“Therefore I make a decree, That every people, nation, and language, which speak any thing amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed–nego, shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall be made a dunghill: because there is no other God that can deliver after this sort.”
Nebuchadnezzar issues a new decree: Therefore I make a decree: Any people, nation, or language that utters blasphemy against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb, and their houses laid in ruins; for there is no other god who is able to deliver in this way. The king reverses his earlier policy; instead of enforcing worship of the golden image, he now forbids blasphemy against Israel's God and threatens death for those who dishonor Him. The decree's severity (tearing limb from limb) matches the furnace's severity, using the king's full power to enforce recognition of God. Significantly, Nebuchadnezzar acknowledges that no god can deliver as Israel's God has delivered; his confession of monotheistic-style supremacy (that Israel's God alone possesses the demonstrated power he witnessed) becomes the basis for the new law. The decree establishes legal protection for Israel's God within Babylon itself, an extraordinary reversal born of witnessed miracle.
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