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Mike Ward, will you open us up with a word of prayer? All right, Daniel chapter 8. I'm just going to pick up in verse 15 and read to the end of the chapter, and then we'll talk about God's fulfillment of this passage.
And when I, Daniel, had seen the vision, I sought to understand it. Behold, standing before me was one who looked like a man, and I heard the voice of a man between the banks of Uli. And he called out, and he said, Gabriel, give this man an understanding of the vision.
So he came near to where I was standing, and when I came, I was frightened, and I fell on my face. But he said to me, Son of man, understand the vision pertains to the time of the end. Now, while I was talking, while he was talking with me, I sank into a deep sleep with my face to the ground, and he touched me and made me stand upright.
He said, Behold, I'm going to let you know what will occur in the final period of the indignation, for it pertains to the appointed time of the end. The ram which you saw with the two horns represents the kings of Media and Persia.
The shaggy goat represents the kingdom of Greece, and the large horn that is between his eyes is the first king, the broken horn, and the four horns that arose in its place represent four kingdoms which will arise from his nation, although not with his power.
In the latter period of their rule, when the transgressors have run their course, a king will arise who will be insolent, skilled in intrigue. His power will be mighty, but not by his own power. He will destroy with an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will.
He will destroy mighty men and the holy people, and through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence. He will magnify himself in his heart. He will destroy many while they are at ease, and he will even oppose the prince of princes, but he will be broken without human agency, and the vision of the evenings and mornings which has been told to you is true, but keep the vision secret, for it pertains to many days in the future.
Then I, Daniel, was exhausted and sick for days, and I got up again and carried on the king's business, but I was astounded at the vision, and there was no one to explain it.". Now, anybody remember last week?
What happened?
What happened last week? We talked about Alexander's conquest. He had four generals. Out of the four generals, what two generals rose up to fight against one another? Anybody remember? Ptolemies, and what was the other?
And the Seleucids. The other two really become insignificant in history because it really doesn't deal.
With what happens.
So these two begin to fight for a number of years. This empire is the one that rises up to be the one that is, begins to be the thorn in the Jewish flesh, per se. It's out of this comes the little horn, when's the last time we saw the little horn?
Previous chapter, and there was a little horn that came, comes after it, which will be in.
The Roman Empire.
What do we know about the little horn? What does it do? It's blasphemous. It's blasphemous.
What else does it do?
We could even say it's a he, but what does he do? Conquers the land with violence. Yes, violence. Very violent. Specifically violent towards the covenant people of God. If you even read in Revelation, which is a comparable, it says he makes war with the.
Saints.
And it's interesting that he's, now he's backing up. The first vision he got was in the fourth kingdom, which was the Roman Empire. Now he's backing up, and he's got, remember that one made him really sick, and there was about two and a half years there where he, God basically left him alone with visions.
Now he has another vision. He was sick because he saw that, hey, there's supposed to be this great time of restoration, and then there's going to be down the road, there's going to be another empire that's going to persecute the people of God, make war with them.
It's going to wear out the saints, and it says they are losing, is what it says. They lose. They lose the battle, but they're not going to lose the war. And then, he's sick for many days, and then God says, you know what, I'm going to give it to him again.
But not only is it going to be this far down the road, it's actually going to be much closer to you, Daniel, than you realize. Daniel, chapter 8, we started verse 15. So now, we need to understand who this person is.
So when these did their fighting, you had, I don't know if I remember, towards the end of last week, I began to tell you, you have Seleucids 1, 2, 3, and 4, and Antiochus 1, 2, 3, and 4, okay? And we don't have time to get into all that.
When we get to chapter 11, we will, that gets more detail to how they come out, all their marriage alliances, and how they come from the north and the south, and all that. And me and Luke were talking about this a couple of weeks ago.
When you get to chapter 11, I wish I had a big old map, and you could put men with jerseys.
And stuff on.
So you could, I mean, you really need one of them war tables with all these, so you can see how they come from the north and the south, and then this one's making an alliance with this one, and this one's going to marry this one, and then that chick gets mad and kills this one, and dude, it's very detailed, what happens.
So that's why chapter 8 and 11, the historical, prophetic fulfillment, the liberals say there's just no way that that was prophesied 300 to 500 years before, there's just no way, because of the detail in which it was fulfilled.
