Daniel Ch4

Daniel 4:1

Daniel 4:2

By the time king Nebuchadnezzar writes this the account you are about to read has all taken place. Nebuchadnezzar is writing 'after the events', and so dramatic were they, he has to tell the world!

Babylon was full of gods. Idolatry was practically invented in Babel (later to be known as Babylon), so don't miss the significance of Nebuchadnezzar referring to Daniel's God as 'the high God'. In the Aramaic (which this chapter was written in) the word translated 'high' is the adjective ʻillay' (il-lah'-ee), meaning highest, supreme, the one above every other god. In Isaiah we read: "Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel, and his redeemer the Lord of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God" (Isaiah 44:6), and "Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations: they have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven image, and pray unto a god that cannot save. Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the Lord? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me. Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else" (Isaiah 45:20-22)

As Nebuchadnezzar will explain, he once thought of himself as supreme. He had acquired great wealth and power, whatever Nebuchadnezzar said, people did. But he came to see that a man can gain the world but lose his soul, and where is the profit in that? (See Matt 16:26). Now he knows that there is a Higher Power, beyond the realm of earthly kings and governments, with a greater sovereignty than man has over even his own life.

Daniel 4:3

In chapter 3 Nebuchadnezzar built a golden statue to symbolize his own 'everlasting kingdom and dominion'. It took the faith of three Hebrew men to show Nebuchadnezzar, by signs and wonders, how inferior he was compared to their mighty God. Nebuchadnezzar was duly impressed but there had been no change of heart. But now, around 26 years later, after learning the hard way (and we will see in the following verses just how hard!) Nebuchadnezzar finally gets it. This would have been the last year of his life. How sad it is that so many people don't get it until they have wasted a lifetime, yet even then, the mighty God whose dominion is from generation to generation is full of mercy and compassion.

Daniel 4:4

On the surface he was flourishing – like so many in this world, thinking that they have it all, not aware that it can all disappear like that.

Daniel 4:5

Daniel 4:6

Daniel was well known to the king by now, so why not just call him? I think that Nebuchadnezzar realised this dream was not good, and may well have wanted to hear a sugar-coated interpretation rather than the truth. We see exactly the same with Ahab, king of Israel in 1 Kings 22:6-8 “Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said unto them, Shall I go against Ramoth-gilead to battle, or shall I forbear? And they said, Go up; for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the king. And Jehoshaphat said, Is there not here a prophet of the LORD besides, that we might inquire of him? And the king of Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, There is yet one man, Micaiah the son of Imlah, by whom we may inquire of the LORD: but I hate him; for he doth not prophesy good concerning me, but evil.” So the reason that Ahab didn’t ask Micaiah is basically because he told the truth! – and sometimes the truth is hard to take! I think that is why king Nebuchadnezzar didn’t call Daniel to start with.

Often the world will not ask our opinion because they don't want to hear it! For non-Christians, even being around Christians can make them uncomfortable, as if a spot-light were shined upon them.

Daniel 4:7

Daniel 4:8

So finally king Nebuchadnezzar gives up and accepts the inevitable. But who does Nebuchadnezzar say came in? DANIEL – that is his Hebrew name, yet the king chooses to use this in telling us the story of these events, adding his Babylonian name just in case anyone didn’t know who Daniel was. How amazing that after all this time in Babylon (Daniel would have been about 50 by now), with so much pressure to blend into their culture (when in Rome…) that Daniel retains his Jewish identity and the name that glorifies his God.

Daniel 4:9

This is an interesting verse because Nebuchadnezzar informs us that Daniel is ‘chief of the Magi’. Now the Magi were essentially a Persian religious sect specialising in the mystical; so what was Daniel doing in charge of them? We will find out in chapter 6 that it was not something that was happily accepted by some of his contemporaries; but it appears that Daniel had converted this group and told them about the prophecies regarding the coming Jewish Messiah. How do we know this? Because just over 500 years later, a group of these Magi travelled for miles across the middle eastern deserts to Israel to celebrate the birth of a baby that had been born King of the Jews! (NB: there were far more than three of these Magi and they didn’t go to the stable but to Joseph and Mary’s house back in Nazareth – we have been duped by tradition into thinking that there were 3 wise men, or 3 kings and they went to the stable. Wrong, Wrong, Wrong! Tradition makes the Word of no effect! (Mark 7:13).

Also in this verse we have confirmed that king Neb knew that Daniel could and would be able to interpret the dream – and it would probably have something to do with Daniel’s ‘holy gods’.

