The Four Beasts of Daniel 7 Explained

From 2022-2024, I studied the book of Revelation and the book of Daniel, seeking to uncover the meaning of its deeply symbolic prophecies about the end of history. While studying, I wrote a commentary of my findings, which until now has been buried in the dust of my google drive. Since I still do not know what to do with these commentaries, I wanted to  publish a small portion of it on this blog in hopes that it is interesting to the reader. 

Daniel's vision of the 4 beasts has puzzled Christians and Jews for thousands of years. Using Exposition of the Divine Principle, along with a comparative analysis of Daniel, Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Revelation, the common scholarly interpretation of the four beasts signifying four civilizations that battle the Jews, takes on an entirely new meaning.

In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed: then he wrote the dream, and told the sum of the matters. Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, and, behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea. And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another. The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man's heart was given to it. And behold another beast, a second, like to a bear, and it raised up itself on one side, and it had three ribs in the mouth of it between the teeth of it: and they said thus unto it, Arise, devour much flesh. After this I beheld, and lo another, like a leopard, which had upon the back of it four wings of a fowl; the beast had also four heads; and dominion was given to it. After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns. I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things. I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him: thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened. I beheld then because of the voice of the great words which the horn spake: I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame. As concerning the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives were prolonged for a season and time. I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.

And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and the visions of my head troubled me. I came near unto one of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all this. So he told me, and made me know the interpretation of the things. These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth. But the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever. Then I would know the truth of the fourth beast, which was diverse from all the others, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and his nails of brass; which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet; And of the ten horns that were in his head, and of the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even of that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things, whose look was more stout than his fellows.I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them; Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom. Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces. And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time. But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end. And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. Hitherto is the end of the matter. As for me Daniel, my cogitations much troubled me, and my countenance changed in me: but I kept the matter in my heart.

Rather than interpreting the king’s dream, Daniel receives a Revelation of his own. Notably, the text rewinds back to the rule of King Belshazzar, who’s failure marked the beginning of the fulfillment of Nebuchadnezzar’s vision. The winds, or forces, of Heaven, come forth to reveal four beasts: a lion with eagle’s wings, a bear with three ribs, a leopard with four wings, and finally a fourth, most deadly and dreadful beast with iron teeth and ten horns.

In the Bible, words often have an internal and external meanings attached to them. For example, there is physical death, such as the death of Belshazzar, and spiritual death, such as the death of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (Resurrection 1, Luke 9:60). A similar dichotomy exists for beasts. Physical beasts, such as the beasts God created in Genesis (Genesis 2:19-20), are physical animals. However, according to DP, the spiritual creatures that exist are angels (Fall 1.4), who reside there as God’s servants and ministers.

The prophet Ezekiel sees a similar set of creatures as Daniel in one his visions: a whirlwind came out of the north…out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures…As for the likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side: and they four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face of an eagle” ( Ezekiel 1:5, 10). These “living creatures” can also only be angels. Later in Ezekiel's vision he sees, “in the firmament that was above the head of the cherubim there appeared over them as it were a sapphire stone, as the appearance of the likeness of a throne” (Ezekiel 10:1). Cherubim, both in DP and in common Christian belief, are angels (https://www.britannica.com/topic/cherub). These creatures appear again serving the Messiah in Revelation (Revelation 4). Although there is a great amount of Jewish mythology that contains many types of spiritual creatures, angels are specifically designed as the servants of God, Christ, and perfected human beings (Human Fall 2).

The use of angels in biblical stories also has its dichotomy. The Hebrew word used for angel is ‘Malach’, or ‘messenger’ (Reuvan, Klein). In several instances in the Bible, the same word is used for human messengers (Genesis 32:3, Numbers 21:21). On the other hand, cherubim, or high-level angels, are specifically assigned to guard the Tree of Life, even though Adam and Eve are the first human beings (with both a body and soul) according to Genesis. Both Ezekiel and Revelation also reference angels in the spirit world serving on the throne of Christ (Ezekiel 10, Revelation 4). Since Ezekiel and John identify the similarly symbolized beasts as angels, creatures with such symbolism in Daniel (and Revelation 13, which makes reference to this dream of Daniel), must also signify angels.

