I’d like to take the opportunity to reply to Richard’s query about my Article called – “The Little Horn of Daniel’s 4^th Empire and the Kingdom of the Jews”, which was posted on 5 doves last year.

Richard Spendiff ( 4 July 2007 )
"Re: EAR, Daniel, beasts, goats and leopards and rams..."

EAR states of Daniel chapter 7:11:-

v.11 I beheld then because of the voice of the great words which the horn spake: I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. v.12 AS CONCERNING THE REST OF THE BEASTS, THEY HAD THEIR DOMINION TAKEN AWAY: YET THEIR LIVES WERE PROLONGED FOR A SEASON AND TIME. (He is here referring to the three remaining Beast Empires of Babylon, Persia and Greece .)

After Babylon was defeated by Persia and it’s dominion taken away, Babylon did not have it’s life extended by a season and a time – Babylon was FINISHED. Therefore, QED, Babylon is not one of the beasts of Daniel chapter 7.

Dan 5:25 And this is the writing that was written: A MINA, A MINA, A SHEKEL, AND HALF MINAS.

Dan 5:26 This is the meaning of the thing: A MINA: God has numbered your kingdom and finished it.

Dan 5:27 A SHEKEL: You are weighed in the balances and found lacking.

Dan 5:28 HALF MINAS: Your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.

Dan 5:29 Then Belshazzar commanded, and they clothed Daniel with purple, and a necklace of gold around his neck. And they made a proclamation concerning him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.

Dan 5:30 In that night Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, was killed.

Dan 5:31 And Darius the Mede took the kingdom, being a son of sixty two years.

It is clear, then, that the beasts in chapter 7 are not Babylon , Persia and Greece .

MY REPLY: Context is important in this vision. The context is that the subject matter is the same as that seen in Chapter 2, but this God given vision is expanded to give further details about how these four great Empires were going to affect Judah (the Jews). To suggest that the Beasts in chapter 7 are not the same as the Empires in Chap. 2, is not borne out by Biblical Commentaries, nor the text itself.

I have wondered where you got that idea from, and realise it has come from some material you posted earlier in the week at -

I have since read thoroughly that material, and find some of it very helpful – i.e. “The Middle East is the focus of prophecy” - and some of it quite confusing, particularly in the Section entitled “The Four Beasts” when the author states that these four Beasts are divisions of the Islamic Empire, but he is unable to identify them.

Daniel 7:3-7 KJV “And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another. The first was like a lion, and had eagle’s wings; I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man’s heart was given to it. And behold another beast, a second, like to a bear, and it raised up itself on one side, and it had three ribs in the mouth of it between the teeth of it; and they said thus unto it, Arise, devour much flesh. 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. 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.” Dan. 7:11-12 “I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. AS CONCERNING THE REST OF THE BEASTS, THEY HAD THEIR DOMINION TAKEN AWAY: YET THEIR LIVES WERE PROLONGED FOR A SEASON AND TIME.”

These four beasts are described as being diverse or different from one another – that doesn’t sound like divisions of a single Islamic Empire to me! These beasts consumed one another. The first LION Beast was given a man’s heart which symbolised the Babylonian King’s eventual belief in the God of the Jews. The 2^nd BEAR Beast (Media/Persia) Empire devoured the first one – the three ribs stand for the areas it conquered – the 3^rd Beast LEOPARD was to have Dominion, and it did – it was the largest Empire of the first three which were all located in one area, and its culture was spread throughout the known World. The 4^th DREADFUL AND TERRIBLE Beast Empire was described again as being different from the earlier beasts, and it was because Rome extended right around the Mediterranean , and not just in the East – in its later European Nation Colonising era it subdued the whole World and broke it in pieces.

“The first beast to arise from the sea corresponds to the head of gold of the image (Dan. 2:32). The symbolism of the lion and eagle’s wings (v. 4) represents Babylon , as may be seen from Jer. 4:7; 49:19 Hab. 1:8 and Ezekiel 17:3. It is difficult to see how a writer, living long after the destruction of the Babylonian Empire, could have learned of this imagery. Babylon is represented by the most kingly of creatures. The change which came upon the beast evidently has reference to the event of Nebuchadnezzar’s madness and his subsequent restoration. Both outwardly and inwardly, a humanizing process takes place.” END QUOTE

Quite apart from the scriptural endorsement, the ISHTAR GATE at Babylon was adorned with pictures of the Winged Lion, which was one of the many idolatrous creatures the Babylonians worshipped. This particular winged Lion God was called Pabilsag. The Original Ishtar Gate is now in the Pergamum Museum in Berlin . You can see the imagery by “Googling” the “Ishtar Gate”. Also I could mention that the Babylonian Chief God MARDUK was depicted as a horned DRAGON. (Compare Rev. 12:3).

