KINGDOM, kingship, reign — the Aramaic word that governs Daniel 2 and 7. It is kept the same across the four earthly MALKU (Babylon and the three that follow) and the everlasting fifth that 'the God of heaven shall set up… which shall never be destroyed' (2:44). The book's whole argument is a contest of kingdoms: the towering, brittle empires of the statue against the stone-become-mountain, the 'kingdom of God' that grinds them to chaff and fills the earth. → first discussed at Dan 2:44