I’ve never understood the concept of God fearing, as in, “He’s a fine, upstanding, God fearing American, etc.”. Why not, “He’s a fine, upstanding, God loving American, etc.”
Why the threats, instead of the love?
*I’m hesitant to put this in the Great Debates forum because I think there’s a straightforward answer to it, but I just don’t know. If this has been asked recently, then kindly point me in the right direction.
I think the reference is to an earlier meaning of “fearing”, now archaic in other contexts, where “awed” or “humbled” would now be used today.
I love my god. I fear yours.
The phrase “fear of God” occurs 9 times in the King James Bible. Four examples:
I’m not sure I understand that last post, bibliophage. Then again, I see I wasn’t exactly clear in my original post.
What I was getting at was, in a sense, what you quoted, “…There is no fear of God before their eyes”.
O.K.
Now, why should I fear God?
If he knows no evil, what’s the worry? I mean, what’s He gonna do about it?
Am I supposed to walk around fearing God, or in awe of God?
And the background on why I’m asking is that, once again, on T.V., I heard those immortal words quoted in my O.P., ‘He’s a God fearing American. He’s the bomb.’
Whenever I hear that, I think, “Huh? What am I missing here.”
It’s probably a basic question, but one I’ve always wondered about.
CnoteChris, this exact question came up in a meeting I was at last night.
I think that this common misconception stems from an inaccurate translation of the original Hebrew. I do not have a Chumash (Hebrew Bible) with me at work, but I am going to go out on a limb and guess that in most (if not all) of the verses bibliophage references, the words “fear of God” are translations of the Hebrew text Yirat Adonai. This phrase is most commonly (mis)translated as “fear of God.”
A more accurate translation would be “reverence of God.” The Hebrew term Yirah is best translated as “reverence,” while the term Pachad means “fear.”
Does this answer your question?
“Revered”? I’m with Elvis on this. “Awed”. But that applied to the popular Hebrew expression “fear of Heavan”, and to some Biblical instances (e.g. Koheles “he who fears God and he who does not”). I would be inclined to think that in the cited example of Abraham in might refer to a literal fear of God, i.e. violating his commandments.
OED lists “fear” meaning “reverence” or “awe” as a lowly #6 in the definition list. It also says, “now usually only found in the form ‘God-fearing.’”
Hmm while everyone is trying to answer like it’s some word error… I’ll give this to you spiritually… and if you’re not christian don’t expect to understand…
Has anyone here ever heard the term “Fire and Brimestone”?
Tell me What you are afraid of? Getting fired? Your children getting hurt? You getting stuck in traffic?
Those who ask questions about the bible read it the least…
Matthew 6:19-21 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where Moth and rust destroy and robbers break in and steal, instead store up for yourself treasures in heaven where robbers cannot break in and rust cannot destroy. For where your treasure is there also your heart will be”
So certainly dont fear anything earthly Matthew 6:28-30 “and why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. they do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God cares for the grass of the field, which is here today and tommorow thrown into the fire, will he not much clothe you, oh you of little faith?”
The preecher at my church said that we all busy ourselves with things like jobs and sports and television because noone wants to face the ultimate question… Where do we go when we die?
A man can hurt you, lie to you, steal from you, and even kill you… But only one decides to send you to heaven or to send you to hell
again… what are you afraid of?
Let me ask you… did you fear your father as a child? But did you not also at the same time love him?
rust will destroy your car, your money will be spent by your childrena after you’re dead, your health will always deminish untill you die (Health is only the slowest way to die)
Only one thing is eternal… eternity! now tell me what do you fear more… losing your house or losing your soul!
Now to answer your other question… When arron went into the tabernacle and screwed up… tell me how many seconds it took God to strick him dead? After the ark fell and the priest caught it… how long was he alive? Or when they left sodom and gamora… how long did the wife survive after she looked back… and even the man who sold his house and gave half to the church but kept half in seceret… he also was struck down…
To serve God without fear is that If we screw up we don’t die on the spot anymore… we don’t have to fear that if we complain about food that we will have to wander around for 40 years… no worry that if we are not a high preist and go into the most holy… we will instantly turn to dust…
if you want a more simple answer… a God fearing man came from Proverbs 1:7 the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline."
basicly a God fearing man is an old way to say “He’s a smart one” kind of like how Gospel-God spell-God speed-Good Speed It just lost meaning over the years
Oh my.