What a testimony Daniel has that even the king knew that: ‘no secret troubleth thee’.

The Dream - Daniel 4:10-17

11 The tree grew, and was strong, and the height thereof reached unto heaven, and the sight thereof to the end of all the earth:

12 The leaves thereof were fair, and the fruit thereof much, and in it was meat for all: the beasts of the field had shadow under it, and the fowls of the heaven dwelt in the boughs thereof, and all flesh was fed of it.

13 I saw in the visions of my head upon my bed, and, behold, a watcher and an holy one came down from heaven;

14 He cried aloud, and said thus, Hew down the tree, and cut off his branches, shake off

his leaves, and scatter his fruit: let the beasts get away from under it, and the fowls from his branches:

15 Nevertheless leave the stump of his roots in the earth, even with a band of iron and brass, in the tender grass of the field; and let it be wet with the dew of heaven, and let his portion be with the beasts in the grass of the earth:

16 Let his heart be changed from man's, and let a beast's heart be given unto him; and let seven times pass over him.

Daniel 4:18

Daniel 4:19

Once again, Nebuchadnezzar uses Daniel’s Jewish name, and then confirms Daniel’s Babylonian name so all would know to whom the king is referring.

Back in verse 9 the king confidently asserts that nothing troubles Daniel – that is, up until now! We will see in chapter nine that Daniel was familiar with Jeremiah’s prophecies; that being the case, Daniel may well be thinking of what Jeremiah said in chapter 27: “And now have I given all these lands unto the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant; and the beasts of the field have I given him also to serve him. And all nations shall serve him, and his son, and his son's son, until the very time of his land come: and then many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of him” (Jer 27:6-7).

This is another remarkable prophecy that accurately foretells that after Nebuchadnezzar (whom God calls ‘My servant’), his son and then his grandson will rule Babylon until their time is up – we will deal with this in the next chapter. As for Daniel’s thoughts, if God had raised up Nebuchadnezzar for a purpose (that of bringing judgment on the house of Judah), what was to happen to him now? No wonder Daniel was ‘astonied’. Then there was the question of how exactly do you break this to the king?

NB: the word translated ‘astonied’ here is not the same as we saw back in chapter 3:24 where king Nebuchadnezzar was ‘astonied’ – lit ‘swept to ruin’. In 3:24 it is ‘tevahh’ which has a negative connotation; here the word is ‘Shemam’ which simply means ‘stunned’.

This hour must have been one of the longest of Nebuchadnezzar’s life; eventually he says to Daniel ‘Don’t let the dream trouble you (as well)’. If Daniel is troubled this is not good.

Daniel 4:20-22

21 Whose leaves were fair, and the fruit thereof much, and in it was meat for all; under which the beasts of the field dwelt, and upon whose branches the fowls of the heaven had their habitation:

22 It is thou, O king, that art grown and become strong: for thy greatness is grown, and reacheth unto heaven, and thy dominion to the end of the earth.

Daniel 4:23

The ‘watcher’ from the context is an angel who comes down from the Holy One in Heaven. The important points in this verse are that the tree is to be cut down but the root is to remain. However the root is to be bound with iron and brass – the possible meaning of this is dealt with in the Pastors Blog https://www.calvaryportsmouth.co.uk/?p=4758&preview=true.

At the beginning of the verse the vocabulary refers to ‘it’ i.e. an impersonal pronoun, but by the end of the sentence the vocabulary changes to use the personal pronoun ‘his/him’. Thus this verse could be seen to have a double reference; firstly to king Nebuchadnezzar who is already identified as the tree in verse 22; and secondly the reference may be to Nebuchadnezzar’s dominion i.e. the kingdom of Babylon.

Daniel 4:24

Daniel 4:25

Thus Daniel explains to the king exactly what will happen to him, how he will be humbled until (whenever you see an ‘until’ in the Bible take note!), until he finally realises that it is the most High who rules in the kingdom of men, and He will give it to whomsoever He chooses. This is the third time this lesson had been taught to the king (two warnings and then this pronounced judgment - see Daniel 2:37-38 & Daniel 3:28-29), on the previous two occasions he has completely missed the point – this time he will finally get it.

Daniel 4:26

Daniel 4:27

Daniel 4:28

Daniel 4:29

Daniel 4:30

Oops! Proverbs 6:16-19 says: “These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.” Notice what is top of the list?

