The King's Impossible Dream

The most powerful man in the world sits up in bed, heart pounding. The palace is silent. He has seen something in the night that he cannot shake off. And by morning, someone is going to have to explain it.

It is the second year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign in Babylon. Daniel and his three friends, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, have finished their training and joined the king's wise men. Babylon has a whole class of experts for moments like this: magicians, enchanters, sorcerers and Chaldeans, people who study the stars and claim to read the meaning of dreams. The king summons them all.

“I have had a dream,” says the king, “and my spirit is troubled to know it.” “O king, live for ever,” they reply. “Tell your servants the dream, and we'll give the interpretation.” But the king has a test in mind. “No. You tell me the dream, and then its meaning. If you can't, you will be cut in pieces, and your houses turned into rubbish heaps. If you can, you will have gifts and great honour.” They protest. “There is no one on earth who can do what the king asks. Only the gods could tell you, and they do not live among people.” The king is furious. He orders that all the wise men of Babylon be put to death. And that includes Daniel and his friends.

Arioch, the captain of the king's guard, comes to carry out the order. Daniel speaks to him with wisdom and tact. “Why is the decree so urgent?” Arioch explains. Daniel goes to the king and asks for time. Then he goes home to his three friends, and they do the one thing they can. They pray, asking the God of heaven for mercy concerning this secret. That night, in a vision, the mystery is revealed to Daniel. And before he does anything else, he praises God. “Blessed be the name of God for ever and ever, for wisdom and might are his. He reveals deep and secret things. He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with him.”

Daniel stands before the king. “No wise man can show the king this secret. But there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets.” Then he describes the dream. A huge statue, dazzling and terrifying. Its head of fine gold. Its chest and arms of silver. Its belly and thighs of bronze. Its legs of iron, its feet part iron and part clay. Then a stone, cut out without human hands, strikes the statue on its feet. The whole thing shatters, and the pieces blow away like chaff from a threshing floor. And the stone grows into a great mountain that fills the whole earth.

“You, O king, are the head of gold,” says Daniel. “The God of heaven has given you your kingdom.” After him will come other kingdoms, one after another, silver, bronze, then iron, strong but finally divided and brittle. Jewish and Christian readers have long discussed which empires these are, and they have not all agreed. But the end of the dream is plain. “The God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed. It will break all these kingdoms in pieces, and it shall stand for ever.” Nebuchadnezzar falls on his face. “Truly, your God is God of gods and Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets.” He makes Daniel ruler over the province of Babylon, and at Daniel's request sets his three friends over its affairs.

Here is something you can't hear in translation. The book of Daniel was written in two languages. It begins in Hebrew. But at chapter 2, verse 4, just as the wise men speak to the king, it switches into Aramaic, the common language of the Babylonian and Persian empires. And it stays in Aramaic until the end of chapter 7. Then it returns to Hebrew. Scholars still discuss why.

The king's impossible dream. You'll find it in Daniel chapter 2. The great statue of human power looked unbeatable, but a small stone from God outlasted it all. And Daniel's first move, before going to the king, was to pray with his friends. So here's the question to carry with you. When you face something impossible, who will you pray with first?