Jer 51:39

“in their heat, I will place their wine feasts I will intend that their wine feasts shall be in the hot season so that they become drunk. in order that they become joyful and sleep Heb. וישנו, and sleep soundly. a perpetual sleep Heb. שנתעולם, a perpetual sleep, and so it happened to them; out of their wine feast and drunkenness they were destroyed and slain, and the city was captured, as it is written in Daniel (5:2): “Belshazzar said while he tasted the wine, etc.”; (5:4), “They drank wine, etc.”; (5: 30), “On that night, Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, was slain”; (6:1), “And Darius the Mede received the kingship.””

“How is Sheshach taken!.... Not the city Shushan, as Sir John Marsham thinks (e); but Babylon, as is plain from a following clause; and so the Targum, "how is Babylon subdued!'' called Sheshach, by a position and commutation of letters the Jews call "athbash"; so Jarchi, Kimchi, and Abarbinel account for it; or else from their idol Shach, the same with Bel, which was worshipped here, and had a temple erected for it; and where an annual feast was kept in honour of it, called the Sacchean feast; and which was observing the very time the city was taken; and may be the true reason of its having this name given it now; See Gill on Jer 25:26; the taking of which was very wonderful; and therefore this question is put by way of admiration; it being so well fortified and provided to hold out a long siege: and how is the praise of the whole earth surprised? for it was taken by stratagem and surprise, before the king and his guards, the army, and the inhabitants of it, were aware; that city, which was matter and occasion of praise to all the world, and went through it; for the compass of it, and height and strength of its walls; the river Euphrates that ran through it, and flowed about it; the temple, palaces, and gardens in it: how is Babylon become an astonishment among the nations! or, "a desolation"; and indeed its being a desolation was the reason of its being an astonishment among the nations; who were amazed to see so strong, rich, and splendid a city brought to ruin in a very short time. (e) Canon. Chron. p. 607.”

“In their heat I will make their feasts--In the midst of their being heated with wine, I will give them "their" potions,--a very different cup to drink, but one which is their due, the wine cup of My stupefying wrath (Jer 25:15; Jer 49:12; Isa 51:17; Lam 4:21). rejoice, and sleep . . . perpetual, &c.--that they may exult, and in the midst of their jubilant exultation sleep the sleep of death (Jer 51:57; Isa 21:4-5).”