So, we're not going to deal with any of the other Antiochuses, but this one. Right before we closed up last week, what was his name? What was the title given to him other than Antiochus?
Epiphanes. What does it mean?
Antiochus Epiphanes. It was Theos Antiochus Epiphanes, and it actually means, Antiochus Epiphanes means God manifest. He believed he was Zeus in the flesh, or the son of Zeus, depending on, and we're going to talk about how he proclaims that in the temple.
So he comes along, interesting, with his dad, and man, we get to chapter 11, he winds up being imprisoned in Rome. His dad owes tons of money to the Roman Empire, and instead of being able to pay his indemnity, they imprison him.
He is released at some point, then he raises himself up with intrigue, and he's good at making, being very deceptive. He's good with words, he's good with being sneaky. He's a great politician. He's good at lying, he's good at backbiting, and he's good about taking advantage of people.
Even he imprisons one king, one of the Ptolemies, and once he imprisons him, they didn't want the Ptolemy back. They didn't want him back. They just put another Ptolemy in its place. Well then he gets upset, and he's like, well hold on, I was hoping y 'all were going to fight about it.
Then he tells the Ptolemy that he imprisoned, says, check it out, I'll put you back in power over there if you'll help me make war with these guys. That's how he was. He just was constantly warring and fighting.
So Daniel's wanting to know the interpretation of the visions. I do want to say something before I go any further. When Antiochus Epiphanes, I think it's in 14, it says 2300 evenings and mornings, and then the holy place will be properly restored.
Don't take that as 2300 days, okay? In a Jewish culture, Jewish law, what did they have to do every morning and every night? What did the priest have to go out and do?
That's it.
Morning and evening sacrifice. So if you take 2300, and the way it's constructed there, even in the Aramaic, I mean in the Hebrew, because this is the Hebrew section now, it's not the yom. It's evening and morning.
So it's kind of combined. So it's telling you this is one event. So there was 2300 evening and morning sacrifice. You divide that, that brings you to about three years, okay? So you take 2300, you divide that by two, that gets you to about three, well, technically I bet it's about 3 .19 years.
Somebody can check the math if they want, but it's roughly three years, okay? Antiochus Epiphanes is on the rise. He comes in, he is going to fight the Ptolemies in Egypt. He is cut off by the ships of Kittim, which is the Roman Empire.
They then put him in a circle, if I said this last week, then forgive me. He stood out there, the general put a circle around him in the sand, that's the line in the sand. He drew a circle around him, he said, you're either going to make a decision to fight or give up before you step out of it.
He said, hey, can I just talk to my war cabinet, basically, and they said, no, you're going to make a decision. You step out of that and you've not told us you've made peace, we're going to make war.
With you.
And he tucked his tail between his legs and said, I give up, heads back. On his way back from Egypt, he's going to go by the beautiful land. What's the beautiful land? Israel. He's going to go through Jerusalem.
He knows, remember, he's broke, he needs cash, he needs cash bad. He's going to go through Jerusalem, and he's going to try to ransack and take money from the temple, and he's going to make tribute. Now, as he tries to make tribute, he's going to go in, he's going to go into the city of Jerusalem, he's going to say, hey, I'm here to make peace, he's going to be nice and kind to them until he's ready to flip the script on them.
So when it says here in verse 23, in the latter period of the rule, when the transgressors have run their course, a king will arise, insolent, skilled in intrigue, and his power will be mighty, but not by his own power.
And if somebody wants to disagree with me, I'm completely fine with this. When it says here, I understand that the power that he is given, although ordained by God to do what he is about to do, I believe this is a demonic power that overtakes him.
And I can make reference to that, to the prince of Persia, and how one goes to protect the prince of Greece from these spiritual powers of darkness, and we'll get into that. But I do certainly believe Antiochus Epiphanes was by a demon.
He will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will, and he will destroy mighty men and the holy people. Who's the holy people?
What's that?
The Jews.
Okay.
And through his shrewdness, he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence, and he will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many while they are at ease. And he will even oppose the prince of princes.
I believe that is in reference to Yahweh's prince, ultimately Jesus Christ. I am.
Come on, man.
Oh, Joe Biden just texted me. Is it a quarrel?
