The Conspicuous Horn-Daniel 8:5-21;

As we begin this morning, please turn in your copies of God’s Word to Daniel chapter 8. we will be reading verses 5-21 shortly, so please have these verses marked and ready for that time.

In reading through chapter 8 of Daniel, it doesn’t take long before you notice something interesting mentioned multiple times throughout the chapter. That interesting thing is “horns” or “a horn” mentioned over and over again throughout. We see it first in verse 3, where Daniel writes;

Daniel 8:3 ESV

I raised my eyes and saw, and behold, a ram standing on the bank of the canal. It had two horns, and both horns were high, but one was higher than the other, and the higher one came up last.

Here we see 2 horns, both were high, but one was higher than the other and the higher one came up second. The angel, Gabriel, lets Daniel know that these 2 horns represent the kings of the Medes and the Persians in verse 20, and we know from history that the horn that was higher and arose later was the Persian Empire, which overthrew the empire of the Medes later in the year Daniel was prophesying here in chapter 8. But rather than make the Medes subservient, they welcomed them as equals. By the way, this, in and of itself, was a proof of the sovereignty of God.

Historically, when one empire conquered another, the defeated empire was humiliated, many times forced into slavery, at a minimum the conquering empire would lord their authority over the conquered empire. This was not the case for the conquered Median empire, they were welcomed as equals. Many, including me 2 weeks ago, will tell you that one of the reasons they were welcomed as equals, was that the 2 empires had multiple family ties. The king of the Median empire was King Cyrus grandfather, King Astyages and King Cyrus mother was his daughter, Princess Mandane. And while this is accurate, there is something deeper at play here, and that deeper thing is fulfilled prophecy.

This is actually the second time in Daniel that we see these 2 empires combined into one ruling empire. We see this both in chapter 7 as well as chapter 8. Here in chapter 8 we find out a more detailed description when we see the dominant ruler came from the later empire, specifically the Persian empire. Both point to one ruler being higher than the other, here in chapter 8, as well as Daniels prophecy that took place at least 2 years earlier in chapter 7, where the bear was raised up on one side. Ultimately, while God used the multiple family ties to form one empire out of the 2, both being equal, was to prove His complete sovereignty over all things.

But in some ways the fulfilled prophecy goes even deeper, and even further back.

Both Biblical as well as classical historians referred to this empire not as the Persian empire, despite the Persian empire being the more powerful of the 2, but the Medo-Persian empire, with the Median empire being listed first in the title. So what gives? Why is the Median empire, the weaker of the 2 listed first?

I believe this, too, comes as a result of fulfilled prophecy. Fulfilled prophecy from somewhere between 29-79 years earlier, in the book of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah 51:11 we read;

Jeremiah 51:11 ESV

“Sharpen the arrows! Take up the shields! The Lord has stirred up the spirit of the kings of the Medes, because His purpose concerning Babylon is to destroy it, for that is the vengeance of the Lord, the vengeance for His temple.

Here we see the Lord using the Medo-Persian empire to destroy the Babylonian empire to exercise His vengeance for Himself as well as His Temple, which was completely destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar of the Babylonian empire in 586 BC.

And in verse 28, we read;

Jeremiah 51:28 ESV

Prepare the nations for war against her, the kings of the Medes, with their governors and deputies, and every land under their dominion.

The “her” in this verse refers to the Babylonian empire. Jeremiah was written somewhere between 630-580 BC, 29-79 years before Daniel has this vision in chapter 8.

Actually, is it too late for me to change the timeline of God’s prophecy on who would destroy the Babylonian empire. While Jeremiah did prophecy the conquering empire would be the Median empire somewhere between 29-79 years earlier, it actually was prophesied even earlier, as in 131 to 189 years earlier, in the Book of Isaiah. We read in Isaiah 13:17-18

Isaiah 13:17–18 ESV

Behold, I am stirring up the Medes against them, who have no regard for silver and do not delight in gold. 18 Their bows will slaughter the young men; they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb; their eyes will not pity children.

The “them” mentioned in verse 17 is the Babylonian empire, which would be conquered by the Medo-Persian empire 12 years after Daniels prophecy in chapter 8, yet Isaiah predicts this will take place somewhere between 131 to 189 years earlier.

Actually, let me correct myself yet again, if you add 12 years to 550 BC, the year of Daniel vision in chapter 8, you get 538 BC, which was when the Medo-Persian empire conquered Babylon.

