King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, had a dream
« You, O king, were watching, and you saw an immense image. That image, which was huge and extremely bright, was standing in front of you, and its appearance was terrifying. The head of that image was of fine gold, its chest and its arms were of silver, its abdomen and its thighs were of copper, its legs were of iron, and its feet were partly of iron and partly of clay. You looked on until a stone was cut out, not by hands, and it struck the image on its feet of iron and of clay and crushed them. At that time the iron, the clay, the copper, the silver, and the gold were, all together, crushed and became like the chaff from the summer threshing floor, and the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that struck the image became a large mountain, and it filled the whole earth » (Daniel 2:31-35).
The interpretation of the dream
“This is the dream, and we will now tell the king its interpretation. You, O king—the king of kings to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the might, the strength, and the glory, and into whose hand he has given men wherever they may dwell, as well as the beasts of the field and the birds of the heavens, and whom he has made ruler over all of them—you yourself are the head of gold. “But after you another kingdom will rise, inferior to you; then another kingdom, a third one, of copper, that will rule over the whole earth. “As for the fourth kingdom, it will be strong like iron. For just as iron crushes and pulverizes everything else, yes, like iron that shatters, it will crush and shatter all of these. “And just as you saw the feet and the toes to be partly of clay of a potter and partly of iron, the kingdom will be divided, but some of the hardness of iron will be in it, just as you saw the iron mixed with soft clay. And as the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of clay, so the kingdom will be partly strong and partly fragile. Just as you saw iron mixed with soft clay, they will be mixed with the people; but they will not stick together, one to the other, just as iron does not mix with clay. “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed. And this kingdom will not be passed on to any other people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, and it alone will stand forever, just as you saw that out of the mountain a stone was cut not by hands, and that it crushed the iron, the copper, the clay, the silver, and the gold. The Grand God has made known to the king what will happen in the future. The dream is true, and its interpretation is trustworthy” (Daniel 2:36-45).
In this dream, it is prophetically described the succession of world powers, from the time of Daniel, when the kingdom of Babylon was the ruling world power, until the great tribulation, when the destruction of human sovereignty, followed by the establishment of the earthly administration of the kingdom of God. This statue is made of four metals:
1 – The golden head: the Babylonian empire, represented by the king Nebuchadnezzar, at the time of the prophet Daniel:
“You, O king—the king of kings to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the might, the strength, and the glory, 38 and into whose hand he has given men wherever they may dwell, as well as the beasts of the field and the birds of the heavens, and whom he has made ruler over all of them—you yourself are the head of gold” (Daniel 2:37,38).
2 – The chest and arms in silver: the Medo-Persian empire (Daniel 2:39a).
The historical narrative of the transition from Babylonian power to Medo-Persian power is found in Daniel chapters 5 and 6.
3 – The abdomen and the thighs made of copper: the Greek empire (Daniel 2:39b).
The prophetic announcement of the transition from the Medo-Persian empire to the Greek empire, through Alexander the Great, is found in Daniel chapter 8 (this chapter will be studied later):
“It threw the ram to the ground and trampled it down, and there was no one to rescue it from its power. Then the male goat exalted itself exceedingly, but as soon as it became mighty, the great horn was broken; then four conspicuous horns came up instead of the one, toward the four winds of the heavens. (…) The two-horned ram that you saw stands for the kings of Media and Persia. The hairy male goat stands for the king of Greece; and the great horn that was between its eyes stands for the first king. As for the horn that was broken, so that four stood up instead of it, there are four kingdoms from his nation that will stand up, but not with his power” (Daniel 8:7,8,20-22).
Two hundred years in advance, this prophecy foretold the advent of Alexander, the Great (the great horn of the male goat) and his very fast conquests (the male goat without touching the ground). The book of Daniel has been completed around 536 BCE, in Babylon. Alexander the Great was born in 356 BCE. In 336, he began his reign. He died very young, in 323 BCE: “the horn was broken”.
4 – The Iron Legs: The Roman Empire (Rome (Western Empire) and Constantinople (Eastern Empire)) (Daniel 2:40).
The prophetic announcement of the transition from Greek to Roman power is detailed in the prophecy of Daniel chapter 7 (this chapter will be studied later):
“After this I kept watching in the visions of the night, and I saw a fourth beast, fearsome and terrifying and unusually strong, and it had large iron teeth. It was devouring and crushing, and what was left it trampled down with its feet. It was different from all the other beasts that were prior to it, and it had ten horns” (Daniel 7:7).
This fourth beast represents Roman imperial power; here is how the angel describes its destructive force:
“This is what he said: ‘As for the fourth beast, there is a fourth kingdom that will come to be on the earth. It will be different from all the other kingdoms, and it will devour all the earth and will trample it down and crush it” (Daniel 7:23).
In Chapter 2, the iron, symbolizing Roman power, extends to the feet and toes, signifying its continued existence to this day. This historical continuation is a late Romanization, reflected in its political, religious, and cultural system. Historically, and in a very simplified way, after the decline of the Western Roman Empire in 476, the Eastern Roman Empire continued until 1453.
These Germanic Peoples (as “Spearhead” of the Eastern Roman Empire), will install Royal dynasties, as Merovingian Dynasty, Carolingian Dynasty, in the Western part of Europe, and by means of the Holy Roman Empire, placing themselves under the influence of the Roman Catholic Church (representation of the extension of the Western Roman Empire, Roman Late Antiquity Influence).
Thus, the Western Roman Empire found its continuation through Rome and its extension to the present day, under the banner of Late Roman Antiquity, largely perpetuated by the Roman Catholic Church, which crowned the kings of Western Europe and also in its Germanic part in Eastern Europe. The continuation of Roman culture in the Eastern Roman Empire was achieved through the Orthodox Church in the Slavic countries of Eastern Europe and the Balkans.
The global expansion of this Roman culture occurred through voyages of exploration and research into new continents, followed by conquests and colonial wars that led to genocides of indigenous peoples (in the Americas (North, South, and Central), Asia, Australia, and Africa). The primary exporters of this Roman culture were Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Great Britain, and France. The United States of America is the result of wars of conquest waged by European nations of Roman origin. Thus, one could say that the United States of America is an extension of this Roman heritage.
On a political and governmental level, the « Caesars » were replaced by tsars, kaisers, kings, presidents, and prime ministers, with chambers of deputies or senates, as in the former Rome.
On a religious level, the Catholic Church fully embraces its Roman identity by identifying itself as Roman. Its teachings, fundamentally Christian (as well as those of the Orthodox Church), have been largely blended with Greco-Roman teachings, such as the Trinity, the concept of hell, the immortality of the soul, the veneration of saints, the cult of the Virgin Mary resembling the worship of the goddess Artemis of Ephesus, and the practice of venerating images, icons, and statues. The current general philosophy of Western nations is based on consumerism, pleasure, and the industrialized entertainment and tourism industries—the famous « bread and circuses » of ancient Rome (Panem et circenses)—to prevent any revolution or social unrest.
5 – The feet of iron mixed with clay (as well as the toes of iron mixed with clay)).
The presence of clay with the iron of the feet and toes, which in fact weaken the whole structure of the statue (world human sovereignty), represents the movements of uncontrolled crowds, in the forms of street, social and revolutionary, terrorist acts perpetrated by small groups, and alternative media outlets undermine the official propaganda of the authorities in power. This antagonism between iron and clay seriously weakens the authority of current governments. This counter-power seriously weakens the iron authority of current governments (Daniel 2:41-43).
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