Daniel. As a comparison of the chapters (two and seven) shows, there are definite similarities. The colossal image had four principal parts or sections, to compare with the four beasts. The metals of the image began with the most precious, gold, becoming successively inferior, while the beasts began with the majestic lion. In both visions the fourth part or “kingdom” receives particular consideration, shows the greatest complexity of form, introduces new elements, and continues down till the time when divine judgment is executed upon it for standing in opposition to God’s rule.

Briefly the four beasts were: lion, first having eagle’s wings, then losing them and taking on human qualities; a bear (a less majestic and more ponderous creature than the lion), devouring much flesh; a leopard with four wings (adding to its great speed) and four heads; and a fourth wild beast not corresponding to any actual animal, unusually strong, with large iron teeth, ten horns and another horn developing with eyes and a “mouth speaking grandiose things.” Much of the chapter relates to the fourth beast and its unusual horn. While each beast was “different from the others,” this was especially true of the fourth one.—Dan. 7:3-8, 11, 12, 15-26.

There are, of course, various explanations offered by scholars as to the application of these symbols. It is an aid to understanding, however, simply to review what history and the Bible show as to the major powers that had direct relations with God’s covenant people from Daniel’s time forward.

Babylon itself was the dominant power in the Near East when the vision was received. After having gained the ascendancy over Assyria, the Babylonian kingdom swiftly extended its domain over Syria and Palestine, overthrowing the kingdom of Judah with its line of Davidic rulers who sat on the glorious throne of Jehovah in Jerusalem. (1 Chron. 29:23) It may be observed that, when warning Judah of its impending fall to Babylon, the prophet Jeremiah likened the future conqueror to ‘a lion going up out of a thicket.’ (Jer. 4:5-7; compare 50:17.) After the fall of Jerusalem, Jeremiah said that Babylon’s forces had been “swifter than the eagles” in their pursuit of the Judeans. (Lam. 4:19) History shows that Babylon’s expansion, at one time reaching as far as Egypt, before long came to a halt and, in the latter part of the empire, Babylon’s rulers showed little of the earlier aggressiveness.

Babylon fell to the Medo-Persian kingdom, with its heartland in the hills to the east of the plains of Mesopotamia. The Medo-Persian Empire was quite different from the Shemitic Babylonian Empire, being the first Japhetic (or Aryan) power to gain the dominant position in the Near East. The Jews, though allowed to return to Judah, continued as a subject people under the Medo-Persian yoke. (Neh. 9:36, 37) This empire showed an even greater appetite for territory than had the Babylonian, extending its domain from “India to Ethiopia.”—Esther 1:1.

Medo-Persia’s domination was ended by the lightning conquest of the Grecian forces headed by Alexander the Great. In a few short years he built up an empire that embraced parts of Europe, Asia and Africa. This was the first European-based power to hold such a position. After Alexander’s death, his generals struggled for control of the empire, four of them eventually gaining the rulership of different sections. Palestine was fought over by the rival Seleucid and Ptolemaic kingdoms.

The Grecian Empire was eventually taken over completely by Rome. The Roman Empire surpassed all the preceding empires, not only in the extent of its domain (covering the entire Mediterranean area and in time reaching to the British Isles), but also in the efficiency of its military machine and the firmness of its application of Roman law to the provinces of its far-flung empire. Rome, of course, was the political instrument used to execute the Messiah, Christ Jesus, as well as to persecute the early Christian congregation. The empire extended for nearly a thousand years thereafter in different forms, but eventually broke up into various nations, with England finally gaining the domiant position.

In A Short History of the World, historian H. G. Wells makes the following interesting observations on the distinctiveness of the Roman Empire: “Now this new Roman power which arose to dominate the western world in the second and first centuries B.C. was in several respects a different thing from any of the great empires that had hitherto prevailed in the civilised world. It was not at first a monarchy, and it was not the creation of any one great conqueror. . . . it was the first republican empire that escaped extinction and went on to fresh developments. . . . its population was less strongly Hamitic and Shemitic than that of any preceding empire. . . . It was so far a new pattern in history, it was an expanded Aryan republic. . . . It was always changing. It never attained to any fixity. In a sense the [administrative] experiment failed. In a sense the experiment remains unfinished, and Europe and America today are still working out the riddles of world-wide statecraft first confronted by the Roman people.”—Chapter 33, “The Growth of the Roman Empire,” pp. 149-151.

The ram and the male goat

In the vision Daniel received two years later (Dan. 8:1), the powers represented by the two symbolic beasts involved are clearly named. The kingdom of Medo-Persia is here pictured as a male sheep (a ram) having two horns, the taller horn coming up afterward. History shows that the Medes first were the stronger and the Persians thereafter gained the ascendancy, though both peoples remained united in a dual power. A he-goat, moving very fast across the earth, symbolized the world power of Greece. (Dan. 8:3-8, 20, 21) The prophetic vision shows that the goat’s “great horn” located between its eyes, representing the first king, was broken “as soon as it became mighty,” four kingdoms resulting, though of inferior strength. (Dan. 8:5, 8, 21, 22) The amazingly quick conquest of the Medo-Persian Empire by Alexander has already been commented upon, as well as the division of his kingdom among four of his generals.

