Jeremiah 51:57

57 I will make its rulers drunk - men of wisdom, leaders, and soldiers. They will go to sleep and never wake up. I, the king, have spoken; I am the Lord Almighty.

Jeremiah 51:57 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 51:57

And I will make drunk her princes
With the wine of divine wrath; that is, slay them; though there may be an allusion to their being drunk with wine at the feast Belshazzar made for his thousand lords; who are the princes here intended, together with the king and his royal family, ( Daniel 5:1 Daniel 5:4 ) ; and her wise [men], her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men:
the counsellors of state, priests, magicians, and astrologers; officers in the army, superior and inferior ones; and the soldiers and warriors, whom Cyrus and his men slew; when they entered the city; compare with this ( Revelation 19:18 ) ; and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not awake;
be all asleep in their drunken fits, and be slain therein; and so never wake, or live more. The Targum is,

``and they shall die the second death, and not come into the world to come;''

(See Gill on Jeremiah 51:39); saith the king, whose name [is] the Lord of hosts;
the King of kings and Lord of lords; the Lord of armies in heaven and earth; and can do, and does, what he pleases in both worlds.

Jeremiah 51:57 In-Context

55 I am destroying Babylon and putting it to silence. The armies rush in like roaring waves and attack with noisy shouts.

56 They have come to destroy Babylon; its soldiers are captured, and their bows are broken. I am a God who punishes evil, and I will treat Babylon as it deserves.

57 I will make its rulers drunk - men of wisdom, leaders, and soldiers. They will go to sleep and never wake up. I, the king, have spoken; I am the Lord Almighty.

58 The walls of mighty Babylon will be thrown to the ground, and its towering gates burned down. The work of the nations is all for nothing; their efforts go up in flames. I, the Lord Almighty, have spoken."

59 King Zedekiah's personal attendant was Seraiah, the son of Neriah and grandson of Mahseiah. In the fourth year that Zedekiah was king of Judah, Seraiah was going to Babylonia with him, and I gave him some instructions.