Daniel In Babylon

The story of a great man’s faith

10. The Beginning of the End

It was two years after Daniel’s dream of the four world‑empires, in the guise of four ravenous wild beasts, that the aged prophet’s eyes were opened again. Perhaps it was the quickening tempo of political events around him that sharpened the old man’s faculties and enabled him to apply himself more devotedly to the leading of the Spirit. For more than ten years past the name of a military leader, Cyrus of Anshan, descendant of the kings of Elam, had been familiar to him as it was to all dwellers in Babylon. Cyrus with his armies was rapidly bringing all the lands of the Middle East into subjection to the rising power of the Medes, who with Babylonians had destroyed Assyria some hundred years previously and in the days of Nebuchadnezzar had ranked as a friendly power to Babylon. Queen Amytis, the wife of Nebuchadnezzar, was herself a princess of Media. But Nebuchadnezzar had been dead now for thirteen years and Queen Amytis was destined to follow him only a year after this particular vision of Daniel, and Cyrus had ambitious designs on Babylon. His army was engaged in the siege of Sardis, capital of Lydia, the only power beside Babylon which remained unsubdued, and Daniel, astute politician that he was, must have known that Babylon’s turn could not be much longer delayed.

So it is not surprising that in the eighth chapter of Daniel we are taken right into the centre of happenings which were to transfer the sovereignty of the world, first from Babylon to Medo‑Persia, and then from Medo‑Persia to Greece. This vision and this prophecy is one of the easiest in the whole of the Bible to interpret for the reason that its application is given by the revealing angel in terms of the plain names of the countries concerned. The correspondence with history is so marked that there can be no doubt about the matter. The factor that requires a little more thought, and yet is of greater importance than the interpretation, is the question: of what value is this strictly "history‑book" prophecy to us? But that question can be looked at after we have considered the vision itself.

According to chap.8, verse 2, Daniel was "at Shushan in the palace...in the province of Elam." It is fairly obvious from the text that he was there only "in the spirit," not literally. Elam and Babylon were virtually in a state of war at this time and Daniel could hardly have been in the capital city of the enemy. He might very well have been a visitor in his earlier years when the two countries were on friendly terms; official business might well have taken him thither, so that it may not be at all strange to think of him seeing, in his dream, surroundings which were already familiar, and realising, perhaps for the first time, that here was a future stage for later acts of the Divine Plan when Babylon had ceased to be a power in the hands of God. Shushan eventually became the capital city of Persia, and was the home of Queen Esther and the scene of the events narrated in the Book of Esther, some seventy years later on.

The vision itself was a vivid and clear‑cut one, easily remembered because of its simplicity and restrained symbolism. A ram, having horns of unequal length, the higher coming up last, was butting its way irresistibly west, north and south—obviously therefore coming from the east—until it stood supreme and none challenged its authority. For a moment Daniel saw it thus, and then beheld a furious he‑goat bearing one great horn advancing from the west, charging the ram, casting it to the ground, and stamping upon it. So the he‑goat in its turn stood supreme.

Now the great horn was broken and in its place there grew up four smaller horns; but the force and power of the goat was not the same; it was spent. Then there appeared, budding out from one of those horns, a little horn, a little horn which began to wax greater and greater, turning itself toward the east and south, and towards the land which was always in Daniel’s heart, the land of Israel. With that thought the background of the vision changed, and Daniel realised that the horn was some strong power that would arise; he saw that power reaching up to heaven as though to challenge God in his own domain, and tearing down some of the stars from heaven, and stamping upon them.

Now Daniel was in the land of his desires, standing in the holy city, Jerusalem, and beheld the Temple of his longings, rebuilt and purified, the morning and the evening sacrifices offered in their due order by the appointed priests according to the law of Moses, the fulfilment of all that he had waited and sought through so many years. Here, at last, was the answer to his prayers. And he watched until that godless power revealed itself a ruthless despot which led its followers to bring to an end those morning and evening sacrifices, to profane and defile the holy Temple, to destroy and cast down all that was sacred to the One God, and persecute and slay those who maintained their loyalty and faith.

