Fear:
fer (yir’ah, yare’; phobos, phobeo):Terms, etc.:
“Fear” is the translation of many words in the Old Testament; the chief are: yir’ah, “fear,” “terror,” “reverence,” “awe,” most often “the fear of God,” “fear of Yahweh” (Ge 20:11; 2Ch 19:9, etc.); also of “fear” generally (Job 22:4; Isa 7:25; Eze 30:13, etc.); yare’,” to be afraid,” “to fear,” “to reverence” (Ge 15:1; Le 19:3,14; Deut 6:2, etc.); pachadh, “fear,” “terror,” “dread” (Ge 31:42,53; Deut 11:25; 1Sa 11:7 the King James Version; Job 4:14; Isa 2:10 the King James Version, etc.).
“Fearful” (timid) is the translation of yare’ (Deut 20:8; Jud 7:3); “to be feared,” yare’ (Ex 15:11; Deut 28:58; compare Ps 130:4); in Isa 35:4, it is the translation of mahar, “hasty,” “them that are of a fearful heart,” margin “Hebrew hasty”; perhaps, ready to flee (for fear).
“Fearfully” (Ps 139:14): yare’,” I am fearfully (and) wonderfully made,” so the Revised Version (British and American); “and” is not in the text, so that “fearfully” may be equivalent to “extremely,” to an awesome degree; compare Ps 65:5, “by terrible things …. in righteousness”; Ps 66:3, “How terrible are thy works (yare’ “fearful “); the Septuagint, Peshitta, Vulgate (Jerome’s Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) have “Thou art fearfully wonderful.”
“Fearfulness” occurs In Ps 55:5 (yir’ah); Isa 21:4 (pallatsuth), the Revised Version (British and American) “horror”; Isa 33:14 (re‘adhah, “trembling”), “Fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites,” the Revised Version (British and American) “Trembling hath seized the godless ones.”
From the ISBE found at Blue Letter Bible
