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“Yes, this is what the Sovereign Lord says: “You will drink from your sister’s cup of terror, a cup that is large and deep. It is filled to the brim with scorn and derision.
Ezekiel 23:32 · New Living Translation
Parallel translations
  • WEB “Thus says the Lord Yahweh: ‘You will drink of your sister’s cup, which is deep and large. You will be ridiculed and held in derision. It contains much.
  • KJV Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou shalt drink of thy sister’s cup deep and large: thou shalt be laughed to scorn and had in derision; it containeth much.
  • BSB This is what the Lord GOD says: ‘You will drink your sister’s cup, a cup deep and wide. It will bring scorn and derision, for it holds so much.
  • NKJV “Thus says the Lord God: ‘You shall drink of your sister’s cup, The deep and wide one; You shall be laughed to scorn And held in derision; It contains much.
  • NASB This is what the Lord God says: ‘You will drink your sister’s cup, Which is deep and wide. You will be laughed at and held in derision; Because it contains much.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Quick answer

Judah must drink a deep, large cup of scorn and ruin like the one Samaria drank. The image conveys the fullness and bitterness of the coming judgment.

Overview

God describes the cup as 'deep and large,' holding much, and bringing ridicule and derision. This poetic intensification stresses that the judgment will be complete and publicly humiliating. The cup of wrath imagery ultimately points to Christ, who in Gethsemane prayed about 'this cup' and willingly drank it on behalf of His people (Matthew 26:39).

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 18

  • Isa 51:17Awake, awake! Stand up, Jerusalem, you who have drunk from Yahweh’s hand the cup of his wrath. You have drunken the bowl of the cup of staggering, and drained it.
  • Ps 60:3You have shown your people hard things. You have made us drink the wine that makes us stagger.
  • Ezek 22:4–5You have become guilty in your blood that you have shed, and are defiled in your idols which you have made! You have caused your days to draw near, and have come even to your years. Therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mocking to all the countries.
  • Deut 28:37You will become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all the peoples where Yahweh will lead you away.
  • 1 Kgs 9:7then I will cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and I will cast this house, which I have made holy for my name, out of my sight; and Israel will be a proverb and a byword among all peoples.
  • Lam 2:15–16All that pass by clap their hands at you. They hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, “Is this the city that men called ‘The perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth’?”
  • Ezek 36:3therefore prophesy, and say, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because, even because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up on every side, that you might be a possession to the residue of the nations, and you are taken up in the lips of talkers, and the evil report of the people;
  • Ezek 35:15As you rejoiced over the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was desolate, so will I do to you: you shall be desolate, Mount Seir, and all Edom, even all of it; and they shall know that I am Yahweh.
  • Ezek 26:2Son of man, because Tyre has said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken: the gate of the peoples; she is turned to me; I shall be replenished, now that she is laid waste:
  • Ezek 25:6For thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because you have clapped your hands, and stamped with the feet, and rejoiced with all the despite of your soul against the land of Israel;
  • Mic 7:8Don’t rejoice against me, my enemy. When I fall, I will arise. When I sit in darkness, Yahweh will be a light to me.
  • Ps 79:3Their blood they have shed like water around Jerusalem. There was no one to bury them.
  • Matt 20:22–23But Jesus answered, “You don’t know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” They said to him, “We are able.”
  • Rev 18:6Return to her just as she returned, and repay her double as she did, and according to her works. In the cup which she mixed, mix to her double.
  • Jer 48:26“Make him drunken; for he magnified himself against Yahweh: and Moab shall wallow in his vomit, and he also shall be in derision.
  • Rev 16:19The great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God, to give to her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.
  • Jer 25:15–28For Yahweh, the God of Israel, says to me: “take this cup of the wine of wrath at my hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I send you, to drink it.
  • Jer 25:9behold, I will send and take all the families of the north,” says Yahweh, “and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against its inhabitants, and against all these nations around. I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations.

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (3)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — Ezekiel videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on Ezekiel 23:32YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on EzekielMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.

Christ at the center

The promise of one Shepherd-King David, a new heart and new Spirit, and the river of life flowing from the temple all stream toward Christ, the good Shepherd who gives the Spirit.

How Ezekiel 23:32 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Original language

Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.