Editor’s Note: As prophesied in Daniel 5: 25-28, Nebuchadnezzar’s gold system was partially abandoned by the United States in 1933 and further abandoned in 1971 during the Nixon years. Today, gold is again in the news as despite wide swings, it is moving up in price very rapidly.
Examine those who were called to attend the function which inaugurated the Image of Gold. It was a function which many scholars believe was not only carried through in Babylon itself, but was repeated in every province of the Empire.
“Then the princes, the governors, and captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counsellors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces were gathered together unto the dedication of the image of Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up; and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up.” (Daniel 3:3)
It will be seen that all of those mentioned were administrative and financial officers of the Empire. There is not an ecclesiastic mentioned. As a matter of fact it was setting up Gold as the basis of the economic structure of the Empire economics.
Thereafter Babylon is called in the Bible THE EXACTRESS OF GOLD.
That the system had not the approval of the people of God who were Hebrew children. That God Himself was against the whole concern is manifested by the fact that He revealed Himself as accompanying His faithful servants into the fiery furnace in which they were thrown, because of opposition to the exaltation of the image of gold.