« 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 »
(Daniel 2:40-43)
Iron symbolizes the expression of the power of the Roman Empire, and its extension to our time. It is a force of authority imposed politically, by the power of an army or a police force. Iron is the symbol of the metal from which weapons are forged; in Roman times, these were swords, shields, spears… And in our time, they are cannons, rifles, pistols, shot guns, bombs, and bombers dropping fire from the sky, to borrow the expression from the Book of Apocalypse, regarding the wild beast with two lamb horns, representing current world power: “It exercises all the authority of the first wild beast in its sight. And it makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first wild beast, whose mortal wound was healed. And it performs great signs, even making fire come down out of heaven to the earth in the sight of mankind” (Apocalypse 13:12,13).
For example, during World War II, Italy, Germany, and Japan (the Axis powers) plunged the world into chaos and bloodshed, while the other Allied nations retaliated. In the aftermath of World War II, far from bringing peace to the world, these same Allied powers, in turn, caused widespread destruction and much bloodshed in post-colonial wars and the Cold War in many countries.
Nevertheless, these iron powers, with their military strength, were hampered by clay. How? Let us take two examples, France and the United States: After the Second World War, these two countries engaged in colonial wars, in Africa (in the Maghrib), in Asia (in Korea, Vietnam, Laos and in Cambodia). On the military level (iron), these countries have undoubtedly exerted a power comparable to iron which destroyed everything in its path, by rifles, machine guns, cannons, incendiary bombs destroying men, women and children living in villages, and forests, in Vietnam and Laos.
Nevertheless, the clay, the men and women, the public opinion, was quick to denounce the exaction of these great colonial powers, which « weakened » their military action (iron), to the point of converting their military victories, in political and diplomatic defeats. More recently, confidential classified information has been hacked, revealing to the general public (clay), abuses made by armies (iron) against civilian populations in the Far East, thereby discrediting these institutions.
Currently, the actions of iron governments are largely hampered by human clay, the « many waters », in the form of crowds protesting against the authority, revolutions, terrorist acts and mob movements that are flexing the authority of « militarized iron », widely relayed by union and media powers, particularly the Internet, which have acted and are acting as powerful checks and balances.
The prophecy of Daniel mentions the “toes” of iron and clay, which accentuates the fragility and stability of the “statue”, through Balkanization and claims of autonomy that have fragmented great empires. This phenomenon has been accentuated after the fall of the former Soviet Union, from the beginning of the years 90. New forms of conflicts by worldwide generalized terrorist actions, with the appearance of the Internet, make that the human clay has nowadays become almost uncontrollable by most governments with their police and militarized iron power.
The uncontrolled and rebellious clay, of the prophecy of Daniel, finds its symbolic correspondence with the book of Apocalypse, with the horizontality of the rough sea and the many waters: “One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me: “Come, I will show you the judgment on the great prostitute who sits on many waters. (…) He said to me: “The waters that you saw, where the prostitute is sitting, mean peoples and crowds and nations and tongues“”(Apocalypse 17:1,15). While iron is represented by the verticality of the governmental “former heaven”, in the book of Apocalypse, it is written that they will disappear: “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea is no more“ (Apocalypse 21:1).
To illustrate the destabilizing effect of the weakening of iron by the presence of clay, another chapter of Daniel’s prophecy states that in the last days, all of humanity would no longer respect authority: « And in the final part of their kingdom, as the transgressors act to a completion, a fierce-looking king who understands ambiguous sayings will stand up » (Daniel 8:23). This text describes the last days when transgressors would prosper. They are part of the clay that weakens the iron governmental authority. Also, Jesus Christ, in prophetically describing the last days, mentioned this weakening of authority through the growth of contempt for the law: « because of the increasing of lawlessness, the love of the greater number will grow cold » (Matthew 24:12).
The conclusion of this dream foretells the destruction of human sovereignty (without God), through the establishment, by force, of the Kingdom of God on earth:
“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. (…) 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, 45 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 2:34,35,44,45).
The stone that will destroy the image, is the Kingdom of God. This will be the fulfillment of the request made in the Lord’s Prayer: « Our Father in the heavens, let your name be sanctified. Let your Kingdom come. Let your will take place, as in heaven, also on earth » (Matthew 6:9,10).
Let your Kingdom come: it is a heavenly government whose king is Jesus Christ, with 144,000 kings and priests, the New Jerusalem, according to the Book of Apocalypse (21:1-4). The mountain from which the stone comes from, is the everlasting sovereignty of God YHWH (Yehouah), which will once again be exercised on planet Earth. This is why this stone, which will destroy the image, will become a mountain over the whole Earth, in expression of the sovereignty of God.
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The Prophecy of the Book of Daniel
The study of the Prophecy of Daniel is the analysis of current prophetic events in the Middle East and in the World…
The Prophecy of the Book of Daniel – The Last Hard-Faced King (Daniel 8:23-25)
This prophecy describes the face and attitude of the last king, of the last world power…
The Prophecy of the Book of Daniel – The Conflict Between the Two Kings (Daniel 11)
This prophecy foreshadows the conclusion of events in the Middle East…
We are, it seems, currently in the last stage of the fulfillment of this prophecy of Daniel, about the two kings…
The Prophecy of the Book of Daniel – The Conflict Between the Two Kings (Daniel 11)
This prophecy foretells the conclusion of events in the Middle East…
The Prophecy of the Book of Zechariah
The prophecy of Zechariah and its prophetic riddles, explanations to know the future…
The Prophecy of Jesus Christ of the end of this system of things, with several preliminary signs…
Table of contents of the http://yomelyah.fr/ website
Reading the Bible daily, this table of contents contains informative Bible articles (Please click on the link above to view it)…
Table of languages of more than seventy languages, with six important biblical articles, written in each of these languages…
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