3:1 The whole image that the king built was gold. The head of the image that Nebuchadnezzar had seen in his dream was also gold.
"Daniel had told him that he was the head of gold (2:38) but that he would be followed by another kingdom inferior to you' (2:39) made of silver (2:32). Rejecting now the idea that any kingdom could follow his own, he may have determined to show the permanence of his golden kingdom by having the entire image covered with gold."96
This image stood about 90 feet high and nine feet wide.97We do not know what the image represented. If it was a figure of a human, it probably stood on a substantial base since it was quite narrow for such a tall statue. However it may have represented an animal or a combination human and animal. Archaeologists have discovered Babylonian images of all these types.98Customarily these were wooden statues overlaid with gold (cf. Isa. 40:19; 41:7; Jer. 10:3-9).99
In view of Nebuchadnezzar's extraordinary ego (cf. ch. 4), the image may have been a likeness of him.100However, there is no evidence that the Mesopotamians ever worshiped statues of their rulers as divine during the ruler's lifetime.101It is likely that the image represented Nebuchadnezzar's patron god, Nebo.102
The most probable site of the Dura Plain seems to be six miles southeast of Babylon.103The Aramaic word dura("fortification") is common and refers to a place enclosed by a wall or perhaps mountains.104
3:2 Nebuchadnezzar summoned his officials to the image for what he probably intended to be a demonstration of loyalty to him.
"The fairly recent date of the establishment of the Babylonian Empire as the successor to Assyria (at least in its southern half) made it appropriate for Nebuchadnezzar to assemble all the local and provincial leaders from every part of his domain and, in essence, exact from them a solemn oath of loyalty . . ."105
The religious connotations of the gathering are unclear, but it was probably not a summons to worship one idol as God. The Babylonians were a polytheistic people and worshiped many gods.
"A refusal to yield homage to the gods of the kingdom, they regarded as an act of hostility against the kingdom and its monarch, while every one might at the same time honour his own national god. This acknowledgment, that the gods of the kingdom were the more powerful, every heathen could grant; and thus, Nebuchadnezzar demanded nothing in a religious point of view which every one of his subjects could not yield. To him, therefore, the refusal of the Jews could not but appear as opposition to the greatness of his kingdom."106
3:3 Some of the titles of the officials named in the text are Persian and some are Babylonian. Daniel may have updated some of these Babylonian titles with modern Persian equivalents when he wrote the book in its final form. Perhaps they were already common when the events of this chapter happened.
The satraps were the highest political officials in each province. The prefects (princes) were military chiefs. The governors (captains) were heads of sections of the provinces. The counselors (advisers, judges) were high-ranking judges. The treasurers were superintendents of the treasury. The judges (counselors) were secondary judges, and the magistrates (sheriffs) were lower level legal officials. The rulers (officials) were subordinates of the satraps.107These groups represented all the administrative government officials of the wide-ranging empire, and they spoke many different languages (v. 7).
3:4-7 The musical instruments referred to (vv. 5, 7) also have Persian names.108Some of these instruments were Greek as well. The Greeks had an influence on Babylonia earlier than Daniel's time.109These were various wind and stringed instruments.110The Babylonians seem to have been an almost music crazed culture (cf. Ps. 137:3; Isa. 14:11).111
"The story of the three young men who were thrown into the fire because they would not worship the image (Dan. 3), brings to mind the great brick-kilns outside the city, where the bricks required for certain purposes in the vast building projects of Nebuchadnezzar were baked. Some of these great ovens where found in the [archaeological] excavations. Worth noting in this connection is a rather Solomonic judicial directive of the ruler Rim Sin (1750 B.C.), which appears in a recently published document of the Yale Babylonian Collection. He speaks thus concerning four men of Larsa: Because they threw a young slave into an oven, throw ye a slave into a furnace.' Clearly, that sort of thing was nothing new in Babylonia."112
In the Tribulation, the Antichrist will command everyone to worship him and his image (Rev. 13:3-18).
