People of the Bible

Nebuchadnezzar

Burned the temple, built the greatest city in the world, and ended up eating grass.

Nebuchadnezzar is the most powerful man in the world for forty years and the instrument that ends the kingdom of Judah. He takes Jerusalem in three stages, deports the skilled and the young, burns the house and breaks the walls. In Babylon he is a man who cannot be argued with: he demands a dream be told before it is interpreted, he builds an image of gold and a furnace to enforce it, and he asks who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands. The book answers the question four times.

Where he appears2 Kings 24 to 25 · Daniel 1 to 4

2 Kings Daniel

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The movements, in the order the text gives them.

The Account of Nebuchadnezzar

01
2 Kings 24:8-17
The first deportation
He takes the treasures, the craftsmen and the smiths, ten thousand captives, and leaves none except the poorest sort of the people of the land. Ezekiel and the young men of Daniel 1 go in these years.
Babylon takes the people who know how to make a country work. Princes, fighting men, craftsmen, smiths: the list is not decorative. Jerusalem loses its leadership, its military strength, and the skilled hands needed to rebuild. The poorest remain, but the institutions around them have been carried away. A city can still have inhabitants and be stripped of much of its capacity to stand.
The gold receives the same treatment. Solomon's vessels, made for the temple, are cut in pieces, yet the sentence ends with as the LORD had said. That small clause refuses to let Babylon write the meaning of its own victory. Nebuchadnezzar has conquered Jerusalem; the Second Book of Kings does not conclude that he has conquered Jerusalem's God. The judgment belongs within the prophetic word already spoken against Judah.
The final act is a naming. Nebuchadnezzar does not abolish the throne immediately. He selects its occupant and changes Mattaniah's name to Zedekiah. A son of David still sits in Jerusalem, but another king now determines who that son will be called. The crown remains. Its freedom does not.
Verse by verse
1. 24:12
  The eighth year is Nebuchadnezzar's regnal year. Jehoiachin has reigned only three months, as verse 8 specifies.
2. 24:13
  The temple is plundered here, not yet burned. Its burning belongs to the later catastrophe in 2 Kings 25:8-9.
3. 24:17
  Mattaniah is Jehoiachin's uncle, not his son. The name change makes the Babylonian king's authority over the appointment explicit.
Worth knowing
Jeremiah 25:9 calls Nebuchadnezzar, spelled Nebuchadrezzar there, God's servant in the judgment of Judah. Only three verses later, Jeremiah 25:12 announces punishment for Babylon's own iniquity. The title describes a role in God's purpose, not approval of everything the ruler does. The conqueror is an instrument, not an exception to judgment.
2 Kings 24:8-17
King James Version · 10 verses
24:8Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. And his mother’s name was Nehushta, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem.
24:9And he did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father had done.
24:10At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against Jerusalem, and the city was besieged.
24:11And Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came against the city, and his servants did besiege it.
24:12And Jehoiachin the king of Judah went out to the king of Babylon, he, and his mother, and his servants, and his princes, and his officers: and the king of Babylon took him in the eighth year of his reign.
24:13And he carried out thence all the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king’s house, and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold which Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of the LORD, as the LORD had said.
24:14And he carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valour, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and smiths: none remained, save the poorest sort of the people of the land.
24:15And he carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, and the king’s mother, and the king’s wives, and his officers, and the mighty of the land, those carried he into captivity from Jerusalem to Babylon.
24:16And all the men of might, even seven thousand, and craftsmen and smiths a thousand, all that were strong and apt for war, even them the king of Babylon brought captive to Babylon.
24:17And the king of Babylon made Mattaniah his father’s brother king in his stead, and changed his name to Zedekiah.
02
Daniel 2:1-13
Tell me the dream and its meaning
He will not say what he saw, and the wise men point out that no king has ever asked such a thing. He decrees the death of all of them, which is how Daniel hears about it.
The experts would like the normal arrangement: the king supplies the dream, and they supply its meaning. Nebuchadnezzar declines. His demand makes the hidden information itself the test of their claim to interpret it. An explanation can sound impressive when nobody can check it; a dream accurately repeated is another matter. The court's entire apparatus of knowledge has been asked to show its working.
His power is enormous and almost useless for the task. He can summon specialists, promise wealth, demolish houses, and order executions. None of those acts can produce the knowledge he lacks. The threat grows precisely where his reach ends. By verse 13 it has spread to Daniel and his companions, although they have not appeared in this exchange. One man's troubled sleep has become other men's death sentence.
The advisers finally say that only the gods could answer, and that their dwelling is not with flesh. That is more than a professional disclaimer. It draws a boundary between divine knowledge and human life which the rest of the chapter directly challenges. Their honest admission of helplessness is the most important thing they say. Nebuchadnezzar responds by ordering them killed.
Verse by verse
1. 2:5
  The Aramaic azda is disputed: the KJV reads the thing as gone, while another established reading makes the royal decision firm. The verse should not be treated as unambiguous proof of a forgotten dream.
2. 2:9
  Nebuchadnezzar explicitly makes disclosure of the dream the test of a trustworthy interpretation. His accusation of lying is his accusation, not independent proof that every adviser is fraudulent.
