Daniel 8 - The Ram and the Goat

Daniel chapter eight is another vision that Daniel has, the vision of the ram and the goat.

As we saw last week, we've moved into a section of the book of Daniel that contains a variety of prophecies, visions that God gives Daniel about things that are to come, and that's what we will be looking at again this morning.

Before I read the text of Daniel 8, I want you to consider with me that if I refer to the day that will live in infamy, many of you know what day that is.

The day that will live in infamy.

It was an ordinary Sunday at a naval base in Hawaii.

There had been some hostility with the nation of Japan, but nobody was expecting a war.

And then all of a sudden, bombs were dropping on Pearl Harbor, and a war had begun.

It was totally a surprise attack, caught people off guard.

The day that will live in infamy.

It changed the course of history.

A bit more recently, we think of the morning of September 11, clear blue skies and the nice fall day over New York City and Washington, D.C., when suddenly planes flew into buildings and we were under attack.

And the event caught everybody off guard.

It was a total shock, a total surprise.

It was something that changed again the course of history.

In the life of a nation, there are events that happen that are surprising and unexpected and that change the way that we think things are going to go.

In our individual lives, there are such events as well.

In our individual lives, there are things that happen that catch us totally off guard and are unexpected.

A cancer diagnosis, sudden loss of a job, the death of a close friend or a family member, unexpected financial calamity.

These types of situations can catch us by surprise, they can shake us to the core, make us question a sense of security, and raise doubts about if anyone is really in control.

Life feels out of control sometimes, both on a national level and on a personal level.

Daniel chapter 8 is a vision that was given to Daniel to reassure the people of Israel that even though things seemed out of control, God remained in control.

Daniel 8 · chapter mention

It was a vision given to reassure Daniel and his friends that in the midst of uncertainty and hardship, there remained one thing for certain: God's rule and God's sovereignty over all things.

It's a reminder to us about the God that we serve, who sees the beginning from the end and is in control of all things.

It's a passage that predicts with remarkable accuracy events that would happen in the ancient world, not for another couple hundred years.

It predicts with remarkable accuracy things that nobody could have known at the time.

In verses 1 through 14, we have the vision itself.

And I'm going to read verses 1 through 14, and then we will discuss the details.

As we read, there are a lot of specific details.

We'll get into some of them, but the overwhelming thrust of the passage I want you to remember is God's knowledge of all things in the future and God's control.

So even if all of the little details might escape you at times, that's okay.

Let's focus on the big picture, and that is that God is in control.

Daniel chapter 8, starting in verse 1.

Daniel 8 · chapter mention

In the third year of King Belshazzar's reign, I, Daniel, had a vision after the one that had already happened appeared to me.

In my vision I saw myself in the Citadel of Susa in the province of Elam.

In the vision I was beside the Uli Canal.

I looked up, and there before me was a ram with two horns, standing beside the canal, and the horns were long.

One of the horns was longer than the other, but grew up later.

I watched the ram as it charged toward the west and the north and the south.

No animal could stand against it, and none could rescue from its power.

It did as it pleased and became great.

As I was thinking about this, suddenly a goat with a prominent horn between its eyes came from the west, crossing the whole earth without touching the ground.

It came toward the two-horned ram I had seen standing beside the canal and charged at it in a great rage.

I saw it attack the ram furiously, striking the ram and shattering its two horns.

The ram was powerless to stand against it.

The goat knocked it to the ground and trampled on it, and none could rescue the ram from its power.

The goat became very great, but at the height of its power the large horn was broken off, and in its place four prominent horns grew up toward the four winds of heaven.

Out of one of them came another horn which started small but grew in power to the south and to the east and toward the beautiful land.

It grew until it reached the host of the heavens, and it threw some of the starry hosts down to the earth and trampled on them.

It set itself up to be as great as the commander of the army of the Lord.

It took away the daily sacrifice from the Lord, and his sanctuary was thrown down.

Because of rebellion the Lord's people and the daily sacrifice were given over to it.

It prospered in everything it did, and truth was thrown to the ground.

Then I heard the Holy One speaking, and another holy one said to him, How long will it take for the vision to be fulfilled?

The vision concerning the daily sacrifice, the rebellion that causes desolation, the surrender of the sanctuary, and the trampling underfoot of the Lord's people.

He said to me, It will take twenty-three hundred evenings and mornings.

Then the sanctuary will be reconsecrated.

Let's pray.

Lord, give us grace and mercy to understand your word.

We thank you for the revelation of your truth.