Yeah. No.
Any Roman Catholics in here? Oh, so this won't really, this won't matter. I'm fixing to read from the Apocrypha.
Okay?
The Apocrypha is still looked at as authoritative within the Roman Catholic Church, but the book that I am reading is from 1 Maccabees. It is a historical book that was in the Jewish Apocrypha before the New Testament came along.
It's a historical book. It's a historical book recounting the events that took place with Antiochus Epiphanes. Understand, what I'm fixing to read is not Scripture. Everybody understand that, right? It's a historical document about what took place.
Did you raise your hand?
Oh.
All right. And if anybody wants to follow along or you can go and read when you get home, you can read chapter 1 and 2 of 1 Maccabees. It said, and it happened that after Alexander, son of Philip the Macedon, who came out from the land of Katim, had smitten Darius, king of Persia, in the Medes, that he reigned in his stead.
He was the first over Greece. He made many wars, won many strongholds. He slew the kings of the earth. He went through the ends of the earth. He took spoils. He took many nations, insomuch that the earth was quiet before him.
Isn't that what we learned last week? Everywhere Alexander the Great went, he smashed them and he subdued everybody in his path. He gathered mighty, strong hosts and he ruled over countries, nations, and all of them became tributaries unto him.
And that is true, from the Indus River to the Nile. After these things, Alexander fell sick and it was perceived that he should die, wherefore he called his servants, such as were honorable, and brought up with him from his youth, and he parted his kingdom among them.
Remember, that's where we got the four kingdoms that came out of the. Alexander reigned for 12 years and then he died. His servants bear rule in every place, and after his death, they all put crowns on themselves so that they did their sons after them in many years, and evils multiplied on the earth.
It's basically talking about these two fighting with one another, unbelievable, for a number of years, decades. And then it says here, and it came out of one of them a wicked root named Antiochus, whose surname is Epiphanes, son of Antiochus the king.
He had been a hostage in Rome. He reigned in the 137th year of the kingdom of Greece. Hey, this is not 137 B .C. This is in the 137th year of the Greek Empire. This would have taken place probably around 168 B .C.
In those days, there were also in Israel wicked men, who persuaded many of them, saying, let's go make a covenant with the heathen that are around about us, for since we have departed from them, we have had nothing but sorrow.
Understand what he just said. He's saying there was Israelites that said, hey, let's make a covenant with the Greek king Antiochus. What was the problem with them getting Hellenized? They would be getting away from their Jewish culture.
They were supposed to come out from under them and be separate. We even see the problems of that even arise even after the new covenant is given in the book of Acts, the Hellenistic Jews. They were then looked down upon because of the others, although once the new covenant came, the Hellenization of the Jews, as long as that didn't lead them into immorality, was not bad.
But up until the new covenant, the Jews were supposed to be separate from the Greek Greco-Roman Empire and from their customs. Then certain of the people were so far therein, and they went to the king, who gave them a license to do after the ordinance of the heathen, whereupon they built a place of exercise at Jerusalem according to the customs of the heathen.
So Antiochus comes in. He builds a gymnasium to do sports inside Jerusalem. Anybody know what the huge problem with the gymnasium and sports? They were naked. Gunas. That's where you get gymnasium from, and that means to be naked.
So what were they doing? They were shaming themselves by becoming naked and getting into sports and doing these things inside that arena. Whereupon they built that place in there according to the customs of the heathen.
They made themselves. Here's where it really starts getting bad. They made themselves uncircumcised. They forsook the holy covenant. They joined themselves to the heathen, and they sold to them mischief.
In other words, hey, we'll take payment as long as we can do what we want to do and as long as you spare our lives. Understand what Antiochus is doing. He hates the Jewish people. He is doing by force and coercion what Alexander the Great was doing when he would conquer nations.
Hey, Alexander's goal was to Hellenize the world, okay, was to make it Greek, was to make it Greek culture. But as he got towards the end of his campaign, the last 10, 11, and 12th year of his life, he did begin to turn and go.
He did begin to like some of the Persian culture. He did like the Persian women. So he began to be more Persian-like in some of his ideas. Now, when the kingdom was established before Antiochus, he thought to reign over Egypt that he might have dominion over two realms.