So the prophet’s hopes and short lived joys were dashed as he saw the fair vision of Zion’s glory crumble again into the dust and ashes of a ruined Temple and scattered people, as his fellows in Judea had seen it happen in reality forty years before. But that was all in the past, and God had promised that he would restore Israel and dwell again with them in the Holy place; this vision spoke of the future, and declared the heart‑breaking truth that after that restoration had become an accomplished fact and Israel had been delivered from captivity, the forces of evil would again prevail. With what painful intensity must Daniel have listened for the answer to the angel’s question (v.13), for "How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot?" For what further long period of time must the desolation of the sanctuary and the oppression of God’s people persist, before the final consummation of eternal glory for Israel? It was a gleam of hope; the desolation was not to be for ever; and Daniel listened anxiously for the answer.

"Unto two thousand and three hundred evenings and mornings; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed." (v.14 RV) Two thousand three hundred omissions of the daily morning and evening offerings of the sacrificial lamb. After that the oppressor’s hand would be lifted, the profaned and defiled Temple be ceremonially purified and rededicated and then the worship of God be resumed without let or hindrance. That was the message to Daniel and that the end of the vision proper. At that point the revealing angel came forward to explain to Daniel what it was all about.

"The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the kings of Media and Persia." (v.20) That is a plain, categorical statement admitting of no argument. The higher horn, which came up last, is plainly Persia. Media as an empire came into existence at the death of Sennacherib, king of Assyria, in 711 B.C., when the Medes revolted from Assyrian domination and established themselves as an independent kingdom under Deioces. Persia owed its rise largely to Cyrus more than a hundred and fifty years later, but in fact Persia did not become the acknowledged dominant factor in the Medo‑Persian partnership until the time of Darius Hystaspes, the third king after Cyrus. Hence "the higher came up last." (v.3) Daniel was perfectly familiar with the political set up of the nations in his own day and he would readily grasp the significance of this part of the vision. Next he was brought face to face with something that was still two centuries future, the overthrow of the Persian empire by Greece. "The rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is between his eyes is the first king." (v.21) That king is known in history, he was Alexander the Great, who led the Greeks into Asia round about the year 330 B.C. and subdued every nation in his path to the frontiers of India—and died at Babylon on his return journey a few years later. Thus was the great horn broken even as the prophecy foretold, and the empire built up by Alexander in those few years was divided between four of the leading generals. "Now that being broken, whereas four (horns) stood up for it, four kingdoms shall stand up out of the nation, but not in his power." (v.22) Continued strife between contending leaders, ambitious for power, was resolved at last in the formation of four separate kingdoms something like twenty‑two years after Alexander’s death. Macedonia passed into the control of Cassander; Thrace to Lysimachus; Syria, Judah, Babylon and Persia to Seleucus, and Egypt to Ptolemy. Israel was sandwiched between Syria in the north and Egypt in the south and her fortunes were bound up with these two contending powers. On this basis is built the further prophecies in Daniel picturing warfare between the "king of the north" and the "king of the south." (Dan.11)

Up to this point this vision follows and amplifies both Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the great image and Daniel’s dream of the four wild beasts, but whereas those dreams only showed the succession of four empires, gold, silver, copper, iron; and lion, bear, leopard and strange beast, this vision gives certain distinctive details of the second and third empires and distinguishes them by name. In verse 22 of chap.8 therefore we are brought in history to about the year 300 B.C. by which time the contending factions in the break‑up of Alexander’s empire had settled their differences and the four kingdoms were more or less firmly established.

Now the revealing angel ceases to use definite names. The "little horn" which came out of one of the four horns is defined as a fierce king who will arise "in the latter time" (v.23) of these four kingdoms and will be manifested as an enemy of God and a defiler of the sanctuary, but at the end he "shall be broken without hand" (v.25) and it is here that possible interpretations vary. The most natural understanding of the expression "in the latter time of their kingdom" (v.23) would appear to be the virtual ending of this four‑kingdom set‑up and its replacement by the fourth empire of prophecy, Rome, the iron of the image and the strange beast in Daniel’s dream. In point of fact three kingdoms—Macedonia, Thrace and Egypt—were all absorbed by Rome during the century before the birth of Christ. Of the fourth, Syria and the terrain west of the Euphrates were added to the Roman Empire at the same time, but the eastern provinces of the "king of the north" Assyria, Babylon, Persia, never did become part of Rome, but merged instead into the not inconsiderable empire of Parthia, the one great power Rome never did subdue. Parthia in turn disappeared before the Saracen armies early in the Christian era. It would seem therefore that the "little horn" in the "latter time of their kingdom" (the four‑kingdom quartet), must have arisen during that century or so during which Rome was pressing inexorably upon them.

