Jeremiah 50:12
New International Version
your mother will be greatly ashamed; she who gave you birth will be disgraced. She will be the least of the nations— a wilderness, a dry land, a desert.

New Living Translation
But your homeland will be overwhelmed with shame and disgrace. You will become the least of nations— a wilderness, a dry and desolate land.

English Standard Version
your mother shall be utterly shamed, and she who bore you shall be disgraced. Behold, she shall be the last of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Berean Standard Bible
your mother will be greatly ashamed; she who bore you will be disgraced. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Berean Literal Bible
your⁺ mother will be greatly ashamed, she who bore you⁺ will be disgraced. Behold, the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

King James Bible
Your mother shall be sore confounded; she that bare you shall be ashamed: behold, the hindermost of the nations shall be a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

New King James Version
Your mother shall be deeply ashamed; She who bore you shall be ashamed. Behold, the least of the nations shall be a wilderness, A dry land and a desert.

New American Standard Bible
Your mother will be greatly ashamed, She who gave you birth will be humiliated. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, A wilderness, a dry land and a desert.

NASB 1995
Your mother will be greatly ashamed, She who gave you birth will be humiliated. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, A wilderness, a parched land and a desert.

NASB 1977
Your mother will be greatly ashamed, She who gave you birth will be humiliated. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, A wilderness, a parched land, and a desert.

Legacy Standard Bible
Your mother will be greatly ashamed; She who gave you birth will be humiliated. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, A wilderness, a parched land, and a desert.

Amplified Bible
Your mother [Babylon] shall be greatly shamed; She who gave you birth will be ashamed. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, A wilderness, a parched land and a desert.

Berean Annotated Bible
your⁺ mother will be greatly ashamed; she who bore you⁺ will be disgraced. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Christian Standard Bible
your mother will be utterly humiliated; she who bore you will be put to shame. Look! She will lag behind all the nations — an arid wilderness, a desert.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
your mother will be utterly humiliated; she who bore you will be put to shame. Look! She will lag behind all the nations— a dry land, a wilderness, an Arabah.

American Standard Version
your mother shall be utterly put to shame; she that bare you shall be confounded: behold, she shall be the hindermost of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Contemporary English Version
The city of Babylon was like a mother to you. But it will be disgraced and become nothing but a barren desert.

English Revised Version
your mother shall be sore ashamed; she that bare you shall be confounded: behold, she shall be the hindermost of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

GOD'S WORD® Translation
But your mother will be greatly ashamed. The woman who gave birth to you will be disgraced. Babylon, you will be the least important nation. You will become a parched desert.

Good News Translation
but your own great city will be humiliated and disgraced. Babylonia will be the least important nation of all; it will become a dry and waterless desert.

International Standard Version
your mother will be greatly devastated, she who gave birth to you will be ashamed. She will become the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

NET Bible
But Babylonia will be put to great shame. The land where you were born will be disgraced. Indeed, Babylonia will become the least important of all nations. It will become a dry and barren desert.

New Heart English Bible
your mother shall be utterly disappointed; she who bore you shall be confounded: look, she shall be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Webster's Bible Translation
Your mother shall be greatly confounded; she that bore you shall be ashamed: behold, the hindermost of the nations shall be a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.
Majority Text Translations
Majority Standard Bible
your mother will be greatly ashamed; she who bore you will be disgraced. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

World English Bible
your mother will be utterly disappointed. She who bore you will be confounded. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.
Literal Translations
Literal Standard Version
Your mother has been greatly ashamed, "" She who bore you has been confounded, "" Behold, the last of nations [is] a wilderness, "" A dry land, and a desert.

Berean Literal Bible
your⁺ mother will be greatly ashamed, she who bore you⁺ will be disgraced. Behold, the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Young's Literal Translation
Ashamed hath been your mother greatly, Confounded hath she been that bare you, Lo, the hindermost of nations is a wilderness, A dry land, and a desert.

Smith's Literal Translation
Your mother was greatly ashamed; she bearing you was put to shame: behold the last of the nations a desert, dryness and a sterile region.
Catholic Translations
Douay-Rheims Bible
Your mother is confounded exceedingly, and she that bore you is made even with the dust: behold she shall be the last among the nations, a wilderness unpassable, and dry.

Catholic Public Domain Version
Your mother has been exceedingly shamed, and she who bore you has become equal to the dust. Behold, she will be the last among the nations, a desert, impassable and dry.

New American Bible
Your mother will indeed be put to shame, she that bore you shall be abashed; See, the last of the nations, a wilderness, a dry wasteland.