3. 2:11
  Rare here means difficult or extraordinary, not merely uncommon. Daniel 2:27-28 agrees that human specialists cannot supply the answer and attributes its disclosure to God.
Worth knowing
Daniel 2:4 marks an actual change of language within the book. After the introductory words, the speech begins the Aramaic section that continues through Daniel 7:28. The KJV calls the language Syriack. The discussion of the king's dream therefore also stands at a linguistic doorway: the book's international court accounts proceed in Aramaic.
Daniel 2:1-13
King James Version · 13 verses
2:1And in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams, wherewith his spirit was troubled, and his sleep brake from him.
2:2Then the king commanded to call the magicians, and the astrologers, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans, for to shew the king his dreams. So they came and stood before the king.
2:3And the king said unto them, I have dreamed a dream, and my spirit was troubled to know the dream.
2:4Then spake the Chaldeans to the king in Syriack, O king, live for ever: tell thy servants the dream, and we will shew the interpretation.
2:5The king answered and said to the Chaldeans, The thing is gone from me: if ye will not make known unto me the dream, with the interpretation thereof, ye shall be cut in pieces, and your houses shall be made a dunghill.
2:6But if ye shew the dream, and the interpretation thereof, ye shall receive of me gifts and rewards and great honour: therefore shew me the dream, and the interpretation thereof.
2:7They answered again and said, Let the king tell his servants the dream, and we will shew the interpretation of it.
2:8The king answered and said, I know of certainty that ye would gain the time, because ye see the thing is gone from me.
2:9But if ye will not make known unto me the dream, there is but one decree for you: for ye have prepared lying and corrupt words to speak before me, till the time be changed: therefore tell me the dream, and I shall know that ye can shew me the interpretation thereof.
2:10The Chaldeans answered before the king, and said, There is not a man upon the earth that can shew the king’s matter: therefore there is no king, lord, nor ruler, that asked such things at any magician, or astrologer, or Chaldean.
2:11And it is a rare thing that the king requireth, and there is none other that can shew it before the king, except the gods, whose dwelling is not with flesh.
2:12For this cause the king was angry and very furious, and commanded to destroy all the wise men of Babylon.
2:13And the decree went forth that the wise men should be slain; and they sought Daniel and his fellows to be slain.
03
Daniel 3:13-25
Who is that God
Given a refusal he cannot buy off, he heats the furnace seven times more. Then he counts four figures walking in the fire and calls the three out by name and by title, servants of the most high God.
Nebuchadnezzar offers another performance of the music, as though the trouble were a missed cue. It is not. The three men have understood the command perfectly. Their answer separates God's ability to rescue from their willingness to bow: the refusal remains even if deliverance does not come. But if not removes the bargain from their obedience. The king can decide the punishment; he cannot purchase their worship with a reprieve.
His challenge concerns deliverance out of his hands. The chapter answers with bodies. The strongest soldiers in his army bind the prisoners, yet the heat kills the soldiers. The prisoners fall bound and are seen walking loose. That reversal is sharper than a general claim that something miraculous happened. The apparatus of royal control fails at each physical point where it was supposed to be strongest.
Nebuchadnezzar has to ask his own officials to confirm the arithmetic. Three went in; four are visible. The fourth figure does not arrive with a recorded speech, a name, or an explanation. His presence is shown beside the threatened men. The king who demanded worship is reduced to reporting what he cannot control.
Verse by verse
1. 3:16
  Not careful means that they have no need to construct a defense in this matter, not that they answer carelessly.
2. 3:18
  The refusal is not conditional on surviving. The passage does not say that they possessed advance knowledge of the rescue.
3. 3:22-25
  The soldiers die from the heat, while the prisoners are unharmed and unbound. Hebrews 11:34 recalls the quenching of the violence of fire among the acts of faith.
Worth knowing
The Aramaic phrase behind the KJV's the Son of God is bar elahin, literally a son of gods or a divine being. In Daniel 3:28 Nebuchadnezzar calls the deliverer God's angel. Identifying the figure specifically as the preincarnate Christ is a Christian interpretation; the king's wording alone does not settle that identification.
Daniel 3:13-25
King James Version · 13 verses
3:13Then Nebuchadnezzar in his rage and fury commanded to bring Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego. Then they brought these men before the king.
3:14Nebuchadnezzar spake and said unto them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up?
3:15Now if ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and worship the image which I have made; well: but if ye worship not, ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?
3:16Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
3:17If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.
3:18But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
3:19Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury, and the form of his visage was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego: therefore he spake, and commanded that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated.
3:20And he commanded the most mighty men that were in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, and to cast them into the burning fiery furnace.
3:21Then these men were bound in their coats, their hosen, and their hats, and their other garments, and were cast into the midst of the burning fiery furnace.
3:22Therefore because the king’s commandment was urgent, and the furnace exceeding hot, the flame of the fire slew those men that took up Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego.
3:23And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, fell down bound into the midst of the burning fiery furnace.
