Day 266. Amos 7-9

Our reading for today comprises a series of visions which are intended to warn the people of the northern kingdom of Israel of the deadly jeopardy in which they stand and compel repentance before it is too late. Does the prophet really expect repentance? That is a question we cannot answer. To be a prophet of the LORD means to speak and act as if reform were always a possibility; hope is the horizon of all biblical prophecy.
The first vision, the locust plague (7:1-3), envisions an infestation similar to that described in Joel 1-2. If the LORD were to send the locusts his judgment would be just, considering the sins of "Jacob," but the prophet begs for mercy and the LORD relents—this time. The second vision, the rain of cosmic fire (7:4-6), is similar to the story of the destruction of Sodom in Genesis 19:24ff. Again the prophet appeals for mercy on the basis, not of Israel's goodness, but of God's faithfulness to his covenant, and again the LORD relents. The third sign, the vision of "the LORD was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand" (7:7), speaks to the moral condition of the people. A carpenter or a mason would understand the message—Israel is "out of plumb"—unfaithful to the covenant they have made with the LORD, and he will no longer "pass them by"—overlook their glaring transgressions and postpone
his judgment. The verdict is in—the northern kingdom is guilty as charged. Amos foretells that the "sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste." and the Lord will "rise against the house of Jeroboam"—Israel's current king—"with a sword" (7:9) to destroy it..
This strikes too close to the seat of power, and now the prophecies of Amos come to the attention of one Amaziah, the priest of the most important of these "sanctuaries of Israel," the royal cult center of Bethel. Amaziah goes to King Jeroboam with the accusation that the Judean prophet is conspiring against him there in his royal sanctuary, the "temple of the kingdom." The priest then tells Amos to go back home—to Judah—and "earn bread there and prophesy" (7:12)—in other words, he tells him to mind his own business. Amaziah assumes that Amos is a professional prophet attached to the Jerusalem temple—an understandable assumption—but Amos answers with one of the small bits of biographical information found in the book—"I am no prophet, nor am I a prophet's son" (7:14). In Bible times prophets lived and traveled in schools or fraternities for mutual protection, support, and encouragement. Usually these prophetic bands would
have a leader—a sort of father-superior—and were attached to a shrine or cultic center. But Amos protests that he does not belong to one of these of these prophetic fraternities. He is instead a layman—"a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees" (7:14). Although Amos is clearly more than just that, he makes it clear that he was taken "from following the flock" by the LORD, and implies that his authority is based solely upon the direct call he has received from the LORD to prophesy to Israel (7:16). But Amaziah's disrespect for the LORD's messenger will not go unpunished. The priest of Bethel, like the sanctuary in which he serves, is cursed. His wife will be debauched, his children slaughtered, his land divided, and he himself "will die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile from its land" (7:17). His personal tragedy becomes the unlucky sign of Israel's fate.
The next vision, the " basket of summer fruit" (8:1), seems pleasant enough on the surface, but here it is used to represent the end of the kingdom of Israel. The combination of the words "end" (8:2) and "fruit" are a word play on the phrase "eternal winter." That is indeed what the prophet foresees—and eternal winter in which silence, despair, and death shall replace "the songs of the temple" (8:3).
For the prophets of Israel—and this is especially true of Amos--social justice is the value by which all other values are measured. If there is no honesty in business—if weights and measures—"the ephah" (8:5)—are corrupted, and the value of the money—"the shekel"—is manipulated so the poor are defrauded, there is no fidelity to the God of the covenant. Money is the worst of all idols, and greed is its worship. A jealous God cannot overlook the idolatry represented by "sharp" business practice. Cheating the poor is expressly forbidden by the Law of Moses—see Exodus 20:15—and will not be overlooked by the LORD who sees all and forgets nothing (8:7). The land of Israel, like the Nile River, shall rise, "be tossed about and sink again" (8:8) into the chaos of pre-creation. On that day LORD will in fact undo his creation. On the day of the LORD darkness will overwhelm the light, and "the sun will go down at noon." It will
be a time of despair, a day that will be "like the mourning for an only son" (8:10). It will be the death of hope. It will be a day of famine, but in that day the people will be hunger and thirst not for bread and water, "but for hearing the words of the Lord" (8:11). The silence of God will be worse than any privation. People shall "run to and fro, seeking the word of the LORD, but they shall not find it" (8:12). Part of the worship of pagan gods of fertility like "Ashimah of Samaria" (8:14) was a desperate ritual search, and then a celebration of the finding of the god, representing the coming of spring. In this case, however, the LORD will not be found and eternal winter will reign.
Now in the last of Amos' visions we are in the shrine at Bethel. There the prophet sees the LORD "standing beside the altar" (9:1). He commands that the capitals be struck repeatedly until the building is shattered "on the heads of all the people." The scene is reminiscent of the story of Samson pulling down the pagan temple upon the heads of the Philistines—see Judges 16:23ff. The people of Israel will be destroyed—nothing in the universe can save them from God's anger. They flee to the height of Mount Carmel, but he will "search them out and take them" (9:3). They may descend to the bottom of the sea, but he will "command the sea-serpent"—the primeval monster he himself made—"and it will bite them" (9:3). Though they go into captivity in a distant land, he will pursue them there "for hard and not for good" (9:4). His control over the earth is absolute, and everything in it rises and falls at his command, like the
mysterious rising and falling of the Nile in Egypt (9:5). The movements of peoples are directed by the LORD—he brought the Israelites from Egypt, the Philistines from "Camphor"—the Aegean islands—the Arameans from Kir—northeastern Mesopotamia. He moves them like pieces on a game-board.
Yet in the future there is a far distant hope. The LORD will destroy the "sinful kingdom" of Israel—but he will stop short of utterly destroying the house of Jacob (9:8). Instead he will shake it "as one shakes a sieve"; no pebble "shall fall to the ground" (9:9)—only the sand. The complacent sinners of Israel shall "die by the sword"; the righteous remnant shall be preserved.
The last portion of Amos (9:11-15), which affirms the LORD's promise to Judah and the house of David, is like nothing else in the book. It may come not from the prophet Amos at all, but from another visionary writing during Judah's exile in Babylon. Its message is very like that of Isaiah—God is faithful, and he shall bring the remnant of Judah back from captivity and restore the Davidic monarchy. The restoration will be a time of fantastic prosperity when "the one who plows will overtake the one who reaps" (9:13). Farmers will not be able to keep up with the fertility of the earth. The ruined cities will be rebuilt, and the uprooted vineyards will be replanted. The People of the Promise will also be replanted, and "they shall never again be plucked up out of the land that the [LORD has] given them" (9:15)

Day 265. Amos 4-6

Like all of the prophets—and more than most—Amos detests the indolent rich, and the book that bears his name is filled with outrage against their callous indifference to the suffering of the poor. Bashan (4:1) is a region in northern trans-Jordan east of Galilee; it was famous in Bible times for its rich pastures and its sleek herds. The rather uncomplimentary term "cows of Bashan" refers to those upper-class women of Israel who lie around all afternoon, calling out to their husbands for cocktails (4:1). They "oppress the poor" in order to support their luxurious life-style and for that reason, the prophet says, they will be dragged off into slavery using cruel hooks inserted through their lips (4:2). "Bethel" and "Gilgal" mentioned in the text (4:4) are the royal cult centers of the northern kingdom of Israel; these shrines were in competition with legitimate worship of the temple in Jerusalem and were therefore regularly condemned
by the prophets. Here Amos rails sarcastically against the hypocrisy of those who worship piously in these shrines, all the while living corrupt and unjust lives (4:4-5).
Through a series of disasters the LORD has given Israel clear warnings about the terrible judgment to come. But in spite of famine—Amos uses the vivid term "cleanness of teeth" (4:5)--the people do not return to the LORD. There has also been a drought (4:7-8), blighted crops (4:9), pestilence "after the manner of [the plagues] of Egypt (4:10), fire and earthquake such as happened "when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah" (4:11), but none of those plagues has caused Israel to repent and return to the Lord. And because there is no repentance and no attempt to reform her abuses, "maiden Israel" must fall and "no more rise" (5:1). Her armies will be decimated (5:3).
The LORD says to the house of Israel, "Seek me and live"--but they should not seek him in the northern sanctuaries at Bethel, Gilgal, and Beer-sheba, which their kings have established to compete with the Jerusalem temple. He will not hear the prayers or heed the sacrifices offered in those shrines, which are doomed to "come to nothing" (5:4-5). The anger of the LORD against Israel is like a consuming fire because the "house of Joseph"—another name of the northern kingdom—has turned "justice into wormwood"—a bushy herb synonymous in the Bible with bitterness and woe. Justice should be sweet, but when it is perverted by the selfishness and greed of the rich and powerful it turns sour and harsh. Those who pervert justice think that God has not see them, but the one who made the constellations of Pleiades and Orion, knows what is going on in the human world, and he "makes destruction flash out against the strong" (5:9).
Humankind cannot stand very much truth, and for that reason the powerful hate the prophet—"the one who reproves in the gate" (5:10)—and place no value upon his words. All they care about is wealth and power. But their "houses of hewn stone" and their "pleasant vineyards" will give them no security; without justice for the poor the nation is doomed. The prophet is constrained to speak out against oppression, but there is hardly any point any point in doing so—"the prudent will keep silent in such a time," Amos says, "for it is an evil time" (5:13).
His words may do no good, but Amos recognizes that a righteous person must always speak and act as if it were not too late. So he continues to call upon Israel to demonstrate the personal integrity and civic virtue which God demands of his people. "Hate evil and love good, and establish justice in the gate" (5:15), the prophet exhorts the people—this alone will restore their relationship to the Lord and cause him to turn and "be gracious to the remnant of Joseph" (5:15). Otherwise, there will be nothing left but mourning and lamentation in the land, for the LORD "will pass through the midst" of them, on his way out of town (5:17).
Apparently some pious souls in Israel were longing for "the day of the LORD," probably in the vain hope that "the day" would bring victory to Israel over its enemies. But the prophet ridicules their expectations and tells them frankly that the day of the LORD will be "darkness, not light" (5:15). The breaking of God into history will be a moment of crisis and danger--an occasion for gloom and terror rather than rejoicing. The day of the LORD will be a day of judgment for the unjust and idolatrous. They may offer their sacrifices and offerings for their sins, but God "will not look upon" them (5:22). They may offer psalms of praise, but he does not want to hear "the noise of [their] songs" (5:23), not as long as the poor and helpless are being oppressed. Empty rituals do not please God, and liturgies do not establish a relationship to him. Instead, as the prophet proclaims in one of the most beautiful verses in all of
scripture—"Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream" (5:24).
For Israel "the day of the LORD" will be a day of defeat and exile, a day when the people will pick up the images their false gods, which they have made for themselves, and go off into exile "beyond Damascus"—which is indeed is exactly what they would do about forty years after Amos predicted it. Their sense of security is based upon a lie. "Alas," cried the prophet, for those who take it easy in Jerusalem and for those who "feel secure on Mount Samaria"—he condemns both kingdoms for their self-assurance and complacency (6:1). And he invites them to look at the kingdoms round-about that have already been reduced to oblivion and ask themselves—Are we better than they were? By postponing the "the evil day" into the distant future, they only succeed in bringing it closer (6:3).
Now Amos returns to one of his favorite themes—the callousness of the rich. He is outraged by the opulence of the Israelite nouveau riches—"who lie on beds of ivory" (6:4). But it is not their bad taste he deplores, but their heartless exploitation of the poor. "They will be the first to go into exile," he foretells. After the cocktails and the laughter, there will be only silence.
Amos dramatizes the terrors to come with overwhelming vividness. Plague will follow military defeat. He imagines a single survivor left in a house filled with the dead. A relative comes to burn the corpses in order to stop the plague and calls out—"Is anyone else with you?" And the lone survivor replies, "No." Then the relative outside begs the one left within not to mention the "name of the LORD" lest his anger break out again and something worse happen (6:9-10). Houses, great and small alike, shall be destroyed because the people who lived in them "have turned justice into wormwood" (6:12). The little kingdom of Israel glories in its modest conquests—the neighboring cities of Lo-debar and Karnaim—and puffs itself up with inflated self-importance. But even now, as the prophet speaks, God is preparing a mighty enemy—Assyria—who will tyrannize Israel from its northern—Lebohamath—to its southern border—Wadi Arabah—and
swallow up its self-confidence in an overwhelming defeat.

