Daniel’s Animals

Animals are one of God’s greatest gifts to us humans. However, text from various religions does not seem to respect animals. After all, animals were used as sacrifices, beasts of burden, and sadly, deemed as impurities. Jews and Muslims are forbidden to eat pork, but freely kill goats and sheep as burnt offerings or rituals. Hard core Christians vehemently denounce the concept of evolution because the thought of being derived from monkeys is unfathomable and disgusting. Even today, you don’t see or hear of churches offering much support to the Humane Society or the local animal shelters.

However, the Book of Daniel is different. We don’t see any sacrifices, we don’t see animal abuse, and instead, we see animals being used as symbols to represent great empires. This is a wonderful compliment. Let’s look at Daniel’s animals.

The Lion
We grew up thinking the lion, crowned by its mane, as the ‘king of the beasts.’ If you look at the majestic male lion and he carries a fearless pride and dares to challenge any creature who threatens his kingdom. King Nebuchadnezzar was the lion of the mid-east, conquering territories and ruled with greatness. He was a creative genius, who designed a civilization unlike any other at the time. The lion represents greatness, as did King Neb.

The Bear
I would imagine that the bear Daniel saw in his dreams is not your typical cute bear cub as we see in cartoons. The bear in Daniel must have been a ferocious grizzly, ready to devour the enemy. The bear represents the Meso-Persia Empire led by Cyrus.

But can a bear defeat and conquer a lion? In reality, yes it can. However, the Babylon ruled by Nebuchadnezzar can be compared to a lion. Meso-Persia conquered a Babylon ruled by King Belshazzar.

The bear is cunning and despite its size, can sneak up to an enemy quietly without being notice. This is exactly what the Meso-Persia army did. They captured Babylon without a sound.

The Leopard
If you’re going to be fast, you better be sure where you are going. The leopard is the smallest of the big cat family, but don’t mess with them. They can adapt to any environment and with speeds at 58 miles per hour, few prey stand a chance to escape the strength, speed, and agility of the leopard. What better animal to describe Alexander the Great, the emperor of Greece. He foresaw the areas he wished to conquer and did so fast and without mercy. He was a hunter.

The Goat and the Ram
Now the use of these animals confuses me a little. The Goat and the Ram both represent two conflicting armies. The ram with the two horns stands for the kingdom of Media and Persia. In the Book of Daniel, it is written, ‘I watched the ram as it charged toward the west and the north and the south. No animal stood against it.’

But then the Ram confronted the Goat when Daniel wrote, “Suddenly a goat with a prominent horn between its eyes emerged from the west and crossed the earth without touching the ground. It charged toward the two-horned ram in great rage. I saw it attack the ram furiously, striking the ram and shattering its two horns.”

Wow!

In real life no goat can defeat a ram. A ram is tough, head strong, and a fighter. A goat is an animal we see at petting zoos. I think what Daniel meant is that Medo-Peria is actually two civilizations under one kingdom, with the Persia side being the strongest. The goat had one horn (which is a disparity since goats usually have two horns), represents one kingdom.

The Terrible Beast
This represented by Rome, the most powerful civilization in world history. So terrible that it could gobble up any animal that stood its way. Because of this, it cannot be represented by an animal.

In Conclusion
Finally a Book that honors animals. I only wish that there are kingdoms out there that can be represented by more gentle animals like the dog, a horse, or even a kangaroo. The USA is represented by the eagle, and rightly so. Russia is represented by the bear. I suppose we will know world peace once we all become lambs under the absolute kingdom that is about to come.