Jeremiah 8:12 · World English Bible
Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed. They couldn’t blush. Therefore they will fall among those who fall. In the time of their visitation they will be cast down, says Yahweh.
The loss of the capacity to blush is not strength. A man who has done wrong so often that his face no longer betrays him has not conquered shame.
From the Clinical Psychology reading below.
The same verse, read by one tradition.
CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY
The loss of the capacity to blush is not strength. A man who has done wrong so often that his face no longer betrays him has not conquered shame. He has amputated the warning that could have called him back.
Shame hurts because it works. The burn tells you your hand is on the stove, and if you silence it long enough you keep the injury without the alarm. Such a man walks straight into his own collapse and never understands why. He sanded away the instrument that measured the distance to the edge.
Clinical Psychology lens
What used to bother me that it no longer does, and is that growth or numbness?
A sense of shame is one of the instruments nature gave you. Wear it down and you have lost a sense, not gained a strength.
Self respect and a healthy caution about doing harm are called guardians. Without them a person keeps going in a direction they would not choose if they could still feel it.
The mark of a decent person is that he still feels shame. When the capacity goes, nothing is left to pull him back from what he is doing.
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Clinical Psychology