In other words, God was seeing to it that prophesies were fulfilled that took place not 131-189 years earlier, but 143-201 years earlier.

Have I mentioned that the overarching theme of the book of Daniel is the sovereignty of God?

Over all things

Over all history

Over all rulers

Past present and future, even our future, as some of the prophecies of Daniel are still in the future even for us.

Ok, so back to the horns. Horns are also mentioned in verses 5 & 6 of Daniel 8, where we read;

Daniel 8:5–6 ESV

As I was considering, behold, a male goat came from the west across the face of the whole earth, without touching the ground. And the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes. 6 He came to the ram with the two horns, which I had seen standing on the bank of the canal, and he ran at him in his powerful wrath.

We also see a horn or horns mentioned in verse 7, again in verse 8, where 4 new horns are added. Then in verse 9, one of those 4 horns rose even higher.

Gabriel also mentions horns as he reveals to Daniel the future his vision represented. We see this in verse 20, 21, and again in verse 22.

We looked at the ram with 2 horns, 2 weeks ago. We will look at the goat with 1 horn this week.

With that, will you please stand, in honor of the reading of God’s holy Word?

Daniel 8:5–21 ESV

As I was considering, behold, a male goat came from the west across the face of the whole earth, without touching the ground. And the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes. 6 He came to the ram with the two horns, which I had seen standing on the bank of the canal, and he ran at him in his powerful wrath. 7 I saw him come close to the ram, and he was enraged against him and struck the ram and broke his two horns. And the ram had no power to stand before him, but he cast him down to the ground and trampled on him. And there was no one who could rescue the ram from his power. 8 Then the goat became exceedingly great, but when he was strong, the great horn was broken, and instead of it there came up four conspicuous horns toward the four winds of heaven. 9 Out of one of them came a little horn, which grew exceedingly great toward the south, toward the east, and toward the glorious land. 10 It grew great, even to the host of heaven. And some of the host and some of the stars it threw down to the ground and trampled on them. 11 It became great, even as great as the Prince of the host. And the regular burnt offering was taken away from him, and the place of his sanctuary was overthrown. 12 And a host will be given over to it together with the regular burnt offering because of transgression, and it will throw truth to the ground, and it will act and prosper. 13 Then I heard a holy one speaking, and another holy one said to the one who spoke, “For how long is the vision concerning the regular burnt offering, the transgression that makes desolate, and the giving over of the sanctuary and host to be trampled underfoot?” 14 And he said to me, “For 2,300 evenings and mornings. Then the sanctuary shall be restored to its rightful state.” 15 When I, Daniel, had seen the vision, I sought to understand it. And behold, there stood before me one having the appearance of a man. 16 And I heard a man’s voice between the banks of the Ulai, and it called, “Gabriel, make this man understand the vision.” 17 So he came near where I stood. And when he came, I was frightened and fell on my face. But he said to me, “Understand, O son of man, that the vision is for the time of the end.” 18 And when he had spoken to me, I fell into a deep sleep with my face to the ground. But he touched me and made me stand up. 19 He said, “Behold, I will make known to you what shall be at the latter end of the indignation, for it refers to the appointed time of the end. 20 As for the ram that you saw with the two horns, these are the kings of Media and Persia. 21 And the goat is the king of Greece. And the great horn between his eyes is the first king.

May the Lord add His blessing to the reading of His Word, please be seated.

Now, let’s go before the Lord in prayer.

Heavenly Father,

These truths we just read from this, Your Living Word, are packed with significance and power. We ask of You that as we consider these truths this morning, that you would open our eyes, that we would miss nothing of which You have laid before us. We ask that You would open the eyes of minds and give us understanding of these truths, and we ask that You would then find in us soft and pliable hearts, ready to take these living truths and apply them to our lives, that we might better serve and honor You, and shine the light of Your glory and love into a world that is dark and in desperate need of transformation.

These things we pray, in Jesus Name, Amen

Now let’s look at;

The “Higher” Horn-Cyrus the Great. Vs. 3

As was mentioned at the beginning of this morning’s message, the ram with 2 horns represented the Medo-Persian empire, who at its birth as a combined empire was lead by Cyrus the Great. This empire lasted for right around 220 years and was defeated in 331 BC. We will discuss the defeat a little later.

The other Medo-Persian rulers.

The 220 years that followed saw at least 6 other prominent kings of the Medo-Persian Empire, as well as 4 other, whom we will say were less than prominent, and ruled a combined 88 years. We have highlighted some of them briefly in previous weeks.

