Bible – Page 399 – Len Bilén's blog, a blog about faith, politics and the environment.

Daniel 7, Daniel’s dream of four great beasts.

Another image in the British Museum

This beast was of course a vision of the Roman Empire, which, at its height encompassed the known world.

This is where we are now. Historically it has been taken as the Roman Empire, the broken horns symbolized the dividing and disintegration of the Empire. The new horn symbolized the revived Roman Empire, and the prophecy seemed to come true as a 10-nation military alliance appeared in Europe in 1995, called the Western European Union (or the Brussels Treaty Powers). The 10 nations that made up the alliance were: Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom. This was seen as prophetic fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy. Unfortunately, on March 31, 2010, the 10 nations announced that they had agreed to terminate their alliance and transfer the Western European Union’s powers to the European Union, which by now has 28 members, soon to be 27 after Brexit.

There is another interpretation of Daniel’s prophecy of the horns. The horn that grew up is Muhammad. He had conquered the Arabian peninsula at his death in 632 A.D. In 100 short years under the Caliph Umayyad three large regions of the world had been conquered, the whole Middle East as far as Pakistan, Egypt and Northern Africa and Spain.

Then in 732 A.D. they were defeated at the battle of Tours ( https://lenbilen.com/2013/11/29/2323/ )

That was the end of the Islamic expansion into Western Europe, and in the 1400,s they were driven out of Spain, which they are resenting until this day.

The Ottoman empire in Eastern Europe, Africa and the Middle East was not defeated until WWI.

All Muslim majority countries adhere to one or more aspects of Sharia law as defined in the Quran, but there are many schools of Islamic theology, all claiming to be the one and only true interpretation of the will of God, as defined by his messenger, Muhammad.

The western world has not declared war against Islam, but Islam is already waging a “Holy War” named Jihad. For Al Qaeda and ISIS it is a very real war of terror, but for the majority of Muslims it is more a war of ideologies and emigration.

Who is this man? For Shiites he is the 12th Imam, coming out of a cistern in Qom in Iran. Sunnis believe he will come out of a place near Babylon.

The bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, one of Iraq’s most revered Shiite shrines shows the sectarian hate between Sunnis and Shiites.

This is interesting, Ahmadinejad is a “twelver”.

“The promised “divine age” will come when the whole world is conquered.

S.A.W. Salallahu Alaihi Wa Salam. Peace be upon him, in English PBUH.

Even Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam chimes in:

https://youtu.be/AmgKywRx06Q

Daniel 6, Daniel in the lions den.

Time has passed. Daniel is by now about 80 years old.

The three prayers were instituted by the Patriarchs. Abraham instituted the morning (Shacharit) prayer; Isaac first prayed the afternoon (Minchah) service; and Jacob was the first to say the evening (Maariv) prayers.

Daniel 5, the handwriting on the wall.

Nabonidus cylinders from Ur (around 540 BC) are noteworthy. The cylinders state:

“As for me, Nabonidus, king of Babylon, save me from sinning against your great godhead and grant me as a present a life long of days, and as for Belshazzar, the eldest son -my offspring- instill reverence for your great godhead in his heart and may he not commit any cultic mistake, may he be sated with a life of plenitude.”^[3]

The written Aramaic and Hebrew writings recorded only the consonants. The context determined what the words meant and how they were pronounced. Writing four words on the wall without context made it impossible to really determine what the saying meant, apart from inspiration from God.

Daniel 4, Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of a tree, cut down and restored.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts, absolutely.

18 Fontaine Nebuchadnezzar’s Vision of the Tree
Book Title:
L’histoire dv Vieux et dv Nouveau Testament :
Author: Fontaine, Nicolas, 1625-1709

Daniel 3, the image of Gold and the fiery furnace.

I was born in a village at the granite coast of northern Bohuslän in Sweden. During the late 1930’s, the Third Reich had placed large orders of granite stone to be delivered to Germany to make large monuments as a tribute to the Fuehrer Adolf Hitler after he had won the war and established the thousand year Third Reich. Even 1950 the stones were not delivered, neither was the war won.And so began the indoctrination into Hitlerjugend.

But Hitler was by no means alone. Many build monuments to themselves while still alive.

And many come from a more humble beginning. This is a picture of Plains, Georgia, the home town of President Jimmy Carter. It used to be called Plain of Dura, but after the railroad was built the name was shorted to Plains.

Back to the Bible. And all the people obeyed, except Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah.

Daniel 2, Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, Daniel’s interpretation.

