THE HE-GOAT STRIKES DOWN THE RAM

Imagine Daniel's astonishment at what he now sees, the account says:  "I, for my part, kept on considering, and, look! There was a male of the goats coming from the sunset upon the  surface of the whole earth, and it was not touching the earth. And  as regards the he-goat, there was a conspicuous horn between its eyes. And it kept coming all the way to the ram possessing two horns, which I had seen standing before the watercourse, and it came running toward it, and it proceeded to strike down the ram and to break its two horns, and there proved to be no power in the ram to stand before it. So it threw it to the earth and trampled it down, and the ram proved  to have no deliverer out of its hand." (Daniel 8:5-7) What does all of this mean?


Neither Daniel nor we are left to guess what the meaning of this vision. "The hairy he-goat stands for the king of Greece, and for the great horn that was between its eyes, it stands for the first king," the angel Gabriel informs Daniel  (Daniel 8:21) In 336 B.C.E., the last king of the Persian Empire, Darius III (Codommanus), was crowned. In that same year, Alexander became king in Macedonia. History  shows that Alexander the Great proved to be the foretold  first "king of Greece." Starting  "from the sunset," or the west, in the year 334 B.C.E., Alexander moved quickly. As if "not touching the earth," He conquered territories and struck down "the ram." Ending the Medo-Persian dominion of nearly two centuries, Greece thus became the fifth world power of Biblical significance. What a remarkable fulfillment of divine prophecy!

But Alexander's power was to be short lived. The vision further reveals: "And the male of the goats, for its part, put on great airs to the extreme; but as soon as it became mighty, the great horn was broken, an there proceeded to come up  conspicuously four instead of it, toward the four winds of the heavens."  (Daniel 8:8) Explaining the prophecy. Gabriel says:  "That one having been broken, so that there were four that finally stood up instead of it, there are four kingdoms from his nation that will stand up, but not with its power." (Daniel 8:22) As predicted, at the very height of his victorious career, Alexander was "broken," or died, at the age of only 32. And his great empire eventually came to divided among four of his generals.

 Next time: A MYSTERIOUS SMALL HORN 

From the book:  PAY ATTENTION TO DANIEL'S PROPHECY! 1999