Daniel 2:43

"And whereas thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men; but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron doth not mingle with clay. And in the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall the sovereignty thereof be left to another people; but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. Forasmuch as thou sawest that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces, the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure."

INTERPRETATION CONTINUED

We shall now notice how exactly the traditional interpretation of these four kingdoms fits the image of Nebuchadnezzar's dream.

BABYLON was the head of gold. And, by the progressive decrease in the value of the materials in the image, the principle that human governments shall wax worse and worse throughout history is established. It will appear strange to some, in view of Nebuchadnezzar's unreasonable cruelty, that Babylon should have been the head of gold. However, since it was Daniel's duty to interpret the vision, it would have been fatal to him, perhaps, if anyone except Nebuchadnezzar had been named as the head of gold. Besides that, the deep religious convictions of Nebuchadnezzar, and the strict manner in which he honored his word, and a great many other commendable qualities of his reign attest the appropriateness of this symbol. In the matter of the captives, Nebuchadnezzar did not seek out young women to gratify his lust, but young men to be trained in art and science. Later human systems reversed this completely. We have never read of a commentator who denied that Babylon was the head of gold.

MEDO-PERSIA was the breasts and arms of silver; and it seems impossible that a more appropriate representative of this dual authority could have been devised than the breasts and arms of the great image. That Medo-Persia was indeed the empire that succeeded Babylon is a matter of history. Darius the Mede was a close confederate of Cyrus who appointed him as his first governor over Babylon after it was taken from the Chaldeans. His name is found on ancient monuments as Gubaru or Ugbaru. (See the full discussion of this in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, pp. 788,789). It is impossible to suppose that any authority, other than that of the Medes and the Persians succeeded the overthrow of Babylon.

THE GREEK EMPIRE (THAT OF ALEXANDER) succeeded to worldwide authority upon the overthrow of Medo-Persia. This power was symbolized by the belly and thighs of brass. "A third kingdom of brass" is the Biblical description; and Jamieson tells us that "This third empire (the Greeks) were celebrated for the bronze armor of their warriors."[15] Another distinguishing mark of this third empire was "its universality."[16] It is said of this third empire, "They shall bear rule over all the earth" (Daniel 2:39). This mark of identification settles forever the error of ascribing this third spot to Persia, for Persia never was able to conquer Greece; and, while it must be admitted that "the whole earth" here must mean the "whole known world"; a prominent nation like Greece could not have been left out of the reckoning. Such allegations as that of Owens which states that, "The third kingdom is that of the Persians,"[17] is clearly in error. Alexander alone conquered the whole world and then sat down and wept because there were no more nations to conquer! There is yet another identification mark of this third world power; and it was pointed out by Thomson. "The word translated "belly" (Daniel 2: 32) is plural; and it expresses along with the two thighs the idea of four-foldness!"[18] This points squarely to the Alexandrian Empire, because, upon the death of Alexander, the empire was promptly divided among the four generals of Alexander's army. "Not only that, the four parts eventually were only two: Syria and Egypt. These are the two thighs of the statue."[19] Efforts to make Alexander's Empire the fourth world power represented by the image fail completely. As Young noted, "The understanding of these four world powers foretold by the image as Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome is the only position that interprets Daniel 2:44 correctly. That verse states emphatically that God's kingdom will appear in the days of these four powers; that means the kingdom had to be established after the fourth of these great powers appeared on earth, that is, in the clays of the Roman kings.

THE ROMAN EMPIRE corresponded to the legs of iron and the feet of iron mingled with miry clay. "It shall be a divided kingdom." Rome divided into the Eastern and Western Empires with capitals at Rome and Constantinople. The iron-like nature of the Roman power to break in pieces and crash all nations is known to every student of history. "They shall not cleave one to another" shows that Rome's conquests, despite their overwhelming nature, and the brutal ruthlessness with which they were executed could never actually unite the conquered peoples. Note the rebelliousness of the Jews and that of the Parthians, and that of practically every other power subdued by the Romans. In no sense whatever were Rome's conquered peoples ever united. Iron cannot mix with clay. "They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men." We find no basis whatever for viewing this as the intermarriage of Roman kings with the heads of conquered states, or any such thing. What seems to be indicated by this is the absorption into the historic Roman Empire of successive waves of barbarian invaders. None of these things suggests either the empire or the times of Alexander.

THE KINGDOM OF GOD is symbolized by the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands, and which smote the great image upon the feet, broke it all into pieces and scattered all of the world empires as dust, and which increased until it filled the whole earth! Some have dared to assert that such a thing never happened, to which it may be replied that all of the world powers of this vision have long since disappeared from the earth; and nothing whatever is known of any of them except what men have written about them in the libraries of the world; but the kingdom of God is still flourishing. There have been more buildings erected to the honor and service of Jesus Christ in the United States of America alone during the last decade only than were previously erected all over the world in honor of all the kings and rulers who ever lived.

A certain critic quoted by Leupold stated that, "The victory of Christianity over Paganism was in no sense a victory of Christianity over the Roman Empire."[20] This, of course, is a gross error. Yes indeed Christianity destroyed the Roman Empire. As Leupold put it, "Christianity was in a sense God's judgment upon sinful Rome."[21] Will Durant has this:

"There is no greater drama in human record than the sight of a few Christians, scorned or oppressed by a succession of emperors, beating all trials with fierce tenacity, multiplying quietly, building order while their enemies generated chaos, fighting the sword with the word, brutality with hope, and at last defeating the strongest state that history has known. Caesar and Christ had met in the arena, and Christ had won."[22]

The Roman Empire was the climax of paganism; and even in the days of Theodosius there yet remained four hundred twenty four pagan temples, each of them manned by a tremendous staff of pagan priests.[23] Every emperor was a self-styled god; and well into the second century Christians were being burned alive for refusing to burn incense to the emperor, as proved by the martyrdom of Polycarp at Smyma (155 A.D.). Did Christianity win over that? Yes. In the year 389 A.D., the Emperor Theodosius closed down all the pagan temples, proscribed and outlawed the pagan priesthood, and initiated many other changes that emphasized the totality of the Christian victory.