The Golden Image
(Daniel iii, 1-30)
NEBUCHADNEZZAR the King caused an image of gold to be made and set up in the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. He also decreed that. at a given signal, all men should fall down and worship, the image.
Now. at Daniel's request, certain
Jews-Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah-who had been given the names of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, had been set over the province of Babylon. These men. therefore, refused to bow down and worship the image which the King had set up, and the matter was reported to the King.
Kebuchadnezzar in his fury, ordered that they should be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace : ' and who,' he added, ' is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands ? '
Then was tho furnace heated seven times more than it was wont to be heated, and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were cast bound into the midst of it: moreover, the fire was so exceedingly hot that it destroyed the men that cast them in. Kebuehadnezzar sat gazing into the furnace, hoping to see the utter destruction of the three who had defied him. And as he looked ho was astonished, for instead of three men lying bound in the midst of the furnace, he saw four men loose, walking in the fire, ' and the form of the fourth was like the Son of God.'
Then the King rose, and going to the mouth of the furnace, said : ' Shadraeh, Meshach, and Abednego, ye servants of the most high God, come forth, and come hither.' And they came forth unharmed from the midst of the fire. Then
Nebuchadnezzar made a decree that every people, nation and language which spoke anything amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego should he cut in pieces, and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were promoted in the province of Babylon.