Wherefore, he entered Egypt with a great multitude with chariots and elephants and horsemen and a great navy, and he made war against Ptolemy, the king of Egypt. But Ptolemy was afraid of him. He fled.
Many were wounded to death, and they got the strong cities and the land of Egypt and took the spoils. Now, after Antiochus had left Egypt, he returned and went up against Israel in Jerusalem with a great multitude.
He entered proudly into the sanctuary. He took away the golden altar, the candlesticks, the light, the vessels thereof, the table of the showbread, the pouring vessels, the vials, the censers of gold, the veil, the crown, the golden ornaments that were before the temple, all which were pulled off.
He took away the silver, the gold, the precious vessels, and he took away all the hidden treasures within it, and he had taken them all away. He went into his own land and made a great massacre, spoken very proudly of happily of what he had done.
So do you see what Antiochus Epiphanes had just did? He came into the city, basically making peace with them, giving them, hey, I'll do this for you, blah, blah, blah. Then he winds up coming in and he massacres many people.
He then does, in essence, the same thing that Nebuchadnezzar did in his first deportation as far as the temple's concerned. What did he go in there and do? He took all the gold. Yeah, he took all the implements.
So Antiochus Epiphanes at this point is doing, in essence, except for being exiling the people, he is doing the same thing that Nebuchadnezzar had done just, what, 400 years earlier?
Why was God using Antiochus Epiphanes to do this? There were covenant breakers. What was the promise to God in the Old Testament? You do what I tell you to do. It was a vassal. It was called a Caesarian treaty.
If you look at the Ten Commandments or the Old Covenant, it's a Caesarian treaty. You do this, I'll do that. You do what I ask you to do. You obey me, I will give you all the blessings. I mean, we even have it in Deuteronomy.
Remember where they were on Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim? You may remember what happens there?
Yeah.
Correct.
And what was they doing? They were recognizing as they were hollering them back and forth, if we do this, God will bless us. If we don't do this or do these things that he's prohibited, all these cursings will come up.
You'll be in exile. The nations around you will be a scourge. You'll be hauled off into slavery. They'll take your women. They'll take your crops. They'll take your gold and your money, and we're seeing that exact same thing happening because of what they had done.
Now, what's that? Caesarian? S-U-Z-E-R-A-N-A-I-N-E? Treaty. Caesarian. And that is actually an ancient treaty that was done to any type of vassal. It's actually a vassal state. When you pull it up, if you want to go look at it on the Internet, it'll be like a vassal state.
It says, after two years had expired, the king sent a chief to collect more tribute in the cities of Judah. He came to Jerusalem with a great multitude. He spoke peaceably with words, but in all was in deceit.
For when they had given him credence, he fell upon that city. He smote it very sorely. He destroyed many people. Hey, it goes on to say, on in the Book of Maccabees, in three days, when Antiochus Epiphanes goes into the city, in three days the bloodbath was 40 ,000.
40 ,000 Jews slaughtered in the street. Women and children were took captive. They possessed all the cattle. They set the city on fire. They pulled down houses and walls on every side. The city of David, which was great and had a strong wall with mighty towers and was mighty for a stronghold, was now in shambles.
They put therein a sinful nation and wicked men and fortified themselves. In other words, here it is, Antiochus Epiphanes comes in and takes the very holy city, which was to fortify them, to keep out the evil people.
Now he's made a fortress of that to himself to keep himself in there. They stored in it with armor, victuals, and when they had gathered the spoils of Jerusalem, they laid them up there and they became a snare to the people.
For it was a place to lie in wait against the sanctuary and an evil adversary to Israel. In other words, they were being an evil adversary and they were going to stay there and be a scourge to the people.
It says, the sanctuary was laid waste like a wilderness. The feasts were turned into mourning, her Sabbaths into a reproach, her honor into contempt. As for the glory which she had, so was her now dishonor, her excellence was turned into mourning.
Listen to what Antiochus wrote for Laws. The king Antiochus wrote over the whole kingdom and for everybody that everyone should leave his law. So all the heathens agreed according to the commandment of the king.
He says, look, you now have to abandon the covenant which God made you and you've got to follow what I say. And it says here that that's exactly what they did. They followed the commandments of the king.