New Revised Standard Version
your mother shall be utterly shamed, and she who bore you shall be disgraced. Lo, she shall be the last of the nations, a wilderness, dry land, and a desert.
Translations from Aramaic
Lamsa Bible
Your mother is exceedingly ashamed; she who bore you is confounded: behold, the last of the nations shall become wilderness, waste, and desolation.

Peshitta Holy Bible Translated
Your mother is very ashamed and she blushed, she who gave you birth. Behold, the last of the nations is as a wilderness, a waste and a desolation
OT Translations
JPS Tanakh 1917
Your mother shall be sore ashamed, She that bore you shall be confounded; Behold, the hindermost of the nations Shall be a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

Brenton Septuagint Translation
Your mother is greatly ashamed; your mother that bore you for prosperity is confounded: she is the last of the nations, desolate,

Additional Translations ...



Context
Babylon's Fall is Certain
11“Because you rejoice, because you sing in triumph—you who plunder My inheritance—because you frolic like a heifer treading grain and neigh like stallions, 12your mother will be greatly ashamed; she who bore you will be disgraced. Behold, she will be the least of the nations, a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert. 13Because of the wrath of the LORD, she will not be inhabited; she will become completely desolate. All who pass through Babylon will be horrified and will hiss at all her wounds.…

Cross References
your mother will be greatly ashamed;

Isaiah 47:1-5
“Go down and sit in the dust, O Virgin Daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, O Daughter of the Chaldeans! For you will no longer be called tender or delicate. / Take millstones and grind flour; remove your veil; strip off your skirt, bare your thigh, and wade through the streams. / Your nakedness will be uncovered and your shame will be exposed. I will take vengeance; I will spare no one.” …

Revelation 18:7-8
As much as she has glorified herself and lived in luxury, give her the same measure of torment and grief. In her heart she says, ‘I sit as queen; I am not a widow and will never see grief.’ / Therefore her plagues will come in one day—death and grief and famine—and she will be consumed by fire, for mighty is the Lord God who judges her.”
she who bore you will be disgraced.

Deuteronomy 32:18
You ignored the Rock who brought you forth; you forgot the God who gave you birth.

Ezekiel 16:52-54
So now you must bear your disgrace, since you have brought justification for your sisters. For they appear more righteous than you, because your sins were more vile than theirs. So you too must bear your shame and disgrace, since you have made your sisters appear righteous. / But I will restore Sodom and her daughters from captivity, as well as Samaria and her daughters. And I will restore you along with them. / So you will bear your disgrace and be ashamed of all you did to comfort them.
Behold, she will be the least of the nations,

Jeremiah 49:15
“For behold, I will make you small among nations, despised among men.

Obadiah 1:2
“Behold, I will make you small among the nations; you will be deeply despised.
a wilderness,

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 die of thirst.

Isaiah 13:19-22
And Babylon, the jewel of the kingdoms, the glory of the pride of the Chaldeans, will be overthrown by God like Sodom and Gomorrah. / She will never be inhabited or settled from generation to generation; no nomad will pitch his tent there, no shepherd will rest his flock there. / But desert creatures will lie down there, and howling creatures will fill her houses. Ostriches will dwell there, and wild goats will leap about. …
a dry land,

Psalm 63:1
A Psalm of David, when he was in the Wilderness of Judah. O God, You are my God. Earnestly I seek You; my soul thirsts for You. My body yearns for You in a dry and weary land without water.

Jeremiah 2:6
They did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD who brought us up from the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and pits, a land of drought and darkness, a land where no one travels and no one lives?’
and a desert.

Jeremiah 4:26
I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert. All its cities were torn down before the LORD, before His fierce anger.

Joel 3:19
Egypt will become desolate, and Edom a desert wasteland, because of the violence done to the people of Judah, in whose land they shed innocent blood.
Revelation 18:2
And he cried out in a mighty voice: “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a lair for demons and a haunt for every unclean spirit, every unclean bird, and every detestable beast.

Revelation 17:5
And on her forehead a mysterious name was written: BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.

Isaiah 14:4-6
you will sing this song of contempt against the king of Babylon: How the oppressor has ceased, and how his fury has ended! / The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers. / It struck the peoples in anger with unceasing blows; it subdued the nations in rage with relentless persecution.

Revelation 18:10
In fear of her torment, they will stand at a distance and cry out: “Woe, woe to the great city, the mighty city of Babylon! For in a single hour your judgment has come.”


