Isaiah 51:21

21 Therefore hear now this, you afflicted, and drunken, but now with wine:

Isaiah 51:21 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 51:21

Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted
By Babylon, by antichrist and his followers; hear, for thy comfort, the following prophecy: and drunken, but not with wine;
not with wine in a literal sense; nor with the wine of the fornication of the whore of Rome; nor with idolatry, as the kings of the earth are said to be, ( Revelation 17:2 ) ( 18:3 ) but, as the Targum expresses it, with tribulation; with afflictions at the hand of God, and persecutions from men.

Isaiah 51:21 In-Context

19 These two things are befallen you, who shall bemoan you? desolation and destruction, and the famine and the sword; how shall I comfort you?

20 Your sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as an antelope in a net; they are full of the wrath of the LORD, the rebuke of your God.

21 Therefore hear now this, you afflicted, and drunken, but now with wine:

22 Thus says your Lord GOD, and 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 shall no more drink it again:

23 and I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you, who have said to your soul, Bow down, that we may go over; and you have laid your back as the ground, and as the street, to those who go over.