The Character Of The Gentile Nations Series

The beast which looked like a leopard with four wings and four heads corresponds to the belly and thighs of bronze in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream and represents Greece. A leopard is a very fast animal, but with its wings would have been even swifter, a picture of the rapidity with which Greece, under Alexander the Great, conquered virtually all of the know world at that time. But upon his death at the age of 33, the empire was split among his four generals, exactly as pictured by the four heads.

4. Rome [63 BC – AD 476 (West)/1453 (East)]

The fourth beast, so terrifying that it was beyond description, corresponds to the legs of iron and represents Rome. And this beast was certainly an appropriate picture of the way the Roman Empire ferociously crushed its foes.

5. Gap

Just as we saw in chapter 2, there is a gap between the historical Roman Empire and the final form of the fourth beast. Here in chapter 7, that gap occurs in the middle of verse 7:

7 After this I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, terrifying and dreadful and exceedingly strong. It had great iron teeth; it devoured and broke in pieces and stamped what was left with its feet.

GAP

It was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.

In the Bible, horns are commonly used as a picture of power and authority and the ten horns here in chapter seven correspond directly to the ten toes of iron mixed with clay in chapter 2. As we mentioned when we looked at that chapter, there is no time in the history of the Roman Empire when it was ever ruled over by an alliance of ten leaders, so this part of the prophecy is still awaiting a future fulfillment. And just as we saw in chapter 2, that future fulfillment will involve a…

6. Revived Roman Empire

Although there is still much that we cannot determine about this revived Roman Empire that will be in place at the return of Jesus, we are given a bit more insight here in chapter 7. Once again, we see that power will be shared among a group of ten leaders, represented by the ten horns. But then another leader, another horn, who is not part of that alliance, will arise and take power. Apparently he will come to power by putting down three of the ten rulers. Frankly, that’s about all we can really determine from this passage and any attempts to further identify these “three kings” would be nothing more that speculation.

There is little doubt that this “other horn” is none other than the Antichrist and his description here in Daniel is certainly consistent with what we see elsewhere in Scripture. Daniel’s dream specifically reveals certain actions that the Antichrist will take.

There are striking parallels here with Revelation 13, which describes a beast which is a composite of all four beast kingdoms described here in Daniel 7. Here is how John describes the actions that the beast will take:

And the beast was given a mouth uttering haughty and blasphemous words, and it was allowed to exercise authority for forty-two months. It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling, that is, those who dwell in heaven. Also it was allowed to make war on the saints and to conquer them.