Feet of clay

Posted by ESC on September 18, 2000

In Reply to: Feet of clay posted by Joel on September 18, 2000

: What is the meaning and origin of "feet of clay"

"FEET OF CLAY -- a vulnerability; a failing or weakness. The image is from the Book of Daniel (2:31-40) (in the Bible) in which King Nebuchadnezzar has a dream that Daniel describes and then interprets: 'Thou, O king, sawest, and, behold, a great image.This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass. His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. Thou sawest till that a stone was cut without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.' The whole image then broke, and the pieces were carried away in the wind. Daniel's interpretation was that Nebuchadnezzar was the head of gold, a king of kings, but that after him would come a series of weaker kingdoms that would finally break up, like the image with feet of clay, and be replaced by the kingdom of God." From the The Dictionary of Cliches by James Rogers (Ballantine Books, New York, 1985).