Daniel 7

Prophets sometimes called vivid dreams “visions of the night” (Zechariah 1:8). Many prophets seemed to get their messages during dreams like this. Bible writers sometimes called daytime visions a trance (Acts 10:10).

About 555 BC, give or take a few years. Belshazzar was a co-regent, according to ancient Babylonian records, not a king. He was more of an Associate King. His father, Nabonidus, was king. But he preferred to live in Arabia. His son Belshazzar served as co-regent from 555-539 BC, when Persian invaders from what is now Iran captured the city of Babylon and executed him. He was 41 years old.

The term is simply “sea.” It’s hard to tell which one: Mediterranean Sea from Daniel’s childhood or the Persian Gulf from his adult years. It may have been open sea, and impossible to tell exactly where the storms hit.

Many scholars say the four creatures represent four kingdoms. Lion is Babylon, wings clipped and the empire humbled. Bear is the combo empires of the Medes and Persians. The part of the bear that rises is Persia. Sorry, Medes. The speedy leopard is Alexander the Great who conquered much of what is now the Middle East in just 13 years, from 336 BC-323 BC. The unstoppable creature with iron teeth is the Roman Empire. These are the most common educated guesses. However, take a look at Hosea 13:7-9. There, God says he’s a leopard, a bear, lion, and a destroyer of Israel. Daniel, it seems, was tapping into some well-known symbols. What that means would take another educated guess.

“Think like a human” could have been a coded dig at Nebuchadnezzar, who went mad for a time (Daniel 4:33). He thought like an animal and grazed on grass like cattle. He eventually came to his senses and thought like a human again.

The four heads on the leopard may represent the four generals who divided Alexander the Great’s kingdom among themselves.

Horns in ancient times represented strength. Bulls had horns. And it’s not safe to mess with a bull, the strongest animal in that part of the world. Most had never seen an elephant.

Many Bible scholars say the little horn with the big mouth was a Greek invader, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, who desecrated the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem with pagan sacrifices to Zeus. Jewish rebel fighters led by Judas Maccabaeus drove out the invaders and won their independence. Jewish priests ritually cleansed the Temple in eight days in December 167 BC. Jews later came to celebrate this with an eight-day religious holiday known as Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights.

“Ancient One,” often translated “Ancient of Days,” is generally regarded as one of the Bible’s titles for God. Literally, the first word, attiq, which looks and sounds much like “antique,” means old or ancient. It was a word used to honor people and to describe them as wise and powerful. The second word, yom, means a stretch of time—a day, a year, an eternity. Take your pick. Context clues sometimes help with the guessing.

Phrased more poetically, “A thousand thousands” served him and “10 thousand 10 thousands” stood by him. We did the math for you.

If the little horn was Antiochus IV Epiphanes, it’s ironic that the “arrogant” little horn died on his way home from lost battles in Persia, in what is now Iran.

There are two Aramaic words describing this person: bar enash. Bar can mean descendant, son, and child of a human or an animal. Enash means a human or humanity. Some scholars translate the words as Son of Man, an obvious reference to Jesus Christ, who called himself the Son of Man, or a human child—“the Son of Humans” (Matthew 8:20). This is a title Jesus used a lot to describe himself. In the Jewish Bible, the phrase contains hints of divinity in some passages and humanity in others—perhaps a perfect phrase for describing someone Christians would say was fully God and fully human. Hint of the divine is in this chapter when Daniel sees someone looking human and coming down in the clouds. Hint of the human: God often described Ezekiel as a mere mortal by using the phrase “son of man” (Ezekiel 2:1).

“Holy people” is literally just one Aramaic word, qddis. It can mean: ceremonially clean, morally pure, saintly people, angels, or holy people. Bible writers suggest people aren’t holy just because they go through cleansing rituals or because they obey God’s laws. Holiness often means “reserved for God’s use.” Temple objects like bowls and lampstands were holy because in an anointing ritual, they were set aside for religious use only. They couldn’t be borrowed for someone’s birthday party. People, too, became holy when they devoted their lives to God.

If the little horn was Antiochus IV Epiphanes, this war may have been the Maccabean Revolt, a successful Jewish rebellion against Antiochus, who ruled from Syria. For a time, Jews were free and independent again. Then they invited Romans to settle a dispute between two wannabe rulers. Romans wouldn’t leave. They stayed for centuries.

When Alexander the Great died, his empire was divided among his four generals and eventually produced 10 kingdoms: Ptolemaic Egypt, Macedon, Seleucia, Pergamum, Bithynia, Pontus, Cappadocia, Armenia, Bactra, and Parthia. But some say these represent 10 Roman emperors. There were 12, but two didn’t last much longer than a worm in a bird nest.

Julius Caesar proposed the Julian calendar in 46 BC. It replaced the 354-day lunar calendar of the Jews with a solar calendar of 365 days a year.

More literally, “a time, times, half a time,” or “a period, periods, and half a period.” This is vague enough that it’s possible for creative or insightful people to work out some intriguing possibilities. But the time didn’t seem important enough for the celestial servant to bother explaining in a way that made sense to Daniel, so he could write it in a way that makes sense to us.