while Daniel had his vision of the world-kingdoms and of the judgment against them in the first year of Belshazzar, i.e., Evilmerodach, the son and successor of Nebuchadnezzar, when with the death of the golden head of the world-monarchy its glory began to fade, and the spirit of its opposition to God became more manifest. This revelation was made to the prophet in a dream-vision by night upon his bed. Compare Dan 2:28. Immediately thereafter Daniel wrote down the principal parts of the dream, that it might be publicly proclaimed - the sum of the things (מלּין ראשׁ) which he had seen in the dream. אמר, to say, to relate, is not opposed to כּתב, to write, but explains it: by means of writing down the vision he said, i.e., reported, the chief contents of the dream, omitting secondary things, e.g., the minute description of the beasts.
Verses 2-3
With Dan 7:2 Daniel begins his written report: “Daniel began and said,” introduces the matter. חזוי עם־ליליא, visions in (during)the night, cf. Dan 2:19. Dan 7:2 and Dan 7:3 describe the scene in general. The four winds of heaven break loose upon the great sea, and rage fiercely, so that four great beasts, each diverse from the others, arise out of its bosom. The great sea is not the Mediterranean (Berth., Ges., Hitz., Ewald), for such a geographical reference is foreign to the context. It is the ocean; and the storm on it represents the “tumults of the people,” commotions among the nations of the world (Häv., Leng., Hofm., etc.), corresponding to the prophetic comparison found in Jer 17:12; Jer 46:7. “Since the beasts represent the forms of the world-power, the sea must represent that out of which they arise, the whole heathen world” (Hofmann). In the interpretation of the image (Dan 7:17) יגּמא מן is explained by ארעא מן. גּיח means to break forth (Eze 32:2), to burst out in storm, not causative, “to make the great sea break forth” (Kran.). The causative meaning is not certainly found either in the Hebrew or the Chaldee. The four winds stand in relation to the four quarters of the heavens; cf. Jer 49:39. Calvin remarks: Mundus similis turbulento mari, quod non agitatur una procella vel uno vento, sed diversis ventis inter se confligentibus, ac si totum coelum conspiraret ad motus excitandos. With this, however, the meaning of the words is not exhausted. The four winds of heaven are not merely diversi venti, and their bursting forth is not only an image of a general commotion represented by a storm in the ocean. The winds of the heavens represent the heavenly powers and forces by which God sets the nations of the world in motion; and the number four has
