Daniel 7:5

"And behold another beast, like to a bear; and it was raised up on one side, and three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth; and they said thus unto it, Arise, devour much flesh."

The big factor in the identification of this beast is that it came after the first thus denoting that it was the empire that succeeded Babylon. All of the other details, it appears to us are inert factors in the vision, collectively designed to show the ruthless and destructive character of all the great pagan empires as they most surely applied to the second beast also. We have discovered no reasonable interpretation of the three ribs between its teeth.

For long ages, this second beast was identified by all scholars as the Medo-Persian power which succeeded Babylon. The critical device of making this second beast refer to the Median Empire and the third beast a reference to the Persian empire, with only one thing in mind, namely that of making the fourth beast a prophecy of Alexander's empire, is fraudulent. The Medo-Persian empire was not two different empires, but one only. "History knows of no Median empire."[11] "This hypothesis of Medo-Persia being two empires is destitute of every foundation."[12] In Daniel's prophecy that Babylon would be divided and given to "the Medes and the Persians" (Daniel 5:28), the fulfillment is given in Daniel 5:31, "Darius the Mede took the kingdom," indicating that there was just one kingdom, Darius taking "the kingdom of the Medes and the Persians."