The Second Call To Awake - Spoken to Distressed Jerusalem (Isaiah 51:17-23).
These words are spoken in view of Yahweh's previous ‘awaking' (Isaiah 51:9) and are to stir up Israel to respond, having drunk sufficiently of God's anger against their sins. Again it is followed by a word of assurance and promise from Yahweh. He will remove that which is causing her distress and her dreadful condition, and will pass it over to her enemies.
‘Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem,
Who has drunk at the hand of Yahweh the cup of his fury.
You have drunk the bowl of the cup of staggering,
And have drained it.'
Their position is first stated. They (represented as Jerusalem) had been under His wrath and made to drink of the cup of His fury, the cup that had rendered them helpless and unable to cope for themselves, so that they have staggered and collapsed. But now they have drunk it and drunk it to the full, so that His anger against their sin is over. The cup represents all the historical events that have come on them leaving them destitute and helpless, the consequence of God's anger over the continual sin and rebellion that had finally become too much. ‘The cup of staggering' does not just refer to being drunk, but to having come to such a drunken state that is impossible to recover. They have reached the final stages of delirium.
We can contrast the Lady Babylon on her throne, who was dragged down to her dreadful state (chapter 47) without hope, with this drunken helpless woman who is to be dragged up from her dreadful state by God's rescue mission. When Babylon drags men and women down, God can lift them up again. God's power works both ways.
So now they are to ‘stand up'. Note that while Yahweh's arm was to ‘put on strength' on awakening (Isaiah 51:9), all that is required of Jerusalem is that they ‘stand up', that they stagger to their feet. All that is required is that they stand and see the salvation of Yahweh. Yahweh will do the rest.
The picture is vivid, Jerusalem slumped like a dishevelled woman by the wayside, drunk, prone and helpless, and now being exhorted to pull themselves together and stand up because God is about to act. For without God her situation is hopeless as we will now see.
‘There is none to guide her among all the sons that she has borne,
Neither is there any who takes her by the hand of all the sons that she has brought up.
These two things are befallen you, who will bemoan you?
Desolation and destruction, even the famine and the sword.
How shall I comfort you? Yours sons have fainted.
They lie at the top of all the streets, like an antelope in a net.
They are full of the fury of Yahweh, the rebuke of your God.'
But what hope is there for her if she stands up? There is no one to take her by the hand and lead her. She has had many sons, the people of Jerusalem and Judah, those who had claimed that they were the people of God, but they cannot help her. For they themselves have fainted away, having become hopeless drunkards, and having collapsed at the road heads, unable to get home. They are like an antelope caught in a net, thrashing about and not free to do anything, a permanent victim with no hope of recovery. For they too are under the heavy hand of Yahweh because of their sins, they are still surfeited with Yahweh's fury, God's rebuke.
And she has faced two things, desolation and destruction in terms of dire famine and sword (no mention of exile). This is what has actually caused her state, continual bouts of famine and invasion. But there is none to bemoan her for they are all taken up with their own deep problems. With her sons in the condition that they are, how is God to comfort her?
The aim is to demonstrate how totally helpless she is, so that from an earthly point of view God can find her no comfort. Her position is totally hopeless. What on earth can she do? The answer is, nothing.
However, there is an answer, and God will provide it. But before that answer is produced the truth must be out.
“Therefore hear now this, you afflicted and drunken, but not with wine.”
Here is the truth of the matter. Her drunkenness is not due to wine, it is due to that which has brought on them God's wrath and rebuke, His fierce anger (Isaiah 51:20). It is due to sin. It is due to an oversurfeit of wickedness and rebellion against God. And it results in their not being aware of Yahweh's words (Isaiah 29:9-10). This is why no one can help her, for her sins are too deep-dyed.
“Thus says the Lord Yahweh,
And your God, who pleads the cause of his people.
See, I have taken out of your hand the cup of staggering,
Even the bowl of the cup of my fury.
You will no more drink it again.
And I will put it into the hand of those who afflict you,
Who have said to your inner heart, ‘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.”
Indeed her full humiliation is now described. As a drunken woman in the street those who had afflicted her had taunted her and told her to lie there while they walked all over her, and she had done as she was bidden. She had become the lowest of the low, the drunken plaything of drunkards. Everyone walked over her. This scene of a misused, drunken woman is played out in many drinking places around the world. It is a sign of the world's sinfulness.
But now Yahweh steps in, the One Who makes the plea for the cause of His people, their judge. He will take the cup from her hand, the cup that is causing her all the trouble, and give it to those who afflict her. She will be released from her problem, and it will be laid on others. She has Yahweh's promise that she will be made free. It remains for the next verses to reveal how this will come about.
‘The Lord Yahweh.' Unusually, in this phrase ‘Lord' is in the plural. Perhaps the idea is to bring out that He is not only her Sovereign Lord, but also her ‘lord' as her husband or parent (Isaiah 54:5) He is acknowledging responsibility for her. Or it may be placing great stress on Lord, a plural of intensity.
We note here a typical Isaianic reversal. In Isaiah 51:17 it was ‘the cup of His fury -- the bowl of the cup of staggering', here it is ‘the cup of staggering -- the bowl of the cup of His fury.' Fury begins and ends the situation, resulting in the staggering.
‘You will no more drink it again.' Isaiah thus has the final everlasting kingdom in mind. The cup will then be given to those who take part in the final judgment.
Who then is Jerusalem in this sad picture? As with all illustrations we must not press too closely. In one sense it is all Israel, for all will be welcomed if they come. Certainly they are all drunk and have drunk of the cup of His fury. But in the finality it is those who will respond and will come to Yahweh, and listen to the voice of His Servant. It is only they who can be sure that the cup of Yahweh's fury has been taken from them. It is only they who can stand rightly and recover to walk again. And certainly it is they who are spoken of in the next verses. It is the holy seed who come from the remnant who are left (Isaiah 6:13).