The text of Daniel has been in Hebrew from chapter 1, but now in verse 20 it switches to Aramaic, and it does not switch back to Hebrew until chapter 7. That is why the three Hebrews are called Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego from now on, but Daniel is still called Daniel.

The Apostle Peter is referred to as the rock “Petros” from the time of his confession. Matt 16:¹⁶and Simon Peter answering said, `Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ ¹⁷And Jesus answering said to him, `Happy art thou, Simon Bar-Jona, because flesh and blood did not reveal [it] to thee, but my Father who is in the heavens. ¹⁸`And I also say to thee, that thou art a rock (Petros), and upon this rock (Petra) I will build my assembly, and gates of Hades shall not prevail against it; ¹⁹and I will give to thee the keys of the reign of the heavens, and whatever thou mayest bind upon the earth shall be having been bound in the heavens, and whatever thou mayest loose upon the earth shall be having been loosed in the heavens.’

Roman Catholics take this verse to mean that Peter is the head of the church, protestants take this verse to point out that it is the confession and the faithful execution of commands according to the heavenly directions given Christ’s followers.

Peter himself seems to indicate the later in 1 Peter: ⁴Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, ⁵you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. ⁶Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture,

“Behold, I lay in Zion
A chief cornerstone, elect, precious,
And he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.”

⁷Therefore, to you who believe, He is precious; but to those who are disobedient,

“The stone which the builders rejected
Has become the chief cornerstone,”

⁸and

“A stone of stumbling
And a rock of offense.”^[d]

They stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they also were appointed.

⁹But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; ¹⁰who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.

Here is a broken replica of the great image.

Daniel 1, the early years, new names, “the Daniel diet”

The “Einstein test” (maybe not from Einstein himself) simply states that for a prophesy to be proven it has to be written down before the event happened, and that the prophet could in no way himself make the prophesy to be fulfilled.

And now to the book of Daniel.

They submitted to new names, but when it came to food they resisted.

You guessed it. This has led to a new fad: “The Daniel diet” consisting of only vegetables, or vegetables and grain, meatless diets or even vegan diets, but they all miss the point. The four young men decided to obey God and only eat kosher food rather than the pagan delicacies, and not drink wine, but trust God and drink their water. This act of obedience is what God honored.

Hebrews 13, Love, contentment, the heavenly altar, the eternal covenant, outside the camp, who wrote the letter to the Hebrews?

Deuteronomy 31:⁶Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.

Psalm 118:⁶The Lord is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me? ⁷The Lord taketh my part with them that help me: therefore shall I see my desire upon them that hate me.

Conclusion: The holy spirit wrote the letter to the Hebrews through one or more of His servants well versed in the Greek language.

Hebrews 12, Looking unto Jesus, God’s discipine, do not refuse God!

Proverbs 3:¹¹My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction: ¹²For whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth. (KJV)

Again, the new covenant is mentioned.

This is the fifth and final warning in Hebrews. Let us review them:

It always helps with a song to wake up to in the morning.

This warning is real and echoes the words of Jesus

It is the confession that is the key to building the church.

In this chapter we got four more “let us” to encourage and admonish us.

Hebrews 11, the great faith chapter.

This chapter has a special meaning to me since I am an immigrant. Yet I realize I am a pilgrim and heaven is my real home.

We can prove from the laws of physics (the preservation of energy and matter but with a constantly increasing entropy) that we cannot possibly exist apart from creation. Yet creation from God’s command must be accepted by faith.Abel sacrificed the firstfruit of his flock, which pointed forward to Jesus being the lamb of God, giving his life for us.

In the upper hand corner is a piece of the book of Enoch, found among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Abraham’s journey was a two step journey. He went to Haran and dwelt there until his father died.

But Abraham also went to Egypt when famine struck the promised land.

This is what it means to be a pilgrim. The Jews had been scattered all over the earth ever since the fall of Israel. They were looking for a homeland to return to.

In the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the United Kingdom became the first world power to endorse the establishment in Palestine of a “national home for the Jewish people.” The British government confirmed this commitment by accepting the British Mandate for Palestine in 1922 (along with their colonial control of the Pirate Coast, Southern Coast of Persia, Iraq and from 1922 a separate area called Transjordan, all of the Middle-Eastern territory except the French territory). The European powers mandated the creation of a Jewish homeland at the San Remo conference of 19–26 April 1920. In 1948, the State of Israel was established.

And so began the prophetic clock to tick again for the Jewish People.