The next ruler after Cyrus the Great was his son;

Cambyses.

He expanded the empire all the way down to Egypt. He was followed by;

Darius the Great.

Who was a brilliant administrator and organized the empire into 20 provinces, which assisted greatly in the management of the empire. Next was;

Xerxes.

Keep this name in mind as we will consider him further after we finish the list. Next was;

Artaxerxes.

He moved in and provided much needed stabilization of the empire, we will discuss why this was needed shortly.

He was followed by 4 other rulers who navigated through a time of great internal rebellion, which ended with the defeat of the last Medo-Persian ruler;

Darius III.

Darius the 3rd was the last Medo-Persian ruler and was defeated in 330 BC.

I mentioned Xerxes earlier and said we would get back to him. Well you may recognize him by another name.

Xerxes/Ahasuerus.

Xerxes is oftentimes identified as Ahasuerus and he is the king from the Book of Esther. He was believed by many to be one of the more egotistical, volatile and unhinged kings during the Medo-Persian Empire. He began to rule in 486 BC and 6 years into his reign he decided to launch an attack against the Grecian empire. He had a massive navy as well as a massive army. According the Greek historian, Herodotus, he had 1207 warships in his navy, he also estimated Xerxes had 1,700,000 foot soldiers as well as 80,000 in his cavalry plus additional camel and chariot soldiers. Some modern historians believe his numbers were exaggerated, but he clearly had a huge army and navy.

He used both his navy and his army to invade Greece. As he marched towards Europe and Greece, when the army arrived at Hellespont there was a body of water to cross. Rather than go up and around, he attempted to have a set of pontoon bridges built so they could cross on foot. Unfortunately, before they could cross, a violent storm blew in and destroyed the pontoon bridges. He was so angry he had all of the engineers and chief bridge builders beheaded. Then he proceeded to have the water given 300 lashes with chains, cursed the sea and and had iron fetters thrown in, to bind the sea. Did I mention he was volatile? Don’t forget, this was Queen Esther, from the book of Esthers husband. This gives you an idea why she was fearful to approach him to save the Jews from extinction.

But back to his behavior at Hellespont.

After having the pontoon bridges rebuilt and finally being able to cross the body of water, he made his way up through Macedonia and then down and into the area of Thermopylae where he achieved early success in the war at Thermopylae. From there the army marched into Attica and then defeated Athens. Not content just defeating Athens, Xerxes then burned Athens to the ground, again, he overachieved, slaughtering all the defenders and burning all of the many temples to the ground. This played a role in the ultimate defeat of the Medo-Persian empire 156 years later, which we will address shortly. Around that same time, he began to sail his massive naval fleet towards Salamis planning to completely defeat the Grecian empire. Unfortunately, another unexpected storm blew in and destroyed 1/3 of his naval fleet, about 400 warships. He had 200 of the remaining warships sail south around the island of Euboea, when another surprise storm blew in and destroyed all 200 of those warship.

At this point in time many of Xerxes military leaders implored him to wait on the west side of the Aegean Sea for the Grecian Navy, less than half the size of his remaining navy, to sail their direction, giving his navy the advantage. Due to the advice of a plant, sent from Greece pretending to be a traitor, bringing secrets about the Grecian navy being in disarray, Xerxes ignored the advice of his military advisors, and the Grecian navy then led him into a trap. In the end He had to retreat, leaving his foot soldiers behind, and they were defeated a year later.

Now, let me tell you how this fits in with the Biblical narrative, and especially with the prophetic vision of Daniel. This brings us to;

The Conspicuous Horn. Vs 5-7

Just a moment ago I noted Xerxes destruction of the city of Athens, which included burning it to the ground, making a special effort to completely destroy all of the temples in Athens. His desire was to completely humiliate the empire, certain it would destroy their morale and break their spirits. Actually, it had the opposite affect, it strengthened their resolve and built within the Grecian empire and intense hatred for the Persian Empire. Which brings us to Daniels vision and what we will see in verses 5-7.

Before we look at these verses. Let me take a moment to refresh your memories. Daniel had this vision in 551 BC. At that time the Babylonian empire still ruled the known world. They would rule for another 12 years before they were conquered by the Medo-Persian empire in 539 BC. About a year after this vision we see in chapter 8, Cyrus conquered the Median empire and united both the Persians and the Medians to form the Medo-Persian empire. This empire lasted for right around 220 years.

