Mark 14:36

14:36 He said, “Abba, ¹  Father, all things are possible for you. Take this cup ²  away from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

Psalms 75:8

75:8 For the Lord holds in his hand a cup full

of foaming wine mixed with spices, ³ 

and pours it out. ⁴ 

Surely all the wicked of the earth

will slurp it up and drink it to its very last drop.” ⁵ 

Isaiah 51:22

51:22 This is what your sovereign master, ⁶  the Lord your God, says:

“Look, I have removed from your hand

the cup of intoxicating wine, ⁷ 

the goblet full of my anger. ⁸ 

You will no longer have to drink it.

Jeremiah 25:15

Judah and the Nations Will Experience God’s Wrath

25:15 So ⁹  the Lord, the God of Israel, spoke to me in a vision. ¹⁰  “Take this cup from my hand. It is filled with the wine of my wrath. ¹¹  Take it and make the nations to whom I send you drink it.

Matthew 26:39

26:39 Going a little farther, he threw himself down with his face to the ground and prayed, ¹²  “My Father, if possible, ¹³  let this cup ¹⁴  pass from me! Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

Luke 22:42

22:42 “Father, if you are willing, take ¹⁵  this cup ¹⁶  away from me. Yet not my will but yours ¹⁷  be done.”

John 18:11

18:11 But Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword back into its sheath! Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?” ¹⁸ 

¹ tn The word means “Father” in Aramaic.

² sn This cup alludes to the wrath of God that Jesus would experience (in the form of suffering and death) for us. See Ps 11:6; 75:8-9; Isa 51:17, 19, 22 for this figure.

³ tn Heb “for a cup [is] in the hand of the Lord, and wine foams, it is full of a spiced drink.” The noun מֶסֶךְ (mesekh) refers to a “mixture” of wine and spices.

⁴ tn Heb “and he pours out from this.”

⁵ tn Heb “surely its dregs they slurp up and drink, all the wicked of the earth.”

⁶ tn The Hebrew term translated “sovereign master” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

⁷ tn Heb “the cup of [= that causes] staggering” (so ASV, NAB, NRSV); NASB “the cup of reeling.”

⁸ tn Heb “the goblet of the cup of my anger.”

⁹ tn This is an attempt to render the Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) which is probably being used in the sense that BDB 473-74 s.v. כִּי 3.c notes, i.e., the causal connection is somewhat loose, related here to the prophecies against the nations. “So” seems to be the most appropriate way to represent this.

¹⁰ tn Heb “Thus said the Lord, the God of Israel, to me.” It is generally understood that the communication is visionary. God does not have a “hand” and the action of going to the nations and making them drink of the cup are scarcely literal. The words are supplied in the translation to show the figurative nature of this passage.

¹¹ sn “Drinking from the cup of wrath” is a common figure to represent being punished by God. Isaiah had used it earlier to refer to the punishment which Judah was to suffer and from which God would deliver her (Isa 51:17, 22) and Jeremiah’s contemporary Habakkuk uses it of Babylon “pouring out its wrath” on the nations and in turn being forced to drink the bitter cup herself (Hab 2:15-16). In Jer 51:7 the Lord will identify Babylon as the cup which makes the nations stagger. In v. 16 drinking from the cup will be identified with the sword (i.e., wars) that the Lord will send against the nations. Babylon is also to be identified as the sword (cf. Jer 51:20-23). What is being alluded to here in highly figurative language is the judgment that the Lord will wreak on the nations listed here through the Babylonians. The prophecy given here in symbolical form is thus an expansion of the one in vv. 9-11.

¹² tn Grk “ground, praying and saying.” Here the participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

¹³ tn Grk “if it is possible.”

¹⁴ sn This cup alludes to the wrath of God that Jesus would experience (in the form of suffering and death) for us. See Ps 11:6; 75:8-9; Isa 51:17, 19, 22 for this figure.

¹⁵ tn Luke’s term παρένεγκε is not as exact as the one in Matt 26:39. Luke’s means “take away” (BDAG 772 s.v. παρένεγκε 2.c) while Matthew’s means “take away without touching,” suggesting an alteration (if possible) in God’s plan. For further discussion see D. L. Bock, Luke (BECNT), 2:1759-60.

¹⁶ sn This cup alludes to the wrath of God that Jesus would experience (in the form of suffering and death) for us. See Ps 11:6; 75:8-9; Isa 51:17, 19, 22 for this figure.

¹⁷ sn With the statement “Not my will but yours be done” Jesus submitted fully to God’s will.

¹⁸ tn Grk “The cup that the Father has given me to drink, shall I not drink it?” The order of the clauses has been rearranged to reflect contemporary English style.