Daniel 7:2
Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, and, behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea. Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, and, behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea.
Daniel's night vision opens with the four winds of heaven struggling over the great sea. The winds are strife and conflict, the sea is peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues in their tides of rise and fall, and their striving is the conquests and revolutions by which kingdoms gained power. From that troubled sea rise beasts of prey, which are the great world-ruling kingdoms of Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. Each nation coming upon the stage is allowed its place and period of test to show whether it will fulfill the purpose of the Watcher and the Holy One, and each fails and its glory fades. Earthly governments so pictured rule by brute force and war and compel the conscience, in contrast to Christ as the Lamb of God whose government implants truth and righteousness and uses no force upon the conscience. The little horn of the same vision is the Roman Church and papacy, inheriting the power and seat and authority of pagan Rome, whose war against the saints matches the leopard-like beast of Revelation 13.
Vision Symbols Explained
Daniel spoke in vision by night and saw the four winds of heaven struggling upon the great sea, and in the historical application the little horn of that vision loses its dominion when French General Berthier takes Rome in February 1798 and the pope is taken prisoner later that month, at the close of the 1260 days. The four winds represent strife and conflict. Their striving upon the sea represents the conquests and revolutions through which the kingdoms attained power and gained power. The sea represents peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues in their great changing tides of rise and fall, from which the beasts representing the Old World nations rise. The great kingdoms that ruled the world are pictured as beasts of prey, even fierce beasts of prey, rising amid conflict and upheaval.
The four beasts are Babylon, Medo-Persia, called Persia, Greece, and Rome. Daniel received the night vision through the spirit of prophetic power because he clung to God with unwavering trust, firmness, self-denial, and purity of motive. God regarded him with approval and blessing and honored him in return, giving him understanding in all visions and dreams and teaching him to read the mysteries of the future.
The vision uses figures and symbols to record for coming generations events covering the history of this world till the close of time, as part of the wonderful prophecies in Daniel 7-12 given to Daniel as God's ambassador and revealing the mysteries of ages to come. The vision was not fully understood even by Daniel himself, and the prophetic writings were to be shut up and sealed even to the time of the end. Daniel was given the blessed assurance that he would rest and stand in his lot and place at the end of the days, in the closing period of this world's history.
Kingdoms Tested and Contrasted
The vision that opens here traces the rise and progress of the world's great empires — Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. Every nation coming upon the stage of action is permitted to occupy its place on the earth so that it may be determined whether it will fulfill the purposes of the Watcher and the Holy One. Each of these empires, like nations of less power, had its period of test, and each failed, its glory faded and its power departed, so that history repeated itself with each.
Worldly kingdoms are pictured here as fierce beasts of prey to show that earthly governments rule by brute force and war and compel the conscience. They stand in contrast to Christ as the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world, whose government uses no brute force to compel the conscience but implants the principle of truth and righteousness to counterwork error and sin. The apocalyptic beasts arising from this troubled scene come from the union of church and state, a union destructive to both civil government and the church and cruelly crushing its opponents.
Papal Power and Last Days
A horn is a symbol of a church, and the little horn of this chapter is the Roman Church, already so represented even before that church gained civil power. Its words, its blasphemy, and its war against the saints closely match the leopard-like beast of Revelation 13. That beast is the papacy, which inherited the power and seat and authority of pagan Rome, and in it is continued the successive power of the four beasts — Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome.
The imagery of this chapter thus provides the comparison for the church represented by the beast of Revelation 13. Like the vision here, that beast arose from the sea, for the sea is peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues, and the papacy was upheld by many nations. In the historical application of the chapter, the little horn loses its dominion when the French general Berthier takes Rome in February 1798 and the pope is taken prisoner later that month, at the close of the 1260 days.
The night vision is a figurative delineation of events leading down to the close of this earth's history. Those events are fulfilled in their order by historical events showing its direct fulfillment, and its line runs to the scenes connected with the working of the man of sin as the last features plainly revealed in this earth's history. The prophecies of Daniel and John, of which this is part, must be diligently studied, and their correct application carefully guarded as a great waymark showing bearings in prophetic history. This vision underlies the special work now of giving the third angel's message, an application kept safe by the experience of those who passed over the ground and acted a part in proclaiming the first, second, and third angels' messages.