Jeremiah 13:26
in Jeremiah 13So I will pull your skirts up over your face, that your shame may be seen.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Therefore will I also uncover thy skirts upon thy face, and thy shame shall appear.
KJV
Therefore will I discover thy skirts upon thy face, that thy shame may appear.
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This verse in Jeremiah 13
Commentary
9 notes on this verseTherefore will I discover thy skirts upon thy face - It was the custom to punish lewd women by stripping them naked, and exposing them to public view; or by throwing their clothes over their heads, as here intimated. Was this the way to correct the evil?
This site's exposition
I will pull your skirts up over your face
on Jeremiah 13:26-27
The exposure carries the chapter’s clothing pictures from the loincloth at verse 11 to skirts pulled up “that your shame may be seen”. The adulteries and “lustful neighings” name the fertility worship done in the open country. The chapter ends on a question, “How long will you remain unclean”.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers3 voices
(Verse 26) Because you have forgotten me, and have trusted (or hoped) in lies: therefore I will also uncover your thighs, and your shame will be revealed, your adulteries and your whinings, the wickedness (or alienation) of your fornication: The cause of Jerusalem's dispersion, because she has forgotten God, and has trusted, or hoped, in lies. Whoever trusts in worldly things besides God, forgets God.
"After committing many transgressions," he says, "you were not prepared to have recourse to repentance. I shall no longer demonstrate longsuffering. Instead, I will inflict punishment." It is better, therefore, to live according to the divine laws. But since we who are human will most …
But if even real virgins, when they have other failings, are not saved by their physical virginity, what shall become of those who have prostituted the members of Christ and have changed the temple of the Holy Spirit into a brothel? Immediately they should hear the words, "Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground—there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans. You shall no more be called tender and delicate. Take the millstone and grind meal. Uncover your locks, make bare your legs, pass over the rivers. Your nakedness shall be uncovered. Yes, your shame shall be seen." Shall she come to this after the bridal chamber of God the Son, after the kisses of him who is to her both kinsman and spouse? Yes, she of whom the prophetic utterance once sang, "At your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir," shall be made naked, and her skirts shall be discovered on her face.
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
Therefore will I discover thy skirts upon thy face,.... Turn them up, or throw them over the head or face; that is, expose to public shame and disgrace; which was done when their city and temple were burnt, and they were carried captive; hence it follows: that thy shame may appear; that their sins might appear to themselves and others, of which they had reason to be ashamed. The allusion is to the treatment which captive women sometimes meet with, or adulterous women, to which the Jews are here compared.
A sign, the marring of a girdle, which the prophet had worn for some time, by hiding it in a hole of a rock near the river Euphrates. It was usual with the prophets to teach by signs, that a stupid unthinking people might be brought to consider, and believe, and be affected with what was thus set before them. He was to wear a linen girdle for some time,
2 more voices on this verse
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
proposed
discover . . . upon thy face--rather, "throw up thy skirts over thy face," or head; done by way of ignominy to captive women and to prostitutes (Na 3:5). The Jews' punishment should answer to their crime. As their sin had been perpetrated in the most public places, so God would expose them to the contempt of other nations most openly (La 1:8).
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — starts-lowercase
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Therefore will I - literally, “And I also;” I also must have my turn, I too must retaliate. Compare Nah 3:5.
The words behind it
8 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| וְגַם־ | vegam- | and also | H1571 → | 769 times |
| אֲנִ֛י | ʾani | I | H589 → | 874 times |
| חָשַׂ֥פְתִּי | chasafti | I will strip off | H2834 → | |
| שׁוּלַ֖יִךְ | shulayikh | skirts your | H7757 → | |
| עַל־ | ʾal- | on | H5921 → | 5755 times |
| פָּנָ֑יִךְ | panayikh | face your | H6440 → | 2123 times |
| וְנִרְאָ֖ה | venirah | and it will be visible | H7200 → | 1300 times |
| קְלוֹנֵֽךְ׃ | kelonekh | shame your | H7036 → |
וְגַם־and also
vegam-H1571 →769 times
אֲנִ֛יI
ʾaniH589 →874 times
חָשַׂ֥פְתִּיI will strip off
chasaftiH2834 →
שׁוּלַ֖יִךְskirts your
shulayikhH7757 →
עַל־on
ʾal-H5921 →5755 times
פָּנָ֑יִךְface your
panayikhH6440 →2123 times
וְנִרְאָ֖הand it will be visible
venirahH7200 →1300 times
קְלוֹנֵֽךְ׃shame your
kelonekhH7036 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Ezekiel 16:37therefore I will surely gather all the lovers with whom you found pleasure, all those you loved and all those you hated. I will gather them against you from all around and expose you…
it leads to
- Jeremiah 13:22
And if you ask yourself, “Why has this happened to me?” It is because of the magnitude of your iniquity that your skirts have been stripped off and your body has been exposed.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Hosea 2:3
Otherwise, I will strip her naked and expose her like the day of her birth. I will make her like a desert and turn her into a parched land, and I will let her…
- Jeremiah 13:22
Through
Jeremiah 13:22And if you ask yourself, “Why has this happened to me?” It is because of the magnitude of your iniquity that your skirts have been stripped off and your body has been exposed.
it leads to
- Nahum 3:5
“Behold, I am against you,” declares the LORD of Hosts. “I will lift your skirts over your face. I will show your nakedness to the nations and your shame to the kingdoms.
- Jeremiah 16:10–11
When you tell these people all these things, they will ask you, ‘Why has the LORD pronounced all this great disaster against us? What is our guilt? What is the sin that we have…
- Jeremiah 5:19
And when the people ask, ‘For what offense has the LORD our God done all these things to us?’ You are to tell them, ‘Just as you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods…
- Lamentations 1:8
Jerusalem has sinned greatly; therefore she has become an object of scorn. All who honored her now despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns away.
- Nahum 3:5
Through
Lamentations 1:8Jerusalem has sinned greatly; therefore she has become an object of scorn. All who honored her now despise her, for they have seen her nakedness; she herself groans and turns away.
it leads to
- Isaiah 59:2–13
But your iniquities have built barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He does not hear.
- Lamentations 1:20–22
See, O LORD, how distressed I am! I am churning within; my heart is pounding within me, for I have been most rebellious. Outside, the sword bereaves; inside, there is death.
- Isaiah 59:2–13
Where this verse is studied
On this page
About Jeremiah
This page draws on 9 works. Open the list of works
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Jeremiah; Jerome, LETTER 22.6; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Theodoret of Cyrus, ON JEREMIAH 3:13.27.