The Biblical analysis of man's history is just the opposite. The Scripture narrates man's noble and perfect beginning and then proceeds to trace his descent from society with God to savagery. Technologically, man has accomplished almost miracles; spiritually and ethically, he has been in retrogression since the fatal transgression in Eden.
The subject at hand gives us a glimpse of the end product--the final stage of man's swift downward plunge to beastiality and the ultimate in moral degradation.
Part 1 (Daniel 7: 1-14)
Chapter 7 turns the clock back to the accession year of Belshazzar when Daniel was granted a series of divine revelations which came to him through the medium of dreams and visions. Not everything which Daniel saw in visionary form is recorded in detail; he wrote down only the salient features of their content--a kind of summary with special attention given to world kingdoms.
Actually, the content of Chapter 7 consists of four visions:
- The vision of the three beasts
- The vision of the fourth beast
- The vision of the judgment scene
- The vision of the coming of the Son of Man
The angels who are responsible for restraining universal commotion and catastrophe permit the storms to rage uncontrollably. Out of the surging, billowing waters arose four tremendous monsters, each different from the other.
Daniel described each as it appeared beginning with a lion, continuing with a bear and a leopard, and concluding with the mention of a beast so ferocious and unique Daniel could compare it with no known creature. It had iron teeth and ten horns. In contemplating the ten horns, Daniel noticed the rise of an eleventh horn, occasioned by the uprooting of three of the other horns (vs. 8).
Then the prophet's eye beheld a governmental scene in Heaven. Seats were arranged around a central throne on which sat the Ancient of days. The very same description in Revelation 1 is given of Christ, although here in Daniel, God the Father is in view, He is the chief justice who decides the affairs of men and earth.
"Ancient" intimates the eternity of the divine person. The white hair is an emblem of purity and holiness. The fiery flame and burning wheels, reminiscent of Ezekiel 1, are indicative of severity. The fiery stream speaks of the going forth of judgment in which sinners are consumed (vs. 10).
The 100 million spirit beings who stand ministering before Him are angels and should be distinquished from the occupants of the lesser thrones.
I've heard it argued the lesser thrones are occupied by a different order of spirit beings or by human representatives of Israel or of the church...
At any rate, the sovereign of the universe has decided to judge earth dwellers for their awful wickedness. This should not be confused with the great white throne judgment after the millennial reign. The judgment in Daniel 7 I believe occurs before the millennial kingdom and especially concerns the destiny of the fourth beast (vs. 11).
The judgment proceeds on the basis of what was recorded in the books. The deeds of men are written down for evidence against them. God's righteous judgment will not overlook the works which men have done.
In a final vision, Daniel sees the Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven (vs. 13). This is a revelation of Christ with special emphasis upon His humanity, His relationship to Israel as the Messiah, and His role as the governor of nations (vs. 14).
Christ has proved himself eminently qualified to rule, as every other human representative has not, and now He is invested with universal regal authority.
Daniel describes both the king and the kingdom. The scope of the kingdom will include "all people, nations and languages." The kingdom is as enduring as the earth itself. The kingdom, then, refers to the future worldwide sway of Jesus Christ over the governments of earth.
None will contest His authority and none will dethrone the king of glory. The kingdom here in Daniel is the earthly millennial kingdom, the restored Davidic kingdom, the Messianic kingdom and not the universal sovereignty of God--sometimes called the absolute kingdom--which He has always exercised in the affairs of men.
The millennial age is a future period in history during which the universal government of God will be exercised on earth without opposition from men, through a human mediator--the man Christ Jesus.
I think a kingdom cannot exist without a king. As long as the king is rejected and absent from earth, the kingdom will be delayed. Some teachers speak of the postponement of the kingdom. I think they mean the interval during which the kingdom program has been suspended during the church age.
Part 2 (Daniel 7: 15-28)
The visions were entirely beyond Daniel's ability to interpret. He'd gazed upon some terrible scenes, and his spirit was disquieted (vs. 15). An angel imparted the information Daniel sought (vs. 16).
The beasts represent the successive empires of ancient Babylon (lion) Medo-Persia (bear), Greece (leopard), and Rome (the nondescript beast), especially at the time when these empires extended their dominions to include the mediteranean coasts. The beasts don't seem to describe the initial beginnings of these empires so much as a later stage in their development.
When it comes to the fourth beast, we have something that goes way beyond anything ever develped in the ancient Roman empire. When Daniel sees this beast, it not only dominates the world of the Mediterranean but exists in the form of ten-state unification.
