The Kings of the South and the North
Daniel 11:4 And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken, and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven; and not to his posterity, nor according to his dominion which he ruled: for his kingdom shall be plucked up, even for others beside those.
kingdom shall be... This refers to the breaking up of the Grecian Empire into 4 divisions after the death of Alexander the Great. The period from Alexander to the conquest of these 4 kingdoms by the Romans (336-100 B.C.) is called the Hellenistic or Alexandrian Age. For a time the generals of the army agreed to rule the various parts of the empire until Alexander’s son by Roxane became of age to take the throne, but they all really desired to become king of the province they held. In 311 B.C. the child and his mother were murdered. Then the struggle for power became an open contest. Antigonus, one of the most able generals of Alexander, used Syria as a base to conquer the whole empire for himself. In 301 B.C. he was defeated by 4 other generals and slain. The 4 great generals then divided the empire.
not to his... This simply means that Alexander’s kingdom was to be divided among others who were not of his posterity nor according to the dominion by which he ruled. In 15 years not one of Alexander’s family, including 3 wives, 2 sons, his brother and wife, and mother, was left alive. Alexander founded no dynasty of rulers; since he had no heirs, his kingdom was divided and the empire was marked by division and weakness.
his kingdom shall... His kingdom was to be plucked up, even for others besides the 4 generals that would seize the greatest part of his empire. Minor parts of the empire did go to others from which they were taken.
Even this great kingdom, falls to the Roman Empire.
The king of the South is Egypt. One of the princes under the king rises to overthrow the king. The king of the North (Aram or Syria), receive emphasis in v.5 and after. As time moved on other leaders ruled, crossing and re-crossing Israel.
A few years after Alexander’s death, his kingdom was divided among his four generals (cf. Dan. 8:22): Seleucus (over Syria and Mesopotamia), Ptolemy (over Egypt), Lysimacus (over Thrace and portions of Asia Minor), and Cassander (over Macedonia and Greece). This division was anticipated through the four heads of the leopard (Dan. 7:6) and the four prominent horns on the goat (Dan. 8:8).
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