Nebuchadnezzar

Nebuchadnezzar II (Babylonian Nabu-kudurri-usur, "Nabu, protect the heir/boundary"), son of Nabopolassar, was the greatest king of the Neo-Babylonian (Chaldean) Empire, reigning about 605–562 BC. A brilliant general and builder who adorned Babylon with its famed walls, the Ishtar Gate, and (by tradition) its hanging gardens, he is the dominant foreign monarch of the books of Kings, Chronicles, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and above all Daniel. In the purposes of God he served as the rod by which Judah was disciplined for its long unfaithfulness, so that the LORD could astonishingly call this pagan emperor "my servant" (Jeremiah 27:6; Jeremiah 25:9).

Having shattered Egyptian power at Carchemish in 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar made Judah his vassal and carried off the first captives — among them the youth Daniel and his companions — together with vessels from the temple (Daniel 1:1–2; 2 Kings 24:1). When Jehoiakim rebelled, he returned and in 597 BC took a second deportation, including King Jehoiachin and the prophet Ezekiel (2 Kings 24:10–16). Finally, after Zedekiah's revolt, his armies besieged Jerusalem for some eighteen months and in 586 BC burned the city and Solomon's temple, slew Zedekiah's sons before blinding him, and bore the bulk of the people into Babylonian exile (2 Kings 25:8–11; Jeremiah 39:1–7) — the catastrophe the prophets had long foretold.

The book of Daniel turns Nebuchadnezzar into the great study of pride confronted by the sovereignty of God. His dream of a towering image of gold, silver, bronze, iron, and clay, which Daniel interpreted, declared him "the head of gold" yet foretold that his kingdom and all earthly empires would give way to an everlasting kingdom set up by God (Daniel 2:37–44). When he raised a golden image and cast Daniel's three friends into the fiery furnace, he was confounded to see a fourth figure walking unharmed in the flames and blessed their God (Daniel 3:24–29). At the height of his glory, boasting "is not this great Babylon, which I have built?", he was struck with madness and driven to live like a beast, eating grass for "seven times" (Daniel 4:30–33).

His restoration is the climax: lifting his eyes to heaven, his reason returned, and he blessed and praised the Most High, confessing that "his dominion is an everlasting dominion" and that God "is able to humble those who walk in pride" (Daniel 4:34–37). Nebuchadnezzar thus stands in Scripture as the supreme example of the proud world-ruler brought low and taught the lesson that runs through Daniel: "the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will" (Daniel 4:25). Instrument of judgment yet himself accountable to God, he became a living witness that every earthly power holds its dominion only at the pleasure of the King of heaven.