DANIEL - CHAPTER 3
A Bible Study - Commentary by Jim
Melough
Copyright
2000 James Melough
3:1.
“Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was threescore
cubits, and the breadth thereof six cubits: he set it up in the plain of Dura, in the
province of Babylon.”
While chapter two
describes a great image which was the symbolic revelation of the succession of
Gentile empires that would wield universal dominion from the time of Nebuchadnezzar
until the victorious return of Christ to end the Tribulation and set up His
millennial kingdom, chapter three furnishes the description of another great image,
and even a cursory reading of the details reveals that this second image is pointing
to what will be in the coming Tribulation era. As
is noted in the Bible Knowledge Commentary, “Nebuchadnezzar ... was instituting a
new form of religious worship. (He)
purposed to establish a unified government and also a unified religion. The king constituted himself as both head of state and head of
religion,” as will the beast in the Tribulation.
It is difficult to
believe that the king who had been so awed by Daniel’s declaration of the dream and
its interpretation, could have so quickly lost that awe of God as to make this
present image, and demand that all worship it. But such is the nature of unregenerate man, that except for an
occasional rare instance when confronted
with some dramatic evidence of God’s power, he neither fears Him, nor desires the
knowledge of Him.
There can be little
question that the colossus of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream had been the inspiration for
this golden image set up on the plain of Dura, but our concern is with its spiritual
significance rather than with what may have inspired its construction.
That significance has been recognized by virtually all students of Biblical
typology to be the foreshadowing of conditions in the coming terrible Tribulation
era.
The parallel between
Daniel chapter 3 and Revelation chapter 13 is too obvious to miss.
In Re 13:13-14 the two-horned beast out of the earth commands that an image be
made in honor of the ten-horned beast out of the sea (the Gentile world ruler in the
Tribulation); and, as in the case of Nebuchadnezzar’s image, the penalty for
refusing to worship will be death. Re
13:18 declares that the number of the beast will be “six hundred threescore and
six,” and it is significant that the number six (the Scriptural number of man,
wickedness, and weakness) is prominent in connection with Nebuchadnezzar’s image. It was sixty cubits high, and six cubits broad; and six musical
instruments are mentioned in connection with its worship, the obvious parallel
leading many to see in Nebuchadnezzar the first Gentile ruler, a picture of the
beast, the last such sovereign; and in Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, a type of the
believing remnant in the Tribulation, suffering persecution and martyrdom because of
their refusal to receive the mark of the beast, or to offer him worship.
The question arises
here, Why is Daniel not mentioned in this chapter, nor apparently involved at all?
Various suggestions have been offered, the most popular being that he may have
been out of the country on official business, but another to be considered is that he
is a figure or type of the Lord Jesus Christ Who will not be subjected to testing in
the Tribulation, as He was when on earth two thousand years ago.
Others have taken him to be a type of the Church, which will not go through
the Tribulation, the Rapture occurring before that time of judgment begins.
Against this latter view is the fact that the Church is always spoken of as
being feminine, and is invariably portrayed in Scripture as a woman.
Additional
confirmation of this being a picture of Israel’s Tribulation experience lies in its
being emphasized that it is Jews who are the objects of the persecution; for while
the Tribulation judgments will involve the whole earth, that terrible period is
specifically described as “The time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer 30:7).
Furthermore, a furnace is the instrument of testing, and it is significant
that times of testing for Israel are portrayed as being in a furnace, e.g., “a
smoking furnace” is used in Ge 15:17 in connection with the foretelling of
Israel’s Egyptian bondage; and their deliverance from that bondage is spoken of in
De 4:20 as being “out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt.”
Another parallel
between the experience of these three young Jews, and Tribulation-age Israel is that
they had but recently enjoyed the favor of the king: he had promoted them.
After the rapture of the Church, Israel will be living in the enjoyment of a
treaty with the Gentile world ruler, by which she will be guaranteed peace, and it
will be the violation of that treaty after only three-and-a-half years that will
precipitate the great Tribulation.
The absence of any
mention of persecution of any Jews other than Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, implies
that the others had bowed to the will of the king.
This also points to Israel’s Tribulation experience, for it will be only the
believing remnant that will refuse to receive the mark of the beast, or accord him
worship. The others will bow to his will, receiving his mark, and
worshiping his image.