So the heathen agreed according to the commandment of the king. Yea, many also the Israelites consented to his religion. They sacrificed unto his idols and they profaned the Sabbath. For the king had sent letters by messengers unto Jerusalem and to all the cities of Judah that they should follow these strange laws in this land.
He forbid burnt sacrifice. He forbid burnt offerings. He forbid drink offerings. He forbid any other offerings up unto himself in the temple. And that they should now profane the Sabbath and all the festival days.
They polluted the sanctuary and the holy people. They set up altars in the land. They set up groves. They set up chapels with idols. They sacrificed pig's flesh on the altar and any other unclean beast.
That they should also leave their children uncircumcised and make their souls abominable with all manner of uncleanness and profanity. To the end that they might forget their law, change their customs and that whosoever would not do according to the king's command would die.
So here it is. They have a choice. They're going to follow the Hellenization of Antiochus Epiphanes or are they going to follow God? What does it say most of them did? Most of them followed Antiochus Epiphanes because it was beneficial to save their neck.
And financially to their benefit. He even set up his own high priest in the temple. Now, this goes on for roughly three years. That's what gets a specific time frame. As that was going on, you can go on to read.
I think it's in the 54th or 56th sentence of Maccabees 1. He sets up the abomination of desolation. Where have we heard the abomination of desolation? Yeah, Matthew 24. So now we have to say, oh, wow, this is the abomination of desolation.
And that's why it says in Matthew 24 when he says, hey, when you see the abomination of desolation as the prophet Daniel spoke, let the reader understand. This happened one time in history. It was going to happen again.
Jesus foretold that was going to happen at the destruction of Jerusalem. So now we see the trajectory of what this little horn is going to do over history. One, he's going to persecute the people of God.
He's going to set himself up to be God. He's going to be worshipped like God. He's going to make war with the saints. And he's going to desecrate the holy place. That was his goal. Now, this went on for roughly three years.
And the city of Modine, if you say here was the Mediterranean, say Tel Aviv would be about right here, modern-day Tel Aviv. If you went straight over, you would have had a city.
Well, let me put the Jordan River right here.
One would be about right here. You had a city, Modine, about 21 miles northwest of Jerusalem. There was a temple set up, I mean an altar set up there for the people to come and offer swine's blood and all that to Antiochus and all of his gods.
So, it come time, the Syrian chief was there. He told a man by the name of Matthias, shows up. He said, it was either you offer the swine on the altar or you die. I mean, imagine you're standing there, John, and this guy says, hey, it's your turn.
And you go, I ain't going to do that. That's what happens. So, Matthias shows up there. It's almost like there's a line of people the way you read the story. And he gets there, and he says, he tells the Syrian officer, I ain't going to do that.
And the guy behind him says, no big deal, I'll do it. So, he offers swine on that altar. Matthias then grabs that dude's sword, turns around like Eleazar in the Old Testament. He kills the Jew for being blasphemous, and then he kills the Syrian guard.
Uh-oh.
What has just happened? You just killed the king's representative. This is a man by the name of Matthias. This is still in the Book of Maccabees? This is in the Book of Maccabees. This is a historical document, okay?
It's at that point that Matthias has sons, John, Jonathan, Simon, Eleazar, and Judas. Judas Maccabeus, what we're reading from. Judas the hammer. Maccabees means the hammer. And, buddy, it is all-out war against Antiochus and his people.
They start here. And they start guerrilla warfare against the Seleucid Empire. And they fight, and they fight, and they fight. They fight all the way to Jerusalem. And they are laying waste to Antiochus' people.
They then, in 163, they get to Jerusalem. They get to Jerusalem, and they fight, and they fight. They run Antiochus' men out. They kill everybody that's there. They then rededicate the temple. Does anybody know the holiday in which we recognize the rededication of the temple?
Hanukkah. Anybody know how that came about? How many of you all knew how that came about?
Well, I know you do.
You meet with me on Thursday. Well, I know you do too. So the Festival of Lights, which is cool, Jesus was even in, if you read in the Gospels, Jesus was even celebrating that very festival in the city when it was remembering the liberation of the Maccabean revolt from Antiochus.
