Tool Beta
Hebrew and Greek Without Learning Either
A walk through Genesis, the Psalms, and John, plus the key Hebrew and Greek words worth knowing. Each card is a place the English Bibles part company, and what in the Hebrew or Greek made them.
yare
To fear, and also to revere. The same problem English has with awe.
Proverbs 1:7, in every translation this tool compares.
An awesome responsibility. That was awesome. English already has a word that slid from dread to enthusiasm, and you can feel both senses in it.
Because the fear of the LORD is a central Old Testament idea and English fear now means being frightened, which turns a posture into a phobia.
Versions read fear, and reverence or awe in a minority of places.
יָרֵא yare · H3372
Yare covers terror, respect and reverence. The same verb is used of being afraid of an army and of the proper posture before God, and Hebrew does not mark which.
English fear kept only the frightened sense, so reverence has to be supplied by a footnote or a sermon.
When a translation offers reverence as an alternative to fear, the word is doing both and the sentence usually is not choosing.
Fear is the overwhelming majority rendering; reverence and awe are minority choices.
- yare of ordinary fear: Genesis 3:10; Exodus 14:10
- the fear of the LORD: Proverbs 1:7; 9:10
- yirah, the noun: Isaiah 11:2-3