Dura means habitation,
and the setting up of the image there may be an oblique indication that when the type
is fulfilled by the setting up of the image of the beast in the Tribulation, it will
affect the whole habitable earth. The
words “in the province of Babylon” may be to remind us that the iniquitous
religious systems of which Babylon is the type, will culminate in man’s worship of
man (the beast ruler) in the Tribulation. It
is significant that the Caesars, the rulers of the fourth world empire, were regarded
as gods, and while many of them accepted the title lightly, there were some who
insisted on being worshiped on pain of death. These
latter are prototypes of the Tribulation-age beast ruler.
His worship also will be compelled, with death as the penalty for refusal to
yield that worship.
3:2.
“Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent to gather together the princes, the
governors, and the captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counsellors, the
sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, to come to the dedication of the image
which Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up.
3:3.
“Then the princes, the governors, and captains, the judges, the treasurers,
the counsellors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, were gathered
together unto the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up;
and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up.”
This gathering
together of all the officials of the Babylonian empire points to what will be in the
Tribulation during the reign of the beast. Only spiritually blind eyes fail to see that the ultimate end of
present day ecumenism will be the gathering together of all the denominations of
apostate Christendom into Satan’s great “Babylonian” counterfeit of the true
Church, which will be then, as now, centered in Rome. Following the rapture of the true Church, that great harlot system
will be left on earth for judgment, and will rule briefly as a queen over countless
multitudes of Satan’s blinded dupes (Re 18:7).
For all the outward glory and false piety of that Satanic travesty, however,
God describes her as “the great whore that sitteth upon many waters (i.e.,
peoples),” having upon her forehead a name written, “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT,
THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH” (Re 17:1-5).
By means of the ecumenical movement, whose nefarious work is being aided by
millions of deluded professing Christians, that harlot mother is gathering her harlot
daughters back home to Rome - but in ignorance of the fact that that gathering is by
God’s appointment for their destruction.
It is that coming
unification of apostate Christendom which is being portrayed in the gathering
together of the vast multitude assembled in the plain of Dura to worship
Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image.
3:4.
“Then an herald cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people, nations, and
languages,”
3:5.
“That at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut,
psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and worship the golden
image that Nebuchadnezzar the king hath set up:”
This herald is a clear
type of the false prophet, for as the herald called the multitude to worship
Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image, so will the false prophet command that all worship
the image of the beast when it is set up in the Tribulation (Re 13:12).
The music associated
with the worship of Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image shouldn’t be dismissed as of
little importance, as is indicated in the fourfold repetition of the musical
instruments. It is very important, for
no one will deny the power which music possesses to influence men’s feelings,
sometimes to such an extent that reason becomes so subservient to emotion that the
individual engages in uncontrolled conduct of which he would never be guilty were
reason in control.
A Christendom that has
long since lost the ability to discern the relevance of the OT to the Church, has
failed to read the spiritual meaning of the fact that in the OT there was no musical
ministry for the Levites until Solomon was about to ascend the throne, and the
Tabernacle replaced the Temple. Spirit-taught believers have never had any difficulty in seeing
that the Tabernacle foreshadows the experience of the Church; the Temple, that of
Israel and the nations in the Millennium. As
there was no musical ministry in connection with the Tabernacle, neither is there for
the Church, God’s command to believers of the Church age being expressed in the
words of Paul, “Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord” (Eph 5:19), “...teaching and
admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace
in your hearts to the Lord” (Col 3:16).
It isn’t just
believers who are aware of the evil character of much of today’s music: many of its
critics are the unconverted, yet this same music with its hypnotic power to inflame
the emotions, and dull the mind, is invading the professing church at an alarming
rate. Equally ominous is the rejection
of hymns, not only harmonic in rhyme, but also Scriptural in content, and their
replacement with hymns so-called, which consist of the mesmerizing repetition of one
line, or of the name Jesus, a type of music favored by charismatics, better known for
their emotional excesses than their knowledge of Scripture.
It requires little stretch of the imagination to foresee the influence such
music will exert on the minds of men in the coming Tribulation.
Inasmuch as six
is the number of man, weakness, and wickedness, the mention of six musical
instruments alerts us, not only to the evil of Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image, but
to the coming idolatrous worship which it foreshadows.
3:6.
“And whoso falleth not down and worshippeth shall the same hour be cast into
the midst of a burning fiery furnace.”