3:24Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonied, and rose up in haste, and spake, and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? They answered and said unto the king, True, O king.
3:25He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.
04
Daniel 4:28-33
Is not this great Babylon
Walking on the roof of his palace twelve months after the warning, he says it out loud. The sentence falls while the word is still in his mouth.
Twelve months stand between the warning and the boast. That interval matters because the judgment does not interrupt an uninformed man. Daniel has interpreted the dream and urged the king to break with his sins by righteousness and mercy to the poor. The delay gives the warning room to be answered. What comes out of Nebuchadnezzar's mouth instead is my power and my majesty.
The boast gathers Babylon into one man's achievement. The answer from heaven is equally concentrated: the kingdom is departed from thee. He has barely finished claiming possession before possession is denied. The Book of Daniel places the two voices almost on top of one another, while the word was in the king's mouth. There is no prolonged contest between them.
Then the language becomes humiliatingly physical: grass, dew, hair, nails. The man who looked over a royal city can no longer maintain the ordinary boundaries of human life. The description does not require a modern diagnosis, nor does it say that his body literally becomes an animal. It records his degradation and names its appointed limit: until he knows that rule is given by the Most High. The boast is answered at its root.
Verse by verse
1. 4:29
  The twelve months follow the dream and Daniel's counsel in 4:27. They should not be confused with the seven times of the announced judgment.
2. 4:32
  The Aramaic iddan means a period of time and is commonly understood here as a year. The KJV itself retains seven times rather than specifying years.
3. 4:33
  Hair like eagles' feathers and nails like birds' claws are comparisons. The passage supplies no medical diagnosis or statement of bodily transformation.
Worth knowing
Daniel 4:12 describes the great tree feeding creatures and sheltering beasts. In Daniel 4:20-22 that tree is identified as Nebuchadnezzar. When the judgment makes him live among beasts and eat grass, the imagery folds back on itself: the ruler represented as their shelter must now share their exposed life. The connection is built into the dream's own interpretation.
Daniel 4:28-33
King James Version · 6 verses
4:28All this came upon the king Nebuchadnezzar.
4:29At the end of twelve months he walked in the palace of the kingdom of Babylon.
4:30The king spake, and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?
4:31While the word was in the king’s mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, saying, O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee.
4:32And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field: they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall pass over thee, until thou know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
4:33The same hour was the thing fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar: and he was driven from men, and did eat grass as oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven, till his hairs were grown like eagles’ feathers, and his nails like birds’ claws.
05
Daniel 4:34-37
I lifted up my eyes
At the end of the days he looks up and his understanding returns, and the chapter that began as a royal proclamation ends with him praising the King of heaven, whose ways are judgment.
The royal first person comes back with the king's understanding. After the account of his degradation, I Nebuchadnezzar resumes the testimony. But the I has changed its work. Earlier it gathered power and majesty into the speaker; now it reports blessing, praise, and honor directed beyond him. The grammatical center remains Nebuchadnezzar. The center of authority does not.
His restored kingdom is not presented as proof that the humiliation meant nothing. Counselors return, honor returns, and excellent majesty is added, but every restored possession now sits beneath an everlasting dominion that is not his own. The contrast is not simply a weak king becoming strong again. It is a king receiving back what he had once described as self-made.
The final sentence is unusually costly public speech. Those that walk in pride he is able to abase includes the man publishing it. The king does not merely praise a God who humiliates enemies. He records his own humiliation and calls the divine ways judgment. The chapter does not provide a complete account of his later religious practice. It does provide this confession, with the royal name still attached. His recovery includes the ability to give the glory away.
Verse by verse
1. 4:34
  Lifting his eyes to heaven reverses the direction of the earlier royal self-contemplation. The verse places this act beside the return of understanding without supplying a medical explanation.
2. 4:35
  None can stay his hand contrasts with Nebuchadnezzar's challenge about deliverance from his hands in Daniel 3:15.
3. 4:37
  The king explicitly attributes truth and judgment to God's works and ways. The passage does not record every subsequent belief or act of worship in his life.
Worth knowing
Daniel 4:34 uses understanding and 4:36 uses reason for the same Aramaic noun, manda. The apparent change of English vocabulary does not describe two separate recoveries. The same faculty returns, first mentioned alongside praise and then alongside restoration to office. Daniel 2:21 also uses this noun for the knowledge God gives.
Daniel 4:34-37
King James Version · 4 verses
4:34And at the end of the days I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up mine eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the most High, and I praised and honoured him that liveth for ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation:
4:35And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?
4:36At the same time my reason returned unto me; and for the glory of my kingdom, mine honour and brightness returned unto me; and my counsellors and my lords sought unto me; and I was established in my kingdom, and excellent majesty was added unto me.
4:37Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.