That's what this is talking about. That is what Daniel 8 is talking about. Now, once they liberate the temple, they get it back. They start putting it back together. They then set up what would be called the Hasmonean dynasty, and then they are basically liberated, and Judea is ruled by the Hasmonean dynasty as an independent state for a number of years until Rome comes in.
And we'll get into that when we get to chapter 11. But Daniel is prophesying this event a couple hundred years before it takes place. Actually, 300 years before it takes place. Yes, sir?
In verse 25, when it says, He shall be broken, I think you're saying without human intervention.
Here's what happens. When it talks about being broken without human agency, that means he's not killed. He's not killed by a sword. He's not killed in war. Even like when it says that Alexander the Great, he didn't die in battle.
He died of either being poisoned, depending on how you understand it, either he was poisoned or he had fever. And both of those have merit. I mean, he could have been poisoned and got a fever.
I don't know.
But both of them have merit. In Antiochus' case, he went back, after having his can whipped, he went back to his home, and he died, from my understanding, of typhoid fever.
Typhoid fever.
Now, once again, last week we said God raises up Alexander the Great, and he throws him down. God raises up Antiochus Epiphanes, and he throws him down. And he can do it without human agency. He can do it with a parasite.
He can do it in such a way. I mean, who would have thought that Alexander the Great would not have died in battle?
I mean, I don't know about y 'all.
If you read any of his, all of his conquests, I mean, this dude got hit in the head with a sword. Cletus the Black had to come save him in one of the first battles that he had. He got hit and went through his helmet into his head.
He's laying on the ground. A guy's fixing to chop Alexander the Great's, either his head or his arm off, and Cletus the Black comes and whacks dude's arm off to save his life. I mean, he had gotten shoved, a spear shoved in him and broke off, and they had to do surgery on him.
Dude, imagine having to be cut open, stop the bleeding in the 300 B .C. There was no putting you to sleep. This is, hey, dude, you're going to bite on this real hard and we're going to hack you open so that we can get whatever's in you out and stop you from bleeding.
So I would have, I mean, you read all of his campaigns, and he was always out in the forefront fighting. It's not like these jacklegs we got up here calling shots from the Pentagon. This guy is in the front lines fighting, and that's how all these guys work.
So to think that Antiochus Epiphanes was probably going to die in battle or he was going to be assassinated because assassination of kings was pretty common. You know, the next guy says, hey, if I get rid of this guy, that means I get the reins.
Let me get this guy when he's asleep.
Or poison him.
But he died of typhoid fever from what we know. God did it. That's the point. God did it. God did it. God did it. Now, what did this do for the disposition of Daniel? What does it say? Sick. Sick.
Why?
I think he was just getting over the little horn two years ago, which is making war and blasphemies, and he's going, wait a minute. That's far off. There's going to be a couple more empires. Now in his mind, look, he knows at this point, he knows that the Babylonian Empire is on the decline.
He has already been told who's the next one coming up?
Persian.
So he goes, okay, I don't know how long, if it lasts as long as this one, it's not going to be long, and then the one after that is going to be the one that's going to make war with the saints. Hey, the Persian Empire, is there anything said bad about the Persian Empire towards God's people?
They were actually very benevolent. So in Daniel's mind, he's going, man, these guys were not waging war against us, but now the next two successive, after the one coming in, the next two successive empires will do nothing but persecute and punish and try to kill the people of God.
That was bothersome to him. What was Daniel's goal? What was he looking forward to? He was looking for the restoration. He was looking for the restoration of God's people back into the land. That's what he was looking forward to.
Hey, look, we know that Daniel was a student of the prophets.
Right?
We know that. We're going to actually learn that when we get into chapter 9. We're going to see that Daniel was actually reading the prophet Jeremiah and studying it. And it's that point he understood at that point, oh, wow, what we've been waiting for, the 70 years, per se, of captivity is over.
Now God's going to restore us. He's going to restore us back into the land. Good. You guys say something? Yes, there was some overlap. Daniel was taken, depending on how you see it. Some people think 605.
I say 603. But yeah, there was some overlap. And when he was taken into exile and Jeremiah, he prophesied up until probably 585, 584?
Because...
Yes. Oh, yeah. Yes. Yeah.
And I even went back.
I started thinking about it yesterday afternoon. I was piddling around at my shop and I had a thought come into my brain. I was like, man, I wonder if I could find any time that maybe Jeremiah went to Babylon.