Little did the
multitude know that in saving themselves from Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace by bowing to
his great image, they were condemning themselves to a far more terrible fate:
consignment to the eternal torment of the lake of fire.
As noted earlier, the
furnace is used in Scripture as a figure of Israel’s afflictions, e.g., Dt 4:20
“But the Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace,
even out of Egypt,” and long before, when that time of affliction was being
foretold to Abraham, the same figure was used, “And it came to pass, that when the
sun went down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking furnace....” (Ge 15:17).
The present mention of the furnace therefore appears to confirm the view that
this chapter is a foreshadowing of what will befall Israel in the coming Tribulation
era, the similarity of the language used here, to that used in Re 13:11-15 being too
obvious to miss, “And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth ... and he
causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast.... saying
to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast.... and
he had power to give life unto the image ... and cause that as many as would not
worship the image of the beast should be killed.”
3:7.
“Therefore at that time, when all the people heard the sound of the cornet,
flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and all kinds of musick, all the people, the nations,
and the languages, fell down and worshipped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the
king had set up.”
“All” here is a
general term applying to the majority, for there were at least three who did not bow,
namely Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, three faithful men whose loyalty to God
foreshadows that of those Tribulation-age believers who will choose to die rather
than worship the image of the beast.
Occupation with the
prophetic should not, however, blind us to the practical application to ourselves.
We too, are under continual pressure to worship the world’s false gods, of
whom Mammon and Pleasure are the chief today. The
frantic pursuit of money and pleasure by the vast majority of today’s professing
Christians, announces the sad truth that now, as in the days of Daniel, there are
only a few, a very few, who refuse to yield this idolatrous worship.
3:8.
“Wherefore at that time certain Chaldeans came near, and accused the
Jews.”
The word “certain”
in the present context means some, indicating perhaps that not all of them
sought the lives of these three faithful Hebrews.
There were, it would seem, some who remembered that they owed their lives to
Daniel’s having interpreted the king’s dream.
The motive of the
accusers is immaterial, for their enmity is simply an illustration of the animosity
of the old nature against the new, its deadly nature being declared in the fact that
what they sought was nothing less than the deaths of Daniel’s companions.
The warfare between the flesh and the spirit is also to the death.
3:9.
“They spake and said to the king Nebuchadnezzar , O king, live for ever.”
3:10.
“Thou, O king, hast made a decree, that every man that shall hear the sound
of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick,
shall fall down and worship the golden image:”
3:11.
“And whoso falleth not down and worship-peth, that he should be cast into
the midst of a burning fiery furnace.”
There can be detected
here the same subtle type of pressure as was used in a later day by the Jewish rulers
to induce Pilate, against his will, to hand Christ over for crucifixion.
Since Nebuchadnezzar himself had promoted Daniel and his three friends, these
accusers were probably afraid that he might possibly be inclined to make an exception
and remit the sentence. But these shrewd
agents of Satan well knew how to balance the king’s pride against any inclination
he might have had toward leniency. Against
the background of his explicit and publicly proclaimed command, his failure to
execute it would make him look like a fool, just as Pilate’s disposition to release
Christ was made to cast the governor in the role of traitor to Caesar.
Satan often imbues his agents with his own fiendish cunning.
3:12.
“There are certain Jews whom thou hast set over the affairs of the province
of Babylon, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; these men, O king, have not regarded
thee: they serve not thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set
up.”
It is recorded
relative to Pilate that, “He knew that for envy they had delivered him” (Mt
27:18), and the Chaldeans’ reference here to the king’s having promoted the three
accused, leaves no doubt, that as Christ’s
accusers were impelled by jealousy, so these also were constrained by the same
envious spirit.
3:13.
“Then Nebuchadnezzar in his rage and fury commanded to bring Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego. Then they brought
these men before the king.”
One cannot but wonder
whether the king’s rage and fury may not have been as much due to his being
compelled to execute his own decree, as against the three faithful Hebrews for having
violated it. Anger, seemingly directed
against another, is often the mask used to try to hide exasperation felt against
oneself. Be that as it may, the fact
remains that the fury of Nebuchadnezzar is a clear foreshadowing of the murderous
anger to be vented by the coming beast ruler against those of the Tribulation era who
will refuse to bow to his image and worship him.
3:14.
“Nebuchadnezzar spake and said unto them, is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach,
and Abednego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set
up?”