Day 264. Amos 1-3

Amos is one of the earliest of Israel's prophets—he was active in the eighth century before Christ—yet his oracles have every right to be called "classic." All the great prophetic themes are present in them, and they are written with great elegance and clarity in what I am told is some of the best Hebrew in the Bible. Yet the author of this highly literate little book does not make any pretensions to learning. We are told that Amos was "among the shepherds of Tekoa" (1:1) before, during, and probably after his short prophetic career at Bethel. Tekoa was a village in the kingdom of Judah, south of Jerusalem; Bethel was the royal sanctuary of the northern kingdom of Israel. Amos journeyed there to denounce the same corrupt religious practices as First Isaiah, who was his contemporary. His prophecies were given during the reign of King Uzziah of Judah (783-742 B.C.) and King Jeroboam II of Israel (786-746 B.C.). The "earthquake" mentioned
in 1:1 took place in 760 B.C., and one of its aftershocks may have occasioned the vision so vividly described Isaiah in 6:1-8.
The division between Judah and Israel was a strictly artificial, political one. The two nations were essentially identical in their ethnic and religious background. So it is not so strange that Amos, a southerner, should rage against the northern kingdom for turning its back of the "right" worship of the temple and embracing a syncretistic mixture of Yahweh worship with paganism. The LORD is the God of both Israel and Judah, and he is "jealous" for his people. He "roars" from Zion, the place of the temple and the throne of the Davidic monarchy, against Israel's neighbors who have one way or another harmed his people. Amos first lashes out against Aram and its capital of Damascus (1:3) for its inhuman treatment of the Israelite town of Gilead. Its transgressions cannot to be forgiven and must be punished. The agent of that punishment, though never named, is the expanding empire of Assyria. The Assyrians will carry off "the people of Aram
. . . into Kir," in eastern Mesopotamia (1:5), and they will vanish.
Then Amos turns to Israel's ancient enemies the Philistines; they have also committed unforgiveable sins in taking "entire communities" of Israelites captive and selling them as slaves to Edom (1:6). The major Philistine city-states—Gaza, Ashdod, Askelon, and Ekron-- will be besieged and taken by Assyria, and "the remnant of the Philistines shall perish" (1:8).
Next the Phoenician city-state of Tyre is condemned, and for much the same reason—it has sold whole Israelite communities as slaves to work the copper mines of Edom and has ignored its covenant obligations going back to the time of David and Solomon (1:9). (This covenant is mentioned in I Kings 7:14). And it will come as no surprise that Edom is likewise condemned in the strongest possible terms. Descendents of Jacob's twin brother Esau (see Genesis 36:1-14), Edom "pursued his brother [Israel] with the sword and cast off all pity" (1:11), and still keeps "his wrath forever." So its strongholds will be taken and destroyed.
The Ammonites were also distant cousins of Israel (see Genesis 19), but they committed atrocities against Israelite civilians while seeking to enlarge their territory (1:13). For this reason the Assyrians will also break upon them "with a storm [on] the day of the whirlwind" (1:14). Their king and his officials will trudge away into exile with all the rest of Israel's enemies (1:15). The Moabites were also kin of Israel, and also estranged from the time of the conquest of the Promised Land. Their crimes climax in their disrespect for the dead—they "burned to lime the bones of the king of Edom" (2:1), we are told. Why this was done we are not told, but the LORD promises "to set a fire on Moab." It will "die amid uproar" (2:2), and its king and his officials will be butchered by the Assyrian invader.
After disposing of unclean and "unchosen" nations, the prophet turns this attention to Israel, speaking out "against the whole family that [the LORD] brought up out of the land of Egypt" (3:1). Scholars think that the condemnation of Judah (2:4-5) comes not from the Amos but from a writer of a much later period after Jerusalem had been destroyed by the Babylonians in 587 B.C. But the condemnation of Israel (2:6ff) is vintage Amos, filled with moral outrage at a people who "sell the righteous" poor, who cannot pay their debts, into slavery. Destitute people in Samaria have as little value as a pair of shoes (2:6). Incest and sexual license are commonplace, and "father and son go in to the same girl" in direct opposition to the Law of Moses (2:7). Garments taken as security on a loan are not returned, and officials drink wine in the "house of their God"—the name "Bethel" means "house of God"—using money they have collected
as fines (2:8).
Corruption is everywhere. The people of Israel have turned out to be no better than the Amorites (2:9), that giant race whom God destroyed to make room for them. God brought them "out of the land of Egypt" and "raised up some of [their] children to be prophets," but now they are worse than their pagan neighbors. Israel has repressed prophecy and forced "the nazirites"--God's holy order—to break their vows and drink wine (2:12). And now they are no different from their enemies roundabout; no human strength or might will save them from the wrath to come. Like those wicked nations whom God has condemned for their sins, Israel will fall before the might of Assyria and nothing they do will "save their lives . . . in that day" (2:15-16). Neither will their chosen-ness save them; the fact of their being set apart only makes the suffering conspicuous, and prophets must announce it. Amos offers a series of examples of causes and effects to
explain why when God does something, he must reveal "his secret to his servants the prophets" (3:7). Now that "the LORD God has spoken", Amos his prophet has no choice but to prophesy.
The people of neighboring countries and erstwhile enemies of Israel are summoned to come to "Mount Samaria," the capital of the northern kingdom, to observe the profound moral chaos and "oppressions" there. In spite of having the Law of Moses to guide them, "they do not know how to do right" (3:10). Therefore, again according to the principle of cause and effect, "the adversary"—Assyria—"shall surround the land, and strip [its people of their] defense, and [their] strongholds shall be plundered" (3:11). Only a slight few shall be rescued from the onslaught. It will be like when a lion attacks a sheep, and the shepherd rescues "two legs, or a piece of an ear" so only a remnant of Israel shall be rescued "with the corner of a couch and part of a bed" (3:12). Only fragments shall be left.
As for the royal sanctuary of Israel and its corrupted worship, the LORD with destroy the "altars of Bethel"--"the horns of the altar shall be cut off and fall to the ground" (3:14). And for the houses of the rich, who have both summer and winter residences, all their "houses of ivory shall perish," all because of their idolatry and their callous treatment of the poor. Nothing will remain but "the corner of a couch and part of a bed."

