GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
DANIEL 2:39
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39 After you, another kingdom will rise up, inferior to yours, and then another, a third kingdom, one of bronze, that will rule over the whole earth.
Two of the following kingdoms are presented in this verse. The one to follow after Babylon is described as ‘ar’a, “earthward” (grammatically, with directive or locative aleph). In Aramaic, this is a word meaning “earth,” but “earthward” is an idiom that means “inferior” in the sense of lower. There are critics who think that this must mean the Medes, and therefore the third kingdom would be Persia, but this is because they object to the ancient and long-standing interpretation that the fourth kingdom is not the Greeks, but the Romans. The Persians historically followed the Babylonians, and they were ethically and morally inferior to Nebuchadnezzar’s empire. The nineteenth century Lutheran commentator Keil also observed that the Medes and Persians “did not form a united people.” And they could not stand against the Greeks.
The argument that the Medes were the silver empire is smashed to dust even by critics who think that Daniel was written by a later Jew, perhaps in the Second Century, because such a person would certainly think nothing at all of the Medes, who never obtained anything like an empire, but he would obviously have known that Babylon was followed by Persia and then Greece. So there is no reason to bring Medea into consideration here.
The third kingdom has two details given in Daniel’s interpretation. First, the metal bronze. Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin, with an unfading brightness and a remarkable toughness. Bronze was a metal for war, for armor and for weapons. And this kingdom of bronze “ruled over the whole earth.” The Greeks under Alexander pressed farther eastward than anyone else ever had, touching India. From the Thracians in the north to the Egyptians in the south he brought unity and a true sense of empire to the known world.
Since the statue is simply that of a man, a human male, there is not necessarily anything symbolic to be made from the torso, the division of the upper body into two legs, at this point. Yet we cannot help but recall from history that after Alexander’s death, his empire was divided into four parts among four of his generals, but that only two of them had any lasting importance: Syria to the north and Egypt to the south. In this much the statue might be seen to anticipate that division of empire at the time of Alexander. A similar division lasted in a sense under the Roman conquests, but due to the size of the Roman conquests, the same division can be better described as that of east and west rather than north and south.
This part of the dream is a proclamation of law and gospel. As a proclamation of law, God demonstrates his absolute power over the world and its history. “From one man,” Paul says, “God made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth, and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live” (Acts 17:26). But there is also the gospel here, for God has shared with Daniel, through the king’s dream, that there will come another kingdom after the Babylonians. Daniel does not yet know it, but this will be Persia. It was the first king of Persia who would release the Israelites from their captivity and permit them to return home. Therefore God was demonstrating that his plan all along was to bring his people home once again so that the Savior would be born at the time determined for him, and in the exact place where he should live.
When Christ appeared in the Old Testament it was most often as he appeared to Moses and the prophets, in a cloud of black and terrifying smoke, with wrath and threats, and with the laws he gave on Mount Sinai and their stiff penalty of eternal damnation for failing at just one point (James 2:10). But in the Gospels Christ is shown coming with love and even in weakness, born of a young girl, coming to see the people and teach them in their towns and cities and in the courts of Jerusalem itself, where people lived in safety. He came with healing and compassion, with understanding and love. The gospel says, “Your sins are forgiven, go and sin no more” (John 5:14; John 8:11). The difference between law and gospel that we should all recognize is that the law puts our sins on display and proclaims a curse on us, and judgment; terrible judgment. But the gospel removes all our sins from display and leaves nothing to see, like a freshly painted wall. Not a whitewashed tomb with something terrible and rotting underneath, but simply a freshly painted wall with nothing at all to be covered up; he gives us a new life, a new beginning in Jesus. The gospel removes the curse, and the judgment becomes a promise and an invitation. “This way to my Father’s house,” our Jesus says. “He has given you a place at the banquet table, and a place with us forever in heaven.”
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
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Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota
God’s Word for You – Daniel 2:39 Gospel in silver and bronze