3:15.
“Now if ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet,
flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down
and worship the image which I have made: well: but if ye worship not, ye shall be
cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that god
that shall deliver you out of my hands?”
It would be futile to
debate whether the king’s offer indicates his willingness to save them, or
announces his desire to hear their defiance from their own lips.
The fact remains that in the final analysis it demonstrates the truth that a
genuine faith, and a fearless confession of that faith, are inseparable, as it is
written, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and
shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be
saved. For with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation”
(Ro 10:9-10). Faith and confession of it
cannot be separated!
Nebuchadnezzar’s
blasphemous defiance of God will be repeated by the final world ruler, for it is
written of him that, “He shall speak great words against the most High, and shall
wear out the saints of the most High....” (Dan 7:25).
3:16.
“Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O
Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.”
We cannot but recall
the Lord’s words to His disciples, recorded in Mt 10:19-20, “But when they
deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you
in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which
speaketh in you.” That command applies
no less to us, but sadly it is little heeded today: lack of courage, and a willing
compliance with the world’s ways, ensure its favor, and preclude the possibility of
our being “brought before governors and kings for (Christ’s) sake, for a
testimony against them....” (Mt 10:18). But in the coming Tribulation there will be found again
that same courageous loyalty to Christ as imbued the Apostolic-age believers; and
this response of Daniel’s three friends is but an OT foreshadowing of that
uncompromising spirit which the Lord values so highly.
3:17.
“If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning
fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.”
3:18.
“But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods,
nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.”
Whether their response
was based on God’s promise, “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with
thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through
the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee” (Isa
43:2), the fact remains that it still required phenomenal courage to render such a
reply. That they were prepared to die,
however, is made clear in the words “If it be so.”
They very obviously took account of the fact that it might not be God’s will
to save them from the furnace, but to deliver them out of the king’s hand by taking
them home to heaven through death. Their
attitude foreshadows that of the Lord Himself in Gethsemane when He concluded His
prayer for deliverance, with the words, “Nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be
done” (Lk 22:42).
3:19.
“Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury, and the form of his visage was
changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego: therefore he spake, and commanded
that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be
heated.”
It is very possible
that in Nebuchadnezzar’s change of attitude towards the three young Hebrews (he had
promoted them, and had obviously been favorable to them), God is pointing
symbolically to what will be in the coming Tribulation era.
The first half of that period will be a time in which Israel will enjoy the
favor of the beast emperor, under the terms of the seven year treaty, the signing of
which will mark the beginning of the Tribulation.
But at the mid point of the seven years he will violate the covenant (9:27),
and for the final three and a half years will be merciless in his persecution of
Israel. There can be little doubt that
the experience of these three Hebrews in
the furnace, foreshadows the suffering to be experienced by the believing remnant in
the Great Tribulation.
3:20.
“And he commanded the most mighty men that were in his army to bind
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.”
This is the symbolic
foreshadowing of the truth that in the Tribulation all the power given to the beast
will be directed toward the extermination of all who refuse to receive his mark, and
offer him worship. Their being bound
before being thrown into the furnace may point to the fact that the Tribulation era
equivalent of the binding will be the fact that refusal to receive the mark of the
beast will preclude possibility of employment, thus virtually “binding” the
individual to certain death.
3:21.
“Then these men were bound in their coats, their hosen (a fine upper
garment), and their hats (turbans), and their other garments, and were cast into the
midst of the burning fiery furnace.”
Inasmuch as garments
are the Biblical symbol of righteousness (either the mere self-righteousness of the
moral but unconverted man, or the righteousness of Christ which clothes every
believer), the binding of the three in their garments, may point symbolically to the
truth that faith such as they possessed precludes any possibility of its possessor
being separated from righteousness. Not
even the prospect of death will induce such a man to sin against God.
3:22.
“Therefore because the king’s commandment was urgent, and the furnace
exceeding hot, the flame of the fire slew those men that took up Shadrach, Meshach,
and Abednego.”
Beyond the literal
statement may be perhaps the symbolic announcement of the truth that the Tribulation
will bring death, not only to faithful believers, but to multitudes of unbelievers as
well, for war, famine, and disease will slay believer and unbeliever alike.
We may detect in it also the proof that God will avenge the wrongs done to His
own, though seldom with such promptness, for almost invariably the execution of that
vengeance won’t occur until the great white throne is set up.