Day 263. Joel 1-3

Most of the prophets—especially Hosea and Amos—are highly critical of the Jewish religious establishment and view it from the outside. Like Ezekiel, Joel does not. He is deeply involved in and concerned for the worship life of the community. This has led scholars to surmise that Joel—whose name means "Yahweh is my God"—was a temple-prophet--a member of the priestly establishment. He speaks his oracles after the rebuilding of the Jerusalem temple but before Alexander the Great's destruction of the great Phoenician city-state of Tyre. So the book is a comparatively late one, written shortly before 348 B.C.
In a time of growing moral laxity, drunkenness (1:5), and religious indifference, the prophet Joel calls the people to repent and return to the LORD. Most of the other prophets deliver their oracles against the backdrop of political calamity—war or the threat of invasion. The crisis behind the Book of Joel is an ecological disaster, not a political one. Locust invasions were by no means uncommon in the ancient Near East; remember that the eighth of the plagues which accompany the exodus from Egypt was a blight of locusts—see Exodus 10:1-20. In our text it is sometimes difficult to tell whether the prophet is talking about an infestation of insects or the advance of an invading army. Locust infestations have a military quality to them. The prophet identifies four kinds of locusts (1:4), which are like soldiers in being differently armed for differing purposes. What one does not devour and destroy, another will until nothing is left.
The prophet sees the invasion of the locust army as a "sign" of the LORD's anger over the moral state of decay of his people. Joel's description is overwhelming in its vividness. The locusts descend upon the verdant land like an army, "powerful and innumerable," destroying everything before it. Everyone and everything—all creation mourns. The priests mourn because the regular offerings in the temple, the grain and the drink offerings, are cut off from the house of the LORD" (1:9) because of the locusts. The whole religious life of the nation is disrupted. Farmers mourn and are "dismayed" (1:11) at the loss of their livelihood. Plants and trees dry up, and "joy withers away among the people" (1:12).
In the face of ecological disaster, all the classes of society are summoned to "put on sackcloth and lament" (1:13). Joel the temple-prophet calls upon the "ministers of the altar" to lead this lament, gathering "the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of the LORD" (1:14) for special services of penitence and fasting. The "day of the Lord is near" (1:13). We have already read of the "day of the LORD" in the writings of Isaiah (13:6), Jeremiah (46:10), and Ezekiel (30:3), in which it is seen as the coming time when the LORD will intervene directly in history. Like other prophets before him, Joel describes it as a day of "darkness and gloom" (2:2).
As the day approaches, all of creation is in crisis and danger. There is drought and wildfires break out. "The seed shrivels" (1:17); "the animals groan"; "cattle wander about"; "sheep are dazed" (1:18); "even the wild animals cry. . . because the watercourses are dried up" (1:20). The alarm is sounded—the "day of the LORD is coming" (2:1). The locust-horde blots out the sun as if creation were being undone. Before them the "land is like the Garden of Eden, but after them a desolate wilderness and nothing escapes them" (2:3).
The insects "have the appearance of horses" (2:4). They swarm everywhere—"they leap on the tops of the mountains." The sound of their wings "is like the crackling of a flame of fire," devouring everything before it. They move forward with a single will, "like a powerful army" (2:5) under the command of an unseen general. They are like besiegers, overwhelming and looting—"they leap upon the city, they run upon the walls; they climb up into the houses, they enter through the windows like a thief" (2:9). And the unseen commander of this invincible army is the LORD himself. "How vast is his host!" the prophet marvels. "Numberless are those who obey his command" (2:11).
The coming of this inhuman army heralds the coming of the day of the LORD. "Who can endure it?" he asks. And then gives an answer—Those who whole-heartedly return to the LORD, who "rend [their] hearts and not [their] clothing" (2:12) will endure. Their hope is based not upon their own strength or goodness, but upon the character of God himself—"he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding a steadfast love, and relents from punishing" (2:13). But God is inherently mysterious and uncontrollable. "Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him . . .?" (2:14), the prophet wonders.
Who knows if he will have mercy? There is only one way to find out-- "sanctify a fast" (2:13). No one is to be excluded, not the very old or the "infant at the breast" (2:16). The priests again take a leading role as intermediaries in this liturgy of repentance, begging the LORD to spare his people and begging him not to bring shame upon his people and upon himself as their God. And the LORD responds to the pleas of the priests and people—he becomes "jealous for his land and [has] pity on his people" (2:18), vindicating them "among the nations," and himself in the process (2:19). He acts to "remove the northern army far from" them, driving the insect horde into the sea.
Joel proclaims the glad news to the soil and to the wild animals, and "the children of Zion," are bid to rejoice because God has begun to heal his creation by giving them "the early rain of [their] vindication" (2:23-24). The prophet hails the return of prosperity to the land. The LORD has pledged that he will "repay [his people] for the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, [the LORD's] great army which [he has] sent against [them]" (2:23). And twice—for emphasis—he reports the LORD's pledge that his "people will never [again] be put to shame" (2:26, 27).
As we noted earlier, the "day of the LORD" is often pictured as a day of darkness and gloom, but Joel sees its positive outcome. "Afterward" he says, the LORD "will pour his spirit on all flesh" (2:28). In the Old Testament the spirit of the LORD is something that is poured out upon charismatic judges and military commanders—Gideon and Samson—and upon prophets. It is poured out upon kings as well, ritually in the rite of anointing with oil. But the prophecy of Joel looks forward to a day when everyone within the covenant community, even slaves—both male and female--will prophesy. (The early church saw this prophecy fulfilled in the events of Pentecost, and Peter uses this passage from Joel as the text for the sermon he preaches that day-- see Acts 2:1-21.) Joel breaks into apocalyptic language in describing the signs and "portents" that will surround the "great and terrible day of the LORD," but he assures his hearers even in
the midst of tribulation and confusion in the natural world, "everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved" (2:30-32)
Before the end there will be a day of judgment. The LORD who has scattered Israel in his great Diaspora—the word in Greek means "scattering"—will gather them into the "the Valley of Jehoshaphat." No such location can be identified-- the name Jehoshaphat means "the LORD has judged"-- the valley is simply the place where LORD will call his people to account (3:2) for their sins. Principally they are judged for selling Jewish youth into slavery, something strictly forbidden by the Law of Moses. This condemnation is extended to Tyre and Sidon because they had sold "the people of Judah to the Greeks." Because of the greed and cruelty their own children will be sold to the far-off Sabeans—residents of southern Arabia (3:8). (This was a time when the slave trade, though recognized as a great evil, was taken for granted as a fact of economic life.)
The day of judgment will take the form of a last great battle, the prophet says. The armies of "all the neighboring nations"—"multitudes, multitudes"—will be gathered in the valley of decision" (3:14). The armies of Israel will also gather in the "valley of Jehoshaphat," and in preparation for combat, they are bidden to "beat [their] plowshares into swords and [their] pruning hooks into spears." This is the reverse of the command of Isaiah in 2:4, but Joel sees the whole nation mobilized in a holy cause. On that day "let the weakling say, 'I am a warrior'" (3:10)--an injunction that has certainly been obeyed in the modern state of Israel.
Joel ends his prophecy with the triumph of Israel over its neighbors. "Jerusalem shall be holy"—purified of all foreign contamination—"and strangers shall never again pass through it" (3:17). Israel's enemies—Edom and Egypt—shall be desolated, but for the People of the Promise "in that day the Mountains shall drip sweet wine, and the hills shall flow with milk" (3:18). The long tribulation will be finally over, and Israel shall live in peace and security. No one will dare abuse or interfere with them.
Joel's particularistic, nationalistic vision of Israel's future is quite different from Isaiah's revelation of the universal gathering of the nations to Mount Zion and to the temple. But Joel's horizon is more limited than Isaiah's. He is a "minor" prophet in this sense—he is more concerned with the preservation of Israel's identity and worship than with its ultimate mission to the world.

