Epaphrizo appears only once in the New Testament (Jude 13), in Jude's blistering catalog of false teachers. He calls them 'wild waves of the sea, foaming up [epaphrizo] their shame.' The word combines epi (upon) + aphros (foam/froth) to describe the action of sea waves churning up foam on shore. Applied to false teachers, the image is of people whose frothy, empty words bubble up and leave only pollution behind.
Jude 13 is one of the most vivid descriptors of false teaching in Scripture. Epaphrizo captures what false teaching does: it foams up noisily, creates an impressive frothy display, and ultimately deposits only 'their shame' — their moral corruption — on those they influence. The metaphor draws from Isaiah 57:20: 'the wicked are like the tossing sea, which cannot rest, whose waves cast up mire and mud.' Wild waves are restless, destructive, and boundary-crossing. The contrast is the still waters of Psalm 23 — God's true teaching leads to quiet, nourishing waters, not churning shame.