The "Little Horn" of Daniel 7:8

To begin our subject, we must understand there are two “little horns” in the book of Daniel, (1) the catholic pope, and (2) Mohammed. The following is what I stated in WTL #55: “In WTL #54 for October, 2002, we discussed the ‘little horn’ of Daniel 8:9. As I had pointed out, the ‘little horn’ in that passage is not the same as the ‘little horn’ of Daniel 7:8. How often have you read or heard someone referring to the ‘little horn’ of Daniel, but they never indicate which ‘little horn’ of Daniel they are talking about? To many, both ‘little horns’ are the same entity in their reasoning, and that simply is not true. To comprehend where we are on our walk through Daniel, you will need back issue #’s 49, 53 & 54. In lesson #54, we established that the ‘little horn’ of Daniel 8:9 was Mohammed.” With this paper we will consider only the ‘little horn’ of Daniel 7:8. This is imperative to grasp the book of Revelation.

Symbolic Prophecies: In chapters 7 and 8, we are dealing with symbolic rather than literal interpretation. Both of these symbolic prophecies are concerned with ‘little horns’ representing powers that arise out of two of the beasts that represent great empires of history. Notice they are not those great empires themselves, but specific powers that rose out of them.

Although William Fowler erred in his End Time Revelation, he was quite an accomplished prophecy student. It is regrettable there are not more men of his caliber today! On pages 126-128, he explained the ‘little horn’ in Daniel chapter 7 of the fourth (or the Roman) empire, where he stated:

“Daniel had a dream in which he saw four great beasts, the fourth having ten horns among which an eleventh little horn sprang up. In the interpretation we are told that the four beasts represent four kingdoms or empires, and the ten horns are ten kings or kingdoms that arise out of the last empire. None of the empires are named but it is widely assumed that they are the same as the four empires represented by the parts of the metallic image in chapter 2. The four beasts, and the ten horns of the fourth beast serve only to introduce, identify and locate the little horn that forms the main feature of this prophecy. This clearly represents a person of power hostile to the children of Yahveh, for we are told that it ‘made war with the saints’, and would prevail ‘for a time, two times, and a half a time’ (verse 25, R.S.V.). As we have previously shown, this is equivalent to 1,260 prophetic ‘days’, or years, or (360x3) +180 = 1260.

“To identify the ten horns of the fourth beast, which was the Roman Empire, one has but to examine history which records that ten kingdoms arose after A.D. 476 in the western half of the Roman Empire, while the eastern half continued to flourish. History also reveals that Justinian, at the head of the Eastern (Roman) Empire at Constantinople subdued three of the ten kingdoms which were established in the western half of the Roman Empire after the fall of Imperial Rome. These were the Vandals, whose kingdom had been established in north Africa, the Ostrogoths, who had established a kingdom in Italy, and the Alemanian kingdom north of Italy. ‘And he shall be diverse from the first, and shall subdue three kings’, (verse 24). Justinian, as head of the civil government, united the interest of the church and established the Temporal Power of the Papacy which clearly fulfilled the prophetic little horn by dominating Europe for 1,260 years until curtailed by Napoleon, (538 A.D. to 1,798 A.D.). [10-toed provinces = 10 horns. Correction: The three kingdoms = Italy, Africa, Spain, but not the Alemanni. C.A.E.]

“‘And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws” (verse 25). Justinian’s best known work was as a codifier and legislator. He greatly stimulated legal studies, and set up a commission under Tribonian which issued the codex, the digest, and the institutes. (Originally introduced in Dec. 534 A.D., and completed in 538 A.D.) The second edition of the codex contained Justinian’s own laws, known as the Novels (Novellae Constitutions). One need only read the utterance of Pope Innocent III in the thirteenth century and his immediate successors to recognize the fulfillment of speaking ‘great words against the Most High.’ Study the history of the inquisition with its massacres, martyrdoms and every kind of persecution to substantiate this interpretation. (See Halley’s Bible Handbook, chapter on Church History, pp. 757-804).

“If our understanding of the identity of the little horn is correct, then it follows that the Papacy is represented in verse 20: ‘they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end’ (verse 26). The process is still continuing, and will only be completed by our Lord at His coming, when the kingdom ‘shall be given to the people of the saints (Israel, white race) of the Most High’ (verse 27). This is reiterated in Rev. 19:20 when the false prophet (who is the head of the false ecclesiastical system), known today as the ‘Ecumenical movement’, probable heir of (Roman Catholicism) is defeated by Christ at His return, and cast into the ‘lake of fire’.”