Day 262. Hosea 10-14

It is part of the tragedy of the prophetic calling to know more about the probable future than those around you do—to see judgment looming and still hope against hope that there will be repentance and reconciliation. That is the position of the prophet Hosea, speaking primarily to the northern kingdom of Israel in the last years of its existence.
Using an image familiar to the Bible, Israel is described as a "luxuriant vine" that God has planted in his vineyard. But Israel builds altars to false deities and raises pillars in the vineyard—these pillars were phallic symbols of the fertility gods worshipped by neighboring peoples that so easily seduced a people lacking spiritual guidance. But the LORD promises that he "will break down their altars and destroy their pillars" (10:2). Hosea presents a picture of a corrupt society in disorder. The ordinary people have no respect for God or king. They perjure themselves without fear of punishment and make covenants they do not intend to keep—"so litigation springs up [everywhere] like poisonous weeds" (10:4). (This situation resembles our own, beloved.)
The inhabitants of Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom, "tremble for the calf of Beth-aven"--this is a statute of the bull calf dedicated to the god Baal and erected under royal patronage. Hosea predicts that the bull, made of some precious metal, will be "carried to Assyria as tribute to the great king," and Israel "shall be ashamed of his idol" (10:6). The pagan "high places" and cult sites shall be abandoned and grow up to "thorn and thistle" (10:8)—but not soon enough to fend off disaster.
Hosea tells a little parable that begins--"Ephraim was a trained heifer." The heifer is a pet, trained to trample grain on the threshing floor, and for that reason she is unused to yoke and plow. But now that situation is about to change. Israel will have to "break the ground," and Judah will have to pull the plow.
If the two kingdoms would sow for themselves righteousness the prophet promises that that they will "reap steadfast love" (10:12) from the LORD. In the midst of so much condemnation, Hosea is a word of hope. But before there can be forgiveness, the people must first "break up [their] fallow ground"—soften their hearts and "seek the LORD" so that he "may come and rain righteousness upon you." But so far they have showed no sign of doing this; instead, they have "plowed wickedness . . . , reaped injustice . . . , and eaten the fruit of lies" (10:13). They have trusted in their own military strength and not the help of LORD. And because of Israel's "great wickedness" (10:15), they face the prospect of invasion, terrible defeat, and atrocities committed against helpless civilians.
It did not need to end this way. In chapter 11 God fondly remembers the childhood of Israel when he trusted and obeyed the voice of his Father. (11:1 is quoted in Matthew 4:14-15 as a prophecy of the flight of the Holy Family into Egypt and their return.) But obedient childhood becomes rebellious adolescence—"the more I called him the more [Israel] went from me" sacrificing to the Baals and offering incense to idols. God was there to teach "Ephraim to walk," tenderly taking him "up in my arms" (11:30), but now the people do not recognize his providence and loving care. Therefore, they shall "return to the land of Egypt" where they were slaves and from whence the LORD brought them; "Assyria shall be their king" because they have rejected God as their king (11:5).
Nevertheless God cannot bring himself to repudiate them forever; he cannot maintain his "fierce anger" (11:9) against his children, no matter how wayward. He will frighten them back to their senses. The LORD will roar "like a lion" and "his children shall come [back] trembling" like "little birds from Egypt"; like "doves from Assyria" they will come again to the LORD, and he "will return them to their homes" (11:11).
Ultimately, however, Hosea despairs of Ephraim, the northern kingdom, filled as it is with lies and deceit. But there is still hope that Judah, the southern kingdom, will remain faithful to the covenant. But Israel chases after false security, trying to make treaties with Assyria and carrying oil to Egypt in an attempt to buy protection (12:1) rather than trust the LORD.
It has always been so. Israel has been wayward from his birth. The LORD remembers how Jacob—also called Israel—struggled with his brother Esau in the womb—see Genesis 25:19ff-- and how he wrestled with God by the brook of Jabok—see Genesis 32:22 ff. Filled with guile, Israel was always trying to get the better of God and man, using "false balances" to oppress the poor and then hiding behind a mask of righteousness, saying—"no offense has been found in me that would be sin" (12:8). There has never been an end to Israel's rebelliousness and waywardness. Through history God has sent prophets to Israel to warn the people of the danger in which they stood, and now through the prophets the LORD "will bring destruction" upon them (12:11). By a prophet—Moses—Israel was brought out of Egypt, and by Moses he "was guarded" (12:13). But because Israel has not heeded the words of the prophets, the LORD is determined to "bring his
crimes down on him and pay him back for his insults" (12:14).
Chief among those insults is his persistent idolatry. Ephraim was chief of the ten tribes of Israel, and he led them all by his example into the worship of Baal. It is all such foolishness. The people make little silver images of the bull calf of Baal and worship them with sacrifices. They kiss them for luck (13:2)—God is horrified at such patent stupidity—Imagine! "People are kissing calves!" These inanimate objects, "the work of artisans" are worse than useless; they amount to less than nothing compared with the power of the LORD, who brought them out of the land of Egypt and fed them in the wilderness and who now says to them—"Besides me there is no savior" (13:4). He was their savior, but now rejection has transformed the LORD into a savage and dangerous beast, like a lion, a leopard, a "bear robbed of her cubs"; "as a wild animal [he] will mangle them" (13:8) and nothing will be able will not "redeem them from Death"
(13:14). The east wind—the armies of Assyria—"a blast from the LORD"-- will "dry up his fountain" and "strip his treasury of every precious thing." Because Israel "has rebelled against her God," the people of Samaria "shall fall by the sword" (13:15-16).
And it would not have had to be so! Nothing is fated. God is capable of mercy. In his last words to the people, the prophet begs them to return to the LORD. The power of Assyria cannot save them, nor can the horses of Egypt (14:3). But God will have compassion upon the repentant, the one in whom "the orphan finds mercy" (14:3) will have pity on his own children. If they will only return to him, the people will again flourish like a luxuriant vine. But God can never have anything to do with idols. He will not take second place to a man-made object. He is "like an evergreen cypress"—changeless, and the faithfulness of his people comes from him.
Those who are wise will "understand these things" (14:9) the prophet has spoken. The ways of the LORD "are right," and those who are "upright walk in them." But because they have no understanding—no trust in the LORD who alone gives the insight that leads to life--"transgressors"—both men and nations—"stumble" and fall.

Day 261 Hosea 5-9

Hosea is the first of what we call the "minor prophets." It is not easy to say what distinguishes them from the "major prophets"—Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel—beyond the length of their writings. What marks an Old Testament prophet—major or minor-- is an unquestioning belief that God is speaking through him to a particular situation in a moment in the history of Israel. For the major prophets, that historical moment is longer and their message of judgment and hope more complex. For the minor prophets the situation is more discrete and more limited. But the same passion for truth and righteousness is shared by all, together with a sense of outrage at the betrayal of God's covenant. And all of them reserve their most violent language for the elites of Israelite society—kings, officials, and priests.
This is certainly true of Hosea. He fumes at the "house of the king," comparing the king and his court to hunters who have snared, spread nets, and dug deep pits to capture the bodies and souls of ordinary people, trapping them like prey. The princes have become dishonest and morally crooked—"like those who remove a landmark" (5:10). The total corruption of Israelite society has filtered down from them. They are without conscience or shame. Their vile deeds have totally estranged them from the Lord and "will not permit them to return to their God" (5:4). "They do not know the LORD"—by which he means they have no trust in him; and as a result God "has withdrawn from them" (5:6). They have "played the whore, pursuing other gods," and "borne illegitimate children" to their lovers (5:7), the offspring of their cultic orgies. Now the new moon festival, where they celebrated their pagan rites by having intercourse in the fields
to insure their fertility, will be not a sacred holiday, but a day of destruction for them "along with their fields."
The northern kingdom of Israel is by far the more highly schooled in depravity—the southern kingdom of Judah is only a willing student, according to Hosea. But both Israel--sometimes called Ephraim in our text--and Judah are corrupted and diseased. However, when they realize that they are sick and wounded, they apply "to the great king"—the ruler of Assyria—for help and security, not to the LORD. They make a mortal man their god and fear him. The king of Assyria is helpless to cure their infirmity (5:13)—he will only make it worse. It is the LORD who represents the greatest danger to their existence. He will be "like a lion to Ephraim, and like a young lion to the house of Judah" the prophet says. He "will tear and go away"; he will "carry off, and no one shall rescue" (5:14) from his grasp. He will go away and not return until the peoples of both kingdoms "acknowledge their guilt and seek [his] face" (5:15).
Chapter 6 begins with a penitential psalm in which the voice of the prophet—speaking for the faithful--expresses a desire to "return to the LORD" for healing after a period of punishment. The words of verse two--"on the third day he will raise us up"--was interpreted by early Christians to refer to the resurrection of Jesus, but originally it expressed confidence that if the people repent God will soon restore what he "has torn." Hosea calls then to turn from idolatry and to "know the LORD"—respond to God with the trust and confidence a wife has to a loving husband. "Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD," he exhorts the people. He alone is the source of security, healing, and hope. "His appearance is like the dawn" after a long dark night, the prophet says, and like "spring rains" after the drought of winter (6:3).
But it is only through obedience that we draw near him. In Old Testament Judaism sacrifice was considered central, necessary to the worship of the LORD, expressing the devotion and dependence of the creature upon the Creator. The prophets did not repudiate sacrifice entirely, but they did place it firmly in an inferior position. Like Jesus of Nazareth, who in so many ways stood within their tradition, they consistently say that it is an attitude of reverence and a life marked by concrete acts of mercy and justice that pleases him, not sacrifices. He seeks constancy in us—"your love is like a morning cloud," he complains of Israel. He know us as we really are; "his judgment goes forth as the light" (6:5)--it penetrates everywhere and everyone. He sees the attitude behind the gift, and he says to his people—"I desire love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings" (6:6).
And burnt offerings cannot disguise the smell of the monstrous crimes—the "whoredom"-- of which Israel is guilty—"Israel is defiled" (6:10), the prophet says. But Judah's sins will not be ignored—"For you also, O Judah, a harvest is appointed" (6:11). The weight of the judgment falls upon Israel and its rulers, who applaud the sins of their people--"by their wickedness they make the king glad, and the officials by their treachery" (7:3). Their lusts, drunken revelry, and violent anger are compared to "a heated oven" (7:4)—"all night their anger smolders; in the morning it blazes like a flaming fire" (7:6). Ephraim—the northern kingdom—is a "cake not turned"—burned on one side, raw on the other. Prematurely old, its national strength is sapped by it alliances with foreigners (7:9), yet Israel does "not return to the LORD their God, or seek him, for all this" (7:10).
These shifting alliances with foreigners--Egypt and Assyria during Hosea's time-- reveal the basic lack of trust in God in both kingdoms—"Destruction to them, for they have rebelled against me" (7:13), he says. Entanglements are a sign of death--the vulture that circles over "the house of the LORD" is Assyria (8:1). It has been summoned by the stench of death; the nation is dying because it has broken covenant with God. Its people "make kings"—but not with God's guidance—they make idols of silver and gold "for their own destruction" (8:4) and worship Baal in the form of a golden bull. (The bull-calf was a symbol of fertility throughout the ancient world and often the representation of the Semitic storm god Baal. Apparently, under royal patronage, a Baal-calf has been erected in Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom, arousing divine jealousy and fury.) "It is from Israel, an artisan made it; it is not God," the LORD
says through his prophet. And because it is not God and the LORD is, "the calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces" (8:6).
And the nation will be broken and scattered with it. "For they sow the wind"—the nothingness of idol worship--and they shall reap the whirlwind" (6:7)—a terrible and now gathering storm. The people of Israel, once a holy nation, are no different from everyone else—"now they are among the nations as a useless vessel" (8:8)—begging to be smashed. Their alliances with Assyria and other nations will prove useless and hopelessly burdensome—"they shall soon writhe under the burden of kings and princes" (8:10). The altars they have constructed to "expiate sin" have become "altars for sinning" (8:11). They have proved unworthy of his forgiveness. Now the great acts God did in the exodus are about to be undone—Israel "shall return to Egypt" (8:13). Because they have "played the whore" they will lose the land that God has given and go into exile—"they shall not remain in the land of the LORD; but Ephraim shall return
to Egypt, and in Assyria they shall eat unclean food" (9:3). As aliens, they shall not only be deprived of the Promised Land, with it they shall be robbed of the opportunity of keeping God's law. They shall make offerings to the LORD, "but their sacrifices shall not please him" (9:4). Their "appointed festivals" shall be neglected and forgotten (9:5). Having lost the laws and traditions of their people, they will lose their identity and become no different from anyone else. "Egypt shall gather them, Memphis shall bury them" (9:6).
But when the prophets try to warn them of the terrible peril in which they stand they ridicule God's messengers—"The prophet is a fool, the man of the spirit is mad!" (9:7). When the prophet is "a sentinel" for Israel, he is despised and "a fowler's snare is on all his ways" (9:8). But Israel was different once: they were not always hard and cold. They were like "grapes in the wilderness" and "like the first fruit on the fig tree" when God first saw and loved their ancestors—they were innocent as a tender plant (9:10). "But they came to Baal-peor"—the story is found in Numbers 25:1-5—"and consecrated themselves to a thing of shame"—the god Baal in bull form—"and became like the thing they loved" (9:10). (People always come to resemble the thing they love most.) And now the people of Israel shall be left barren and sterile—"no birth, no pregnancy, no conception" (9:11). They will be bereaved "until
no one is left" (9:12). They prayed to their idols for fertility, and what will they receive?—"a miscarrying womb and dry breasts" (9:14).
From the time when they entered the Land of Promise at Gilgal, Israel has done nothing but grieve the Lord, and now he is determined that he "will love them no more"; the people are strayed into idolatry, and "all their officials are rebels" (9:15). The whole country is "stricken with barrenness"; now even if they do succeed in giving birth, the LORD threatens to "kill their cherished offspring" (9:16). And they are destined to lose the land and "become wanderers among the nations" (9:17).