Treasury of Scripture

Your mother shall be sore confounded; she that bore you shall be ashamed: behold, the last of the nations shall be a wilderness, a dry land, and a desert.

mother

Jeremiah 49:2
Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard in Rabbah of the Ammonites; and it shall be a desolate heap, and her daughters shall be burned with fire: then shall Israel be heir unto them that were his heirs, saith the LORD.

Galatians 4:26
But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.

Revelation 17:5
And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.

the hindermost

Jeremiah 25:26
And all the kings of the north, far and near, one with another, and all the kingdoms of the world, which are upon the face of the earth: and the king of Sheshach shall drink after them.

Isaiah 23:13
Behold the land of the Chaldeans; this people was not, till the Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness: they set up the towers thereof, they raised up the palaces thereof; and he brought it to ruin.

a wilderness

Jeremiah 50:35-40
A sword is upon the Chaldeans, saith the LORD, and upon the inhabitants of Babylon, and upon her princes, and upon her wise men

Jeremiah 25:12
And it shall come to pass, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the LORD, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans, and will make it perpetual desolations.

Jeremiah 51:25,26,43,62-64
Behold, I am against thee, O destroying mountain, saith the LORD, which destroyest all the earth: and I will stretch out mine hand upon thee, and roll thee down from the rocks, and will make thee a burnt mountain…

Jump to Previous
Ashamed Bare Birth Bore Confounded Covered Desert Disappointed Disgraced Dry Greatly Hindermost Hindmost Humiliated Least Mother Nations Parched Reproach Shamed Sore Sorely Unwatered Utterly Waste Wilderness
Jump to Next
Ashamed Bare Birth Bore Confounded Covered Desert Disappointed Disgraced Dry Greatly Hindermost Hindmost Humiliated Least Mother Nations Parched Reproach Shamed Sore Sorely Unwatered Utterly Waste Wilderness
Jeremiah 50
1. The judgment of Babylon and the redemption of Israel












your mother will be greatly ashamed;

Babylon, portrayed as a mother, would see the humiliation of the empire she had produced. Once proud, wealthy, and secure behind its defenses, Babylon would face God’s judgment for its violence, idolatry, and arrogance.

Isa 47:1-5 Go down and sit in the dust, O Virgin Daughter of Babylon.…
Rev 18:7-8 As much as she has glorified herself and lived in luxury,…

she who bore you will be disgraced.

The city’s downfall would reverse its position among the nations. Babylon’s capture by the Medes and Persians ended its imperial dominance, and its moral corruption was exposed along with its military weakness.

Deu 32:18 You ignored the Rock who brought you forth;…
Ezk 16:52-54 So now you must bear your disgrace, since you have brought…

Behold, she will be the least of the nations,

Babylon would no longer rule kingdoms or command the surrounding region. Though it remained inhabited for a time after its conquest, it never recovered its former power or influence.

Jer 49:15 For behold, I will make you small among nations,…
Oba 1:2 Behold, I will make you small among the nations;…

a wilderness,

The fertile and heavily populated lands associated with Babylon would become abandoned and desolate. Its decline unfolded over generations as its political importance, population, and irrigation systems diminished.

Hos 2:3 Otherwise, I will strip her naked and expose her…
Isa 13:19-22 And Babylon, the jewel of the kingdoms,…

a dry land,

The judgment would leave what had been a prosperous center of trade and agriculture barren. Babylon’s wealth and splendor could not preserve it from the consequences of its rebellion against God.

Psa 63:1 A Psalm of David, when he was in the Wilderness…
Jer 2:6 They did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD who brought us……

and a desert.

The ruins of Babylon stand as evidence of its lasting collapse. The great city that had conquered nations became a place of ruins, confirming the certainty of God’s judgment upon proud kingdoms.

Jer 4:26 I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert.…
Jol 3:19 Egypt will become desolate, and Edom a desert wasteland…

Persons / Places / Events
1. Babylon
The primary subject of this prophecy, Babylon was a powerful empire known for its wealth and influence. In this context, it is personified as a mother who will be shamed and disgraced.

2. Jeremiah
The prophet who delivered this message. He was called by God to speak to the nations, including pronouncing judgment on Babylon.

3. Israel and Judah
The people of God who were in exile in Babylon at the time of this prophecy. Their eventual deliverance is implied in the broader context of Jeremiah 50.

4. The Wilderness
Symbolic of desolation and judgment, representing the future state of Babylon as prophesied by Jeremiah.

5. The Nations
Refers to the surrounding nations that would witness Babylon's downfall and the fulfillment of God's judgment.
Teaching Points
God's Sovereignty Over Nations
God is in control of all nations, and His plans will prevail despite human power and pride.

