What does Isaiah 24:12 mean?

Isaiah is painting a bleak picture of life for the survivors of the judgment God will hurl against the world in response to our sin (Isaiah 24:1–5). Wine stands in for resources, food, and comforts; the city represents civilization. In the same way, the gates of a city were its primary defense: this refers to the vulnerability and helplessness of these survivors.

What was once bustling with life, song, and luxury experienced a cataclysm, leaving it in ruins. Those who remain do not even have the resources to remove the rubble and begin again (Isaiah 24:6–11). They live surrounded by the destruction of the city while the ruined gates leave the place exposed to the outer world.

Aside from apparent riots over the lack of wine, most people remain locked behind the closed doors of their houses. There are multiple reasons for this isolation, it could be due to safety from violence or from disease or simply because they languish in the torment of life on a nearly lifeless planet. As Isaiah has said in the previous verse, gladness has been banished from the earth (Isaiah 24:11).