Day 260. Hosea 1-4

In out reading for today we move far back into the history of the chosen people to the period before the fall of the northern kingdom of the Israel and the career of the prophet Hosea, who was active between 769-697 B.C. His oracles span the reigns of five kings of Israel and Judah (1:1) and give us a unique perspective on the relationship between God and his people based upon metaphors drawn from marriage and sexual love.
In it one of the misperceptions cherished by those who have never made a business of actually reading the Bible that the Christian scriptures are prim and straitlaced, when in fact quite the opposite is true. The Bible is in fact an embarrassment to the prudish of every age, dealing as it does with shocking honesty with every very aspect of human life, not the least the sexual. And for proof of that we need go no further than the writings of Hosea.
Who was Hosea? We get little information about his life before he is called to prophetic ministry with an outrageous command--"take a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom" (1:2). This goes against all the social norms of society in which virginity before marriage and faithfulness in marriage were both expected and demanded of women—on pain of disgrace or even death. The prophet is told essentially to marry a harlot and have children with her. What a family in the parsonage! Hosea might not have been much of a bargain either, of course, but that's not the point.
Prophets were often commanded to perform symbolic acts—visual parables—to illustrate the message that God is speaking to his people—we have seen this before. Hosea's dysfunctional family life is his message. The chosen people—who are God's spouse—have been profoundly unfaithful to their husband. They have "whored" after the Canaanite fertility gods and taken part in the orgies that accompanied their worship. And Hosea is commanded to marry Gomer, whose name means "End" and who symbolizes the people of Israel, and when she bears him a son, the LORD commands him to name the child "Jezreel" (1:4). This name has a complex double meaning. It means "God sows [abundantly]". It is also the name of a plain where a great battle had been fought. A rebellious general named Jehu fought and killed both King Joram of Israel and King Ahaziah of the house of David on the plain of Jezreel. Jehu's bloody coup founded the present dynasty
in Samaria, which was notorious for its wickedness. Now through his prophet Hosea God promises that he will "put an end of to the kingdom of the house of Israel" (1:4). When a second child is born to Hosea and Gomer, a girl, she is named "Lo-ruhamah," which means "not pitied"—because God will "no longer have pity on the house of Israel or forgive them" (1:6). The LORD has not yet given up on the southern kingdom of Judah—Hosea prophesied during the supremacy of several of Judah's best rulers—and the LORD promises that he "will have pity on the house of Judah" and "save them" (1:7). But when Gomer bears Hosea another son, the LORD commands that he be named "Lo-ammi," (1:8), which means "I am not yours." This is to underline the message God has for the northern kingdom of Israel—they are on their own.
Because of their unfaithfulness the people of Israel are no longer his people and he is no longer their God—that is Hosea's message. Yet inside the LORD's harshest condemnation mercy is always hidden. So, based upon God's love for his people and his eternal faithfulness to His word, at the same time Hosea condemns Israel his is also able to express the hope that Ephraim will have numberless descendents and that the day will come when the name "You are not my people"—Lo-ammi--will be changed to "Children of the living God" (1:10). The divided kingdoms of Israel and Judah will someday be reunited under one king (1:11). Then the shame of "Jezreel" will be taken away, and only its other name will be remembered--"God sows [abundantly]"(2:22). Lo-ammi shall become Ammi—"my people"—and Lo-ruhamah shall be renamed Ruhamah—"pitied" (2:1).
In this section—2:2-16-- Hosea, taking the part of God, the wronged husband, calls upon his children to beg their mother to "put away her whoring from her face" (2:2). She will continued to be punished until she realizes who it was "who gave her the grain, the wine and the oil, and who lavished upon her silver and gold" that she lavished upon the worship on the pagan god Baal (2:8). The LORD will "lay waste her vines and her fig trees, of which she said, 'These are my pay, which my lovers have given me' (2:12). But when these things are taken away and she is miserable and destitute, then she will realize it was the LORD, her husband, who gave her these good things, and not Baal—the name means "my Lord"—or the other pagan gods she has taken as her lovers.
Beyond punishment there is hope, however. Once he has disciplined her for her unfaithfulness, the LORD promises her a sort of second honeymoon. He will "allure her, and bring her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her" (2:14). And then they will be reconciled and their love renewed. "Then she will respond as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt" (2:15). Then God will "marry" Israel forever "in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy" (2:19) and take her as his wife "in faithfulness" (2:20). And she shall call him, "My husband," and no longer "my Baal" (2:16)—"my Lord"-- for the names of the pagan gods, with whom she was once unfaithful, shall be banished and mentioned "no more" (2:18). "On that day" the LORD will call from heaven and Israel shall answer from the earth that "God sows" his people "in the land, they are his and he is
theirs" (2:23).
Then the prophet—who is indeed given some rough assignments—is told to go and "love a woman who has a lover and is an adulteress"—we are not told if this is poor Gomer or not—"just as the LORD loved the people of Israel though they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes" (3:1). (Raisin cakes were a traditional offering brought to the agricultural gods worshiped in Canaan.) But he is forbidden to have intercourse with her "for many days" because for a long time Israel shall be without regular government—"king or prince"—and without spiritual guidance from either the LORD or the pagan gods—"without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or teraphim" (3:4). When this period of abstinence is over the people "shall return and seek the LORD their God, and David their king" (3:5).
But in the oracle that begins with chapter four, the LORD delivers an "indictment against the inhabitants of the land," because there is no trust in him--"no faithfulness or loyalty, and no knowledge of God" (4:1). Creation is languishing because of their unfaithfulness—wild animals, birds, and fish are dying because of the moral decay and decadence of the people. And who is to blame? Hosea singles out the priests and the prophets, because they "have forgotten the law of God." Because of the terrible examples they set and their negligence in teaching the Law of Moses, "the people are destroyed for lack of knowledge" (4:6). Hosea quotes the proverb: "Like people, like priest" (4:9)—the moral decay of the people reflects the laziness and carelessness of the clergy.
And because they are not taught, the people have reverted to the practices of the pagan Canaanites—sacrificing to strange deities on the mountains and in sacred groves, and seeking to ensure of fertility of the land by having sexual intercourse with temple prostitutes. "When their drinking is ended, they indulge in sexual orgies" (4:18), Hosea complains. The northern kingdom of Israel is more deeply into pagan practices—"playing the whore"; the prophet can only hope that Judah will not follow the example of Israel and become guilty of the same offenses (4:15). There is still hope for Judah and for the house David; as for Israel his depravity is too deep to be reformed—"let him alone" (4:17), the LORD says.