Help us to be discerning and to receive willingly what you would have to teach us.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

In the verses we just read, there are a lot of details.

And as I mentioned, the details in the passage can at times perhaps become a little overwhelming, but we'll focus on a few key details of what Daniel sees.

And then verses 15 and following, which we will read in a moment, are the interpretation.

In the vision, Daniel sees two animals, a ram and a goat.

The ram has two long horns.

One horn was shorter than the other, but then the short horn grew, and the ram was so large that as this animal charged, nobody could stop it.

But then a goat appeared to challenge the ram.

A goat with a prominent horn between its eyes appeared.

It came from the west, it says, and it touched the whole earth without touching the ground.

The goat charged at the two-horned ram.

The ram was helpless against the goat.

The ram was destroyed, and these two animals battled with each other, and the goat won.

The goat rose to power.

It continued to grow, it became a large goat.

And as it was at its peak, it had a large horn that was broken off.

And four larger horns grew up in its place.

Out of one of the four horns came another horn.

It started off small, but grew up to be really large.

It grew up to heaven so high that some of the stars came down to earth.

And verse 11 is significant for understanding this horn that's on the goat.

It says in verse 11 that it set itself up to be as great as the commander of the army of the Lord.

It took away the daily sacrifice from the Lord, and his sanctuary was thrown down.

So this is a vision of a goat.

But in the vision, the goat is interfering with God's people worshiping.

It's desecrating the space where God's people worship and not allowing them to worship properly.

And in verse 12, it says that God's people were actually taken captive, were given over by this little horn on the goat.

Verse 12 says, Because of the rebellion, the Lord's people and the daily sacrifice were given over, it prospered in everything it did.

In other words, this is telling us this goat is symbolizing the fact that for a time God's people actually would experience hardship, trial, and persecution.

They would seem to be doing the right thing, going to at that time the temple, offering sacrifice and worship, as in that time was appropriate to do.

And yet there was something interfering with that.

It was hard, it was difficult.

It seemed like they were trying to do the right thing, but they just couldn't.

Sometimes in your life it might seem like you're trying to do the right thing, but there's opposition and there's difficulty and there's frustration and you don't know what to do.

And you ask, if I'm really trying to follow God, why is it so difficult?

The goat here symbolizes a force that makes it difficult for God's people to follow Him and to do the right thing.

In verses 13 and 14, Daniel hears a voice, and it says that it will take 2,300 evenings and mornings, then the sanctuary will be reconsecrated.

That is, the place of worship will be restored, and God's people will be able to worship again.

A lot of detail there, and it seems pretty opaque.

What's going on here?

Starting in verse 15, we have an interpretation.

Daniel says that he was watching the vision and he was trying to understand it.

He couldn't figure it out.

And then in verse 19, he receives an interpretation.

I'm going to tell you what will happen later in the time of wrath, because the vision concerns the appointed time of the end.

The two-horned ram that you saw represents the kings of Media and Persia.

The shaggy goat is the king of Greece, and the large horn between its eyes is the first king.

The four horns that replaced the one that was broken off represent four kingdoms that will emerge from his nation, but will not have the same power.

In the latter part of their reign, when rebels have become completely wicked, a fierce-looking king, a master of intrigue, will arise.

He will become very strong, but not by his own power.

He will cause astounding devastation and will succeed in whatever he does.

He will destroy those who are mighty, the holy people.

He will cause deceit to prosper, and he will consider himself superior.

When they feel secure, he will destroy many and take his stand against the prince of princes.

Yet he will be destroyed, but not by human power.

And so we have an interpretation here.

And it says that the ram, the two animals that Daniel saw, the goat and the ram.

The ram represents the kings of Media and Persia.

Media and Persia.

Now Daniel at that time was living under the Babylonian Empire.

Media and Persia were these two nations that existed, but they were small in comparison.

They didn't have any power.

And so the ram represents Media and Persia coming to power.

And then verse 21 says that the shaggy goat is the king of Greece, and the large horn between its eyes is the first king.

And so what we have represented here with these two animals is two world powers that would come onto the stage following Daniel receiving this vision.

He was living under Babylon, but he receives a vision here, and he says that the kingdom of Medo-Persia, Media and Persia, would rise and become powerful.

And then Greece would become powerful.

Now, Greece also existed in the time when Daniel received this vision, but Greece was just a small little nation.

It had no power at all.

The idea that Greece would become powerful and take over the whole area must have sounded ridiculous.

I mean, it'd be a little bit like, I don't know, if I told you all that Sweden was going to come invade Arkansas.

You'd say, what?