To summarise – This is a record of the Vision given to Daniel about the four Great Empires which would subjugate

Judah

. Daniel wanted to focus the VISION on the 4^th Beast Empire and his wish was granted – there is a whole heap of information about this one – right up until it is DESTROYED. In this vision Daniel saw that the other beasts had their DOMINION taken away – i.e. they would no longer be a force in history once their reign had ended, but they were NOT DESTROYED. This VISION condenses the future, giving Daniel a picture of both the beginning and the ending of these entities as EMPIRES i.e. their Dominion was taken away by the succeeding Empire in the order of history in which it occurred. i.e. BABYLON , MEDIA/PERSIA,

GREECE

and lastly ROME (which was destroyed) in Daniel’s Vision.

The one common thread of the conquests in these areas was that the people became vassals of the conquering Empire which swallowed them up until they became part of the succeeding Empire.

Daniel 7:12 says that after these Empires lost their DOMINION, something was salvaged for a future season and a time, i.e. the basic component – their lives. WHY?

Jesus endorsed Daniel as a great prophet of

Judah

, to his disciples – WHY? So that when John on the Isle of Patmos had a similar vision to Daniel’s he would recognise the imagery and understand what they stood for.

A LION, A BEAR, and a LEOPARD. And an “UN-NAMED BEAST”, which was destroyed.

part of a LEOPARD, part of a BEAR, and part of a LION combined as one rising BEAST, and later on he saw that it had a prostitute sitting on it. History tells us that there was only one Empire which came after those previous three, and which was sitting on most of the same territory as the previous Empires, and that was ROME ! Rome took over the Greek/Seleucid territory. John hid Rome ’s identity (in all its manifestations) in the imagery of the Woman sitting on the Beast. It was Rome (in his day and afterwards) which was drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs – trading slaves, buying and selling, dressed in Purple (Emperors) and Scarlet (Popes), sitting on 7 hills, controlling the Kings of the World – actually the Popes appointed Kings.

Once you identify the first of the Dan. 7 Beast Empires, the rest of them fit history as it unfolded.

Today, we live in the tail end of the devolved Roman era which will soon suffer the consequences of the Islamist Empire rising in the territory of the 3 previous Empires - Babylon, Media/Persia, and Grecian Beast Empires which had their lives prolonged for a season and time, and reappear in Revelation 13 as a Revived Islamic Beast Empire.

If you want to understand more about this you could read the Series I posted on 5 doves last November

In Rev. 17 and 18 this is the Beast that attacks the last semblance of Rome which now appears in the image of the Harlot - Rev. 18:24 “In her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.” That describes the 2,000 years of Rome ’s Dominion in all its manifestations on earth until its destruction as an Empire in 1945.

By the way Babylon did not disappear.– Scripture says it was DIVIDED and given to the Medes and the Persians (Dan.5:28 and 31.) “And Darius took the Kingdom....” It was taken peacefully and amalgamated, and swallowed up in a greater Kingdom, but Babylon as an Empire was ended. The Babylonians lived on....and the succeeding Empires of Media/Persia, and

Greece

all ruled from Babylon . I guess in one way these 3 Empires did all end their Dominion at the same time when Rome conquered the territories, because the 4^th Empires Capital was Rome, which was on a different continent.

EAR States:-

v.25 “And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High,... On 30^th January 1939, Hitler threatened the Jews during his Reichstag speech. On 6^th October 1939 he made a further proclamation on the isolation of Jews. In January 1940, the Nazis chose the town of Auschwitz in Poland as the site for a new concentration Camp. From 1941, after wiping out his opposition, Hitler was then free to do what he wanted and his previous propaganda programme was directed towards the persecution and killing of the Jews “the saints of the most High”, whom he blamed for all of Germany’s problems.

Are we really to believe that the Jews in the holocaust were the saints of the most high.

Rom 11:20 Well! For unbelief they were broken off. And you stand by faith. Do not be highminded, but fear.