Day 259. Daniel 10-12

It will be no secret from you by now, beloved, that apocalyptic literature is difficult to understand. It not only runs counter to the expectation of the modern reader for clarity and transparency in writing, it is deliberately obscure, and intentionally unclear to those who do not know its secret codes. If you approach it without expecting to completely understand it, its images will be luminous and its symbolic language dramatic. It is great poetry electrically charged with spiritual meanings. It is intended to give strength and hope to the helpless and oppressed, and it does. But it also exerts an endless fascination for certain people—sometimes a dangerous fascination, as the history of both Judaism and Christianity demonstrates with abundant examples. It encourages crazy and violent interpretations. It has the power to unhinge and fanaticize. It arms the unbalanced, the angry and the ignorant with the weapon of revelation about the future, and
nothing is more dangerous than that. Enough said.
Our reading for today delivers to us one last climatic vision before the Book of Daniel ends. Daniel, sage and hero, stands "on the bank of the great river (that is, the Tigris)"; and confronted with the most frightening apparition thus far—"a man clothed in linen" (10:5. Although the angel is not named, only lavishly described, he is in all probability the "prince" Gabriel, the LORD's secretary of state and ambassador extraordinaire. At the angel's appearance, Daniel's companions flee in fear, and so he is "left alone to see this great vision" (10:8).
And indeed so tremendous and terrible is the sight that that his strength leaves him and Daniel "[falls] into a trance, face to the ground" (10:9) But an angelic hand touches him and rouses him to consciousness (10:10), and then Gabriel explains, almost apologetically, why he is so long delayed. He has been engaged in a struggle with another "prince." Ancient people believed that every nation and people has its own personification—its "prince,"—a spirit expressed their own corporate personality. Gabriel tells Daniel that "the prince," the guardian spirit, "of Persia opposed [him] twenty-one days" (10:13). Seven times three is a holy number, in divine time awhile--but not forever. No nation, no matter how strong, lasts forever. But the Persian "prince" is indeed redoubtable. Finally Michael the archangel, "one of the chief princes"--the guardian spirit of the people of Israel and the LORD's commander in chief—has to be
brought in to "help" Gabriel. The struggle is, however, unconcluded. Gabriel has left Michael to handle "the prince of the kingdom of Persia," and has comes to Daniel to help him "understand what is to happen to [his] people at the end of days." His people are in need of additional revelation "for there is a further vision for those days" (10:14).
But Daniel is too shell-shocked by Gabriel's appearance to absorb his message. Twice more the angel has to touch him and speak words of encouragement—"Do not fear, greatly beloved, you are safe. Be strong and courageous!" Only then is Daniel able to collect his wits enough to say, "Let my lord speak, for you have strengthened me" (10:19). But Gabriel is in a hurry. His has great business to attend to. He must oppose "against the prince of Persia" on the battleground of history, and when he is through with Persia "the prince of Greece will come" (10:20). They are mighty adversaries he must fight one after another with only the archangel Michael, the warrior and the "prince" of Israel to help him (10:21).
But before hastening away to these battles Gabriel announces the future to Daniel—and to the persecuted Jewish people. The angel's revelations to Daniel represent the past for the writer and for his contemporaries. He is recounting what is history to them when he says that three more kings would arise from Persia, and during the reign of the fourth, from Greece "a warrior king" would appear (11:3). This is, of course, Alexander the Great, who extended his dominion across much of the then-known world. But at Alexander's early death his vast empire was separated four ways-- "divided toward the four winds of heaven"-- partitioned among his generals, rather than inherited by "his posterity" (11:4), since Alexander died without issue. Alexander's successors in Egypt, the kings of the Ptolemaic dynasty, began a long struggle with the Seleucid dynasty in Syria for control of Palestine—the "beautiful land" (11:16). There is no reason
for us to linger over all of this—it was interesting to the Book of Daniel's first readers as background to their own political situation. In our text it is the meaning of the protracted conflict between the "king of the south"—Egypt—and the "king of the north"—Syria, and it occupies chapter 11:5-39.
Again all this is past history to the writer and his readers, until he reaches the account of how a usurper, "a contemptible person on whom royal majesty had now been conferred"—Antiochus IV Epiphanes-- comes to power "through intrigue" (11:21). For the writer of the Book of Daniel, Antiochus is the present ruler of Palestine and the dangerous reality with which the Jewish people are now dealing.
Having established his authority over Palestine and "swept away" the Jewish high priest—"the prince of the covenant" (11:22)—Antiochus sets about an ambitious—and from the point of view of the writer, sacrilegious--program for "reforming" Jewish worship. His "heart [is] against the holy covenant" (11:28), and he lavishes enormous funds in fostering a syncretistic blend of Jewish and Greek religious practice. This proceeds by force, when necessary; the Syrian king occupies and profanes the temple and the fortress of Jerusalem. He then sets about abolishing "the regular burnt offering" and installs "the abomination that makes desolate" (11:31) in the sanctuary. This "abomination"—to which the writer has referred earlier--was the statue of Olympian Zeus which Antiochus orders erected in the temple. Some Jews, especially among the upper classes, collaborated with the king, "but the people who are loyal to God . . .
stand firm and take action" (11:32). This action means armed revolt, and it is met with bloody repression. The faithful "fall by sword and flame, and suffer captivity and plunder" (11:33). Some of the "wise"—the unblemished, righteous ones-- are also killed, but by their martyrdom the vision promises that they will "be refined, purified, and cleansed, until the time of the end" (11:35).
And that is not yet—"there is still an interval until the time appointed" (11:35). Here the vision is less specific because we are now in the "true future." But this much is certain—the worst is yet to come. Antiochus' pretensions know no bounds. He considers "himself greater than any god"—his own gods or "the God of gods" (11:36)—and he offers to make those who "acknowledge him" wealthy (11:39). But the righteous will endure in their struggle against this incarnation of evil, and in the end his forces shall be scattered and exhausted, and he shall "come to his end, with no one to help him" (11:45)
But what of those who die in that "time of anguish"?—that is the final question the writer of the Book of Daniel considers. And his answer is in Old Testament terms, truly revolutionary. The angel Gabriel reveals to Daniel the truly amazing fact that at the end of time a general resurrection shall take place—"Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake," he says, "some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt." There is hope beyond death for the faithful—"Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever" (12:2-3). This is the clearest statement about the general resurrection of the dead to be found in the Old Testament. But it is linked to the ancient belief in God's absolute justice. It is the answer to Job's relentless question—Why to the good suffer? The doctrine of the resurrection says that
beyond history justice will triumph over injustice. There is no reason to fear the sword of tyrants like Antiochus because they have no control of our ultimate destiny. God is in control.
But questions remain—more questions than answers. The author tells both Daniel, the hero of the story and us what we want to know--When will this happen? When will justice and life triumph over the forces of death? How will long will it be until the anguish and wonder of present time give place to the glorious end? An angel "clothed in linen" gives him a typical cryptic apocalyptic answer—The tribulation will last "for a time, two times, and half a time" (12:7)—a time is a year in apocalyptic language—so in three and a half years it will be over. But what happens then?
Daniel does not understand—How can he? How can anyone? Some the things must remain a secret even from the wise—"sealed until the time of the end" (12:9). Some things must be spoken in riddles to protect them from the wicked. The language of apocalyptic is a secret language, a code—but those "who are wise shall understand" (12:10), the prophet is assured. When the wicked king takes away "the regular burnt offering" and "the abomination that desolates" is set up in the temple, the wise can start counting—it will be 1290 days till the end (12:11). And those who persevere to see that end are called blessed. It will be all right—that is the message conveyed to the faithful. And Daniel himself, hero and sage, is promised rest by the angel after his terrible visions and disturbing dreams, and the reward of resurrection with the wise "at the end of days" (12:13), when all that is obscure will be revealed.

