גּוּר
gur
to dread
Lexicon Entry
Lexicon data from STEPBible TIPNR, Tyndale House, Cambridge. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
What Original Readers Understood
Supported# H1481C (gur): To Dread The Hebrew verb *gur* carries the fundamental meaning "to dread," expressing an emotional response of fear or apprehension. With ten occurrences across the biblical text, this word occupies a modest but meaningful place in Hebrew vocabulary for describing human emotional states, particularly anxiety or fearfulness in the face of perceived threat or uncertainty. The limited frequency of *gur* suggests it represents a specific shade of fear rather than a general or primary term. Its presence across ten separate instances indicates the concept it conveys—dread as a distinctive emotional experience—was important enough to biblical writers to warrant its own dedicated vocabulary. This distinction matters: dread differs from other fear-related words in Hebrew by connoting a more anticipatory or brooding quality, the kind of fear that precedes a known or suspected difficulty. Without access to specific contextual examples from those ten biblical occurrences, the precise situations triggering this emotion remain beyond our current analysis. However, the existence of a dedicated verb for this particular emotional state reflects the biblical text's nuanced interest in the interior life and the various ways humans experience danger, uncertainty, or divine presence.
Source data & methodology
Occurrences in Scripture
10 total occurrences across the text
be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishments of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment.”
Job 41:25When he raises himself up, the mighty are afraid. They retreat before his thrashing.
Psalms 22:23You who fear Yahweh, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, glorify him! Stand in awe of him, all you descendants of Israel!
Psalms 33:8Let all the earth fear Yahweh. Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
Hosea 10:5The inhabitants of Samaria will be in terror for the calves of Beth Aven; for its people will mourn over it, Along with its priests who rejoiced over it, for its glory, because it has departed from it.
Numbers 22:3Moab was very afraid of the people, because they were many. Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel.
Deuteronomy 1:17You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small and the great alike. You shall not be afraid of the face of man, for the judgment is God’s. The case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.”
Deuteronomy 18:22When a prophet speaks in Yahweh’s name, if the thing doesn’t follow, nor happen, that is the thing which Yahweh has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of him.
Deuteronomy 32:27were it not that I feared the provocation of the enemy, lest their adversaries should judge wrongly, lest they should say, ‘Our hand is exalted, Yahweh has not done all this.’ ”
1 Samuel 18:15When Saul saw that he behaved himself very wisely, he stood in awe of him.