Rom 11:21 For if God did not spare the natural branches, fear that it may be He will not spare you either.

Rom 11:22 Behold, then, the kindness and severity of God: On those having fallen, severity. But on you, kindness, if you continue in the kindness. Otherwise, you will also be cut off.

Isn’t this scripture talking about the holocaust:-

Deu 31:16 The LORD said to Moshe, Behold, you shall sleep with your fathers; and this people will rise up, and play the prostitute after the strange gods of the land, where they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.

Deu 31:17 Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall come on them; so that they will say in that day, Haven't these evils come on us because our God is not among us?

Deu 31:18 I will surely hide my face in that day for all the evil which they shall have worked, in that they are turned to other gods.

Psa 37:18 The LORD knows the days of the blameless, and their heritage will remain forever;

Psa 37:19 they are not put to shame in evil times; in the days of famine they have abundance.

The blameless are not put to shame – the Jews fell before their enemies in the holocaust which means they were not blameless.

It is clear that the Jews are still in unbelief but the Lord has plans for (perhaps only for some of) them. Those who perished in the holocaust were abandoned by their God for they had abandoned Him a long time ago.

I’m glad you brought this subject up because it has caused me to look even closer at Daniel 7 and I found something which endorsed what I believe and wrote about in “The Little Horn of Daniel’s 4^th Empire and the Kingdom of the Jews”

What else would Daniel call his persecuted people, but the “Saints” or the “Saints of the Most High”? That is why they were persecuted – they were God’s people, but because of their idolatry and sin, God gave them over to punishment and dispersion by the succeeding Empires.

Daniel knew very well what his people were like – Daniel 9:5-6 gives a list of their sins, and throughout chapter 9 he identifies with them by using “we” “us” and “thy people”. However scripture is full of little surprises, and FIVE times in Chapter 7 he calls them “Saints” or the “Saints of the Most High”. 7:18 – 7:21 – 7:22 – 7:22 – 7:25. However, it is very interesting that in the last reference in that chapter, the Kingdom is not given to the “Saints of the most High” but to “the people of the saints of the most high”. An interesting and discerning phrase, which probably describes today’s secular Jews.

You see the 4^th Kingdom ( Rome ) had persecuted the Saints of the Most High (Jewish Christians) in the early Centuries of the Church Age. It is interesting is it not, that there are no Saints mentioned in the other Chapters of Daniel (apart from 8:13 which might refer to an angel) – only in Chapter 7, and only in reporting what the “little horn” of the 4^th Empire (ROME) did to the “Saints” through the Nazi Regime. However, I note with satisfaction that Daniel did not say the Kingdom was given to the Saints of the most High, but only to their descendants, who as you point out are still in unbelief. Daniel’s view of the Kingdom’s future is just that – still future and the Jews who inherit it will eventually be “The Saints of the Most High” when they recognise their Messiah.

The Covenant that you refer to in Deut. 31:16 was indeed broken. It was replaced with the new Covenant of Jeremiah 31:31-34 which I have written about in my Booklet – “Daniel’s Prophecy of 70 Weeks and the Covenant” http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/sep2006/ear922.htm

This Covenant is always available for all Jews when they come to belief in Jesus Christ – which many are doing.

Unfortunately, I had not dealt with this particular point in the posting on 5 doves which you read.

The Hebrew word for “times” used here is listed as Strongs Word No. 2166 – it means times, event or occurrence. The word is used here in the sense of desiring to change the “past”, “history” or “events” rather more than changing the “times and seasons” on the calendar.

The words “to change times” may simply mean to “re-write history” for ones own benefit – e.g., blame the intended victims for past failures; and “to change laws” means to change the laws to expedite ones own future “unlawful” aims and purposes.

Hitler changed the record of historical events to suit himself. He orchestrated the events leading up to the invasion of

Poland

to justify his actions. The Jews were blamed for things they did not do.

In the 19^th Century

Germany

was under a spirit of pride and arrogance believing in the innate superiority of the Aryan race, whilst regarding Jews, Poles, Slavs and Russians as lower class races. The Jews in particular were blamed for WWI and WWII and the Great Depression. Hitler’s rhetoric hid a “lying spirit” which inverted the truth and laid the blame for everything on the Jews.

In effect, Hitler put a slant on history, events and occurrences to suit his agenda.