Daniel 2- Explanation

[1] “You O king, are a king of kings: for the God of heaven has given you a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. And wherever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven has he given into your hand, and has made you ruler over them all. You are this head of gold. [2] And after you shall arise another kingdom inferior to you [3] and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth. [4u] And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: just as iron breaks in pieces and subdues all things: and as iron that breaks all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise. [4d] And like as you saw the feet and toes, part of potters‘ clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, just as you saw the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. And like as you saw iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cling one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay. [g] And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever. Just as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God has made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation of it sure.” (Daniel 2:37-45)

Just as the stone shattered the statue, so this dream shattered the dream of a Hebrew empire. From Nebuchadnezzar’s time to the end of the world, history would be controlled by other empires. At best, Israel would just be another country.

This dream leaves no wiggle room. Just as the metal sections sit one atop another in the statue, so empire 1 would be followed immediately by empire 2, then 3, then 4, then God’s kingdom. There are no gaps for Israel to exploit. There are no loopholes of which to take advantage.

You are probably wondering about the U and the D after the 4. U stands for United and D for Divided. Those are my letters. Read the interpretation again and see if that makes sense to you.

This dream has laid down a solid first layer on which to build. We know that the first empire is Babylon (king and kingdom are used interchangeably) and the last one is God’s. We know that in between there is a second, third, and fourth with no gaps. Therefore, all human history since about 600b.c. fits on this timeline.

Although this chapter does not tell us the names of the other kingdoms, many answers will be revealed as we continue reading. What we currently know is summarized in the empire chart.