1 “And in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams; and his spirit was troubled. 2 And his sleep brake from him. Then the king commanded to call the magicians, and the astrologers, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans, for to tell the king his dreams. So 3 they came in and stood before the king. And the king said unto them, I have dreamed a dream, and my spirit is troubled 4 to know the dream. Then spake the Chaldeans to the king in the Syrian language, O king, live forever; tell thy servants the 5 dream, and we will shew the interpretation. The king answered and said to the Chaldeans, The thing is gone from me: if ye make not known unto me the dream and the interpretation thereof, ye shall be cut in pieces, and your houses shall be 6 made a dunghill. But if ye shew the dream and the interpretation thereof, ye shall receive of me gifts and rewards and great honor; therefore shew me the dream and the interpretation thereof. 7 They answered the second time and said, Let the king tell his servants the dream, and we will shew the interpretation. 8 The king answered and said, I know of a certainty that ye would gain time, because ye see the thing is gone from me. 9 But if ye make not known unto me the dream, there is but one law for you: for ye have prepared lying and corrupt words to speak before me, till the time be changed; therefore tell me the dream, and I shall know that ye can shew me the interpretation thereof. 10 The Chaldeans answered before the king, and said, There is not a man upon the earth that can shew the king’s matter: forasmuch as no king, lord, nor ruler, hath asked such a thing of any magician, or astrologer, or Chaldean. 11 And it is a rare thing that the king requireth, and there is none other that can shew it before the king, except the gods, whose dwelling is not with flesh. 12 For this cause the king was angry and very furious, and commanded to destroy all the wise men of Babylon. 13 So the decree went forth; and the wise men were to be slain; and they sought Daniel and his companions to be slain.”
SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS.
What happened to Nebuchadnezzar in the second year of his reign?
How was he affected by this experience?
For whom did the king then call? With what result?
What did the king then say to them?
What did the Chaldeans then ask the king to do?
What did they promise they would then do?
Why did not the king do as they requested?
With what threat did he then urge his demand upon the Chaldeans?
What did he promise them if they would comply with his request?
What did he again urge them to do?
What demand did they in turn repeat?
What did the king declare to be their purpose? Why?
How did the king repeat his former threat? What did he say was their plan of action?
What final demand did he make of the Chaldeans?
In what emphatic statement did they acknowledge their inability to do what the king asked?
Did they regard the demand as a common one?
What did they say about it? Who alone did they declare could reveal what the king asked them to show? What reason did they give as sufficient to prevent such a thing from being done?
What effect did this interview with the Chaldeans have upon the king?
What command did he then issue?
What decree was then made? Why did they seek for Daniel and his companions as a result of this decree?
NOTES.
1. Daniel and his companions had been under training for a definite purpose. The Lord had a message for Babylon, and it was to be given in the court of the king. “As Israel had lost the power to arrest and command the attention of all the nations, that the nations might consider God and His wonderful ways and works with the children of men, God would now use them to enlighten those who had acquired the power to arrest and command the attention of all the nations, and thus cause all nations to consider the wonderful ways and works of God with the children of men.”—Great Empires of Prophecy, pp. 6, 7. By the training which they had received, these young captives had been prepared to stand before the king, that they might impart in his own language the knowledge of the true God and His working among men.
2. God purposes to demonstrate in Babylon that the wisdom of men is foolishness with Him, that true wisdom comes from Him alone, and that it is imparted to man through the indwelling of the divine life as the wisdom. The failure of the Chaldeans to meet the demands of the king made it clear that all their pretensions of being the channel of communication through which could come knowledge which was otherwise unattainable was all a sham. To justify their failure they declared, that only the gods could do what they were asked to do, and even in this there was no hope, from the Babylonish standpoint and experience, because, they declared, their “dwelling is not with flesh.” This is the creed of Babylon. This is the teaching and experience of heathenism.
3. The original promise in which the Gospel was first preached (Gen. 3:15) was the promise of the union of divinity with humanity in the flesh, and this is the essence of Christianity. Daniel and his companions are in Babylon to teach this very truth, and the opportunity has now come in God’s own providence. According to the statement of the Chaldeans themselves, the ability to reveal the dream and its interpretation as demanded by King Nebuchadnezzar, would be equivalent to the demonstration of the fact that God dwells with flesh. That which they put forward as an excuse for their own failure will be the highest testimony to the truth of the experience which they deny to the flesh,—the indwelling of God in the flesh of sinful man. Thus the truth is set forth that “their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges.”
