Jeremiah 25:17

Jer 25:17 Then took I the cup at the LORD’S hand, and made all the nations to drink, unto whom the LORD had sent me:

Ver. 17. And made all drink,] viz., In vision, and by denunciation.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Jer 25:17. Then took I the cup — It is not to be imagined that Jeremiah went round in person to all the nations and kings here enumerated, with a cup of wine in his hand, but, doubtless, what is here related passed in a vision, in which it was represented to his view. This, either by writing, or by some special messenger, he communicated to the several kings and nations to which God ordered him to publish it. Or, he himself actually did what is figuratively designed, that is, he publicly announced the judgments of God severally against them, as we find in the chapters mentioned in the note on Jer 25:13.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

25:17 So I . . . made all the nations drink from it: Jeremiah accomplished this by announcing God’s judgment.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 17. Then took I the cup - and made all the nations to drink] This cup of God's wrath is merely symbolical, and simply means that the prophet should declare to all these people that they shall fall under the Chaldean yoke, and that this is a punishment inflicted on them by God for their iniquities. "Then I took the cup;" I declared publicly the tribulation that God was about to bring on Jerusalem, the cities of Judah, and all the nations.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Prophet now adds that he obeyed God’s command; for he had before often testified that he was constrained to perform his office, which he would have willingly not have done, if he was at liberty. But as he was bound to obey the divine call, it was evident that it was not his fault, and that he was unjustly charged by the people as the author of the evils denounced. We indeed know that the prophets incurred much ill-will and reproach from the refractory and the despisers of God, as though all their calamities were to be imputed to them. Jeremiah then says, that he took the cup and gave it to drink to all the nations: he intimates that he had no desire to do this, but that necessity was laid on him to perform his office. He then shews who these nations were, —

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(17) Then took I the cup . . .—The words describe the act of the prophet as in the ecstasy of vision. One by one the nations are made to drink of that cup of the wrath of Jehovah of which His own country was to have the first and fullest draught. It is a strange example of the literalism of minds incapable of entering into the poetry of a prophet’s work, that one commentator (Michaelis) has supposed that the prophet offered an actual goblet of wine to the ambassadors of the states named, who were then, as he imagines, assembled at Jerusalem, as in Jer_27:3.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

17. Then took I the cup] not in any literal sense, but in vision; yet “not a mere allegory, but a psychic experience, in which Jeremiah really seems to himself to be forcing the goblet on the nations which he enumerates.” Pe.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Then took I the cup at the Lord's hand,.... In a visionary way, and did as he commanded, and prophesied as he directed him. The prophet was obedient to the heavenly vision, as became him:

and made all the nations to drink, unto whom, the Lord had sent me; not that he travelled through each of the nations with a cup in his hand, as an emblem of what wrath would come upon them, and they should drink deep of; but this was done in vision, and also in prophecy; the prophet publishing the will of God, denouncing his judgments upon the nations, and declaring to them what would befall them.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Then took I the cup - Not actually offering the wine-cup - Holy Scripture has suffered much from this materialistic way of explaining it: but publicly proclaiming this prophecy in Jerusalem, as the central spot of God’s dealings with men, and leaving it to find its way to the neighboring states.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

That is, in the vision; for it cannot be thought that the Lord made the prophet to travel up and down to all the nations afterward named with a cup of wine in his hand.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Then took I the cup... and made all the nations to drink. It is too pro-sale to suppose either that Jeremiah made a journey to "all the nations," or that he actually went through the form of presenting the cup to the ambassadors who (it is conjectured, comp. Jer_27:3) had come to Jerusalem to take measures against the common foe (so J. D. Michaelis). But the supposition arises (as Keil has well observed) out of an imperfect comprehension of the figure. It is not a cup with wine which the prophet receives from Jehovah, but a wine-cup filled with the wine of God"s fury, which wine (one may add) is no more a literal wine than the "sword of Jehovah" is a literal sword. The "making all the nations to drink" is simply a way of expressing the prophet"s firm faith that the word of Jehovah will not "return unto him void that a prophecy once uttered must fulfill itself; and "sent me," in the last clause, merely means "entrusted me with a message". (comp. Pro_26:6) For the fulfillment of this detailed prediction, see on Jeremiah 46-51.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

This duty imposed by the Lord Jeremiah performs; he takes the cup and makes all peoples drink it. Here the question has been suggested, how Jeremiah performed this commission: whether he made journeys to the various kings and peoples, or, as J. D. Mich. thought, gave the cup to ambassadors, who were perhaps then in Jerusalem. This question is the result of an imperfect understanding of the case. The prophet does not receive from god a flagon filled with wine which he is to give, as a symbol of divine wrath, to the kings and peoples; he receives a cup filled with the wrath of God, which is to intoxicate those that drink of it. As the wrath of God is no essence that may be drunk by the bodily act, so manifestly the cup is no material cup, and the drinking of it no act of the outer, physical reality. The whole action is accordingly only emblematical of a real work of God wrought on kings and peoples, and is performed by Jeremiah when he announces what he is commanded. And the announcement he accomplished not by travelling to each of the nations named, but by declaring to the king and his princes in Jerusalem the divine decree of judgment.

The enumeration begins with Judah, Jer 25:18, on which first judgment is to come. Along with it are named Jerusalem, the capital, and the other cities, and then the kings and princes; whereas in what follows, for the most part only the kings, or, alternating with them, the peoples, are mentioned, to show that kings and peoples alike must fall before the coming judgment. The plural "kings of Judah" is used as in Jer 19:3. The consequence of the judgment: to make them a desolation, etc., runs as in Jer 25:9, Jer 25:11, Jer 19:8; Jer 24:9. כּיּום הזּה has here the force: as is now about to happen.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

Connecting Statement:

This passage continues the metaphor of Yahweh's extreme anger as wine that he causes the people of the nations to drink from a cup. (See: Metaphor)

I made all the nations ... drink it

The word "nations" represents the people of the nations. AT: "I made all the people of the nations ... drink the wine from the cup" (See: Metonymy)

something terrifying

The adjective "terrifying" can be translated with a verbal phrase. AT: "something that terrifies people"

an object for hissing and cursing

The word "hissing" refers to a sound that shows strong disapproval. Both "hissing" and "cursing" can be translated with a verbal phrase. AT: "an object at which people hiss and which they curse"

they are at this present day

Possible meanings are that this phrase 1) refers to the time when the book of Jeremiah was written and some time after Jeremiah had proclaimed this prophecy or 2) means that the things about which Jeremiah prophesies here have already started to happen.

translationWords

Jerusalem

kingdom of Judah

king

ruin

curse

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.