I would state this: those who do not have a comprehension of this subject, as explained here by William V. Fowler, should withhold any opinion on the topic until they come to a proper understanding on the matter! If one has no knowledge concerning Justinian, and how he fits Daniel’s prophecy, one should simply keep quiet for fear of the shame that comes by exposing their wretched illiteracy! I would remind the reader, there was a time when I was woefully ignorant of these things, and I’m now ashamed of my former unscholarly opinions!

The Biblical passage that nearly everyone takes out-of-context is Daniel 7:24-25, which we will read at this time:

“²⁴ And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings. ²⁵ And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.”

This is one of the key passages “futurists” use to prove a future so-called Antichrist and a three and one half year period of tribulation, along with the so-called mark of the beast. If our people understood history, they wouldn’t be falling for such nonsense. All that futurist bunk was dreamed up by a Spanish Jesuit by the name of Ribera about 1580 A.D., and no one before that time ever heard of such a doctrine.

The important thing to notice with this passage is that we are looking for a king of a kingdom who subdued three other kingdoms of our people during his reign. You will also notice we are looking for a king who, during his reign, had a very strong impact upon writing and managing laws. You will notice Justinian fits both of these qualifications. As we go along, the picture of the fulfillment of this passage will start to come into focus. I will now quote from The World Book Encyclopedia, volume 11, page 168, to get further insight on this subject:

“JUSTINIAN I, jus TIN ih un (A.D. 482-565), was the Byzantine (East Roman) emperor from A.D. 527 until his death. He collected Roman laws under one code, the Corpus Juris Civilis (Body of Civil Law). This code, also known as the Justinian Code, is the basis of the legal systems in many nations today ... Justinian was called The Great. He recaptured many parts of what had been the West Roman Empire from barbarians. He built fortresses, harbors, monasteries, and the famous church of Saint Sophia in what is now Istanbul, Turkey.

“Justinian was born in a part of Macedonia that is now in Yugoslavia. His uncle, Emperor Justin I, made him co-ruler in 527. Justin died a few months later, and Justinian became sole emperor. During Justinian’s reign, his wife, Theodora, tried to influence his politics ... Justinian was an orthodox Christian, and tried to unify his empire under one Christian faith. He persecuted Christian heretics (those who opposed church teachings), Jews, and pagans (non-Christians). In 529, he closed the schools of philosophy in Athens, Greece, because he felt they taught paganism.

“In the early 530’s, Justinian began a series of wars against the Vandals, Ostrogoths, and Visigoths, who had conquered most of the West Roman Empire in the 400’s. By the mid-550’s his armies had taken northern Africa, Italy, and parts of Spain ...

“JUSTINIAN CODE. Justinian I, ruler of the eastern Roman Empire from 527 to 565, commanded 10 of the wisest men in his realm to draw up a collection of the Roman laws. This collection is known as the Corpus Juris Civilis, which means Body of Civil Law. Also called the Justinian Code, this body of law is recognized as one of the greatest Roman contributions to civilization. It was a compilation of early Roman laws and legal principles, illustrated by cases, and combined with an explanation of new laws, and future legislation. The code clarified the laws of those times, and has since been a basis for law codes of many countries.

“The scholars who compiled the Justinian Code divided it into four parts. The Institutes served as a textbook in law for students and lawyers. The Digest was a casebook covering many trials and decisions. The Codex was a collection of statutes and principles. The Novels contained proposed new laws.”