Have I missed something? Did Jeremiah ever go to Babylon? And no, he did not. He never went to Babylon. So how did he get the scroll? How did he get the scroll? Did Jeremiah send that to him? Did it come through Nebuchadnezzar, Adaron, who was very benevolent to Jeremiah?
We don't know. But Jeremiah never went to Babylon. He did go to Egypt. And that is where supposedly he was stoned to death by his own people because when he got there, he said, hey, God told you all don't leave.
Put your neck under the yoke of Babylon. Then they said, no, we're leaving. And they kidnapped him and took him over there. And when he got there, he said, didn't I tell you don't come here? God told me to tell you.
He's going to follow you over here and he's going to have your women raped. He's going to have your daughters enslaved. And he's going to kill you. And they took up stones and killed him. The satraps.
Well, and not the satraps yet. But yeah, he was over that whole wise men guild, which had been the conjurers, the Chaldeans, the sorcerers, the magicians,.
All that.
Sure.
He would have certainly had the authority to tell one of them guys, go get, this is what I want. I know y 'all are going back and forth to Jerusalem. Get to Jeremiah. Because we do know this. Nebuchadnezzar did know Jeremiah.
We know that.
He actually took care of Jeremiah. I think I've said it a number of times. He took care of Jeremiah. Jeremiah said, hey, Nebuchadnezzar, you're the one, you're God's man to put these people into punishment.
You need to,.
I'm telling them to put themselves under your yoke and to do what they tell you to do. And I've told them if they do that, you'll be benevolent to them. Remember, that is what God told them. If you do what I tell you to do and put your neck under the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar, it will be good for you.
But they did not do that. They fought against it. But yeah, he could have very well. But I was just trying to find out, did they ever cross paths that we could find? And no. And we know Daniel never went back to Jerusalem.
Once he was exiled, he never made it back. I think he went other places in the kingdom, but never back to Jerusalem. Any more questions, comments? Sir?
Are we going to go next week?
No.
We're doing chapter 5 this morning. I'm going to preach chapter 5 this morning. Is that all right with you, Mike? You don't mind? Yeah, we'll do chapter 5 this morning. I'm going to preach that passage, and then we'll pick up in chapter 6 next week.
It was also amazing, too. Daniel saw that second kingdom. He actually lived in that second kingdom.
He did.
For a brief period of time. Because we don't know. And I'm going to bring that up when we get into Daniel chapter 9, because we don't know how long Daniel lived. We don't know how long Daniel lived once he got into Cyrus' kingdom.
We don't know. We know that he was put in an elevated place, but we don't know how long he lived. We know he was anywhere between 80 and 86 years old. You know, at that point. That's an old dude. That's an old guy who had a long life of being around nothing but pagan people.
And remained faithful. Think about Daniel's life, man. He could have indulged in any type, any type of pleasure he wanted. And he remained faithful. He remained faithful.
With Antiochus, he said that he considered himself the son of Zeus?
And what was his name?
What's that? Antiochus Epiphanes?
Yeah, what was his... He said that he called himself...
Somebody else called him... Oh, they called him Epimenes. Epimenes was a play on words, meaning the madman. So he called himself God Manifest, but his subjects... I mean, I'm sure they didn't say, hey, good morning, Antiochus Epiphanes.
I'm sure they didn't do that. But the hubbub on the street was he was a madman because of the things that he did. I mean, even... I'll probably read more of that when we get into Chapter 11 because there's more specific things that take place in Chapter 11.
We're not done with this guy yet.
We're not done.
He's going to get brought up again in more detail.
That's the Jewish mean man.
Gifts. Yeah, I mean, he even... And if the women circumcised their children, he would then take the child, tie their hands behind the woman's back, kill the child, and then make her wear it around her neck in the city.
That's the nutcase we're talking about.
Um...
Yeah, in a different way. Yeah, in a different way. Certainly there's some similarities. That's why we can say the little horn has things that it does.
It has characteristics.
And the little horn was one that waged its war against the people of God, claimed himself to be God. And certainly Nero claimed himself to be deity. I mean, not quite yet full... Oh, we got to go. And to a full-blown worship of emperors at that point.
Yeah, but yeah.
Mike, would you close us?