No, that's not going to happen.

Sounds totally implausible.

And yet that's what the vision says: that this tiny little nation, Greece, would rise to power, become powerful.

And it gives some detail about Greece, and it says that the four horns, there's a large horn, and then four horns replace that one.

And it represents four kingdoms that will emerge from Greece.

Four kingdoms will come from Greece.

And out of that fourth, those four kingdoms, there's one king in particular.

Verse 24, a fierce-looking king, a master of intrigue, will arise.

And so Daniel receives a letter from God about things that are to come.

That the kingdom of Media and Persia will come to power, the kingdom of Greece will then come to power after it.

And the four horns here, this speaks about the fact that when Greece came to power under the authority of Alexander the Great, Greece was the greatest kingdom in the area.

The large horn spoken of on the goat is identified as Alexander the Great by most commentators.

That's not explicit in the text, but looking back on this, commentators almost universally agree that this is a prophecy of Alexander the Great.

Between 334 and 330 BC, Alexander was a Greek ruler who came to power rapidly and swept through the area and took over most of the known world in that area.

He led the kingdom of Greece to heights that it had never seen before.

But then the prophecy says that four horns replaced the one that was broken off.

And this speaks about Alexander the Great's sudden death.

He rose to power rapidly, took over much of the known world.

But then in 323 BC, he died suddenly.

He was celebrating his victory with a heavy drinking party, and he got severely ill and died suddenly.

And after he died, his kingdom was divided up into four successors.

And there were four areas of his kingdom ruled by different kings.

And each of those four successors ruled part of Alexander's kingdom.

And that is the four horns spoken about here on the goat.

Verse 23 goes on to say that after the horn is broken off the goat, that a fierce-looking king, a master of intrigue, will arise.

And it gives particular detail about this ruler.

Says in verses 24 and 25, he will become very strong, he will cause astounding devastation, he will destroy those who are mighty, he will take his stand against the Prince of Peace.

So this is somebody who specifically targets God's people, and it's somebody who comes out of the four kingdoms of Greece after Alexander the Great.

And this is identified almost universally by commentators as a prophecy of a man named Antiochus Epiphanes IV.

He was a Greek ruler, Antiochus Epiphanes, who ruled over the land of Israel starting around 175 BC.

175 BC.

And when he came to power, he immediately came into the Jewish temple.

He banned all sacrifices.

He set up an altar to the Greek god Zeus.

He offered a pig as a sacrifice on the altar.

It was a form of profound disrespect and mockery to God.

He blasphemed God.

It'd be like somebody desecrating a church.

It would be a way of mocking God and mocking people who worship God.

This is what Antiochus Epiphanes did around 175.

And though he was ultimately destroyed and the temple restored, he became very powerful for a brief time.

And so God essentially tells Daniel by way of prophecy here that Neto-Persia and Greece are going to rise to power.

Greece is going to be broken off into four kingdoms, and then there is going to be one really bad dude who is going to oppress God's people, but in the end, he will be defeated.

Now there's a lot of history here, obviously.

There's a lot of history.

And it's natural when you hear all these details to ask, so what?

What does this mean for me?

After all, if you wanted an ancient history lesson, you could have gone to SIU for that.

You don't need to come to church for an ancient history lesson.

So what does this have to do with us?

Why am I telling you all this?

What is the big deal for 2026?

Well, I don't know about you, but I'm somebody who is easily startled.

I'm very jumpy.

And if somebody walks into a room suddenly, I jump.

Alright, if something happens, it's unexpected.

There's an unexpected noise or something.

I get a little scared.

Yeah, amen.

Some of you know that uh I have a new dog at home and I've been walking the dog, and something I've discovered about the dog is he's even jumpier than I am.

Sometimes if a leaf rustles, he starts barking his head off.

He's one jumpy little guy.

Doesn't like anything happen that's unexpected, or then he doesn't know what's going on.

Now in life, sometimes we can all be a little bit jumpy when things happen unexpectedly.

When things come about that are unknown to us, that we weren't anticipating, that we don't know how to navigate.

It's very difficult.

It can be a source of anxiety, it can be a source of fear.

In this text here, Daniel receives a vision around 550 BC, and it contains details about events that would not happen until about 175 BC.

That's about a 375-year gap.

This vision predicts details that would happen 375 years in advance, and it does so with remarkable accuracy.

If God is in control of the next 375 years of Daniel's life, he is in control of every day of the rest of your life.

God is well in control of every day that you will ever face.

There is no day you will ever encounter where God has not been there.

God is in control of every day that will happen.