The Consequences of Pride
Babylon's downfall serves as a warning against pride and self-reliance. Nations and individuals alike must humble themselves before God.

Hope for the Oppressed
The prophecy offers hope to those suffering under oppression, reminding them that God sees their plight and will act in His timing.

The Certainty of God's Judgment
Just as Babylon faced judgment, all will be held accountable before God. This calls for repentance and faithfulness.

Spiritual Desolation
The imagery of wilderness and desert can also apply to spiritual dryness, urging believers to seek renewal in God.
Bible Study Questions and Answers
1. What is the meaning of Jeremiah 50:12?

2. How does Jeremiah 50:12 illustrate God's judgment on Babylon's pride and arrogance?

3. What lessons can we learn from Babylon's downfall in Jeremiah 50:12?

4. How does Jeremiah 50:12 connect with other prophecies about Babylon's destruction?

5. How can we apply the warning in Jeremiah 50:12 to modern nations today?

6. What does "your mother will be greatly ashamed" teach about consequences of sin?

7. How does Jeremiah 50:12 reflect God's judgment on nations?

8. What historical context surrounds Jeremiah 50:12?

9. How does Jeremiah 50:12 relate to the fall of Babylon?

10. What are the top 10 Lessons from Jeremiah 50?


(12) Your mother shall be sore confounded . . .--The prophet speaks to the people of Babylon, and the city is therefore described as their mother.

The hindermost of the nations shall be a wilderness . . .--The interpolated words mar the force of the sentence. Better, behold the hindermost of the nations, a wilderness, a waste, and a desert. This was to be the state to which Babylon should be reduced.

Jeremiah 50:12 paints Babylon’s complete reversal: from honored mother to shamed outcast, from head of nations to forgotten wasteland. The verse assures us that God’s justice is certain, far-reaching, and literal. Prideful powers fall, but His word stands.

Parallel Commentaries ...


Hebrew
your mother
אִמְּכֶם֙ (’im·mə·ḵem)
Noun - feminine singular construct | second person masculine plural
Strong's 517: A mother, )

will be greatly
מְאֹ֔ד (mə·’ōḏ)
Adverb
Strong's 3966: Vehemence, vehemently, wholly, speedily

ashamed;
בּ֤וֹשָׁה (bō·wō·šāh)
Verb - Qal - Perfect - third person feminine singular
Strong's 954: To pale, to be ashamed, to be disappointed, delayed

she who bore you
יֽוֹלַדְתְּכֶ֑ם (yō·w·laḏ·tə·ḵem)
Verb - Qal - Participle - feminine singular construct | second person masculine plural
Strong's 3205: To bear young, to beget, medically, to act as midwife, to show lineage

will be disgraced.
חָפְרָ֖ה (ḥā·p̄ə·rāh)
Verb - Qal - Perfect - third person feminine singular
Strong's 2659: To blush, to be ashamed, disappointed, to shame, reproach

Behold,
הִנֵּה֙ (hin·nêh)
Interjection
Strong's 2009: Lo! behold!

[she will be] the least
אַחֲרִ֣ית (’a·ḥă·rîṯ)
Noun - feminine singular construct
Strong's 319: The last, end, the future, posterity

of the nations,
גּוֹיִ֔ם (gō·w·yim)
Noun - masculine plural
Strong's 1471: A foreign nation, a Gentile, a troop of animals, a flight of locusts

a wilderness,
מִדְבָּ֖ר (miḏ·bār)
Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 4057: A pasture, a desert, speech

a dry land,
צִיָּ֥ה (ṣî·yāh)
Noun - feminine singular
Strong's 6723: Aridity, a desert

and a desert.
וַעֲרָבָֽה׃ (wa·‘ă·rā·ḇāh)
Conjunctive waw | Noun - feminine singular
Strong's 6160: Arabah -- a steppe or desert plain, also a desert valley running south from the Sea of Galilee


Additonal Resources
Jeremiah 50:12 Blue Letter Bible
Jeremiah 50:12 Bible Gateway
Jeremiah 50:12 Bible.com

Jeremiah 50:12 NIV
Jeremiah 50:12 NLT
Jeremiah 50:12 ESV
Jeremiah 50:12 NASB
Jeremiah 50:12 KJV

Jeremiah 50:12 Study Bible
Jeremiah 50:12 Biblia Paralela
Jeremiah 50:12 Chinese Bible
Jeremiah 50:12 French Bible
Jeremiah 50:12 Catholic Bible

OT Prophets: Jeremiah 50:12 Your mother shall be utterly disappointed (Jer.)

Jeremiah 50:11
Top of Page
Top of Page