In my  study of the book of Daniel, I’m looking at his own identity as a clue to understand the nature of the symbols God spoke to Him through. To understand the nature of the personal and collective symbolic. And ultimately to look at God’s dream life, or symbolic nature. Reading the book as a study of who God is. 

Learning to read predictive prophecy as God’s dream, about Himself. Or, put another way, learning to read the symbolic life of God.  The principles of interpretation are based in God’s symbolic Nature. See how He symbolizes, and go from there. Then we look at the particular symbolic life of each prophet, to see how God communicated to each of them. At times, God uses His Own symbols, and at times, those of the personal life of the prophet–just as in dream. The prophet is one, whose personal imagination has been sanctified for the purpose of communication with God. Although, no prophet was perfect, there is a higher baptism of the imagination in them which allows God’s symbols to broadcast through them. That is the basic spirituality of the prophet–to meet God in his or her imagination. 

 The deeper goal of prophecy is to reveal God’s Nature to humanity. Prophecy is a way to reveal who God is, and what He is like–that is another guiding principle in studying prophecy. We want to come to see His ways through examining prophecy.