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.

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.

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.

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, Jeremiah 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 Jeremiah 19:3. The consequence of the judgment: to make them a desolation, etc., runs as in Jeremiah 25:9, Jeremiah 25:11, Jeremiah 19:8; Jeremiah 24:9. כּיּום הזּה has here the force: as is now about to happen.

Then took I the cup at the LORD's hand, and made all the nations to drink, unto whom the LORD had sent me:

25:15-29 The evil and the good events of life are often represented in Scripture as cups. Under this figure is represented the desolation then coming upon that part of the world, of which Nebuchadnezzar, who had just began to reign and act, was to be the instrument; but this destroying sword would come from the hand of God. The desolations the sword should make in all these kingdoms, are represented by the consequences of excessive drinking. This may make us loathe the sin of drunkenness, that the consequences of it are used to set forth such a woful condition. Drunkenness deprives men of the use of their reason, makes men as mad. It takes from them the valuable blessing, health; and is a sin which is its own punishment. This may also make us dread the judgments of war. It soon fills a nation with confusion. They will refuse to take the cup at thy hand. They will not believe Jeremiah; but he must tell them it is the word of the Lord of hosts, and it is in vain for them to struggle against Almighty power. And if God's judgments begin with backsliding professors, let not the wicked expect to escape.