It is worthy of mention here that the same nation may be represented by different animal symbols in different prophecies. Thus, Babylon (as well as Assyria) is represented by lions at Jeremiah 50:17, while at Ezekiel 17:3-17 both Babylon and Egypt are pictured by great eagles. Ezekiel elsewhere likens Egypt’s Pharaoh to a “great sea monster” lying in the Nile canals. (Ezek. 29:3) Hence the fact that Medo-Persia and Greece are represented by certain symbolisms in Daniel chapter 8 does not eliminate the possibility of their being represented by other symbolisms in the earlier vision (chapter 7) nor in subsequent prophecies.

The seven-headed wild beast out of the sea

In the vision had by the apostle John and recorded at Revelation chapter 13 a seven-headed, ten-horned wild boast comes up out of the sea, leopard-like, yet with feet of a bear and the mouth of a lion. It is thus a composite form of several of the symbols appearing in Daniel’s vision of the four beasts. The dragon, identified at Revelation 12:9 as Satan the Devil, gives it its authority and power. (Rev. 13:1, 2) This beast’s seven heads (bearing ten horns) distinguish it from the one-headed beasts of Daniel’s vision. Seven (and ten) are commonly acknowledged as Biblical symbols of completeness. (See NUMBER, NUMERAL.) This is corroborated by the extent of this beast’s domain, for it exercises authority, not over one nation or a group of nations, but “over every tribe and people and tongue and nation.” (Rev. 13:7, 8; compare 16:13, 14.) Noting these factors, The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible comments: “The first of these beasts [of Revelation chapter 13] combines in itself the joint characteristics of the four beasts of Daniel’s vision . . . Accordingly, this first beast represents the combined forces of all political rule opposed to God in the world.”—Vol. 1, p. 369.

Two-horned beast out of the earth

Then John saw a beast with two horns like those of a harmless lamb yet speaking as a dragon, exercising the full authority of the first wild beast, just described. It directs making an image of the globally ruling seven-headed beast, putting all persons under compulsion to accept its “mark.”—Rev. 13:11-17.

It may be recalled that the two-horned ram of Daniel chapter 7 represented a dual power, Medo-Persia. Of course, that power had long disappeared in the apostle John’s day, and his vision was of things yet future. (Rev. 1:1) Other dual powers have existed since John’s day, but among these the historical association of Britain and the United States is particularly notable and of long duration.

The other notable characteristic of the two-horned beast, its speaking like a dragon, recalls the “mouth speaking grandiose things” on the outstanding horn of the fourth beast of Daniel 7 (vss. 8, 20-26); while its “misleading” earth’s inhabitants compares with the deception practiced by the ‘fierce king’ described at Daniel 8:23-25.—Rev. 13:11, 14.

The scarlet-colored wild beast

At Revelation 17 the apostle records his vision of a scarlet-colored beast with seven heads and ten horns, mounted by the symbolic woman “Babylon the Great.” This beast thus resembles or is in the image of the first beast of Revelation 13 but is distinct due to its scarlet color and the fact that no crowns are seen on its ten horns. Beholding the beast, John is told that five of the seven kings represented by the seven heads had already fallen, while one existed at that time and the seventh was yet to come. The scarlet-colored beast itself is an eighth king but springs from or is a product of the previous seven. The “ten kings” represented by the ten horns exist and exercise authority in association with the scarlet beast for a short time. Warring against the Lamb, Jesus Christ, and those with him, they go down in defeat.—Rev. 17:3-5, 9-14.

Some scholars would apply this vision to pagan Rome and the seven heads to seven emperors of Rome, followed by an eighth emperor. They disagree, however, as to which emperors should be included. The Bible itself does not treat of more than two Roman emperors by name, with a third (Nero) being mentioned under the title of “Caesar.” Other scholars understand the “heads” or “kings” to represent world powers, as in the book of Daniel. It is noteworthy that the Bible does name five world powers in the Hebrew Scriptures, namely, Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece, while the Greek Scriptures name a sixth, Rome, ruling in John’s day. While this would leave the seventh ‘king’ unnamed, the fact that it had not yet appeared when John recorded the Revelation would allow for such anonymity. At any rate, the eighth king, the symbolic scarlet beast, in some way unites in itself these seven heads while at the same time springing from them.

BEATING

The Mosaic law provided for punishment by beating. This was with a stick or a rod. The judges were to decide the number of strokes to be given according to the misdeed committed, considering also the motive, circumstances, and so forth. The position was prescribed: “The judge must also have him laid prostrate and given strokes before him by number to correspond with his wicked deed.” The punishment was limited to forty strokes. (Deut. 25:2, 3) The reason given for such limitation was that more than this would disgrace the person in the eyes of his