And thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations whither the LORD shall lead thee.
Thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a by-word, among all nations - other people should wonder at their great and protracted calamities. No doubt they were so to the Assyrians and Babylonians. And what was the natural effect of this, but to excite deadly resentment in their breasts, (cf. Psalms 138:1-8.) In subsequent times they have been no less "a proverb and a by word among all nations," ever since their dispersion by the Romans. There is not a quarter of the globe where this prediction is not verified.
Mohammedans and pagans of every description pour contempt upon them and load them with all manner of indignities. Nor have Christians been at all more kindly disposed toward them; on the contrary, they have in times gone by been foremost in executing upon them the divine vengeance. In short, the annals of almost every nation, for 1,800 years, afford abundant proofs that this has been, as it still is, the case-the very name of Jew being a universally recognized term for extreme degradation and wretchedness, and is often applied by passionate people in derision, 'you Jew.'