Daniel 2:43-49

Daniel 2:43

And whereas thou sawest 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 is not mixed with clay.

 

To keep these kingdoms together in a unified state to maintain power, these kingdoms begin to intermingle with each other by means of marriage between the rulers and by taking captives from one country and planting them in their empire.  Instead of these empires becoming more unified and stronger, the foreign influences within them will have a debilitating effect on them thus leading to their demise.  When Rome conquered other lands, they tried to assimilate the people of different cultures but it only made problems and not strength.  The verse states that these different groups will not cleave to each other.  The word “cleave” carries with it the meaning of “to hold together or adhere with a strong attachment.”  The attempt to intermarry the races in captivity will only lead to more problems and normally kingdoms and empires are destroyed from within, a long time before an enemy comes from the outsider and finishes the job.  Abraham Lincoln said it best about America:

 

“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”

Daniel 2:44

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.

 

Now God introduces the fact that there is another kingdom which shall never see defeat or demise.  Even during the reign of all the kings of these mighty kingdoms and empires, God was setting up the kingdom of God through which the Lord Jesus Christ would eventually come.  This reveals to us that even though there are great kingdoms on earth, the kingdom of God is the one that will never wane and it is the one authority on this earth which rules and overrules the earthly kingdoms.   Just as each kingdom was conquered and the people in them and their countries and their material goods went to the conquerors, the kingdom of God will never be conquered and given to someone else.  It will only contain those who have been elected by God for salvation and God will never relinquish control of it because it is an eternal kingdom.  It is a continuum without end.  Just as earthly kingdoms like Rome or Babylon stood strong at the zenith of their existence, they eventually waned and were subject to capture.  Not so with the kingdom of God which will never lose power nor its authority in this entire universe.  In fact, the earthly kingdoms will be subject to the kingdom of God and as we already saw it is God who raises up kings and deposes them. 

 

Romans 13:1 (KJV)   Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.

 

While these kingdoms believed they are the ultimate power on earth, where are they today?  Not one exists in the form they did when they were empires.

 

Daniel 2:45

Forasmuch as thou sawest that the 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.

 

The stone is the kingdom of God and the Lord Jesus Christ mentions its destructive powers in the New Testament in the following verses.  No matter how powerful an earthly kingdom seems to be, when they attempt to challenge the kingdom of God, they will suffer the fate as if a large stone has fallen upon them and ground them to powder.  Christ came to earth under Rome which looked like it was impossible to defeat, yet it was finally defeated.

 

Matthew 21:44 (KJV)   And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

 

Luke 20:18 (KJV)   Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

 

Each of these kingdoms were pagan kingdoms and worshipped false gods, some like Rome had a pantheon of false gods.  Nebuchadnezzar had the privilege in his dream to see the demise of all the kingdoms, his and those which would come after him all the way up till the 5^th century A.D. when Rome was completely destroyed.  Daniel goes on to finish his interpretation of the dream by stating that what was seen in the dream, such as the destruction of the subsequent empires from his, was certain.  The word “certain” carries with it the meaning of “concrete, fixed, or truth.”  In other words, it is not something which can be reversed.  Then he completes his words by saying that the interpretation of the dream is “sure.”  The word “sure” carries with it the meaning of “faithful and sure.”  In fact it is the Aramaic word “aman” and we see related words in both Hebrew and Greek that are translated “amen” which means from Hebrew “so it be, truth” and from Greek “firm or surely.”  In other words, what Daniel interpreted was to happen as if it happened already.

 

Daniel 2:46

Then the king Nebuchadnezzar fell upon his face, and worshipped Daniel, and commanded that they should offer an oblation and sweet odours unto him.

 

Then as what pagans always do, Nebuchadnezzar then fell on his face or he prostrated himself before Daniel and basically worshipped him since he probably believed that he was more than a man containing some deity because of his sure interpretation of the dream.  The king then commanded some kind of oblation which would have been some kind of offering mingled with the sweet incense from a pagan ritual be made unto Daniel.  It does not seem to say that it was carried out once the king got back on his feet and started to speak with Daniel.  The king was probably very elated that he found someone to interpret his dream.  He might have not been paying too close attention especially about the part where Babylon was going to be destroyed and taken over by another kingdom.  Normally if anyone prophesies that to a sitting king, they either get thrown in jail or beheaded.

 

Daniel 2:47

The king answered unto Daniel, and said, Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret.

 

Nebuchadnezzar now acknowledges that the God of Daniel is a God of gods, that is, He is supreme because the other counselors who served false gods could not even come close to what Daniel had told the king.  He also acknowledges that God is not only the God of gods but He is also Lord of all the kings on earth especially as Daniel had relayed to him the coming destruction and replacement of the coming kingdoms of Babylon and those afterwards.  He was also happy that God had revealed to him the great secret of his dream that none of the other wise men could even come close to doing.  All they did was make excuses but Daniel was so confident in God that he told the king even before he went into prayer that God would give him the details and interpretation of that dream.  Daniel knew that it was God who gave the king the dream and that the true interpretation of it could only come from God.

 

Daniel 2:48

Then the king made Daniel a great man, and gave him many great gifts, and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon, and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon.

 

The king was true to his word as we read in verse 6:

 

Daniel 2:6 (KJV) But if ye shew the dream, and the interpretation thereof, ye shall receive of me gifts and rewards and great honour: therefore shew me the dream, and the interpretation thereof.

 

The king then proceeded to make Daniel a great man in the kingdom.  Of course, he was already made great by God’s choosing but a pagan king looks at material goods and that is what he showered Daniel with.  He showered him with great gifts, probably much silver and gold and maybe jewels.  Just like Joseph who became governor of Egypt in one day, because of his faithfulness to God, Daniel became a very wealthy man in one day and along with that wealth came a major promotion as governor over the chief province of Babylon.  Babylon was divided into many provinces but the most central and chief province was Babylon itself.  So it was a high position that Daniel was given.  Along with that promotion, since the king saw that Daniel could interpret dreams, he also made him chief of the governors of all the wise men of Babylon.  This position would place him in charge of all those who were studying to be wise men and those who were teaching the arts of being a wise man.  They had something like a school where they learned these arts and since Daniel had the great ability to interpret dreams, he was placed in charge of all those who were students and professors.

 

Daniel 2:49

Then Daniel requested of the king, and he set Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, over the affairs of the province of Babylon: but Daniel sat in the gate of the king.

 

Daniel did not forget his companions who prayed with him that God would give the king the true interpretation of his dream.  So Daniel made request of the king to also promote his three companions to positions where they could use their wisdom and knowledge in the service of the king.  So the king obliged Daniel’s request and made Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego assistants to Daniel and placed them in positions overseeing the affairs of the central province of Babylon.   However, because of Daniel’s upper position he sat in the king’s gate which was the central corridor leading into the king’s court.  It was probably in this position where Daniel would handle the king’s business without having to disturb the king.  People would probably come to Daniel so he could adjudicate matters brought before him.  For as the wisdom of Solomon spread throughout the land of Israel, no doubt the wisdom of Daniel also was reported among the province of Babylon.  Daniel would have been the chief man in the king’s court at this time.

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