I will make Jerusalem like an intoxicating drink that makes the nearby nations stagger when they send their armies to besiege Jerusalem and Judah.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of reeling to all the surrounding peoples, and it will also be on Judah in the siege against Jerusalem.
- KJV Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem.
- BSB “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of drunkenness to all the surrounding peoples. Judah will be besieged, as well as Jerusalem.
- NKJV “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of drunkenness to all the surrounding peoples, when they lay siege against Judah and Jerusalem.
- NASB “Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that causes staggering to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah.
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
God will make Jerusalem a 'cup of reeling' that intoxicates and staggers the nations that come against her. It matters because those who assault God's people bring drunken self-destruction upon themselves.
Overview
Jerusalem under siege becomes, by God's design, a cup whose contents make the attacking peoples reel like drunken men. Rather than overcoming the city, the besiegers are themselves overcome and disoriented. The 'cup' image, often a symbol of God's wrath (Jer. 25:15-16), shows that opposing God's purposes invites His judgment.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Zech 14:14Judah also will fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the surrounding nations will be gathered together: gold, and silver, and clothing, in great abundance.
- Ps 75:8For in Yahweh’s hand there is a cup, full of foaming wine mixed with spices. He pours it out. Indeed the wicked of the earth drink and drink it to its very dregs.
- Isa 51:22–23Thus says your Lord Yahweh, your God who pleads the cause of his people, “Behold, I have taken out of your hand the cup of staggering, even the bowl of the cup of my wrath. You will not drink it any more:
- 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.
- Jer 51:57I will make her princes, her wise men, her governors, her deputies, and her mighty men drunk. They will sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake up,” says the King, whose name is Yahweh of Armies.
- Jer 49:12For Yahweh says: “Behold, they to whom it didn’t pertain to drink of the cup shall certainly drink; and are you he who shall altogether go unpunished? You shall not go unpunished, but you shall surely drink.
- 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 8:14“Why do we sit still? Assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the fortified cities, and let us be silent there; for Yahweh our God has put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against Yahweh.
- Jer 51:7Babylon has been a golden cup in Yahweh’s hand, who made all the earth drunk. The nations have drunk of her wine; therefore the nations have gone mad.
- Rev 14:10he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is prepared unmixed in the cup of his anger. He will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.
- Hab 2:16You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed! The cup of Yahweh’s right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory.
- 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 25:17Then took I the cup at Yahweh’s hand, and made all the nations to drink, to whom Yahweh had sent me:
- Jer 25:15For 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.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The Branch who is both priest and king, the shepherd struck and the flock scattered, the king coming humble on a donkey, the one they pierced, the fountain opened for sin — Zechariah is dense with Christ.
How Zechariah 12:2 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.