Chapter Twenty-Eight/Contending With Two Ferocious Beasts - Continue

 What is this freakish beast? The Bible itself gives the answer. Before the fall of Babylon in 539 B.C.E., the Jewish prophet Daniel saw visions involving ferocious beasts. At Daniel 7:2-8 he describes four beasts coming out of the sea, the first resembled a lion, the second a bear, the third a leopard, and "see there! a fourth beast m fearsome and terrible and unusually strong . . . and it had ten horns." This is remarkably similar to the wild beast seen by John about the year 96 C.E. That beast also has the characteristics of a lion, a bear, and a leopard and it has ten horns. What is the identity of the huge beasts seen by Daniel? He informs us: "These huge beasts . . . are four kings that will stand up from the earth." (Daniel 7:17) Yes, those beasts represent "kings," or political powers of the earth. 

In another vision, Daniel sees a two-horned ram that is struck down by a goat with a great horn. The angel Gabriel explains to him what it means: "The ram . . . stands for the kings of Media and Persia. And the hairy he-goat stands of the king of Greece. " Gabriel goes on to prophesy that the great horn of the he-goat would be broken and be succeeded by four horns.  This actually happened more than 200 years later when Alexander the Great died and his kingdom was split into four kingdoms ruled over by four of his generals. - DANIEL 8:3-8, 20-25. 

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