Again we read: “Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD: though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished.” (Prov 16:5) “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall” (Prov 16:18) “A man's pride shall bring him low: but honour shall uphold the humble in spirit” (Prov 29:23)

Daniel 4:31

The terror of this is almost unimaginable. However God had warned twice and foretold this judgment a year before, so the king was without excuse. The same is true for the people in this world; God has given ample warning through His two witnesses – the law and the prophets (cf Luke 16:31) and has foretold the coming judgment ‘so they are without excuse’.

Daniel 4:32-33

33 The same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar: and he was driven from men, and did eat grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagles' feathers, and his nails like birds' claws.

There is a condition known as Lycanthropy, coming from the Greek ‘lykos’ meaning ‘wolf’ and ‘anthropos’ meaning ‘man’ lit. ‘Wolf-Man’. Very few recorded cases exist yet extensive mythology has originated by the belief that a person could change into a wolf; this has led to world-wide legends of werewolf’s etc.

A variation of this disease is Boanthropy where, rather than believing oneself to be a wolf, one believes oneself to be an ox or cow. It is this illness that most likely fits this situation. Myth and legend aside, there was a fairly recent case recorded in England just after the Second World War. A man in his early twenties was admitted to a mental institution with all the symptoms consistent with Boanthropy. In his commentary on Daniel, Dr John Walvoord offers the following: “Raymond Harrison recites a personal experience with a modern case similar to that of Nebuchadnezzar which he observed in a British mental institution in 1946. Harrison writes: ‘A great many doctors spend an entire busy professional career without once encountering an incidence of this kind of boanthropy described in the book of Daniel. The present writer therefore considers himself particularly fortunate to have actually observed a clinical case of boanthropy in a British mental institution in 1946. The patient was in his early twenties, who had reportedly been hospitalised for about five years. His symptoms were well developed on admission and diagnosis was immediate and conclusive. He was of average height and weight, with a good physique and he was in excellent bodily health. His mental symptoms included pronounced anti-social tendencies, and because of this he spent the entire day from dawn to dusk outdoors in the grounds of the institution. His daily routine consisted of wandering around the magnificent lawns, with which the hospital was graced. And it was his custom to pluck up and eat handfuls of grass all day long as he went. On observation he was seen to discriminate carefully between grass and weeds. And on enquiry from the attendant, the writer was told that the diet of this patient consisted exclusively of grass from the hospital lawns. He never ate institutional food with other inmates, and his only drink was water. The writer was able to examine him curiously, and the only physical abnormality noted, consisted of a lengthening of the hair and a coarse thickened condition of the fingernails. Without institutional care the patient would have manifested precisely the same physical conditions as those mentioned in Daniel 4:33. From the foregoing it seems evident that author of the forth chapter of Daniel was describing an accurate and attestable, rather rare mental affliction.”

Of course the critics of the Bible say that this could never of happened, however Eusebius refers to a Greek historian called Abydenus who sites a case in 268BC of a man with almost identical symptoms to Nebuchadnezzar. Josephus also quotes Berosus, a Babylonian historian, who documented the case of a Chaldean priest at the time of Alexander the Great, who once again appears to have suffered from this disease. In the East India Company Museum in London there is a cuneiform tablet that has been discovered that is inscribed with details about Nebuchadnezzar’s illness. Yet further evidence to support the Biblical account was the discovery of what has become known as the ‘Prayer of Nabonidus’ found in cave no#4 at Qumran (part of the Dead Sea Scrolls found between 1947-1956). Whilst the scroll is ascribed to Nabonidus (almost certainly due to confusion in the similar spelling of the names - only one letter is different in the two names) there is little doubt that the author is none other than Nebuchadnezzar himself. The scroll reads:

Daniel 4:34

Daniel 4:35

“Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou? or thy work, He hath no hands?” (Isaiah 45:9)

Daniel 4:36-37

37 Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.

Amen!

Nebuchadnezzar lived for about one year after this time.

The Jewish Talmud records that Daniel was the one who looked after Nebuchadnezzar throughout the seven years, and then saw him restored to his throne. However this time the king knew that ‘his’ throne was really only on loan.

If God can reach someone like Nebuchadnezzar who had the position, wealth and all the ‘trappings’ this world can afford, then God can reach anyone. What an onus on us to pray for all those near and dear to us who don’t know the love of the Saviour, whose works are truth, and His ways judgment.

Also we should remember the admonition by Paul:

“I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men;

For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.

For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour;

Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”

(1 Tim 2:1-5)