No 7

(Prophesies that have been realized in the book of Daniel)

In our last study on prophesy, we saw an overview of this book and now, we will look at some specific prophesies that have already come to pass and are verifiable in secular history. Let’s remember one thing : Daniel gave these prophesies 200 years before they cam to pass. We have pretty much covered the prophesies in chapters 2 & 7 relating to the empires that follow the Babylonian empire.

In the year 539 BC, the history books tells us that Medo Persian Empire, under the rule of Darius, defeated the Babylonians.

The Greeks, under Alexander the Great who was very young (early twenties) defeated the Medo-Persians in the year 336 BC. The Greeks ruled 200 years until the Romans took over power in the year 63 BC. This was the broad overview, now let us look at some of the intricacies of these prophesies. In chapter 8, Daniel has another vision; this time it entails a ram and a he-goat. The ram is Medo-Persia (vs 20) and the he-goat in Greece (vs 21); this vision seem repetative but elsewhere in the chapter, we see such precision that only God could’ve been the author. In verse 8, the big horn is Alexander the Great (who died unexpectedly) and four other horns came forth. Again, the history books say that these four horns were four rulers of the Greek empire that was divided into four parts; these rulers were : Cassander (Macedonia), Lisymacus (Asia Minor); Ptolomy(Egypt), Selucus(the rest of the Middle East). Out of one of these four horns (rulers) came a little horn (vs 9) who magnified himself greatly and the daily sacrifice was taken away from the Jews. Antichus Ephiphanes was a fierce Greek ruler who hated the Jews and caused the sacrifices to cease. In the Apocrpha, there are books called the Machabees; the abominations that Antichus did are described in those books. The Jews overthrew the Greeks and purified the temple; the holiday of Hannukah (around Christmas) was created to remember these events. There are numerous other prophecies such as these in the book of Daniel that have been realized but we won’t look at them for lack of time. The thing that we must keep in mind is that the Bible is the Word of God and everything that is in it will come to pass.