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NOVEMBER 29
23 “I thank You and praise You, king, are a king of kings. For the God of heav-
O God of my fathers; en has given you a kingdom, power, strength,
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You have given me wisdom and might, and glory; and wherever the children of men
And have now made known to me what dwell, or the beasts of the field and the birds
we asked of You, of the heaven, He has given them into your
For You have made known to us the hand, and has made you ruler over them all—
king’s demand.” you are this head of gold. But after you shall
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arise another kingdom inferior to yours; then
24 Therefore Daniel went to Arioch, whom
the king had appointed to destroy the wise another, a third kingdom of bronze, which
shall rule over all the earth. And the fourth
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men of Babylon. He went and said thus to him: kingdom shall be as strong as iron, inasmuch
“Do not destroy the wise men of Babylon; take as iron breaks in pieces and shatters every-
me before the king, and I will tell the king the thing; and like iron that crushes, that kingdom
interpretation.”
25 Then Arioch quickly brought Daniel will break in pieces and crush all the others.
Whereas you saw the feet and toes, partly of
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before the king, and said thus to him, “I have potter’s clay and partly of iron, the kingdom
found a man of the captives of Judah, who will shall be divided; yet the strength of the iron
make known to the king the interpretation.”
26 The king answered and said to Daniel, shall be in it, just as you saw the iron mixed
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whose name was Belteshazzar, “Are you able with ceramic clay. And as the toes of the feet
were partly of iron and partly of clay, so the
to make known to me the dream which I have kingdom shall be partly strong and partly
seen, and its interpretation?” 43
27 fragile. As you saw iron mixed with ceramic
Daniel answered in the presence of the
king, and said, “The secret which the king has clay, they will mingle with the seed of men;
demanded, the wise men, the astrologers, the but they will not adhere to one another, just as
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magicians, and the soothsayers cannot declare iron does not mix with clay. And in the days
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to the king. But there is a God in heaven who of these kings the God of heaven will set up a
reveals secrets, and He has made known to kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and
King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter the kingdom shall not be left to other people;
days. Your dream, and the visions of your head it shall break in pieces and consume all these
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upon your bed, were these: As for you, O kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. Inas-
king, thoughts came to your mind while on your much as you saw that the stone was cut out of
bed, about what would come to pass after this; the mountain without hands, and that it broke
and He who reveals secrets has made known in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the sil-
to you what will be. But as for me, this secret ver, and the gold—the great God has made
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has not been revealed to me because I have known to the king what will come to pass
more wisdom than anyone living, but for our after this. The dream is certain, and its inter-
sakes who make known the interpretation to pretation is sure.”
the king, and that you may know the thoughts
of your heart.
31 “You, O king, were watching; and behold,
a great image! This great image, whose splen- 2:36–45 we will tell the interpretation. Five
dor was excellent, stood before you; and its empires in succession would rule over Israel,
form was awesome. This image’s head was of here pictured by parts of a statue (body). In
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fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its belly Daniel 7,the same empires are represented by
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and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet 4 great beasts. These empires are Babylon,
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partly of iron and partly of clay. You watched Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, and the later
while a stone was cut out without hands, revived Rome, each one differentiated from
which struck the image on its feet of iron and the previous as indicated by the declining
clay, and broke them in pieces. Then the iron, quality of the metal. A stone picturing Christ
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the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold (Luke 20:18) at His Second Coming (as the Son
were crushed together, and became like chaff of Man also does in Dan. 7:13,14) will destroy
from the summer threshing floors; the wind the fourth empire in its final phase with cata-
carried them away so that no trace of them strophic suddenness (2:34,35,44,45). Christ’s
was found. And the stone that struck the total shattering of Gentile power will result in
image became a great mountain and filled the the establishment of His millennial kingdom,
whole earth. the ultimate empire, and then continuing on
“This is the dream. Now we will tell the
36 eternally (2:44; 7:27).
interpretation of it before the king. You, O
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