The Lion's Den

 The city of Nordlingen lies in a crater created by meteorite impact 15 million years ago.  Located near Roman settlements, the medieval free city was named in 898.  The town was a major trading hub which maintained independence until it became part of Bavaria in the early 1800's.  A site of battle in the war between the Catholic Church and the Protestants, a surrounding wall of protection was built in the 1300's which remains today, tracing the rim of ancient impact.  This structure has 12 gates with St. George's church in the center and 5 main roads that radiate out to the wall, forming a wheel.

Daniel is the English version of the Hebrew name דָּנִיֵּאל which translated, means "God is my Judge" and name was given to the tower projecting from St. George's church at the center of the city.  The Book of Daniel is a biblical apocalypse which recounts the interactions of a Jewish noble in exile in Babylon with Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar, father and son kings of Babylon respectively.  Daniel interprets dreams for both kings which describe nations and kings represented as a giant humanoid statue made of gold, silver, bronze, iron and clay or beasts with successive horns.  Ultimately all the statue nations are crushed by a rock which is cut out "not by human hands" and God's Kingdom is established.

Daniel 2:34-35 describes this apocalypse: 

"While you were watching, a rock was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and smashed them.  Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were all broken to pieces and became like chaff on a threshing floor in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a trace. But the rock that struck the statue became a huge mountain and filled the whole earth."
 
The tower in the center of Nordlingen was named Daniel, likely by Christians living in the crater of ancient impact by a rock cut out not by human hands.  Daniel itself is formed from rock that originated deep in space.

These Christians were also living in in the midst of another impact, the advent of the printing press and the subsequent Protestant Reformation.  The printing press allowed people of European pagan heritage who had previously been subject to the monolithic rule of the Catholic Church being exposed to the Bible in a language they could actually understand.  One the people had the Word of God in their hands, they no longer needed the Catholic Church for access and the statue made of metal and clay was irrevocably damaged.

There is a theme of initiation by survival in apocalypses and in the Bible in general.  Apocalypse in Greek is translated to "unveiling" and that is exactly what happened when the German people got their hands on the Bible in their own language.  Christianity was no longer an exclusive product of the Catholic Church but a state of mind which spawned hundreds of variations, each competing for the most complete vision of God's Kingdom.  The rock not formed by human hands was the Bible printed by a press, a technological intervention allowing the machine to reproduce meaning on a scale never before seen.

Both Nebuchadnezzar and his son, Belshazzar orchestrate apocalypses for Daniel and his fellow Jewish nobles for not complying with the Babylonian religion.  First Nebuchadnezzar puts Daniel's companions Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in a fiery furnace and they survive, joined by a fourth figure said to represent the Son of God.  Then Belshazzar puts Daniel in a lion's den and Daniel emerges unharmed.  These apocalypses have the effect of unveiling the power of Daniel's god over their own as demonstrated by their survival.

Daniel, the tower stands amidst two impacts, having survived both.  In the last chapter of the Book of Daniel, the last apocalypse is marked by the rise of the angel Michael, the prince who protects the Jewish people and described as below.

Daniel 12:1-2

"There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then. But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered.  Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt."

This apocalypse became personal for anyone who took these words literally. To get one's name in the book was surely a priority for anyone exposed to the prophecy during the Protestant Reformation. Survival of this apocalypse means documentation of meaning in the form of books that then carry the names of those involved in it's reproduction.

The genius of the Catholic Church was it's ability to absorb and neuter whatever other forms of religion it competed with by keeping the veil between the experience of the lay people and clergy intact.  The lay people were allowed to continue their indigenous religious traditions, Saturnalia became Christmas, Eostre became Easter just under new names.  The Catholic Church built Daniel while the Latin veil was still up and the church it was attached to was named St. Georg's.  In the legend of St. George, a king keeps a dragon appeased with sacrifice until he runs out of offerings and almost has to give up his daughter.  St. George wounds the beast instead, saves the princess and tames the dragon.  He then offers to kill the dragon if the people convert to Christianity and thousands agree so the dragon is executed.

At the end of the Book of Daniel, the time of final apocalypse is revealed: "From the time that the daily sacrifice is abolished and the abomination that causes desolation is set up, there will be 1,290 days.  Blessed is the one who waits for and reaches the end of the 1,335 days."  It is interesting to note that the story of St. George was brought back from the Crusades and used to sell the romance of fighting for the Catholic Church.  The more European nobles fighting in the crusades meant furthering the geographical reach of the Church and often acquiring land and resources of nobles who died, however romantically. 

What is the relationship between the desecration of the Jewish Temple which eliminated the practice of daily sacrifice and the sacrifice which was interrupted by St. George?  Was the Protestant Reformation a strike against an abomination or a further manifestation of the apocalypse?  Are abominations necessary to prove worthiness?


Nebuchadnezzar's apocalypse as predicted by Daniel involved him going into the wilderness and eating grass like an ox, growing a beard like eagles feathers, nails like a bird and being drenched in the dew of heaven. 

 Only once Nebuchadnezzar sacrificed his identity did he appreciate its value.  The approach of God's Kingdom is marked by destruction of false idols, the statues in Babylonian times and Catholic interpretation of scripture during the Protestant Reformation.  When exposed to dangerous conditions, those that survive prove membership to the eternal.

More concretely, Daniel the tower stands today in Nordlingen.  It was featured at the end of the movie Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory when flying in a glass elevator, Wonka reveals to Charlie that the actual prize in the contest was inheritance of the Chocolate Factory.  The ordeal was again to prove worthiness to an inheritance in the end.  Nordlingen was used as the background in this shot because it represented one of the few intact German cities from a period when many had been destroyed in fire.