You will notice in both of these quotes, three kingdoms were taken by Justinian. William V. Fowler records them the same as The World Book Encyclopedia, except for the Alemanian which The World Book Encyclopedia calls the Visigoths. The Alemanni and Visigoths are different tribes of the same people, so there is no real problem. Justinian was corrupting the church and the state with his law code, so we will not completely understand this passage unless we look further. To see how all of this happened, I will quote from the book, Study in Daniel, by Howard B. Rand, pp. 182 and 183:

“Having discovered the identity of the four beasts; let us now note the meaning of the little horn which Daniel saw arise from among the ten horns on the fourth beast. The ten horns represent subdivisions [or provinces] in the Roman Empire:

“The little horn that arose among the ten, which was diversified from them, pulling up three, is none other than Justinian at the head of the Eastern [Roman] Empire at Constantinople. History reveals that he subdued three of the ten kingdoms which were established in the Roman Empire after the fall of Imperial Rome. These were the Vandals, whose kingdom had been established in north Africa, The Ostrogoths who had established a kingdom in Italy, and the Alemannian Kingdom, north of Italy [not true, the 3rd. kingdom was southern Spain]. In the eyes and the mouth that appear in this little horn we have a new power associated with the rule of the little horn. In fact, this power became the eyes and mouth of the civil and economic activities of the government represented in the little horn. Justinian, as head of the civil government, and the Pope, as the head of the Church, united their interest and Church and State became one. Finally the Pope became the director of both Church and State and ruled as a great politico-ecclesiastical potentate. One needs but read the utterances of past Popes to recognize the fulfillment of speaking ‘great words against the most High’ as prophesied by Daniel.”

Again, I will take you to Watchman’s Teaching Letter #12 of April, 1999 to show you the connection between Justinian and the popes of the Roman Catholic Church. This is an interesting perception, for the popes gained their state-political authority by Justinian’s Law Code.

“What we are talking about here is an ecclesiastical-political power with the combination of Justinian and the Pope. That is why this new ecclesiastical-political beast is diverse from all the beasts that were before it, Daniel 7:7. I will now quote from Howard B. Rand’s book, Study In Revelation, page 44:

“‘Upon the ruins of the ancient Roman Empire there arose, gradually, a new and different type of Empire, which became all the more powerful because it claimed control over the souls of men as well as their bodies, and extended its dominion beyond this life into the grave. History has amply verified these facts and that the Popes claimed the right to temporal power, taking the place of the Caesars, while the Eternal City under pagan Rome became the Eternal City under Papal control. How apt is the description of her supporter as named by John, Hell. This is Hades or the abode of the dead, for through the doctrine of Purgatory, the church was able to hold supremacy and exercise tremendous power over her followers not only in this life, but beyond through the fear of future suffering in Purgatory.’ [emphasis mine]

“Then quoting on page 49 from this same book: ‘CHURCH OVER STATE: Pope Agapetus, in a dispute with Justinian the Emperor of the East, won his point and the Emperor yielded to the Pope. The head of the Church had triumphed over the head of the government. This was 536 A.D. A Church council assembled at Constantinople this same year and informed the government, as a servant of the Church, that an edict be issued ordering a decision of the council executed. This was done and thus Church and State became united. Persecutions followed, which the Church dictated and the State supported. One thousand two hundred and sixty years of cruel torture and destruction now followed, resulting in nearly a hundred million dying violent deaths’.”

538 A.D. TO 1798 A.D. = 1,260 YEARS, NOT 3½ YEARS

Let’s go back to our original Scripture of Daniel 7:24-25 and pick up the sentence concerning this period of time: “... and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.”

This sentence is used by futurists as a basis for their postulation of a future three and one half year tribulation period, when a so-called Antichrist will set up his kingdom after a so-called rapture. Some futurists call for a seven year tribulation period. As I told you before, the futurist theory was dreamed up by a Spanish Jesuit priest by the name of Ribera, about 1580 A.D., and the teaching had never been heard of before that time. It has a long and sordid history, and I don’t have space here to go into much detail on the subject. But this portion of Scripture quoted immediately above is one of the basic passages they use, out-of-context, to support their theory. By showing you the true historical meaning of this passage, I hope to drive a nail into the coffin of this doctrine so it will stay dead for a long time. What could be more of a tribulation than 1,260 years and 100,000,000 violent deaths, mostly of our people? Some estimate as low as 60 million, but it is still a lot of people. This is the legacy of Justinian and his law code, along with the Universal Church.

