2:36 Daniel carefully distinguished the dream (vv. 31-35) from its interpretation (vv. 36-45) for the sake of clarity. His reference to "we"telling the interpretation is probably an editorial plural. This form of speech allowed Daniel to present himself humbly to the king and at the same time remind him that God had given the dream and its interpretation.
2:37-38 Nebuchadnezzar was the supreme authority in the world of his day. Earlier Jeremiah had warned the kings of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre, and Sidon that God had given Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty over the entire earth, including the animals (Jer. 27:6-7, 14). While the extent of his empire was not as great as those that followed him, he exercised absolute control as no one after him did.
"For a despot like Nebuchadnezzar, his government was the ideal type and was therefore esteemed as highly as gold. He exercised unrestricted authority over life and death throughout all Babylon. His word was law; no prior written law could challenge his will (v. 38)."75
The Lord referred to Nebuchadnezzar as "king of kings"in Ezekiel 26:7. Nonetheless "the God of heavens"(cf. vv. 18, 28) had given this mighty monarch his position. He ruled under the authority of a higher power.
"At the time of Creation the right to rule over the earth was given man who was to have dominion over it and all the creatures in it (Gen. 1:26). Here Nebuchadnezzar by divine appointment was helping fulfill what God had planned for man."76
It took considerable courage for Daniel to tell the most powerful ruler of his time that he was responsible to God. God had given Nebuchadnezzar sovereignty (symbolized by the head of the statue), power (the head's weight), strength (the connotation of the head on a body), and glory (its value as gold). The head of gold aptly described Nebuchadnezzar. It also symbolized the kingdom over which he ruled.77Nebuchadnezzar ruled about 45 years (605-560 B.C.), and his empire only lasted another 21 years. Nebuchadnezzar's father, Nabopolassar, founded the Neo-Babylon Empire in 627 B.C., and it fell to the Persians in 539 B.C.
2:39a The Medo-Persian Empire led by Cyrus the Great would have been inferior in quality to Babylon from Nebuchadnezzar's viewpoint (cf. 5:28, 31). The Medo-Persian monarchs could not annul a law once it went into effect (cf. 6:8, 12). This restricted the absolute authority of the king. However in some respects this kingdom was superior to Babylonia. For example, it covered a larger geographical territory, and it lasted longer (539-331 B.C.). The arms of the image evidently represented the two nations of Media and Persia that united to defeat Babylon.78
2:39b The world kingdom that succeeded Medo-Persia was Greece under Alexander the Great (cf. 8:20-21). Its territory was even larger than that of Medo-Persia. Greece dominated the ancient cradle of civilization from 331 to 31 B.C., so it lasted longer than either Babylonia or Medo-Persia. However after Alexander the Great died in 323 B.C., the empire split into four parts, and each of Alexander's generals took one piece. Antipater ruled Macedon-Greece, Lysimachus governed Thrace-Asia Minor, Seleucus headed Asia, and Ptolemy reigned over Egypt, Cyrenaica, and Palestine. Thus Greece lacked the unified strength of Medo-Persia and Babylonia. Its republican form of government gave more power to the people and less to the rulers. The two legs of the statue evidently represented the two major divisions of the Greek Empire: its eastern and western sectors.
2:40 Rome defeated the last vestige of the Greek Empire in 31 B.C. and ruled for hundreds of years, until A.D. 476 in the West and until A.D. 1453 in the East. The eastern and western parts of this empire crushed all opposition with a brutal strength that surpassed any of its predecessors. Certainly iron legs fitly symbolized the Roman Empire. Rome also dominated the map more extensively than any previous kingdom encompassing almost all of Europe including Spain and the British Isles as well as India. Those legs stood astride most of the ancient world.
"The Roman Empire embraced a much wider territory in which the Western division became fully as strong as the Eastern, and this seems to be portrayed by the two legs."79
However from Nebuchadnezzar's viewpoint, Rome was indeed an inferior power. The people and the senate played major roles in setting its policies, and they controlled the emperors more than had been true in the preceding empires.