The angel interprets the horns to be "ten kings that shall arise" (vs. 24). I don't think it means the kings will come on the scene successively, one after the other with perhaps long intervals between. I believe they are all ruling simultaneously when an eleventh king puts in his appearance. Never in the past was the Roman empire ruled by ten contemporaneous kings.
The ten horns are identical in meaning to the ten toes of the image in Nebuchadnezzar's dream. The ten horns, like the ten toes, represent a future development in which the Mediterranean world will be controlled by ten united states.
This form of government will be functioning when Christ returns from glory to destroy it. The forth kingdom, in this ten-nation form, will be the last Gentile world government and will be demolished to make room for the fifth world government--a theocracy under the rule of the Messiah (vs. 14, 18, 22, 27).
The kingdom of Messiah did not follow the collapse of Rome in A.D. 476, and the Roman empire at that time was not ruled by ten kings simultaneously. The fourth beast is ancient Rome, but the stage of the empire, as Daniel describes it, belongs to the future tribulation period.
I think that although these kingdoms (Medo-Persia, Greece, Roman)... are historical and successive in their rising, one does not completely destroy the other. Each continues in its characteristic features utnil they are all combined in the reorganized empire of the future.
Most of Daniel 7 deals with the fourth kingdom, the ten horns, and the little horn because these are the matters which have special significance for the time of the end.
The first three beasts get little consideration because they do not have future ramifications--the territories of Babylon, Persia, and Greece were conqured by ancient Rome and will be included in the teriritories of the reorganized Roman empire. Moreover, the future empire will be characterized by the voracity of Babylon, the tenacity of Persia, the velocity of Greece, and the rapacity of Rome. (I think five of these kings will preside over Europe, and the other five over the Middle East)...
The little horn must now engage our interest. After the ten kings have asserted their authority over the vast empire of the future, another king will make his appearance. He has an insignificant arrival--"little horn", but he soon makes his authority felt.
He overcomes opposition from three kings and is eatapulted to absolute sovereignty over the reorganized empire (vs. 24). He is especially remarkable for diabolical intelligence. His eyes mesmerize his audiences. He is a master of persuasive oratory.
Primarily... his verbal abuse is directed against the most high God and the tribulation saints (vs. 25). His dictatorship will continue for 3 1/2 years--the last half of the seven year tribulation.
I think the saints referred here in verses 18, 21, 22, 25, and 27 are people who will be saved after the church saints have been raptured. Many of the saints of the tribulation period will survive the judgments and remain on the earth after the tribulation to become the citizens of the millennial kingdom.
Side note here.....I've often heard the "little horn" described as the "antichrist"... typically the term antichrist is used to identify the first beast of Revelation 13:1-10. All premillenial interpreters agree that the first beast of Revelation and the little horn of Daniel 7 are one and the same person, but not all agree to which endtime personality the title "antichrist" should be applied... because there are a couple of beasts described in Revelation.
Getting these end-time characters distinguished and identified is one of the most complicated projects in prophetic studies. I have no idea what interpretations may be accurate.. but it seems most in keeping with the full picture of Scripture to take the view that the antichrist is the last ecclesiastical head of the reorganized Roman empire, and the European dictator is the last civil head.
Revelation 13:1-10 gives the clearest analysis of the character and conduct of the little horn of Daniel 7--the European beast dictator.
In all of the details this passgage corresponds to what Daniel discloses. In a vision, John sees a beast rise out of the Mediterranean Sea--a beast which already has 10 horns (Rev. 13:1). The empire of the future is a composite of the leopard, bear, and lion, which suggests the empire of the beast will eventually incorporate everything within the old territories.
The empire of the future will be brought out of the period of inactivity and rise to political supremacy. The emperor will demand to be worshiped as God (Rev. 13:4).
John paints the same portrait of the beast Danil unveils---bestial, blatent, blasphemous, and belligerent.
John concurs with Daniel... the ten kings will recognize the absolute authority of the dictator (Rev. 17: 12, 13). He anticipates the collapse of the empire of the beast and finally sees the beast seized and his armies destroyed in the lake of fire.
John, like Daniel (Daniel 7:12), even intimates the destruction of the beast himself and his kingdom will not be the finale of end time events, for a remamnt of armies will need to be dealt with and destroyed after the slaying of the beast and his armies (Revelation 19:21). But the Son of Man will triumph over the man of sin.
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