When Daniel sees this goat with the conspicuous horn, he is looking approximately 221 years into the future. At the time of his vision, the Persian empire was still quite small and had not conquered the Medes yet. And there was literally no unified Greek empire. So neither the ram with 2 horns nor the goat with 1 conspicuous horn was on the scene during this vision. We looked at the ram 2 weeks ago, now lets look at the goat. We read in verses 5-7

Daniel 8:5–7 ESV

As I was considering, behold, a male goat came from the west across the face of the whole earth, without touching the ground. And the goat had a conspicuous horn between his eyes. 6 He came to the ram with the two horns, which I had seen standing on the bank of the canal, and he ran at him in his powerful wrath. 7 I saw him come close to the ram, and he was enraged against him and struck the ram and broke his two horns. And the ram had no power to stand before him, but he cast him down to the ground and trampled on him. And there was no one who could rescue the ram from his power.

We see the male goat coming from the west, of course we know the eventual Greek empire was west of Babylon. For a moment, I’d like to jump ahead to a phrase in verse 6 and another in verse 7. In verse 6 we see of the goat that “he ran at him in his powerful wrath.” Then in verse 7 we see “he was enraged against him ”. Now fast forward 70 years where we see Xerxes completely destroy Athens, burn it to the ground, with special attention placed on all of the temples located in the area. Again his hope was that this would humiliate them and break their spirits, he underestimated their resolve. Now fast forward another 150 years. Which, by the way brings us to the identity of the conspicuous horn. Any idea who the conspicuous horn represents?

The Conspicuous Horn is: Alexander the Great.

The Greeks never forgot what Xerxes did, they held on to their resentment and hatred for 150 years. Not long before Alexander the Great’s father, Philip II passed away, he organized the Greek city-states into the League of Corinth with the explicit, officially stated goal of invading Persia to exact revenge for Xerxes’ past destruction of Greek temples and cities. Alexander adopted and fulfilled this very mission when he began his campaign in 334 BC. Alexander formed his entire crusade on this framework.

Which our great God, the Ancient of Days, the timeless God, El Elyon, the Most High God. El Roi, the God Who Sees, Who see the past, Who sees the present, Who sees the future, because He is not bound by time or space, He sees into the future because He’s already been there! Our great God saw all of this 220 years before it took place!

Did I say 220 years. Change that to 222 years, because he saw the rise of what would become the Greek empire led by Alexander the Great 2 years earlier in his first vision.

Did I say 222 years? Make that 274 years, because 52 years earlier, King Nebuchadnezzar, of the Babylonian empire, saw the rise of what would become the Greek empire in his vision of the statue recorded in chapter 2 of Daniel.

Actually, forget 220 years, forget 222 years, and forget 274 years. Our timeless God, the Omniscient-all knowing One, has known all of these details before He laid the foundation of the earth.

This is the God Whom we serve!

Let me ask you a question here.

How are things going in your world? In some ways it seems this great nation we live in is fading quickly. What was once considered undeniably good and right has been turned upside down and is now considered bad and wrong. Morality has been turned on its head.

Many you and I know are facing insurmountable tragedy, even death at this very moment. Fires rage, there is a major war in the middle east, another between Russian and Ukraine, and probably many more I don’t know about. Antisemitism is growing like fertilized crops all around the globe. And you hear me saying that God is in control!

When Daniel had this vision, he was 55 years into what would be 70 years of captivity for the Nation of Judah. He was kidnapped from his home and brought to the Babylonian empire 55 years earlier, and one of the things God was communicating to him in these visions was that as the Sovereign God, He knew the beginning from the end and all of these things were a part of His perfect plan.

Daniel understand our pain, if he were standing here alongside me this morning he would say to us;

Don’t focus on the troubles of today, no matter how great they may be. Instead, fix your eues on our sovereign Lord. Trust His perfect plan. Let me close with a verse we looked at 3 weeks ago;

Isaiah 26:3–4 ESV

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed onYou, because he trusts in You. 4 Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.

Heavenly Father,

While there are things we see happening in this world that are troubling, even tragic. We follow the lead of Daniel, the lead of Isaiah, the lead of the prophet Jeremiah, who wrote, For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. 12 Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will hear you. 13 You will seek Me and find Me, when you seek Me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you, declares the Lord.

This morning, we seek You with all our hearts, and we trust You and Your perfect plan.

We pray this in the Name of Jesus our Savior,

Amen