A friendly word of advice, peewee_RotA:
This is the General Questions forum. You ask a question, you get a factual answer. Preaching belongs in Great Debates. Unless you’re a returning troll, I’ll assume you mean well, but it seems you’re simply out of line here. The best analogy I can come up with at the moment is if you came across two strangers discussing the performance statistics of their new cars, and you butted in and told them they were ruining the environment.
You will not endear yourself to the moderators in this manner.
But why do we fear the Mods? Should we not, instead, love them?
I am currently reading the Bible and it seems to me that for the entire first half of the Old Testament, God just went around trying to get the Israelites to fear Him but at the same time he was trying to get them to TRUST Him and BELIEVE Him. But the Israelites were generally scared, and whiny (with good reason) so he kept having to show “tough love” until they figured it out to shut up and trust Him.
If you look at the story about the plagues of Egypt, you will see God at his most schiester-ist. He is actually being a bit of a jackass to those Egyptians, and trying to get them to fear Him but they keep not fearing him until he’s put about six plauges on them but by then it’s too late and he just toys with them like a cat plays with a mouse.
I think by the time we get into the New Testament, God’s realized that humans are way too whiny and stupid to figure out how to be good “God Fearing” people so He puts Jesus in the picture to make it easier on everyone. He is, apparently, less scary than God.
Well, if we use the definitions “awe” and “reverence” for the word “fear”, can’t we do both?
“Honour thy moderators and thy admins, that thy days may be long upon the boards which Cecil thy Master giveth thee.”
I had assumed this was a question about the meaning and origin of the phrase, which would be a General Question. It now seems to be about why we should or should not fear God, which is a Great Debate.
bibliophage,
moderator, GQ
ZipperJJ, Are you saying that God got smarter as time went by in the bible? How about humans got smarter in their understanding of God. A process which we are probably still engaged in today.
That is so patently ludicrous as to warrant no further comment.
…I suppose peewee can witness to his (or her) heart’s content.
To address the “why should we fear God” question:
Skeptical: The leaders wanted to exercise control, to keep the masses from rising up against them. (To quote the movie Dogma, “Do it and I’ll… I’ll f****n spank you!”) Thus the people are taught to respect the authority of God and, by extension, his “agents” on Earth.
Faithful and Loving: God, being the benevolent Father who knows what is good for us, tells us that if we respect his commandments we will live happier, fuller lives.
Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid: God is vengeful and will f****n spank you.
Choose your poison.
<< Has anyone here ever heard the term “Fire and Brimestone”? >>
Well, yeah…What’s up with “fire and brimstone”? What’s brimstone?
:::: resist temptation to pounce upon the grotesquely naive, for they are smug and full of self-aggrandisement ::::
To be honest with you, bibliophage, it’s a bit of a two-parter.
Once the first part of the question is answered, it basically leads to the obvious second question.
The first part of the question essentially is this: Are we supposed to fear God, or simply be in awe of Him?
If my interpretation of that phrase was correct (Which, to be honest with you, is still a bit murky to me. Is it fear, awe, or something else?) and it is in fact fear, then the second question is: Why do we need to fear a loving, caring, etc., etc., God?
The issue is becoming more clear to me, thanks to the above posts, but I was really after both parts of the question. In retrospect, I could and should have made it as clear as possible in the original posts.
I hope this post clears up a bit what I was after. I mean, I don’t know about anyone else, but coming from this non-religious person, it can get confusing awfully fast.
I’m feeling generous today…
Having grown up Lutheran, I’m pretty familiar with Christian theology. Let me clue you in… the interpretation is everything when it comes to the different denominations. It’s why they exist. Some see God as domineering, some see Him as loving, some are a little of both. Most conservative (and fundamentalist) Christianity basically falls into a combination of numbers 2 and 3 on my list… God’s loves you, but if you don’t believe in Jesus you’ll have to be punished. It’s a strange duality that’s difficult to explain to those who’ve not been indoctrinated, but God is frequently viewed as a judge–merciful and kind to the repentant, righteously indignant to the rebellious. Thus He is both loving and literally to be feared, though most Christians probably won’t admit that’s what they’re saying when they mention they believe in hell. (At least them old Puritans were honest about it.)
Other Christian denom’s reject hell and judgment altogether and interpret “fear” as “respect”. It seems many Jews follow this view as well, though I am less familiar with the range of Jewish belief structures.
To be quite honest, as a child I was very certain of my religion, but I’m not sure what to believe anymore. Intuitively, I know (as much as anyone can know) there’s a God. I still accept a good portion of Christian theology. But beyond that… I don’t know. Personally I’d go with “respect” definition.