Why it matters

Daniel keeps him as a person rather than a symbol, which is rare for an enemy king. He rages and he also falls on his face; he threatens execution and then promotes the men who defied him; he publishes a decree of his own humiliation in the first person. The lesson he is given is repeated so often it becomes a refrain: that the Most High rules in the kingdom of men and gives it to whomsoever he will, and sets over it the basest of men.

12 songs

The music

Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.

2 Kings 23:31-25:30
Jerusalem Was Broken Up
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2 Kings 24-25; 2 Chronicles 36
The City Burned
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Daniel 1:1-21
Daniel Purposed in His Heart
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Daniel 1
Ten Times Better
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Daniel 2:1-49
A Stone Cut without Hands
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Daniel 2
The Stone Without Hands
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Daniel 3:16-30
Gold in the Fire
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Daniel 3:1-30
In the Midst of the Fire
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Daniel 3
Through the Fire
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Daniel 3:1-30
We Will Not Serve Thy Gods
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Daniel 4
The King Ate Grass
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Daniel 4:1-37
Till Seven Times Pass over Thee
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Nebuchadnezzar

The Account of Nebuchadnezzar

The first deportation

Verse by verse

2 Kings 24:8-17

Tell me the dream and its meaning

Verse by verse

Daniel 2:1-13

Who is that God

Verse by verse

Daniel 3:13-25

Is not this great Babylon

Verse by verse

Daniel 4:28-33

I lifted up my eyes

Verse by verse

Daniel 4:34-37

Why it matters

The music

Jerusalem Was Broken Up

The City Burned

Daniel Purposed in His Heart

Ten Times Better

A Stone Cut without Hands

The Stone Without Hands

Gold in the Fire

In the Midst of the Fire

Through the Fire

We Will Not Serve Thy Gods

The King Ate Grass

Till Seven Times Pass over Thee

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