Daniel 3:1, commentary and pictures

Nebuchadnezzar set up an image wholly of gold, sixty cubits high and six cubits broad, about ninety feet high and nine feet broad, in the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon, where a vast gathering assembled for its dedication. Made at exceeding cost from treasures of war as the embodiment of Babylon's glory and power, it copied in general form the statue of his dream but was made all of gold to reject the interpretation that his kingdom would pass to others and to claim that Babylon was eternal and indestructible, when God had shown that He would establish an everlasting kingdom that would destroy earthly kingdoms and endure forever. It was consecrated as the established religion and represented the kingdom and the king himself, and all peoples, nations and rulers were commanded at the sound of music to bow down and worship it on pain of being cast immediately into a burning fiery furnace, setting up a human rival to the God of heaven to whom every faculty is owed. Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego refused because worship and loyalty belonged to God alone above all human rulers, and their trial displayed to an idolatrous nation the power and faithfulness of Israel's God, for Christ walked with them in the furnace and preserved them until the proud king was humbled to acknowledge God's superior and everlasting dominion. As the golden image was exalted on the plain of Dura, so a spurious sabbath is exalted in place of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, when Sunday observance, a human institution with no command in God's Word, is set up as an idol and enforced by oppressive laws under threat of punishment and death, and the loyal will manifest the same principle as the three Hebrews with increased zeal for God's law.

Image and Its Setting

The image was of gold, sixty cubits high and six cubits broad, about ninety feet in height and nine in breadth. In idolatrous eyes it presented a most imposing and majestic appearance.

He set it up in the plain of Dura, in Babylon, in the province of Babylon. There, on the appointed day, a vast gathering assembled from many peoples and languages.

It was made wholly of gold from treasures obtained in war, wrought at exceeding cost by Chaldean skill from his own treasure. It was the most imposing idol yet produced, exceedingly costly and magnificent, as the embodiment of Babylon's glory, magnificence and power.

It was set up after heavenly light had for a little time influenced the king with the fear of God, when a few years of prosperity filled his heart with pride. This was in the year Daniel and his companions entered the king's service.

Why the King Made It

Although he had once acknowledged the power of God, pride and worldly ambition led him to honor God no longer, and after heavenly light had for a little time influenced him with the fear of God, a few years of prosperity filled his heart with pride so that he forgot his acknowledgment of the living God and resumed idol worship with increased zeal and bigotry. The image copied in general form the statue he had seen in his dream, which had revealed events reaching to the close of time and his own part in world history, including that God would establish an everlasting kingdom that would destroy the earthly kingdoms and endure forever. Yet he made it wholly of gold, from treasures obtained in war and wrought by Chaldean skill, to reject Daniel's interpretation that his kingdom would be followed by others and to claim Babylon as eternal and indestructible, contrary to the teaching that earthly kingdoms would pass away while God's kingdom endures forever. In that all-gold form it glorified human power and Babylon itself, deliberately set up in place of God as an imposing object of worship to counteract the dream's message that other kingdoms would follow Babylon.

The image represented the kingdom of Babylon and more particularly the king himself, magnifying him as its ruler and embodying Babylon's glory, magnificence and power. Its display of Babylon's supposed excellence and glory was intended to lead all nations to worship it, with bowing before it on the day of dedication required as proof of supreme loyalty to Babylonian power. Flattered by the words that he was the head of gold and by heathen counselors, and flattered by the idea that Babylon was gold while later kingdoms were baser metal because nations would separate from God and decrease in value, he placed himself before the people as an object of worship in an exceedingly costly and magnificent form. Instead of accepting that Jehovah is more powerful than earthly kings and that his kingdom would pass to others, he read the interpretation in the light of his own idolatrous mind, ambitions, dreams and fancies, thereby perverting the light given through the dream and using God-given reason to glorify himself rather than God. His earlier just and merciful rule thus gave way to oppression as jealousy toward those future kingdoms and ambition to make his kingdom last beyond them hardened his heart.

