The Hyperlinked Bible
Intertextuality Pair
Allusion
Later text
As you watched, a stone was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay, and crushed them. Then the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold were shattered and became like chaff on the threshing floor in summer. The wind carried them away, and not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that had struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.
Earlier text
Behold, I will make you into a threshing sledge, new and sharp, with many teeth. You will thresh the mountains and crush them, and reduce the hills to chaff. You will winnow them, and a wind will carry them away; a gale will scatter them. But you will rejoice in the LORD; you will glory in the Holy One of Israel.
Daniel 2:34-35 describes the stone striking the statue, which becomes "like chaff on the threshing floor in summer" (כְּעוּר מִן־אִדְּרֵי־קַיִט) and is carried away by the wind so "not a trace of them could be found." Isaiah 41:15-16 deploys virtually identical imagery: Israel as a threshing sledge will crush mountains and reduce hills to מוֹץ (motz, "chaff"), and "a wind will carry them away; a gale will scatter them." The sequence in both texts -- crushing, reducing to chaff, wind carrying away -- is structurally identical. Daniel's stone-kingdom vision appears to draw on Isaiah's earlier threshing metaphor, recasting Israel's promised victory over oppressors as an eschatological kingdom that displaces all human empires. Isaiah 41:15 further names Israel's instrument מוֹרַג חָרוּץ חָדָשׁ (morag charutz chadash, "a threshing sledge, new and sharp"), underscoring that the crushing power described belongs to an implement God Himself fashions and wields.