Is the Bible history, or is it epic fiction – closer to Spider-Man swinging through New York or Harry Potter doing his wizard thing? Stories can carry lessons, entertainment, even inspiration, without being historical or divine. So how would we tell the difference?

One test is prophecy. Not vague prediction that can be twisted to fit anything later – prophecy with detail.

The test: detail makes a funnel

Suppose someone predicts that a man in a green shirt will come down the street. That is specific, but only a little – it could match a lot of people on a lot of days. Add that he will be wearing a backpack, and the picture tightens. Add that he is coming at noon, and it tightens again. No name was ever given, but green shirt, backpack, noon – if that man actually walks by, it gets hard to call it a lucky guess.

Every detail added creates a funnel that eliminates the alternatives. Stack enough specifics and there is less and less room left for random chance. At some point the reasonable explanations narrow to two: the one who said it had prior knowledge of what would happen – or he was in control of it, and made it happen.

The Bible does not rest on one prediction like that. It contains a whole network of prophecy, each passage providing more and more detail, and taken together they form a detailed narrative. The narrative below is drawn from the prophecies specific to the fall of Jerusalem – an event we can find in the history books, but one that is not recorded in the New Testament. This is not the New Testament confirming the Old. To check it, we have to look outside the New Testament entirely. But first, a word about which texts belong in the picture – because they were not gathered at random.

Identifying the Exile and Final Restoration

Not every Old Testament passage concerning Israel’s restoration necessarily refers to the same historical event. Some passages, particularly in Jeremiah, speak of a return from Babylon. But the prophetic picture extends beyond that initial restoration.

The approach taken here is to begin with the promises describing Israel’s final restoration: a return to the land in which the people are reunited, both houses are restored, and Israel is never again uprooted from the land. From there, we work backward through the prophetic text to identify the judgment and exile that precede that restoration.

This distinction matters. The return from Babylon primarily restored Judah, but the prophets describe a restoration involving both Israel and Judah. They also describe a permanence that goes beyond a temporary return from captivity. Jeremiah 31:35-37, for example, compares the continued existence of Israel as a nation before God to the fixed order of the heavens.

We must therefore consider whether the Babylonian return exhausted these promises or whether the prophets anticipated a further scattering before their ultimate fulfillment. Daniel’s four kingdoms and Zechariah’s vision of four horns provide an important part of that larger picture. The scattering of God’s people is not attributed to Babylon alone, but is presented within a succession of kingdoms and powers.

Consequently, a passage may speak of restoration beyond Babylon without necessarily placing its fulfillment immediately after Babylon. The prophetic narrative must be followed through to its final promised outcome.

The narrative

During the fourth kingdom to reign over the Jewish people, counting from their Babylonian exile, after ten rulers of that kingdom had arisen, the eleventh ruler would subdue the previous three rulers. The prince of that people would destroy the city and the sanctuary, resulting in desolation.

This would be a judgment – a day of the LORD – for the sins of bloodshed and idolatry within Judah throughout the previous generations. That generation would be very perverse, and would themselves do enough bloodshed to warrant the judgment.

Prior to that judgment, God would send a Redeemer to provide a way of escape to those who repented. A messenger would prepare the way for the LORD. Then the LORD would come to His temple. All who trusted in Him would be saved from the judgment. However, most would reject Him. Later He would return, and each person would be repaid according to what they had done.

Most would fall by the sword. Of the survivors, most would be sent into slavery and would be scattered all over the world. They would live many days without priest or king. They would live under persecution – but not be totally rejected by God. They would remain a nation before Him. While they were in exile, the nations would turn to the God of Israel.

After they had gone through this sentence, He would remember His covenant with their forefathers and bring them back into the land. It would be like a resurrection. After all this, they would have atoned for their sins under the covenant. Then the nations would be judged for the way they treated them during their exile.

Every line of that narrative is addressed by an Old Testament reference:

  1. Fourth kingdom – Dan. 7:23
  2. Eleventh ruler – Dan. 7:24
  3. Subdue previous three rulers – Dan. 7:24
  4. Prince destroy city and sanctuary – Dan. 7:26
  5. City desolate – Dan. 7:26
  6. Sins of idolatry and bloodshed – Deut. 32:21-43
  7. For previous generations – Is. 65:7
  8. Redeemer provide way of escape – Is. 59:20
  9. For those who repent – Is. 59:20
  10. Messenger prepare way – Mal. 3:1
  11. Lord come to His temple – Mal. 3:1
  12. Those trusting in Him saved – Joel 2:32
  13. Most would reject Him – Is. 53:3-4
  14. He would return – Mal. 3:5
  15. Repay each according to deeds – Is. 59:18
  16. Most would fall by the sword – Is. 65:12
  17. Survivors sent into slavery – Joel 3:3
  18. Scattered all over the world – Amos 9:9
  19. Many days without priest or king – Hos. 3:4
  20. Live under persecution – Lev. 26:35-39
  21. Not be totally rejected by God – Amos 9:8
  22. Remain a nation before him – Jer. 31:36
  23. Nations turn to the God of Israel – Is. 11:10
  24. God would remember His covenant – Lev. 26:42-45
  25. Bring them back into the land – Amos 9:13
  26. Like a national resurrection – Ez. 37:12
  27. Their sin would be atoned for – Is. 27:9
  28. Nations judged – Ez. 38, 39
  29. Based on treatment of Jews – Joel 3:2-6
  30. Jews live for generations on land – Joel 3:20