The image and its worship were part of a scheme to exalt the king and to compel the Hebrew captives to obey human laws in direct opposition to God's law, refusing to dishonor the God of heaven whom they served above all human rulers. On the appointed day that worship threatened to make idolatry a permanent part of Babylon's state religion and to frustrate God's purpose of using captive Israel to bless the nations. The demand brought a hard test of conscience upon Daniel's three companions, for the idol was a rival to the God of heaven to whom they owed every faculty they possessed, and with lofty aspiration to prove entirely loyal to Him while showing generous sympathy to all men they counted the demand contemptible and met it with a store of eloquent arguments. The decree for worshiping the image was secured through envy and jealousy by the very astrologers and soothsayers whose lives had been saved when God heard the prayer and fasting of Daniel and his companions and gave Daniel wisdom to interpret the king's dream.

Enforced Worship and Refusal

The image was consecrated as an object of worship and made the established religion of Babylon. Officers and rulers of the kingdom were summoned to its dedication on the plain of Dura, and all peoples were commanded that at the sound of the musical instruments they should bow down and worship it. Anyone who failed to bow was to be cast immediately into the midst of a burning fiery furnace. On the appointed day a vast gathering from many peoples and languages assembled and obeyed the command.

The decree created a state-enforced religion designed to compel the Hebrew captives and all others to obey human laws contrary to God's law. The image and its worship set up a rival to the God of heaven, to whom every faculty possessed is owed. The worship decree was secured through envy and jealousy by the very astrologers and soothsayers whose lives had been saved when God heard prayer and fasting and gave wisdom to interpret the king's dream.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego refused because loyalty and worship belonged to God alone above all human rulers. They would not dishonor God, the King of kings, but chose to serve Him whatever the cost. The demand to comply with the royal edict appeared contemptible to them, men with a conscience void of offense toward God whose lofty aspiration was to prove entirely loyal while showing generous sympathy to all men, and they met it with a store of eloquent arguments. Their loyalty to God was thus made clear when obedience to God came into conflict with a ruler's command.

The events tested the young Hebrews' integrity and displayed to an idolatrous nation the power and faithfulness of the God of Israel. The history brings out important principles regarding the working out of the Lord's purpose for the children of obedience and the children of disobedience. The three Hebrew captives were cast into the burning fiery furnace for loyalty to heaven, but the Lord Jesus was with them and preserved them from harm and manifested Himself to them. Christ Himself walked in the fiery furnace with His three faithful servants, and the miracle moved Nebuchadnezzar to acknowledge God and His superior power.

On the plain of Dura the king's proud spirit was humbled and he once more acknowledged that God's kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and His dominion is from generation to generation. Though an idolater by birth and training at the head of an idolatrous people, he kept an innate sense of justice and right. God was able to use him as an instrument to punish the rebellious and to fulfill the divine purpose, giving him Tyre after years of patient and wearing labor and Egypt to his victorious armies, adding nation after nation to Babylon until he grew famous as the greatest ruler of the age.

Pattern for Final Conflict

The plain of Dura is a lesson for the last days, when innocent servants of God will be given over to suffer humiliation and abuse at the hands of those inspired by Satan and filled with envy and religious bigotry. The wrath of men will be aroused especially against those who hallow the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, and at last a universal decree will denounce Sabbathkeepers as deserving of death.

As the golden image was exalted on the plain of Dura, a rival spurious sabbath is exalted in place of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment. That Sabbath is God's memorial of creation, while Sunday observance is a human institution and a humanly created rest day with no sanctity and no command in God's Word to reverence it. It is set up as an idol to be worshiped, displacing God's Sabbath and honoring a day exalted by God's enemy. The effort to enforce worship of the image is the pattern for setting aside God's Sabbath and demanding observance of that humanly created rest day, with universal homage to the image illustrating the coercive demand to obey human religious laws rather than God. Representatives who exalt the first day of the week and seek to make all people observe it act after the example of rulers who required people to bow to an institution in place of God's command, in opposition to the Bible Sabbath.

As the king used power to compel worship, oppressive laws will pressure all to honor the counterfeit under threat of losing legal protection, imprisonment, punishment and death. Those who oppress and punish people because they refuse to violate conscience and dishonor God claim the right to control conscience, a right belonging to God alone, and would act as Nebuchadnezzar did in setting up the image on the plain of Dura. God will intervene for His loyal, commandment-keeping people when future laws restrict religious liberty, especially laws opposing obedience to the seventh-day Sabbath. The ceremony and formalism, vainglory and oppression seen in the course of the heathen king is being and will continue to be manifested in this age against all who will not observe the spurious sabbath.