Day 258. Daniel 7-9

We have noticed characteristics of apocalyptic literature in our earlier readings, but here in the last chapters of the Book of Daniel we encounter apocalyptic fully developed. Apocalyptic is addressed to an oppressed minority to encourage them in a time of persecution. That is what the Book of Daniel does—constantly underlining the theme that in spite of appearances, The LORD is in charge of history and that before long he will vindicate and rescue his "holy ones." As we noted earlier the Book of Daniel is set during the period of transition between the Babylonian and Persian empires and centers around the character of a Jewish hero and sage of that period whose name it bears. But in fact it was written by an unnamed author much later in the Greek period when the Jews were experiencing savage persecution at the hands of Syrian overlords. He uses all the apocalyptic elements to convey his message—visions, dreams, supernatural voices, and a
language of bizarre symbols intended to reveal a hopeful message about the future while hiding its meaning from the hostile and the uninitiated.
We are among those uninitiated, dear readers, and we have to pick our way slowly through our obscure text to uncover its meaning. The story is set hundreds of years before its writing, back before the fall of Babylon to Darius the Persian. The sage named Daniel experiences "a dream and visions of his head as he [lies] in bed" (7:1). The substance of his dream is this: Out of the sea—symbolizing the chaotic future—there arise four beasts, each different. There is a winged lion, a tusked bear, and four-headed leopard. Daniel does not linger longer over these than it takes to describe these beasts, symbolizing powerful kingdoms that rise and fall with the ebb and flow of history.
It is with the fourth beast that the dream is mostly concerned—it is depicted as "terrifying and dreadful and exceedingly strong" (7:7). Unlike the beasts that preceded it, this one has "ten horns"—horns, apocalyptic symbols of power, in this case represent kings. As Daniel watches a small horn sprouts from among the others, and three earlier horns are "plucked up by the roots" to make room for it (7:8). This new horn is different from the others in that it has "human eyes"—symbols of sentience and knowledge and a "mouth [that speaks] arrogantly" (7:8). This king is the immediate threat to the writer's generation. Daniel's vision of the distant future is his clear and present danger.
The vision continues as Daniel is ushered into the heavenly court and sees "an Ancient One" enthroned, "his clothing . . . white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool" (7:9), surrounded by "ten thousand times ten thousand [angels] attending him" (7:10). The appearance of God—his great age-- emphasizes that persistent theme in the Book of Daniel—that the LORD's dominion is an everlasting one, outlasting all earthly kingdoms. They are mere upstarts, coming and going, as the "Ancient One judges and deposes them. The "books" are opened—they represent the record kept of the good and evil deeds done by nations and individuals in preparation for their final judgment (7:10). The "arrogant words that the horn was speaking" are registered. He is endured for a time, but like all the others he will fall. The beast from which he springs will be "put to death" and its body "burned with fire" (7:11). The other three
beasts have lost their dominion, "but their lives [are] prolonged for a season and a time" (7:12)—this last expression, familiar to apocalyptic literature, means a while, but not forever. They live only at the sufferance of LORD until his final kingdom is established, then they too will pass away.
Still in the heavenly court, Daniel sees "one like a human being coming on the clouds of heaven" and approaching the Ancient One (7:13). The identity of this heavenly being, described as having the appearance of a mortal man—a son of man-- is not revealed in our text. Perhaps he is the embodiment of the coming kingdom, or perhaps he is God's true intention for humanity—his untarnished image. Of course Christians are bound to identify him with Jesus Christ, to whom is delivered an eternal dominion and a kingship . . . that shall never be destroyed," once the beasts—the kingdoms of this world-- have passed away. And it is a source of comfort to us to think of Jesus Christ, who is the same "yesterday, today, and forevermore."
But Daniel finds no such consolation in his dreams; in fact we are told that "the visions in [Daniel's] head terrified [him]" (7:15)--just as Nebuchadnezzar's dreams had frightened him. In his perplexity he approaches one of the supernatural attendants to "ask him the truth concerning all this." In reply he is told that the four beasts he had seen represent "four kings that shall arise out of the earth." They are indeed terrifying and powerful in their own time, but in the end the "holy ones of the Most High shall receive the kingdom forever" (7:18). Then Daniel inquires specifically about the fourth beast because it is so especially frightful, and he is told that it is a kingdom "different from all other kingdoms," because it will "devour the whole earth" (7:23). Ten horns—ten kings—shall arise from its head, and then a last king—the little horn that sprouts among the others-- will be different from all the former and
much worse, because he blasphemes the LORD God, makes war upon his "holy ones," and attempts to change the sacred seasons and the law" (7:25)—undermining the identity of the Jewish people. These "holy ones" shall be given into his power for "a time, two times, and half a time" –apocalyptic language for 3 ½ years (see Daniel 9:27). Then the divine court shall sit in judgment and the power of the fourth beast shall be taken away and dominion will be "given to the people of the holy ones of the Most High" forever (7:27). It is an encouraging thought, but Daniel can only contemplate with fear the persecutions that are coming to his people and we are told that his face turns pale with terror (7:28).
Two years later Daniel is visited by another dream. This time he finds himself "in Susa in the province of Elam" (8:2). King Belshazzar still reigns in Babylon, but now Daniel is transported to the winter capital of the Persian Empire, the empire of Darius, who will supplant Belshazzar. There at the heart of the Persian realm the prophet sees a ram with two horns. It charges "westward and northward and eastward"—all other beasts "are powerless to withstand it" (8:4).
Then a male goat appears with a single horn between its eyes—a lone ruler. It runs at the ram "with savage force" (8:6). It ran at the ram and broke it horns and the ram "did not have power withstand it" (8:7) and "there was one who could rescue the ram from its power." And "the male goat became exceedingly great; but at the height of its power. The great horn was broken, and in its place there came four prominent horns toward the four winds of heaven" (8:8).
This is where the prophecy intersects with writer's own moment in time. Out of one of these horns grows a smaller horn, a ruler who will extend his power in all directions notably toward "the beautiful land"—Israel. He not only acts arrogantly, as former rulers had. He also interferes with temple worship, taking "the regular burnt offering away [from the LORD]" and overthrowing "the place of his sanctuary" (8:11). His evil regime shall "cast truth to the ground," but nevertheless keep on "prospering in what it [does]" (8:12). The persecution seems unendurable. As the Book of Daniel is being composed, the Jewish people are asking--How long can this state of affairs continue? Daniel hears one of the "holy ones"—an angel—ask another that question, and he replies that after 2300 morning and evenings "the sanctuary shall be restored to its rightful state" (8:14). Until then the people of God must wait and hope.
Confused and frustrated--and well he might be—Daniel the sage struggles to understand the vision he has been granted. The angel Gabriel tells him that these visions are "for the time of the end" (8:17). Apocalyptic literature always deals with "the appointed time of the end" (8:19). It attempts to explain the direction in which history is moving, and to elucidate how present events fit into the universal scheme of things.
So Gabriel explains that the ram with two horns stands for the king of Media and Persia, whose alliance overthrows the Babylonian empire. The "male goat" signifies the King of Greece--the great horn is its king—Alexander the Great. After Alexander's death—when "the horn . . . [is] broken" (8:22)-- his vast empire is divided among four of his generals, who received respectively Macedonia and Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt—the four horns. Palestine fell first under the authority of Syria and its rulers, who were called the Seleucids, after the first ruler Seleucus I.
The Seleucid ruler at the time of the writing of the Book of Daniel is one Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175-163 B.C). He is the horn, "a little one, which grows exceedingly toward the south, [and] toward the east," extending his sphere of power outward from the Seleucid capital of Antioch, and encroaching upon "the beautiful land" (8:9)—Israel. Antiochus is the one who will "without warning . . . destroy many." There will be martyrs among the faithful, and he will even rise up against the Prince of princes"—against God himself. Putting himself in the place of God, savagely persecute those who do not accept his authority—the "holy ones" of our text-- and he will even venture to interfere with the sacrifices in the temple.
The sage Daniel in our story does not understand the prophecy even when the angel explains it and his lack of comprehension makes him physically ill (8:27). But he gets up and goes back to the king's work, strengthened by the assurance that God will in the end triumph over all his enemies—the beasts that defy him—and save his people.
Now Daniel has recourse to the writings of the prophet Jeremiah, especially the prophecy that seventy years—one full lifetime-- after "the devastation of Jerusalem" the people will be allowed to return to their homeland (9:2). So in the hope that God will keep his promise made long ago, Daniel prays "with fasting and sackcloth and ashes" (9:3-4), making confession for the sins of his people, past and present. God is righteous; Israel is shameful in its disobedience (9:7). God is merciful and forgiving; Israel is disobedient and willful (9:8). Daniel readily admits that "what was done against Jerusalem" was the result of the people's infidelity to the Law of Moses. "God is right in all that he has done" (9:14). But in spite of that, Daniel prays that "[his] face shine upon [his] desolated sanctuary" (9:17). Daniel presents his supplication for himself and his people "not on the ground of [their] righteousness, but on the ground
of [God's] great mercies" and for his name's sake (9:19).
And as Daniel is praying the angel Gabriel appears "in a vision . . . in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice" (9:22). He assures Daniel that he is "greatly beloved" (9:23) and gives him an insight into things to come. For the writer of the Book of Daniel the seventy years of captivity in Babylon are long past. Now another crisis is taking place—a pagan ruler is seeking to destroy the very identity of the Jewish nation. It will be "seventy weeks"—a long, but finite time—before the persecution will end. The exile in Babylon was a punishment for sins against the Law. The persecution the Jews are now undergoing has a larger meaning. It is not only a punishment and atonement for past sins, but part of the struggle "to bring in everlasting righteousness" (9:24). It is part of God's plan for the establishment of his kingdom.
The "seventy weeks" of persecution is broken down into periods: seven weeks for the word to go out to rebuild Jerusalem; sixty-two weeks and then an "anointed one" shall be "cut off"—defeated--with nothing. Then the "troops of a prince who is to come"—Antiochus Epiphanes, the king of Syria—"shall destroy the city and the sanctuary" (9:26). There will be all sorts of disasters-- flood and war-- and "desolations are decreed" (9:26). This evil prince—called in the text "the desolator" (9:27) will make a "strong covenant" with many of the Jews—traitors and collaborators. With their collusion, he will stop the "sacrifice and offering" in the temple. In place of rightful worship, he will establish "an abomination that desolates"—The Abomination of Desolation—in the sanctuary (9:27). In fact, Antiochus IV Epiphanes did erect a statue of the Olympian Zeus within the temple compound, sparking the revolt among
pious Jews recorded in the books of First and Second Maccabees. But "the desolator" and the "abomination that desolates" have a "decreed end." God is sovereign over all those evil forces at work in history to thwart his will, and his holy people will share his victory over them.