2:41-43 In contrast to the preceding empire descriptions, which were quite brief, Daniel gave an extended explanation of this fourth one. The chief feature of the feet is that there were two materials that composed them, and these two materials do not adhere well to one another. Whereas Daniel used metals to describe the kingdoms previously, now he referred to clay, perhaps kiln-fired clay, mixed with iron. The final form of the fourth kingdom--Daniel did not identify it as a fifth kingdom--would not have the cohesiveness that the earlier kingdoms possessed.
What elements are in view in the figures of iron and clay? Obviously one substance is very strong and the other is quite weak. The other metals apparently represent forms of government that were more desirable or less desirable from Nebuchadnezzar's viewpoint and stronger or weaker in controlling populations. That is probably what is in view here too. The iron is quite clearly the well-organized imperial rule that allowed Rome to dominate her world. The clay may refer to some form of government that gives more rule to the people, perhaps democracy and or socialism. Perhaps the clay represents the democratic Roman Republic and the iron the imperial Roman Empire. While democratic government has many obvious advantages over other forms of government, all stemming from the freedoms that its citizens enjoy, it is essentially weak. Its rulers must operate under many checks and balances imposed by the people they serve.
The political weakness of democracy is becoming increasingly obvious in America, which has led the world in exemplifying and promoting this form of government. Self-interest gets in the way of political efficiency. People can block political action with demonstrations and lawsuits. In one sense this is good because it checks the government's powers. However in another it makes the jobs of political leaders much more difficult than if they could just do what they want. Imperial power caters to the leaders whereas democracy caters to those led. It is impossible to have both at the same time. Therefore this may be what is in view with the unmixable iron and clay combination, not that America is in view.
Another indication that democracy or socialism may be what is in view in the clay figure is that people are essentially clay physically (Gen. 2:7). Rule by the people (i.e., democracy) is rule by clay. Thus it should be no surprise that many students of this passage have seen some combination of imperial rule and democracy in the final stage of the fourth (Roman) empire.
"The rulers of the succeeding empires had their powers more and more circumscribed; until in the last state of the Roman empire we find iron mixed with miry clay, or brittle pottery--speaking of an attempted union between imperialism and democracy."80
"But what does the clay represent? Clay is of the earth. It stands for that which does not belong to the great statue at all, a foreign ingredient brought in. The metals represent monarchies, but the clay stands for democratic rule, the rule by the people."81
The reference to the seed of men (v. 43) seems to stress the amalgamation of people where everyone is equal, at least in theory.
"The figure of mixing by seed is derived from the sowing of the field with mingled seed, and denotes all the means employed by the rulers to combine the different nationalities, among which the connubium[intermarriage] is only spoken of as the most important and successful means."82
"The final form of the kingdom will include diverse elements whether this refers to race, political idealism, or sectional interests; and this will prevent the final form of the kingdom from having a real unity."83
If this interpretation is correct, we have another problem. The Roman Empire never consisted of a combination of imperial rule and democracy even though the people had some voice in government. It remained imperialistic to its very end. The way that many scholars have dealt with this problem is to view the last stage of the Roman Empire in this vision (vv. 41-43) as still future.
"Probably the best solution to the problem [of identifying the feet and toes] is the familiar teaching that Daniel's prophecy actually passes over the present age, the period between the first and second coming of Christ or, more specifically, the period between Pentecost and the rapture of the church. There is nothing unusual about such a solution as Old Testament prophecies often lump together predictions concerning the first and second coming of Christ without regard for the millennia that lay between (Lk 4:17-19; cf. Is 61:1-2).