The Romans originated from Greece in the 8th century B.C. but built up their power in Italy for some four centuries before manifesting interest in the Eastern lands. The death of Alexander and the consequent confusion amongst the four subsequent kingdoms awakened their interest and about sixty years after his death the then ruler of Egypt sent an embassy to Rome soliciting their help on his behalf in his conflict with Syria, to which the Jews were at the time subject. From then onwards Rome had an increasing influence in Eastern affairs.

Fifty years later Rome sent an embassy to Greece and from then on increasingly interfered in the political struggle between the four successors of Alexander gradually bringing them under their own control. The process culminated after a couple of centuries with Pompey’s capture of Jerusalem in 63 B.C. at which point the Jews passed from the control of Greece to that of Rome. A century later the Romans subdued Judah and Galilee, destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple and scattered the Jews all over the world.

Of the various interpretations of this vision which have been current through the centuries three have to be noticed. The immediate one, current in Jewry immediately prior to the First Advent, and carried over into early Christian thought, was that the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes of the 2nd century B.C. filled the role of the "little horn" and the "fierce king" of this chapter. Prophetic writers have described his conduct in such detail that there is no need to repeat it here; the Jews themselves have never been in any doubt as to his place in this prophecy. Antiochus launched a furious persecution against Jewish worship; he plundered the Temple and desecrated it by offering a sow upon the Brasen Altar; this was the defilement from which the sanctuary was later to be cleansed. Plenty of calculations exist interpreting the two thousand three hundred days as the literal number of days—about three and a half years—during which the Temple was to lie defiled. It is a fact that the cleansing and re‑dedication of the Temple by Judas Maccabeus in 165 B.C. was approximately three and a half years after its defilement in 168 B.C. It is claimed that the two thousand three hundred "evening‑mornings"—repetitions of the morning and evening sacrifices—equals eleven hundred and fifty literal days, and this was approximately, but only approximately, the interval between defilement and cleansing. So far as can be discovered from the histories of the period, the actual time was about eleven hundred and ninety two days.

This interpretation, viewed from the present time, has one serious defect. Although not stated in so many words, it is implied that once the "sanctuary" is "cleansed," Israel’s troubles are over and the Messiah would appear to establish his kingdom, sitting on the throne of the Lord at Jerusalem. At that time this could be held to be reasonable. According to Jewish expectation that event was to take place six thousand years from Creation, and their own Scriptures of that era claimed that the time was close at hand. Only two centuries later, when Jesus did appear at his First Advent, it is stated that "all men were in expectation." The reality was different. Christ did appear, but the time of his reign upon earth was still two thousand years away.

It is also true that the constant warfare between Syria and Egypt, between the death of Alexander and the Roman supremacy three centuries later, involved repeated acts of desecration of the Temple and robbery of its treasures. The Jews themselves were not without blame. Much of the severity of Antiochus Epiphanes was due to his efforts to quell the fratricidal conflicts between the supporters of contending High Priests, each endeavouring to secure the coveted position for themselves, shedding much blood in consequence. It is said by dispassionate historians that Ptolemy Philopator of Egypt at much the same time was a greater oppressor of the Jews than was Antiochus Epiphanes of Syria.

The other major interpretation is that the "little horn" is Mahomet (Muhammad) the prophet of Islam and that the defilement of the sanctuary occurred when at the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem in A.D.637 the holy places were handed over to the forces of the Caliph Omar. This ignores the fact that at the time the Holy City had been in possession of the Christians for many years and in fact the Jews at the time were better off under the Muslims than they had been under the Christians. This hypothesis is a centuries old conception born of the detestation of the Muslims felt by the then Christian world and since from the nature of the case the end of the 2,300 days must lie somewhere near the seven times of Gentile rule in the earlier account of the Babylonian king’s experience, this explanation would appear rather irrational.