Day 257. Daniel 5-6

"Pride goeth before a fall," my mother was fond of saying.
The mighty Nebuchadnezzar is reduced to eating grass. The great king recovers his senses and humbles himself before a Greater King before he dies. His son, however, learns nothing from his father's mortification. This new king, Belshazzar, is if anything haughtier than the old one, and the time comes to show him who's boss.
The occasion is a party. And what a party—a thousand guests are gathered to witness his glory and power. Belshazzar's feast is the stuff of opera and silent movies. Everybody is the worse for wine. In the midst of it the sodden king commands that the vessels plundered by his father from the temple in Jerusalem be brought out "so that the king and his lords, his wives, and his concubines might drink from them" (5:2). This is, of course, the most frightful sacrilege—a mockery of the Most High. Not only does the drunken crowd drink wine from the holy vessels of gold and silver, but they use them to toast the health of "the gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone" (5:4), of their idols, in short, the sworn enemies of God. It is an insult that cannot be endured.
And it isn't. "Immediately" the fingers of a supernatural hand appear and began to write on the plaster of the wall of the palace. The king's consternation is unbounded—"his limbs gave way, and his knees knocked together" (5:6). The music and laughter die. The party is over. The court magicians are summoned, but in spite of the motivation provided by the promise of great wealth, they are unable to read the writing on the plaster wall. "King Belshazzar became greatly terrified; his face turned pale, and his lords were perplexed" (5:9), we are told. But the queen, who is obviously the brighter bulb on the tree, recommends that Daniel be sent for, because during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar he had proved himself to be "an excellent spirit, [filled with] knowledge, and understanding to interpret dreams, explain riddles, and solve problems" (5:12).
So Daniel is brought in, and the challenge of the supernatural writing put before him. He gallantly declines the gaudy gifts the king offers, however. But he does take the opportunity to recount the story of the humiliation of Belshazzar's father, who through madness and disgrace finally learned the truth "that the Most High God has sovereignty over the kingdom of mortals, and sets over it whomever he will" (5:21). But Belshazzar has proved that he learned nothing from his father's experience. He knows all that befell to the old man, and yet he "has exalted himself against the LORD of heaven" (5:23). The prank of drinking wine from the sacred temple vessels was the last straw. It would have been bad enough, but he used them to praise idols, "but the God in whose power is [his] very breath, and to whom belong all [his] ways," he did not honor (5:23).
Now the party really is over. The writing is on the wall, as they say. Daniel tells Belshazzar that the days of his kingdom are numbered—"mene." He has been weighed on the scale of history and found wanting—"tekel." His kingdom shall be divided between the Medes and the Persians (5:26-28)—"parsin." In spite of getting such ominous news, Belshazzar is as good as his word—he exalts and enriches Daniel, giving him the third rank in the kingdom. But the party is over. Belshazzar's feast is in fact a wake. That very night Belshazzar is killed and the Darius the Mede "[receives] the kingdom, being about sixty-two years old" (5:31).
Daniel remains a power in the new regime. But again there are evil forces working against him. He is incorruptible, that is universally acknowledged, and his enemies realize that if they are to bring him down it must be through "the law of his God" (6:5). So they persuade Darius to issue an edict saying that "whoever prays to anyone, divine or human, except [the king] "shall be thrown into a den of lions" (6:7). It is a silly, wicked piece of law, and unworthy of Darius, who was famous over-all for his tolerance, clemency, and wisdom. But the story is the story, and the cruel edict is necessary to it. It places before our hero that choice about where to place his ultimate allegiance—with the king or with God. And, of course, Daniel chooses God; his loyalty cannot be swayed, even if it means death. It is a constant them in the Book of Daniel, without absolute commitment, honor, wealth, and life itself is meaningless. It is a message tailored
for a people under stress and persecution.
"The conspirators" resort to spying on Daniel and catch him praying in the direction of Jerusalem as God had commanded his people to do. At their report the king is greatly distressed, but we are told—several times in fact--that "according the law of the Medes and the Persians" the edict could not be changed (6:12). It is another silly, wicked law, but necessary to the story. Because of it, the king has no recourse but to have Daniel cast into the lions' den, through with his best wishes—"May your God, whom you faithfully serve, deliver you!" (6:16), he says by way of good-by. We are told, however, that he has no appetite for his dinner and "sleep [flees] from him" (6:18).
Every child in Sunday school knows what happens then. Early the next morning the hurries to the lions' den, calls out for the prophet, and waits anxiously for an answer. He is not disappointed. Daniel replies, "Oh king, live forever! My God sent his angel and shut the lions' mouths so that they would not hurt me, because I was found blameless before him; and also before you, O king, I have done no wrong" (6:22).
So Daniel, vindicated, is pulled out, and the king rejoices. But his joy quickly turns to anger and he orders that those "who accused Daniel [be] brought and thrown into the den of lions—they, their children, and their wives" (6:24)—a part of the story usually suppressed in the Sunday school versions. And the cats "overpowered them and broke all their bones in pieces" (6:24), and being cats, ate them all up.
Then the king publishes another decree, this one to the effect that all peoples "should tremble and fear before the God of Daniel" (6:26) who saved him "from the power of the lions" (6:27). And Darius acknowledges that empires and their kings come and go, but the LORD's "dominion has no end" (6:26). It is the constant them of the Book of Daniel--God is in ultimate control of all of history and knows its directions and its end. And in the next chapters of the book through dreams and visions he lifts the curtain a little and gives the prophet and his hearers a glimpse how things will shake down.

Day 256. Daniel 3-4

Kings often suffer from forgetfulness—history abounds with examples to prove it. That's why they make the same mistakes over and over again.
That's what happens to King Nebuchadnezzar in our reading for today. The dream of the crumbling statue that so terrified him in yesterday's reading is no sooner explained to him, than the king in his overweening pride commences to make an enormous golden statue—essentially an idol--of himself. And once the great poppet is set up, his herald is instructed to command all his officials—"satraps," by the way, were the highest ranking provincial administrators in the Babylonian and Persian empires—shall "fall down and worship the golden statue" that the king has erected. Indeed at a designated signal all the kings subjects—"all the people, nations, languages" (3:7) of his empire—are to worship his golden image.
Of course we know that the Jews cannot do that, bound as they are by the First Commandment which forbids the fashioning and worshipping of images. So we are told that "certain Chaldeans" denounce them to the king--Snitches! They are almost certainly moved by jealousy and political ambition. In particular they snitch on "certain Jews whom [the king has] appointed over the affairs of the province of Babylon: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego" (3:12).
When he hears of it the king is furious—imagining anyone not wanting to worship your image! He threatens to heave the three of them "into a furnace of blazing fire" if they persist in refusing to worship him (3:15). The problem is a conflict of loyalties. Modern people might see it as conflict between the individual and the state, but from the point of view of the Book of Daniel the clash is between the king and the LORD himself. The question is: Who is God? Nebuchadnezzar has forgotten the most basic fact of human life—the arrangements mortals make for governing themselves are transitory and both kings and nations die. The Jews are put in this world remind us all where our ultimate loyalties lie—with the eternal rather than the temporary. (The Jews tend to forget this too.)
But the three young Judeans remember well enough, and they make this heroic reply to the angry king—"If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king, let him deliver us." You note that the three do not make any demands of God. They do not claim a miracle as their right. Instead, they remain obedient to the will of God whether that means life or death—it is up to their God to decide which. They are only willing to say that if they are not delivered, "be is known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods, and we will not worship the golden statue that you have set up" (3:17-18). So there!
All attentive Sunday school children know what happens next. The king is filled with rage—he is literally burning. He orders the furnace stoked up to match his fury. He has the three young men bound and cast into the furnace, which by now is so overheated that the raging flames kill the men who lift Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego" and cast them into the fire (3:22). Collateral damage, we might call it. In any case, it is manifest that the king is has lost control of his temper and is losing control of the situation.
And if that weren't bad enough, the king is further alarmed because in the furnace he can see not three men bound, but "four men unbound, walking in the middle of the fire," unscathed, and the fourth having the appearance of a god" (3:25). The truth of the situation is not lost upon us, dear reader—the three young Jews with the difficult names are not alone, even in the fiery furnace—and neither are we in our furnace. But the king is dazzled. He summons the three out of the furnace, and they emerge, totally un-singed, with "not even the smell of fire" about them (3:27). Nebuchadnezzar recognizes a miracle when he sees one, and he issues another royal decree, this one to the effect that anyone who "utters blasphemy against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb . . . for there is no other God who is able to deliver in this way" (3:29).
Now we might think he has learned his lesson, but we would be wrong. (Kings often suffer from forgetfulness.) Nebuchadnezzar has another dream. He tells us about it in the form of an imperial letter or proclamation that begins with this salutation—"King Nebuchadnezzar to all peoples, nations, and languages that live through the earth: May you have abundant prosperity!" (4:1). He then gives glory to "the Most High God" and acknowledges the lesson that he learned through the first of his dreams—and will shortly to his sorrow have to relearn—that kings rise and fall, but the LORD's "sovereignty is from generation to generation" (4:3).
The king confides in all the peoples through the earth the dream that he says had that "frightened" and "terrified" him. (Ancient people put more stock in dreams than we can imagine putting.) He says that he sought the advice of the Chaldean diviners about it, but they could give him no interpretation worthy of the name. So at last he consulted Daniel "who is endowed with the spirit of the holy gods" (4:8).
Then Nebuchadnezzar recounts his dream. In it he sees "a world tree," so enormous that its top reaches heaven. Animals and birds find shelter under its branches, and its abundant fruit "provided food for all" creatures, and "from it all living beings were fed" (4:12). But now the dream takes an alarming turn. "A holy watcher"--an angel we suppose, or a god-- "coming down from heaven" cries out—"Cut down the tree and chop off its branches" (4:14). All that is spared is the stump of the tree, bound with iron, which is left to be "bathed with the dew of heaven," in the company of "the animals of the field in the grass of the earth" (4:13). The tree is a person, obviously, but who is it? We know, but the great Nebuchadnezzar is clueless. Whoever the tree is, the watcher says, "his mind [will be] changed from that of a human, and the mind of an animal will be given to him" (4:16). All this will take place, the voice of
the watcher says, in order to demonstrate that "the Most High is sovereign over the kingdom of mortals"(4:17).
This is the dream Nebuchadnezzar submits to Daniel for his interpretation. Now it is Daniel's turn to be "terrified" because the explanation of it is worse than the dream--and it is certainly more dangerous to his own well-being. But the king insists upon an interpretation. So Daniel reveals that the tree is the king himself—Surprise! –and the sentence the Most High has passed upon him is degradation and madness. As Daniel says: "You shall be driven away from human society, and your dwelling shall be with the wild animals. You shall be made to eat grass like oxen, and you shall be bathed with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass over you" (4:25)--"seven times" means "seven years" (see Daniel 7:25)—before your will knowledge that "heaven is Sovereign" over you. Daniel then advises the king to "atone for [his] sins with righteousness, and your iniquities with mercy" (4:27), and perhaps things will go easier on him.
We are not told whether the king takes this excellent counsel; we can assume he did not, because twelve months later Nebuchadnezzar was walking on the wall of Babylon, exalting in the magnificence of his city and his own power, when he is struck with madness and is reduced to eating "grass like an oxen" (4:32). His mental illness reduces him to the level of a beast—"his hair grew as long as eagles' feathers and his nails became like birds' claws" (4:33).
The humbling of Nebuchadnezzar remind us of the humbling of Pharaoh in the book of Exodus, and it is undertaken for the same reason—to punish his pride and show him who is boss. It comes, however, to a more merciful end. After seven years of insanity, his reason returns to him. His lesson is learned and he returns to imperial power, but with a sobering insight—"the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing" even kings (4:35). God's power is sovereign and endures forever, and his decisions are above censure or reproach (4:35). So the proud king is harshly disciplined; the mighty tyrant is chastened by the fear of the LORD, who alone is able "to bring low those who walk in pride" (4:37).