This verse is not a complete sentence, and has no verb. It is the beginning of a list of those who had to drink from the cup Jeremiah brought. Many translators begin a new sentence here, as in “Here is who I made drink from the cup,” “I made all the people of Jerusalem and the towns of Judah, including the kings and leaders, drink from the cup,” or, as in Good News Translation, “Jerusalem … were made to drink from it.”

The first to drink from the cup of the LORD’s anger were God’s own people, Jerusalem and the cities of Judah.

Princes: See 24.1 (Good News Translation “leaders”).

Desolation: See 7.34 (Revised Standard Version “waste”); 25.9 (Revised Standard Version “reproach”), 11 (Revised Standard Version “ruin”).

A waste: See 2.15; 25.9 (Revised Standard Version “horror”), 11.

A hissing: See 19.8 (Revised Standard Version “a thing to be hissed at”); 25.9.

A curse is used elsewhere in 24.9; 26.6; 29.22; 42.18; 44.8, 12, 22; 49.13. Good News Translation renders and a curse as “and so that people would use their name as a curse.”

As at this day: The reference is to the time when the book of Jeremiah was composed or compiled.

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Jeremiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2003. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .