabernacle and them that dwell in Heaven. “And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. “And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:1-8). No one can read these two descriptions and doubt that the same individual is described,—the same world power suggested. They both come out of the ten-point kingdom. They both exercise an imparted power. They both speak boastfully and blaspheme. They each continue forty and two months, or time, times and a half a time. They both make war with the saints and overcome them; and this is the individual who secures the worship of the world.It is not in dispute, though the Roman Empire as such crumbled, that its pieces still exist in the multiplied forms of government now to be found upon the face of the earth.

Its imperial characteristics are to enjoy a restoration, and its last emperor, the beast of this description, is to rule a federated empire of ten kingdoms.Beyond all question history now moves to that objective.The last war declared the independence of small nations. President Wilson’s deliverance on the subject secured world attention.The wars of the future will move in a different direction. They will force little nations out of existence, and will increase the power of the greater ones to the point where finally a federation of ten of the same will be proposed, and accepted.The supreme mark of the many antichrists that are in the world now, in fact the spirit of antichrist himself, is the denial of Christian Truth as it involves the Incarnation of God, and that philosophy of unbelief never had so many propagandas as at present.We move more and more, and in recent years with tremendous rapidity, toward the fulfilment of this prophecy.But, thanks be unto God, we also move more and more to the prophecy that follows as it relates to—THE CHRIST Of Him Daniel also speaks, saying:“I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought Him near before Him. “And there was given Him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve Him: His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and His Kingdom that which shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7:13-14). How marvelous to interject these two verses right into the middle of the visions and their interpretations, as if that long period of Church history were but a moment!That very fact is full of suggestion.He shall come shortly and suddenly. “In an hour when ye think not, the Son of Man cometh”, as suddenly as a flash of lightning seen from the east even unto the west. The better interpreters of the Book claim that Daniel’s “seventy weeks” are weeks of years, and that sixty-nine of them preceded His first advent—when He came to be cut off, that by the shedding of His Blood we might be redeemed; and that the Church period is a parenthesis, the termination of which is indefinite, but beyond which a period of only seven years follows, when He shall come in power and great glory to take the throne.The one thing we know concerning this time of the Gentiles—this period of the Church—is that it shall last until “this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness”. The hermit nations are no more; the testimony of the Christian Church has been given in them all, and no man can say that the day of His Appearance, coming with the clouds of Heaven, is not nigh. But God forbid that we should ever so far miss the meaning of our Master’s words, as to set the day for His Appearance, and become like those representatives of the Dowie movement, Burnette and Taylor, who declared “Unto Judah and unto Israel and unto all the world” that before the close of 1912, Jesus the Christ, the Son of God, will come forth to take His throne.”But more foolish yet were the virgins who slumbered and slept until the cry, “Behold, the bridegroom cometh” put them to utter confusion. It is ours to be ready to behold in fact what Daniel saw in the night vision, “the Son of Man [coming] with the clouds of Heaven”. He shall take the throne unto Himself, for “there was given Him dominion, and glory, and a Kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve Him: His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and His Kingdom that which shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7:14).

And the saints shall share it with Him (Daniel 7:27).Truly, as Dr. H. Grattan Guinness says, “The glory of the Kingdom of God irradiates this closing prophecy, and the people who are to inherit that glory fill its pages.” These, the chief themes of the Old Testament prophecy, involve the greatest event to which all apocalyptic Scripture directs attention—the Second Advent of Christ, who will come in glory and majesty to raise the dead, judge the world and reign with His saints forever. And every Bible instructed man ought to join with John in crying, “Come, Lord Jesus, and come quickly!”He shall bring in a better age.“His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and His Kingdom that which shall not be destroyed”. In that day nations shall cease from war, and not till then. The implements of destruction shall be beaten into those of husbandry. Jeremiah waxes eloquent as he writes:“Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the House of Israel and to the Home of Judah. “In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land. “In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely: and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The Lord our righteousness” (Jeremiah 33:14-16). There are men, and their names are a multitude, who are putting their trust now in armaments, and the Heaven-born word of Prophecy is deliberately displaced with the earth-born one of “Preparedness.” Men are turning from confidence in Christ to the creation of new and bigger cannons; and instead of putting their trust in the Lord, who is to descend from Heaven, they are proposing to invent machines that will fly into the same, and drop the darts of death upon their opponent.In January, 1916, the Journal of Minneapolis published a sacrilegious cartoon in the form of! Uncle Sam, with a staff tied about his neck as if he were unable to hold it up. On the staff was a shield, out from which grinned a face, whose Rooseveltian teeth were the prominent thing about it, while in the right hand of that representation of our national life was held a garlanded cross, and below was written “Armed to the teeth,” the plain intent of which was the sacrilegious suggestion that the Nation that had no other defense than the Cross of Christ could be the easy prey of any enemy that cared to come within our borders, to overrun our land, subjugate and enslave our people.This all means that the time may not be distant when the members of the professing Church shall be compelled to make their choice between cannon and the Cross. The one thing that is increasingly evident is that we cannot trust in both. They have no fellowship one with the other. The antichrist will be the man of war, and under his administration multitudes of his opponents will perish.

The Christ of God will be the Prince of Peace and under His administration men shall cease from battle and become brethren.Some of us believe profoundly, and even increasingly, that there is more safety in the Cross than in cannon, in the Saviour who is to come out of Heaven, than in airships that fly there, and in the Man of Nazareth who walks on the waters, than in crafts that steal about underneath them, seeking to strike and send down their foes. It is a time when we might do well to remind ourselves of a piece of history that comes to us out of Josephus.Alexander the Great was gone forth conquering and to conquer, and at last he turned his face toward Jerusalem, after having successfully besieged Tyre and Gaza and reduced them to ashes.

Jaddua, the high-priest (Nehemiah 12:22), who had been warned in a dream how to avert the king’s anger, calmly awaited his approach. And as Jaddua walked into the city of Sapha, accompanied by priests and citizens clothed in garments of white, Alexander looked upon them, and seeing that they had no sword in hand, or other weapons of defense, but came to him in the Name of God, and arrayed in garments that spoke of innocence and peace, he was so moved by the solemn spectacle that he did reverence to the holy Name inscribed upon the priest’s tiara. And when Parmenio expressed surprise, Alexander said that he had had a dream in which the God of Jaddua had encouraged him to cross over into Asia, and had promised him success. In consequence, he would not lift his hand against them; but visited Jerusalem and offered sacrifice there, heard the prophecies of Daniel, and believed that he saw in them his own victories; and realized perfectly that instead of conquering the Jews he ought indeed to placate them by conferring upon them important privileges, which he did.America has boasted itself civilized and Christian. We are rapidly approaching the time that shall test our profession and the whole world will know and be affected and influenced accordingly. Do we trust in the Cross or in cannon?