And God reveals this vision to Daniel to reassure the people of Israel and their captivity that he remained in control.

As I said, during this time, you know, Greece was nothing.

It would have sounded ridiculous to say that Greece was going to become a great power and And it says exactly that.

And it tells us that God knows from the beginning from the end.

And it also tells us that God is in control when his people suffer.

God allowed the suffering and hardship of his people for a time, but he remained absolutely in control.

Often it is easy to look at our lives when things aren't going the way we think they should and to interpret them as evidence that God is no longer in control.

If God really were on the throne, things would be going my way.

If God really were on the throne, I wouldn't be so confused about what's happening right now.

If God were in control, I wouldn't be facing these health challenges or this hardship or whatever it is it may be.

God is in control.

He told Daniel 375 years or so in advance that nations would come and go, people would try to oppress the church, and yet God would remain in control.

Interestingly, there is an Old Testament scholar, a scholar of the ancient Near East of the Old Testament, who taught at Oxford University.

S.R.

Driver is his name.

He's not a believer, as far as I know.

And I want you to listen to what he says about this prophecy.

He's an ancient Near Eastern historian, and he says that actual events in history are described with surprising distinctiveness, right down to the period of Antiochus' persecution.

Antiochus Epiphanes IV is the individual I mentioned earlier who desecrates the temple about 175.

This non-believing ancient Near Eastern historian, Old Testament scholar, says that this predicts events with remarkable accuracy.

And you know what he concludes from this?

He concludes that the accuracy of this passage would imply that the author wrote during the period of the persecution itself.

In other words, it's so accurate that there's no way this can be a prophecy.

It's so accurate that there's no way this could have been written ahead of time.

And most non-believing Old Testament scholars and ancient historians actually say that this section of the book of Daniel was written hundreds of years after the fact and then given an earlier date so that it looked like a prophecy.

Because if you don't believe in a God who is in control of all things and knows the beginning from the end, there's no way to explain the existence of a text like this in 550 BC.

The only way to explain it is to explain it away, to say it's a forgery, it's a fake.

I have a more comforting explanation.

We have a God who knows the beginning from the end and has no problem telling us what's going to happen 375 years from now.

The remarkable accuracy of this passage reminds us of the control of God over all things.

So, what is it that you need to lay before the feet of God?

What is it in your life are you looking at and questioning whether God really is in control?

Take a moment.

Think about the events happening in your life, think about circumstances, think about things happening that challenge your view of God and God's sovereignty.

Consider the God who knows the beginning from the end, and for whom 375 years from now is not a mystery at all.

What may be a mystery to us is no mystery to him.

And he might not tell us every detail of every second of our lives like we might wish he would.

But even though we don't always understand his hand and the way that he works, we can trust his heart.

He is a good and caring God, and his heart is for us, even when his hand is mysterious.

Just because things appear out of control does not mean they actually are out of control.

And just because something is out of our control doesn't mean that it's actually out of control.

Just because it's out of your control doesn't mean it's out of God's control.

It is very much in the control of our all-knowing God.

I've played chess a couple times in my life.

I am by no means a great chess player.

I pretty much know how the pieces move.

But I'll tell you why I'm not a great chess player.

I have no strategy.

I only think one move ahead.

I only think one move ahead.

I think, oh, this piece can go there.

That's open.

And then I'm in checkmate.

And maybe if I would have looked a few moves ahead, I could have anticipated that that would have happened.

Sometimes I play with people, I've played chess with people who are actually really good at planning five, six, seven moves ahead.

And sometimes they make moves with their chess pieces that don't seem to make any sense.

And I think, wow, I'm a chess novice, but I know not to do that.

And then five moves later I see, ah, that's why he did that.

He checkmated me.

Yeah, when he made that move, he was already thinking five steps ahead.

He knew what he was doing.

I sure didn't.

That's the difference between me and a good chess player.

In life, we often can only think one or two steps ahead.

And because of that, our idea of what should happen is often determined by how nearsighted we are.

We look one or two steps ahead and think that's what should happen, and then when it doesn't happen, we blame God.

And think, well, God, if you'd turn over control of the world to me, I could have probably made a better decision.

But God doesn't think just one move ahead.

He's thinking 10, 20, 30, 375 moves ahead.

God is in control of the board.

And I encourage you not to let your limited knowledge and limited understanding cloud your vision of our Almighty God.

Come before Him, worship Him, and recognize that He alone is in ultimate control.

Not only is He in control, but He is good.

And because of that, we can trust Him with our futures.

Amen.