God’s reservation of their punishment until then has led many to conclude
that there will be no punishment. Nothing
could be further from the truth. Whether in time or eternity, God will avenge His own, for
what is written concerning Israel applies to all who belong to Him, “For thus saith
the Lord of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled
you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple (pupil) of his eye” (Zec 3:8).
3:23.
“And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell down bound into
the midst of the burning fiery furnace.”
We can’t contemplate
this experience of the three faithful Hebrews without remembering what Peter has
written concerning the trial of our faith, “Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now
for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: that the
trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it
be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing
of Jesus Christ” (I Pe 1:6-7).
3:24.
“Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonied, and rose up in haste, and spake,
and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the
fire? They answered and said unto the
king, True, O king.”
3:25.
“He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the
fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”
God didn’t deliver
them from the fire, but He kept His promise, “When thou passest through the waters,
I will be with thee ... they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee” (Isa
43:2). Their preservation points to what
will be in the Tribulation, for in the midst of those terrible judgments a remnant
will be preserved to stand upon the millennial earth as the new converted Israel
which will inherit the long-promised blessings of Christ’s millennial kingdom.
But the assurance
given them is given to every believer. God
doesn’t promise to keep us from the waters or the fire of testing, but the Lord
Jesus Christ has said, “I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world
(age)” (Mt 28:20). The believer may be
called upon to give up his life, but even then he has the assurance that “to be
absent from the body is to be present with the Lord” (2 Co 5:8), and as he faces
death he can say, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I
will fear no evil: for thou art with me” (Ps 23:4).
Nebuchadnezzar had
cast three men bound into the fire, but in the furnace he saw them loose,
walking, suffering no hurt, and accompanied by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
So is it with everyone who is willing to die rather than disobey God.
Man may bind the body, but he cannot bind the soul of him who belongs to
Christ, and as in the instance we are now considering, testing simply reveals that
the believer is the only man who is truly free: in the furnace they were loose, and
walked, as it is written, “For if the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall
be ye shall be free indeed” (Jn 8:36).
3:26.
“Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the mouth of the burning fiery furnace,
and spake, and said, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, ye servants of the most high
God, come forth, and come hither. Then
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came forth of the midst of the fire.”
3:27.
“And the princes, governors, and captains, and the king’s counsellors,
being gathered together, saw these men, upon whose bodies the fire had no power, nor
was an hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of
fire had passed on them.”
Beyond dispute, God
means us to see in this a picture of what will be at the end of the Tribulation.
Out of that terrible “furnace” will walk, not only the new converted
nation of Israel, but those also who will constitute the believing nations that will
stand upon the earth as Christ’s millennial reign begins.
3:28.
“Then Nebuchadnezzar spake, and said, Blessed be the God of Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego, who hath sent his angel, and delivered his servants that
trusted in him, and have changed the king’s word, and yielded their bodies, that
they might not serve nor worship any god, except their own God.”
Nebuchadnezzar’s
acknowledgement of the supremacy of God, points to the glory that will be brought to
God through the faithfulness of the believers, Jewish and Gentile, in the coming
Tribulation. The practical instruction
of this episode will have been missed, however, if we fail to learn that it is by our
obedience in the midst of earthly testing that He is glorified today.
3:29.
“Therefore I make a decree, That every people, nation, and language, which
speak any thing amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, shall be
cut in pieces, and their houses shall be made a dunghill; because there is no other
God that can deliver after this sort.”
This decree of the
king continues to point to what will be in the Millennium.
During the last thousand years of earth’s history, God will brook no
infraction of His will, as it is written, Christ will “rule all nations with a rod
of iron” (Re 12:5), and grace beyond comprehension gives the further assurance that
obedient believers will also enjoy that same dominion, as it is written, “And he
that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the
nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron” (Re 2:26-27).
3:30.
“Then the king promoted Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in the province of
Babylon.”
This promotion of
Daniel’s three friends is a figure of the promotion of Israel to a place of
supremacy over the nations in the Millennium. Her
exaltation, as noted already, however, is a type of our own, for believers of this
present age are assured of reigning with Christ from the heavenly Jerusalem over that
same millennial earth, as it is written, “For if we suffer (endure) we shall also
reign with Him” (2 Tim 2:12).
[Daniel 4]
