Bible Strands
Jeremiah 23:40
And I will bring upon you everlasting shame and perpetual humiliation that will never be forgotten.”
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — God addresses Judah and Jerusalem immediately after declaring He will forget them and cast them out of His presence. This pronouncement concludes a judgment sequence targeting the nation and its false leadership.
The words — חֶרְפַּת עוֹלָם (cherpat olam) literally translates to "a reproach of perpetuity," paired with כְלִמַּת עוֹלָם (kelimat olam), "shame of perpetuity." The text states God will place this unending disgrace upon them, with the Hebrew לֹא (lo') explicitly negating any future forgetting of it.
The thread — This pattern of lasting disgrace among surrounding nations appears in Ezekiel 5:14 and Jeremiah 42:18, where divine judgment produces permanent ruin and poured-out wrath. The cross-references show the same trajectory of irreversible social and spiritual abandonment.
Why it lands — The text requires the reader to accept that covenant rebellion produces final, unerasable disgrace. It demands a sober assessment of divine judgment without assuming temporary consequences or automatic restoration.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten.
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 20:11 But the LORD is with me like a fearsome warrior. Therefore, my persecutors will stumble and will not prevail. Since they have not succeeded, they will be utterly put to shame, with an everlasting disgrace that will never be forgotten.
- Ezekiel 5:14 I will make you a ruin and a disgrace among the nations around you, in the sight of all who pass by.
- Jeremiah 42:18 For this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘Just as My anger and wrath were poured out on the residents of Jerusalem, so will My wrath be poured out on you if you go to Egypt. You will become an object of cursing and horror, of vilification and disgrace, and you will never see this place again.’
- Deuteronomy 28:37 You will become an object of horror, scorn, and ridicule among all the nations to which the LORD will drive you.
- Jeremiah 24:9 I will make them a horror and an offense to all the kingdoms of the earth, a disgrace and an object of scorn, ridicule, and cursing wherever I have banished them.
- Jeremiah 44:8 Why are you provoking Me to anger by the work of your hands by burning incense to other gods in the land of Egypt, where you have gone to reside? As a result, you will be cut off and will become an object of cursing and reproach among all the nations of the earth.
- Daniel 9:16 O Lord, in keeping with all Your righteous acts, I pray that Your anger and wrath may turn away from Your city Jerusalem, Your holy mountain; for because of our sins and the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and Your people are a reproach to all around us.
- Daniel 12:2 And many who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life, but others to shame and everlasting contempt.
- Hosea 4:7 The more they multiplied, the more they sinned against Me; they exchanged their Glory for a thing of disgrace.