However, Daniel identifies the four beasts as four kings of four kingdoms that rise up against God and His people during the Last Days. These beasts, or angels, actually represent four physical human beings who rule four kingdoms. Each king, however, contains the symbols of the four head tribes of Israel, similar to the four beasts of Ezekiel 10 and Revelation 4.

Judah, represented by a lion, Reuben, represented by a man, Ephraim, represented by an ox, and Dan, represented by an eagle, not only are the head tribes of God’s people, the Israelites, but are inscribed on Aaron’s breastplate and the walls of the Holy City in Revelation (Revelation 21:12). Like angels, the tribes of Israel were also responsible for ministering and following God. However, like human beings, some angels also disobeyed God and went to the archangel Lucifer’s, Satan’s side. Since Satan’s strategy is fulfilled through evil imitations of God’s Principle, Satan will seek to defeat God’s people through his tribes. While God only has tribes and groups within one nation, Israel, Satan, “the god of this world,” (2 Corinthians 4:4) has tribes in the form of nations. Therefore, just as God has four head tribes of his people, Satan will look to muster four head rulers and nation-states to oppose God’s side, in a satanic imitation of the tribes of Judah, Reuben, Ephraim, and Dan.

Each king of each nation battles God’s people one at a time until the final fourth, and most deadly beast, which has ten horns, or rulers, within its existence, followed by an eleventh wise king. This eleventh king takes down the first three and speaks blasphemy until a time of divide. Finally, the Ancient of Days, which in Daniel’s vision specifically means God Himself, judges the world and brings His kingdom to earth.

So far, all of the visions and dreams Daniel has interpreted have to do with the fall of Babylon and its eventual fate of domination by the Persians and Medians, followed by a third and fourth strong nation. Daniel’s most recent dream exactly coincides with this theme. Earlier, Daniel identified the feet of the image featured in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream to be the fourth and most powerful kingdom. That kingdom, however, will face a time of turmoil and division until it too is finally swept away by the Kingdom of the Ancient of Days. This new dream of Daniel gives more details as to how this fourth kingdom, this fourth beast with iron teeth, divides and crumbles. However, as previously stated, this prophecy’s fulfillment is in the hands of the king of the nation, who can choose to have truth faith in God and build God’s kingdom from within his own.

Daniel’s dream also indicates the coming of a Son of Man, or the Messiah, the king of Israel who defeats Satan’s forces once and for all. Since the 1st Coming of the Messiah (and only coming in the mind of Daniel and all Jews thereafter), is Jesus Christ, hundreds of years after Daniel’s vision, in the time between Daniel’s vision and Jesus’ coming, one should expect to find four nations that went against Israel in between these times.

Examining the history of Israel beginning with the Babylonian exile in 586 BCE, four kingdoms have gone against Israel and Judea in accordance with Daniel’s visions. The first two are mentioned by name: Babylon, symbolized by the golden head in Daniel 2, and Persia and Medina, which conquered the Babylonian Empire over the course of the 6th century BCE beginning with, in the biblical narrative, King Darius. Decades later, Persia and Medina were conquered by the Greek Empire’s Alexander the Great in the 4th century BCE. Judea was then put under their occupation, and after that the occupation of the Romans after their conquest of the Greek Empire. The Roman Empire, one of the vastest, advanced and powerful empires in world history, stood as the fourth beast/kingdom in Daniel’s dream. It had numerous powerful emperors. One of the emperors is also represented by the eleventh horn, which marks the beginnings of the internal divide of the empire. Crucially, the eleventh horn/emperor along with others speak words of blasphemy towards God. In particular, the Emperor Caesar was regarded as a god in the Roman religion. Caesar in particular represented an anti-type to the Messiah, and was a chief vessel for Satan to perpetuate his defective imitation of God’s strategy and Principle.

The Roman Empire, as Daniel predicted, eventually divided in the third century and eventually crumbled in the final decades of the fifth century. As Daniel’s story teaches, even the Romans had two opportunities, just as the Babylonian Empire, to accept God, first by not crucifying Jesus, and second by accepting Paul when he traveled to Rome years later. As a result of the Romans’ failure to accept the Messiah Himself, the Christians internally conquered Rome while the Barbarians and other forces externally ravaged it in the following centuries. Nevertheless, Satan’s forces manifest against four anti-types to the head tribes of Israel in the Last Days of the 2nd Coming of Christ, and eventually are defeated and give way to God’s direct judgement and governance over the world (Revelation 13).