EXAMPLE OF LACK OF INSIGHT ON DANIEL 7:20-26

Now that we have covered this prophecy of Daniel 7, let’s take a look at some comments from The Bible Knowledge Commentary on this passage found in vol. 1, page 1355. While there are some positive contributions from this source, other positions are faulty, hampering understanding. As I quote an example here, compare it with the evidence:

“The amillenarian view that the ‘little horn’ has already appeared sometime in the past (but since Christ’s First Advent) is wrong because: (a) no such ruler has attained worldwide status (7:23), (b) no such ruler has subdued 3 of 10 kings who were ruling at once (v. 24), (c) no such ruler has persecuted Israel (v. 21) for three and one-half years (v. 25), and (d) no such ruler has been destroyed forever (v. 26) by Christ’s return. Nor could this ‘little horn’ be the Roman Catholic papacy because: (a) the ‘little horn’ is a king, not a pope, (b) the papacy’s power has not been limited to three and one-half years, (c) the papacy has not concentrated on persecuting the nation Israel, and (d) the papacy has not been destroyed by the return of Christ to the earth.” [This source hasn’t the least idea who true Israel is!]

The answers to these blatantly false statements by The Bible Knowledge Commentary, edited by John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck of the Dallas Seminary Faculty are: YES, the “little horn” of Daniel 7:8 did appear in the past, represented by Justinian, and continued through the Roman Catholic papal system! YES, the “little horn” did attain worldwide status in the prophesied Roman world! YES, Justinian did subdue 3 out of 10 kings! YES, the Roman Catholic papal system did persecute Israelites of Anglo-Saxon and European descent! YES, that prophecy was for a prophetic 3½ years, or 1260 actual years! YES, that papal ruler lost his power in 1798 A.D., and will be totally destroyed at the Second Advent! YES, the papacy represents the “little horn” of Daniel 7:8! YES, the papacy did concentrate on persecuting European, Anglo-Saxon and related “Israelites” during that period! And, YES, while the papacy did lose its ruling power, it will finally be totally destroyed at Messiah’s Second Advent! While John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck of the Dallas Seminary got some things right on the dynasty of Egyptian pharaohs during the time of Moses, they’re as blind-as-a-bat concerning who the true Israelites of the Bible are! While we should give credit where credit is due, likewise we should give criticism where criticism is due, so here is the other side of the story:

It is important here to know that John F. Walvoord was a student, and later became the president of Dallas Theological Seminary, which was an outgrowth from Scofield’s theology, which was formerly known as the Southwestern School of the Bible. This school is now a major contributor for the spreading of Scofield’s views! This shows that sometimes truth can come from less than competent sources.

An allied school to the Dallas Theological Seminary was the Moody Bible Institute, both strongly supporting the teachings of John Nelson Darby, which has continued to pour fuel on futurism’s growth. Out of this milieu came the (so-called pastor) Hal Lindsey, a graduate of DTS who released (what was considered a blockbuster book) The Late Great Planet Earth. He designed this volume to be an easy read, and its 177 pages brought the lie of futurism to the American Christian masses, as well as the entire world. Hitting the press, the New York Times labeled it, “The number one bestseller of the decade”, selling over 30 million copies in 30 different languages! By the means of this medium, it spread the lie of futurism, hatched-up by a Jesuit priest 400 years earlier, tightening the grip of Satan’s agenda on the minds of Christians worldwide! Note what one Protestant writer had to say over 100 years ago:

“Accordingly, towards the close of the century of the Reformation, two of her most learned doctors set themselves to the task, each endeavouring by different means to accomplish the same end, namely, that of diverting men’s minds from perceiving the fulfilment of the prophecies of the Antichrist in the Papal system. The Jesuit Alcasar devoted himself to bring into prominence the Preterist method of interpretation, which we have already briefly noticed, and thus endeavouring to show that the prophecies of Antichrist were fulfilled before the Popes ever ruled in Rome, and therefore could not apply to the Papacy. On the other hand, the Jesuit Ribera tried to set aside the application of these prophecies to the Papal Power by bringing out the Futurist system, which asserts that these prophecies refer properly not to the career of the Papacy, but to that of some future supernatural individual, who is yet to appear, and to continue in power for three and a half years. Thus, as Alford says, the Jesuit Ribera, about A.D. 1580, may be regarded as the Founder of the Futurist system in modern times.” [I cite this subject often in other papers.]

It should now be evident to the reader that there isn’t any prophetic time left over for a so-called 3½ or 7 calendar year tribulation. Besides, if all of the “saints of the most high” are going to be taken in a “rapture”, how could the antichrist “wear them out”, Dan. 7:25?