It was supposed to be just another calm afternoon at Taipei Zoo. Families were snapping pictures. Kids were feeding giraffes. And then, out of nowhere, a man clutching a Bible climbed into the lions’ den — declaring he was Daniel reborn.
On November 3, 2004, 46-year-old Chen Chung-ho walked calmly toward two African lions like a man on a divine mission. Eyewitnesses thought it was a bizarre show — until he shouted, “Jesus will save you!” and spread his arms wide as if waiting for a miracle.
Moments later, he turned to the stunned crowd and yelled, “Come bite me!” waving his jacket like a matador facing the devil himself. The male lion — a 300-pound king with a golden mane — rose from under a tree, locked eyes on Chen, and leapt.
The crowd screamed as the lion clamped its jaws on Chen’s right arm, dragging him to the ground. A second lion circled, snarling. “It looked like something straight out of the Bible,” one witness told reporters. “He wasn’t even afraid.”
Chen tried to climb a rock, raising his hands toward the sky as if surrendering to God — or to fate. But the lion lunged again, biting into his arm and leg. Blood ran down the rocks as children screamed and parents shielded their eyes.
Inside the zoo’s control room, panic erupted. “We were shocked — no one could believe a man would test God like that,” said veterinarian Chih-Hua Chang, who watched the horror unfold. Zoo staff fired tranquilizer darts, but several missed. When the male lion roared and prepared to strike again, keepers blasted a fire hose to drive it back.
Within minutes, the lions were sedated — and Chen, miraculously still conscious, was dragged to safety. He had deep wounds but no life-threatening injuries. Doctors later said it was a “statistical miracle” he survived the first bite at all.
Police later revealed that Chen was a devout but troubled Christian battling drug and alcohol addiction. Investigators found that he had been obsessed with the Old Testament story of Daniel — the faithful servant who defied King Darius and was thrown into a den of lions, only to be saved by an angel.
“Chen believed he was chosen,” one officer said. “He told us he wanted to prove God’s power.”
Chen later admitted, “I was drinking and using drugs every day. I didn’t know what was real. I thought God wanted me to go in there.”
Instead of jail, authorities sent him to a rehabilitation center. He recovered, got clean, and quietly disappeared from public life — forever remembered as the man who faced the lions and lived.
To this day, many in Taiwan still refer to him as “The Daniel of Taipei.” Religious leaders were divided. Some called his survival a modern miracle. Others saw it as a warning against testing divine power.
“God may close the mouths of lions,” said one local pastor, “but He does not bless foolishness.”
Chen’s story would inspire copycats — and tragedies. In 2016, a man in Chile stripped naked inside a lion pit, quoting scripture as he was mauled. In India last year, another man leapt into a lion’s den claiming God would protect him. He was dead within minutes.
Psychologists say these “faith-fueled delusions” are often fueled by desperation and drug abuse. “It’s a tragic collision of scripture and psychosis,” said Dr. Li Wen-Hsien.
Twenty-one years later, the video still circulates online — a shaky clip of a man with a Bible, standing inches from death, shouting to the heavens.
While Daniel’s lions were tamed by an angel, Chen’s were stopped by tranquilizer darts. But to those who saw it, his survival still feels biblical.
A miracle? Madness? Or a message that faith, however misguided, can still defy death itself?
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