"This interpretation depends first of all upon the evidence leading to the conclusion that the ten-toe stage of the image has not been fulfilled in history and is still prophetic.84The familiar attempts in many commentaries to find a ten-toe stage of the image in the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. do not correspond to the actual facts of history and do not fulfill the ten-toe stage. According to Daniel's prophecy, the ten-toe stage is simultaneous, that is, the kingdoms existed side by side and were destroyed by one sudden catastrophic blow. Nothing like this has yet occurred in history."85
"Verse 41 deals with a later phase or outgrowth of this fourth empire, symbolized by the feet and 10 toes--made up of iron and earthenware, a fragile base for the huge monument. The text clearly implies that this final phase will be marked by some sort of federation rather than by a powerful single realm. The iron may possibly represent the influence of the old Roman culture and tradition, and the pottery may represent the inherent weakness in a socialist society based on relativism in morality and philosophy. Out of this mixture of iron and clay come weakness and confusion, pointing to the approaching day of doom. Within the scope of v. 43 are disunity, class struggle, and even civil war, resulting from the failure of a hopelessly divided society to achieve an integrated world-order. The iron and pottery may coexist, but they cannot combine into a strong and durable world-order."86
2:44-45 These verses explain what the rock that crushed the feet and toes of the image and destroyed it completely signifies. It is a fifth kingdom that God Himself will establish following the final phase of the fourth kingdom (Rome; cf. Ps. 2:7-9; Rev. 11:15). The rock, a frequent symbol of Jesus Christ in Scripture (cf. Ps. 188:22; Isa. 8:14; 28:16; Zech. 3:9; 1 Pet. 2:6-8), evidently represents the King as well as His kingdom (cf. v. 38: "You are the head of gold"). The mountain out of which the rock comes is evidently God (cf. Deut. 32:18; Ps. 18:2; 31:2-3), though a mountain is also a common figure for a kingdom or government in the Bible (cf. Isa. 2:2; 27:13; Mic. 4:1; et al.). "Those kings"evidently refers to the 10 kings represented by the 10 toes. They are quite clearly contemporaneous with one another, not sequential rulers. God's kingdom, the mountain of verse 35, will fill the earth and will last forever (cf. 2 Sam. 7:16). It will never suffer destruction or be succeeded by another kingdom as all the preceding kingdoms had. It will begin with the Millennium and continue forever in the eternal state.
"The major burden of the book of Daniel is the tension and conflict between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world."87
Whereas almost all expositors agree that the kingdom of God is in view, they disagree on the nature of that kingdom. They also disagree on how it will destroy the preceding kingdoms and when this destruction will happen. Amillenarians, and some postmillenarians and some premillenarians, believe that Jesus inaugurated this kingdom when He came to earth.88They view the church as this kingdom that defeated Rome.
"The disintegrating and corrupt empire crumbled through decay from within as well as through the impact of the sound morals and the healthy life of Christianity that condemned lascivious Rome. . . . Christianity was in a sense God's judgment upon sinful Rome."89
Many students of this passage, including myself, find this explanation unsatisfying. First, Rome did not fall because of Christianity primarily but because of its own internal decay. Invaders from the North defeated it. Second, the effects of the Roman Empire, the fragments of the legs and toes if you will, remained for hundreds of years after Jesus Christ's first coming. Yet the vision pictures all vestiges of this kingdom and its predecessors disappearing, apparently soon after that. "The wind carried them away so that not a trace of them was found"(v. 35). Third, few people today would dare say that the kingdom of God has in any sense, certainly not politically, conquered the world. The popular title for our age as the "post-Christian era"testifies to this truth. Fourth, God gave prophecies after Jesus Christ's ascension that He would return to the earth as King of Kings, smite the nations, and rule them with a rod of iron (Rev. 19:11-21).
"Nothing is more evident after nineteen hundred years of Christianity than that the stone, if it reflects the church or the spiritual kingdom which Christ formed at His first coming, is not in any sense of the term occupying the center of the stage in which Gentile power has been destroyed. As a matter of fact, in the twentieth century the church has been an ebbing tide in the affairs of the world; and there has been no progress whatever in the church's gaining control of the world politically. If the image represents the political power of the Gentiles, it is very much still standing."90
Seeing the destruction of the final stage of the fourth kingdom as future seems more in harmony with the facts of history and with other Scriptures (cf. 7:24; Rev. 17:12). This premillennial view sees the kingdom that Jesus Christ will set up on earth following His second advent as the first stage of his endless rule. The stone in Nebuchadnezzar's vision represents that ruler and His rule.
Daniel concluded by explaining to Nebuchadnezzar that the sovereign God had revealed to him what would happen in the future. He further affirmed that the dream represented reality and that the interpretation that Daniel had given was reliable.
"Daniel 2:31-45 indicates that the Aramaic word for kingdom' may include the concept of a kingdom with both earthly/temporal and heavenly/eternal aspects. The context in Daniel 2 allows for one kingdom beginning on earth and continuing into the eternal state. This kingdom is established by God, fills the whole earth after destroying all other earthly kingdoms, and will never be destroyed."91
