Another variation of the Seven Heads of Daniel 7 view.

I laid out my view of the Seven Heads of Daniel 7, and then improved it a bit in my Basra post.  This view is predicated on saying seven heads are implied in Daniel 7, 3 beasts with 1 head each and 1 beast with 4 heads.

The most controversial aspect of that was making Rome the seventh head instead of the 6th, defining it as yet future in John's time because it hadn't taken Babylon yet.  And that still may be the best way of looking at Daniel 7.  But I have recently devised a variation that keeps the basic premise but returns Rome to being the 6th and then present head.

Basically, it makes Rome not the 4th Beast anymore but the fourth head of the Leopard.  The Leopard and his heads I associate with Javan and his four Sons, and there have long been reasons to justify associating Kittim with Rome.  Rome was very influenced by Greece.  In the Eastern Empire Greek was always the more popular language, and after the western Empire fell the Eastern Empire eventually even flat out made Greek it's official Language.  So Rome as it was to it's Eastern conquests including Judea, was always very Greek, Paul used Greek and Gentile interchangeably even though he wrote during the Roman period.

My initial form of this Daniel 7 view was based on it being Babylon/Shinar's POV of history, for this we return to the focal point being the Land/Erets of Israel.

The Four Heads of the Leopard are thus Alexander, the Ptolemies, the Seleucids and the Caesars.

Naturally, the fourth beast/seventh head must thus be the Islamic Empire.  Chris White bases his objection to Islam as the 7th head mainly on saying you can't possibly define Islam as having a short reign.  However in this theory, that's where the Horns come in.

Just as the Four Horns in Daniel 8 represent a Kingdom being divided.  The 10 Horns/Toes represent Islam being divided.  Initially it was just a split in two, the Sunni/Shia split, hence the Two Legs of the Statue in Daniel 2.  But has since fractured even more.

It was a united Islam that had a comparatively short reign over the Eretz of Israel.  It was the second Caliph who captured Judea, and then the Split was cemented as soon as the fourth died.  All of the first five were people who knew Muhammad, meaning this all happened in the course of one lifetime.

If I'm going to look for a specific individual to identify with the Seventh Head, it would be Ali ibn Abu Talib based on what I've discussed elsewhere.

This does not necessarily prove an Islamic Antichrist view, it makes Islam relevant, but I still feel the Eight King of Revelation 17 is one of the first 5, not the seventh.

How should we define the Fourth Beast in terms of the Table of Nations?  Since we know the first three are Asshur, Madai and Javan?

The thing is Arabia was a very ethnically mixed region.  The word Arab is in the Hebrew texts spelled the same as the Hebrew word for an ethnically mixed person (sometimes translated Mongrel), when Israel is called a "Mixed Multitude" at the Exodus "Mixed" is also Arab there.  And it's the same when Daniel 2:41 describes the toes of the Statue as "Iron mixed with Miry Clay".

Arabia had Cushites and possibly also Mizraimites from Ham, and also I think some Canaanite presence, particularly the Sinites.  From Shem it had the Joktanites, the tribes of Ishmael the firstborn of Abraham, and also Abraham's sons by Keturah, by the time of Joseph Midianite and Ishmaelite became interchangeable. The Trans-Jordan tribes were often in conflict with Ishmaelites as 1 Chronicles 5 shows.  And I think 1 Chronicles 4 shows Simeon migrated to some Ishmaelite lands, and I think the clan of Jamin specifically went to Yemen and provided Yemen it's name.  My defining Arabia as being not just the whole peninsula but also everything between the Jordan and Euphrates rivers, also puts within it Moab, Ammon, and Edom, including the Amalekites who are linked to both Seir and Kadesh.

Edom is perhaps the most important.  Removing Rome as the Fourth Beast would destroy my support for seeing Edom as Rome, because the foundation of that was largely how the Fourth Beast's unique fate of being completely destroyed with no national identity left in the Messianic Era, is outside Daniel given only to Edom and Amalek, some cities may be described similarly but no other whole nation.  We see this in Balaam's Prophecies and in Obadaiah.  Jeremiah 46-49 also foretells judgment on several nations, but with Edom lacking a promise of restoration.  Isaiah 34 and Ezekiel 35-36 also seem to see Edom as the last Nation to be destroyed before The Messianic Era begins.

And it's possible Edom could be linked to more of Arabia then is traditionally assumed.  Where you place Sinai and Kadesh-Barnea inevitably effects your view of how far Edom's borders stretch, and I've gone back and forth between a few theories that place Sinai at least pretty far away.  And his having a grandson named Teman can justify linking Edom to Yemen.  Genesis 14 links the Amalekites to the same region Ishmael would later settle.

It's also interesting thematically how all the passed over First Born lines from Abraham can be linked to Arabia.  Ishmael's status is the one tied directly to Islamic theology.  But Esau was also originally considered the firstborn of Isaac.  And then the fact that some Tribes of Israel can be linked Arabia, they include Reuben, the firstborn of Jacob, and eastern Manasseh who was the firstborn of Joseph.   Perhaps the Little Horn is an attempt by Satan to create an heir to all these lines?

It also could be viable to in Daniel 2 see the Iron as the peoples of Arabia and the Miry Clay as the Ottomans.