The exaltation of the image foreshadows the mystery of iniquity devised by satanic agencies and carried into effect by the man of sin, while the law of Jehovah is trampled and the memorial of God, the sign between Him and His commandment-keeping people, is made a thing of naught and despised. It is Satan's exaltation of a false sabbath, which takes the appearance of holiness while diverting worship from God's seventh-day Sabbath. Churches that uphold the papal sabbath rather than the seventh-day Sabbath worship the image of the beast and receive its mark, as the inhabitants of Babylon worshipped the image. The image represents an idolatrous religious institution imposed through civil power with suppression of religious liberty.

When the law of God is made void by a national act exalting Sunday by law, dishonoring God's name and making keeping the seventh day as the Sabbath seem disloyal, the world and the church will be united in making void the law and seeking to compel conscience. Those loyal to the commandments of God will not give up loyalty to God but will manifest the same principle as the three Hebrews, with increased zeal making the value of God's law as a rule of conduct manifest. That stand of the three worthies in refusing to bow will be repeated in the Southern States in connection with bringing truth to the colored people, when a period comes to do as they did and that time will present decisions for or against the commandments of God. Until that period comes there is to be no haphazard or presumptuous action, no encouraging the spirit of defiance and resistance, and no closing up the way entirely, lest it become more difficult to work the many fields not yet touched.

Principles for Faithful Obedience

Earthly rulers who use power to compel worship act as Nebuchadnezzar did in setting up the golden image on the plain of Dura, as shown in Daniel 3:1-6. Those who oppress and punish people because they refuse to violate conscience and dishonor God would, given the opportunity, do the same. Such rulers claim the right to control conscience, a right belonging to God alone, and demand worship of what human authority has set up on pain of punishment for refusal. The same principle applies to future laws restricting religious liberty, especially laws opposing obedience to the seventh-day Sabbath, yet God will intervene for His loyal, commandment-keeping people.

False religion runs counter to the commandments of God. The great golden image was impressive and attractive, and with beautiful music to charm the senses it entrapped men through the senses and did honor to the prince of darkness. It illustrates religion without inward purity and beauty, without inward holiness and without the Spirit of God. Such religion depends on position of authority to compel those who acknowledge God as Creator and Sovereign to bow to human enactments without question. It depends on outward display, outward beauty, parade, ceremonies, ornaments, shrines, embroidered altars and magnificent architecture to attract and hold the senses, to make up for the absence of the Spirit and to conceal spiritual poverty and apostasy, as the Protestant churches follow in the footsteps of Rome instead of depending on Christ the divine Teacher.

God had honored Nebuchadnezzar with the dream of the great image in which his kingdom was the head of gold, but he followed his own inventions. Flattered by the idea that Babylon was gold while later kingdoms were baser metal because nations would separate from God and decrease in value, and flattered by heathen counselors, he placed himself before the people as an object of worship. Instead of accepting that Jehovah is more powerful than earthly kings and that his kingdom would pass to others, he read the interpretation in the light of his own idolatrous mind, ambitions, dreams and fancies, thus perverting the light given through Daniel's interpretation. He set up an exceedingly costly and magnificent golden image in the plain of Dura representing the kingdom of Babylon and magnifying himself as its ruler and representing the glory of himself and his kingdom and the excellency of Babylon, commanding men to bow down before it with the hope of converting all nations to worship his image. The image brought a fiery trial upon the three Hebrew captives who cherished the knowledge of the true God and refused from loyalty to heaven to worship it, and they were cast into the burning fiery furnace, but the Lord Jesus was with them and walked with His three faithful servants in the furnace and preserved them from harm and manifested Himself to them, and the miracle moved Nebuchadnezzar to acknowledge God and His superior power. Therefore king and subjects alike must not read the Scriptures and God's providences in the light of their dreams and fancies, but must read their dreams in the light of the living oracles, and the verse warns against setting God aside, trusting own wisdom, and cherishing Nebuchadnezzar's self-exalting thoughts and feelings, which lead to a trying experience.

The earlier dream had revealed events reaching to the close of time and the king's part in world history. Although he had acknowledged God's power, pride and worldly ambition led him to honor God no longer and to renew idolatry by setting up the gold image. Its gold represented Babylon as an eternal, indestructible kingdom. Contrary to that claim, the dream affirms that God will establish an everlasting kingdom that will destroy the earthly kingdoms and endure forever.