²⁸ PERES: Your kingdom has been divided, and given to the ^(A)Medes and ^(B)Persians.”^{[a] 29} Then Belshazzar gave the command, and they clothed Daniel with purple and put a chain of gold around his neck, and made a proclamation concerning him ^(C)that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.

Belshazzar’s Fall

^30 (D)That very night Belshazzar, king of the Chaldeans, was slain. ^31 (E)And Darius the Mede received the kingdom, being about sixty-two years old.

⁴⁴ And in the days of these kings ^(A)the God of heaven will set up a kingdom ^(B)which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; ^(C)it shall ^[a]break in pieces and ^[b]consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. ^45 (D)Inasmuch as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold—the great God has made known to the king what will come to pass after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation is sure.”

³⁴ You watched while a stone was cut out ^(A)without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. ^35 (B)Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were crushed together, and became ^(C)like chaff from the summer threshing floors; the wind carried them away so that ^(D)no trace of them was found. And the stone that struck the image ^(E)became a great mountain ^(F)and filled the whole earth.