That is the receipt list – thirty lines, thirty passages, and not one of them left unaddressed. Walking all thirty in depth would take a series of its own; the videos do it piece by piece. But one identification carries more weight than the rest, because everything after it depends on it: the fourth kingdom, and the eleventh ruler who comes out of it. Get that identification wrong, and the prince, the destroyed city, and the sanctuary all float free of history. Get it right, and they lock into place. So it is worth slowing down here and defending the identification itself – not just naming Rome, but showing why Rome is where Daniel’s own text points.

Why the Fourth Kingdom Is Rome

The identification of the fourth kingdom is essential to understanding these prophecies. Daniel 7 describes four successive kingdoms: a lion, a bear, a leopard, and a terrifying fourth beast unlike the others. While some interpret these kingdoms as Babylon, Media, Persia, and Greece, the parallel vision in Daniel 8 provides a compelling reason to understand them differently.

Daniel 8 explicitly identifies the two-horned ram as the kings of Media and Persia (Daniel 8:20), and the male goat as the kingdom of Greece (Daniel 8:21). The imagery closely corresponds to the animals in Daniel 7. The bear, raised up on one side, resembles the ram with one horn higher than the other. The swift leopard with four heads resembles the swift goat whose great horn is replaced by four horns. These parallels suggest that the bear and ram represent the same kingdom, as do the leopard and goat.

This gives us a natural progression: Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and then a fourth kingdom. Historically, this fourth kingdom is Rome. It also avoids dividing the Medes and Persians into two successive empires when Daniel elsewhere speaks of them as one kingdom (Daniel 5:28; 6:8).

Nor should the references to the “end” in Daniel 8 be assumed to describe the absolute end of history. Daniel 8:23 speaks specifically of the latter part of the Greek kingdom. Kingdoms have their own appointed ends, and the end of one dominion does not necessarily mean the end of all things.

Daniel 7 then gives us a picture of the fourth kingdom’s final rulers. It describes ten kings arising from that kingdom, followed by another ruler who rises after them and brings three kings low. If we begin counting Roman rulers from the point at which Rome established supremacy over Judea in 63 BC, with Pompey’s intervention, the sequence is remarkably specific:

  1. Pompey
  2. Julius Caesar
  3. Augustus
  4. Tiberius
  5. Caligula
  6. Claudius
  7. Nero
  8. Galba
  9. Otho
  10. Vitellius
  11. Vespasian

The final three rulers – Galba, Otho, and Vitellius – rose and fell during the Roman civil war of AD 69. Vespasian emerged from that struggle as the next ruler of Rome. He is therefore a strong candidate for the eleventh ruler, the little horn who arises after the ten and displaces three.

This identification also brings Daniel 9 into focus. The prophecy speaks of the people of a coming prince destroying the city and the sanctuary (Daniel 9:26). In AD 70, Roman forces destroyed Jerusalem and its temple under the command of Titus, son of Vespasian. The distinction between the ruler and the prince is significant: Vespasian rose to power in Rome, while his son Titus led the campaign that brought Jerusalem to ruin.

Taken together, these passages present a coherent prophetic sequence: the rise of Rome, the emergence of its final rulers, the upheaval that brings Vespasian to power, and the destruction of Jerusalem under Titus. Rather than treating Daniel’s visions as disconnected predictions, this reading allows the details of Daniel 7, 8, and 9 to illuminate one another.

The same test for the other reading

Some secular scholars argue the fourth kingdom is Greece instead of Rome. There is a simple test for that claim: ask them for the list of eleven Greek rulers that fits the text. If Greece stacks up better than Rome, the list will show it. Don’t take our word for it, and don’t take theirs either – study it for yourself, and compare.

One more detail from Daniel 7: while all of this was happening on the ground at the fall of Jerusalem, Daniel prophesied that one like a Son of Man would be coming into His kingdom in heaven. The visible events we can verify were signaling something in heaven that we could not see – which is exactly what the New Testament said. That is a subject for another article.

The summit

If all of this lines up the way the texts say, it is hard to write off as random. Details this specific, made to happen across centuries, are beyond human planning. Only the true God could give details like these – and then make them happen.

He says so Himself:

“Declare and present your case; indeed, let them consult together. Who has announced this long ago? Who has long since declared it? Is it not I, the LORD? And there is no other God besides Me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is no one except Me. Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other.” – Isaiah 45:21-22

Spider-Man and Harry Potter are good stories. But they do not claim to predict real-world events. This does – and the record is there to check.

One line of the narrative is still ahead of us. The nations would be judged in the same way Judah was judged – but their judgment will be based on how they treated Judah during its exile. If the past lines check out, that sets up a solid case for expecting the future one to play out too. That is what evidence is for.

Watch the video: The Bible shows control over real-world events – Episode 1: Extraordinary Evidence