Today, I am reading and commenting on Daniel 7-8.
When I was younger these two visions were among my favorite passages in the Bible. I felt that as the events described came to pass we would see how they predicted the future. I still believe that they describe a time in Daniel’s future, but now I think their meaning for us is more complicated than demonstrating God’s ability to reveal the future. Which means I find them challenging to write about. Today I want to write about the first vision. There are four beasts mentioned and their descriptions seem bizarre. The first one is described as a winged lion, which has its wings torn off, is stood up like a human and given a human mind. The second looks like a bear, but is raised up on one side. Then we are told it has three ribs between its teeth. I have always assumed that to mean that it has the ribs of some animal in its mouth that it is chewing on, but it struck me today that perhaps they were supposed to be thought of like baleen in the mouth of a baleen whale (if you don’t know what I mean, go look up baleen whales). Even without the ribs part I have trouble forming a picture of this beast in my mind (what does it mean by “raised up on one of its sides”). The third beast looks like a leopard with four bird wings and four heads. That is a strange look, but at least one that I can fully imagine in my head. The final beast I always imagine as looking something like a tunnel boring machine. Although, I struggle with the ten horns. I wonder if we were intended to be able to visualize these beasts, or if it was more to just metaphorically compare them? (kind of a lion, kind of a bear, kind of a leopard, and some kind of monstrous mechanical beast).
Now, I have typically seen these four beasts compared to empires which existed sequentially. The winged lion was seen as the Babylonian empire, the bear as the Persian empire, the leopard as the Hellenistic empires (Alexander the Great and the four empires built by his successors), the fourth beast as the Roman empire. The problem is that when the fourth beast is destroyed the other three are allowed to live for a time after that, although stripped of their power. The only part of the understanding of this vision which I grew up with which fits my understanding today is that Jesus’ kingdom represents the end of the rule of these four beasts. I was hoping that as I wrote the above I would develop some further insight into the meanings of these four beasts, but that did not happen. The only thing which I have to add at this point is that each of these beasts are supposed to give us insight into living in this world and our tendency to focus solely on the fourth beast interferes with us fully comprehending the meaning of this vision.
I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.
