Jeremiah 25:15

Hebrew Bible

13 I will bring on that land everything that I said I would. I will bring on it everything that is written in this book. I will bring on it everything that Jeremiah has prophesied against all the nations. 14 For many nations and great kings will make slaves of the king of Babylon and his nation too. I will repay them for all they have done.’” 15 So the Lord, the God of Israel, spoke to me in a vision: “Take this cup from my hand. It is filled with the wine of my wrath. Take it and make the nations to whom I send you drink it. 16 When they have drunk it, they will stagger to and fro and act insane. For I will send wars sweeping through them.” 17 So I took the cup from the Lord’s hand. I made all the nations to whom he sent me drink the wine of his wrath.

Obadiah 1:16

Hebrew Bible

14 You should not have stood at the fork in the road to slaughter those trying to escape. You should not have captured their refugees when they suffered adversity. 15 “For the day of the Lord is approaching for all the nations! Just as you have done, so it will be done to you. You will get exactly what your deeds deserve. 16 For just as you have drunk on my holy mountain, so all the nations will drink continually. They will drink, and they will gulp down; they will be as though they had never been. 17 But on Mount Zion there will be a remnant of those who escape, and it will be a holy place once again. The descendants of Jacob will conquer those who had conquered them. 18 The descendants of Jacob will be a fire and the descendants of Joseph a flame. The descendants of Esau will be like stubble. They will burn them up and devour them. There will not be a single survivor of the descendants of Esau!” Indeed, the Lord has spoken it.

 Notes and References

"... The use of water in drinking trials was by no means restricted to Israelite territory. Tikva Frymer-Kensky found evidence for it in Susa texts, and could also point out a Hittite parallel ... There are also a few Neo-Assyrian texts which bear on the theme. They show that a promissory oath (as contrasted with the assertive oath) could also be accompanied by “drinking water from a ṣarṣaru-jar.” The oath was thus coupled with a drinking trial. In other words: the perjurer was thus exposed to a curse (referred to in Hebrew as qĕlālâ or ᴐālâ) that would “enter his innards like water” (Psalm 109:18). There is no need to assume that some sort of poison was added to the water, since in the ancient Near East water by itself was often unhealthy. A Babylonian extispicy text contains the following apodosis, apparently laid in the mouth of a king: “My army will be overcome by thirst on a campaign it will go on, will drink bad water and will die.” Less destructive, but still “causing miscarriages” (mĕšakkelet), is the water in the vicinity of Jericho (2 Kings 2:19). In such circumstances water that had been neither filtered nor boiled could well serve as a judgement drink. Most of the biblical allusions to drinking trials, however, seem to envisage the use of wine. The relevant texts are often referred to as the “cup of wrath” passages. (Isaiah 51:17-23; Jeremiah 25:15-29; Ezekiel 23:31-34; Obadiah 16; Habakkuk 2:15-16; Zechariah 12:2; Psalm 60:5; Lamentations 4:21) They conjure up the image of an “anti-banquet” (McKane) during which Yahweh provides his guests with poisonous food and drink instead of wholesome food and wine that cheers the heart. A special emphasis falls on the “cup” or “chalice”. It apparently contains wine (Jeremiah 25:15; Psalm 75:9), but this is “wine of wrath” (Jeremiah 25:15) which causes “staggering” ..."

Van der Toorn, Karel God in Context: Selected Essays on Society and Religion in the Early Middle East (p. 78) Mohr Siebeck, 2018

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