Somewhere during the three centuries the enthusiasm of those pioneers who returned from Babylon in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah faded away and was lost, submerged in a sea of self‑seeking and violence between antagonistic parties under which true worship disappeared. The lesson of Babylon had not been learned; that was the true defilement of the sanctuary and that was more than two thousand years ago. Perhaps not only Antiochus, but also Titus, pagan Rome, the forces of Islam, Papal Rome, the powers of this world as they now exist, are all part of this little horn, this fierce king, who is to give way at the appointed time to a cleansed sanctuary. When Ezekiel in his vision of the Last Days pictured the last great conflict, he declared "so the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward." (Ezek.39:22) In that case, although the end of the 2,300 days has manifestly not yet come, it must certainly be imminent, in this our day when the world as we know it is going to pieces. The Kingdom for which Daniel looked and prayed is not now a long way off; it might well be "at the doors." So the most reasonable identification of the "little horn," arising out of the original four may well be Rome, originating from the Greek "horn" of Cassander, defiling the "sanctuary" of Israel by wars and oppression through the centuries of Rome pagan, Rome Papal, until at the end the fourth world‑empire seen by Daniel comes to its end at the coming of the Millennial Kingdom of our Lord. The cleansing of the sanctuary is then synonymous with the deliverance of Israel in the day of "Jacob’s Trouble" (Ezek.38 & 39) at the end of this Present Age.

Suffice it that Daniel perceived from this vision the probably very unwelcome truth that even though Israel be delivered from the power of Babylon and Jerusalem be restored, the days of Israel’s darkness were not ended; trouble and distress were yet to be their lot because of renewed unfaithfulness and apostasy. The end of all evil and the time of the kingdom were still a long way off.

The realisation came slowly. Even yet Daniel was not permitted to perceive the details of wars and rumours of wars which were to fill the long Gospel Age and terminate in a time of trouble which had not been since there was a nation. That was reserved for his final vision, the one that is recorded in his tenth to twelfth chapters, and that vision was vouchsafed to him something like fifteen years after the one we are now considering. Slowly, through the whole of his long life, Daniel was brought to realise that the ways of God, sure and unchangeable though they be, require for their accomplishment what seems to the mind of man, long and sometimes weary terms of years. One little human life is a very short span in the vast time‑scale of the Creator’s outworking purpose.

Perhaps that is the real lesson for us in Daniel chapter 8. Whether the little horn is descriptive of Antiochus or Mahomet or both; whether the mystic 2,300 represents literal days or symbolic years, or only evenings and mornings, half‑days, is all of very little consequence compared with the great central truth embedded in this chapter. The downfall of the Gentile powers which oppressed Old Testament Israel, the return of the captives to Jerusalem, the rebuilding of their Temple and their city, would not of itself abolish evil and bring in everlasting righteousness. Righteous zeal and true worship would flourish again, but it would flag and fade. Apostasy and iniquity would certainly return, and with it the distress and oppression which under Israel’s covenant was the logical and inevitable consequence. Again must the rod of the Lord be wielded, and whether that rod be Antiochus the scourge of Israel or Mahomet the scourge of Christendom matters little, for the principle is the same. Both Daniel’s people and all the world must needs wait for two great things, both of which are necessary to bring in the golden age for which Daniel longed. One is the First Advent and the other is the Second Advent. In visions yet to come Daniel was destined to see each of those great events pictured and only with both of them accomplished facts did he at last see the glad vision of resurrection.

So it must be with us. We have been privileged, as Daniel was never privileged to know that we live in the days of the Second Advent but we do not see the work of the Advent completed—in fact it is scarcely begun. Like Daniel, we still do not know "how long." Blessed are we if, again like Daniel, we rest firm in our conviction that, though it tarry, "it will surely come, it will not tarry." (Hab.2:3) Even though still like Daniel, we are destined first to "rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days." (Dan.12:13) Daniel died in Babylon without seeing that for which his heart had waited his whole life long; we like so many of our forebears in the past, may have to do the same. Happy we if, notwithstanding that, we are found steadfast in faith until the end.

(To be continued)
AOH