φοβέω
to fear
Full lexicon entry — Thayer's Greek Lexicon
From Thayer's Greek Lexicon
Where this word appears
See every Present-tense verb in the Greek New Testament →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Tense
- Aorist
- Action viewed as a simple whole, without regard to duration — often past (perfective aspect).
- Present
- Ongoing or general action in present time (imperfective aspect).
- Imperfect
- Continuous or repeated action in past time (“was writing”).
- Future
- Action expected in future time.
Voice
- Passive deponent
- Passive in form but active in meaning.
- Middle or Passive deponent
- Middle/passive in form but active in meaning.
Mood
- Indicative
- States a fact or asks a factual question (the mood of reality).
- Imperative
- Expresses a command or request.
- Participle
- A verbal adjective (“writing,” “having written”).
- Subjunctive
- Expresses probability, purpose, or possibility (the mood of contingency).
- Infinitive
- A verbal noun (“to write”), unmarked for person or number.
Case
- Nominative
- The case of the subject (and the predicate nominative).
- Dative
- The case of the indirect object, means, or location — “to / for / with / in.”
Person
- 3rd person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 2nd person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 1st person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Plural
- More than one.
- Singular
- One.
Every verse where G5399 appears in the Book of Revelation — 6 distinct verses. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Greek form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Greek New Testament; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences of this word are not indexed here.
Revelation
- Revelation 1:17 φοβοῦ pres mid/pass.dep impv 2sg When I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead man. He laid his right hand on me, saying, "Don't be afraid. I am the first and the last,
- Revelation 2:10 φοβοῦ pres mid/pass.dep impv 2sg Don't be afraid of the things which you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested; and you will have oppression for ten days. Be faithful to death, and I will give you the crown of life.
- Revelation 11:18 φοβουμένοις pres mid/pass.dep ptcp dat pl masc The nations were angry, and your wrath came, as did the time for the dead to be judged, and to give your bondservants the prophets, their reward, as well as to the saints, and those who fear your name, to the small and the great; and to destroy those who destroy the earth."
- Revelation 14:7 φοβήθητε aor pass.dep impv 2pl He said with a loud voice, "Fear the Lord, and give him glory; for the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the springs of waters!"
- Revelation 15:4 φοβηθῇ aor pass.dep subj 3sg Who wouldn't fear you, Lord, And glorify your name? For you only are holy. For all the nations will come and worship before you. For your righteous acts have been revealed."
- Revelation 19:5 φοβούμενοι pres mid/pass.dep ptcp nom pl masc A voice came forth from the throne, saying, "Give praise to our God, all you his servants, you who fear him, the small and the great!"
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
The Greek verb φοβεω centers on the idea of “to fear.” Debuting at Matthew 1:20, it then recurs through the corpus. Spanning 92 verses in 14 books, it ranks among the moderately common words of the Greek New Testament. Sharing its root, it stands alongside φοβος, φοβερος and φοβητρον. Dig into 92-verse concordance and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's G5399 catalogs a Greek word from the Greek New Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Greek New Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 92
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 92 distinct verses.
- 14 / 27
- NT books
- The word appears in 14 of 27 New Testament books.
- #179
- by frequency
- Top 250 most frequent Greek words (rank 179 of 5,347 Greek words by occurrence).
View all 92 occurrences in the concordance →
By section of the New Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Some books belong to more than one corpus (Luke is in both the Gospels and the Lukan corpus, and so on), so these shares overlap and need not total 100%. Each figure is a share of the word’s 92 distinct verses.
- Gospels 55 verses · 60%
- Lukan (Luke–Acts) 35 verses · 38%
- Johannine 12 verses · 13%
- Pauline corpus 9 verses · 10%
- Revelation 6 verses · 7%
- Hebrews 4 verses · 4%
- General (Catholic) Epistles 4 verses · 4%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
- King James Version: Fear 26×, Afraid 15×, They feared 12×
- American Standard Version: Fear 31×, Afraid 13×, They feared 11×
- Berean Standard Bible: Fear 18×, Be afraid 17×, They were afraid 9×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Fear 23×, Do 22×, Be afraid 14×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders G5399 across 110 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 21 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders G5399 across 109 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 25 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 1 further occurrence.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders G5399 across 94 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 29 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 1 further occurrence.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders G5399 across 131 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus other, less common renderings. Plus 22 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in Thayer's
The 1 sense Thayer's distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency or importance). The full entry — with sub-senses — is in the Lexicon Entry tab.
- to put to flight by terrifying (to scare away)
Word origin
Derived from φοβος (phóbos) (G5401) — fear.
From G5401 ; to frighten that is (passively) to be alarmed ; by analogy to be in awe of that is revere : - be (+ sore) afraid fear (exceedingly) reverence.
— Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance (1890), public domain.
Forms in the corpus
The 26 distinct written forms G5399 takes in the Greek New Testament, most frequent first — each parse links to that tense’s occurrences in the concordance.
Same root — word family
Other Thayer's entries built from the same root as G5399, grouped by Strong’s listed origin. These share a root / origin per the lexicon — not necessarily a shared meaning. Each links to that word’s own entry.
Derives from
Shares the same root
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint usage
The same Greek word φοβεω appears 343 times in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), across 327 verses in 34 books.
- 343
- LXX occurrences
- Tagged occurrences of this Greek word in the Septuagint.
- 327
- verses
- Distinct Septuagint verses containing this word.
- 34 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 34 of the 39 Old Testament books.
Sample Septuagint occurrences
- Genesis 3:10 φοβέω
- Exodus 1:17 φοβέω
- Leviticus 19:3 φοβέω
- Numbers 12:8 φοβέω
- Deuteronomy 1:21 φοβέω
- Joshua 1:9 φοβέω
- Judges 4:18 φοβέω
- Ruth 3:11 φοβέω
- 1 Samuel 3:15 φοβέω
- 2 Samuel 1:14 φοβέω
- 1 Kings 1:50 φοβέω
- 2 Kings 1:15 φοβέω
Septuagint occurrences (same lexeme)
Every verse where the same Strong’s number (G5399) appears in the Greek Septuagint — showing the first 50 of 327. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context; the Greek form is the matched word — the English is not keyword-highlighted.
- Genesis 3:10 φοβέω The man said, "I heard your voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself."
- Genesis 15:1 φοβέω After these things the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision, saying, "Don't be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward."
- Genesis 18:15 φοβέω Then Sarah denied, saying, "I didn't laugh," for she was afraid." He said, "No, but you did laugh."
- Genesis 19:30 φοβέω Lot went up out of Zoar, and lived in the mountain, and his two daughters with him; for he was afraid to live in Zoar. He lived in a cave with his two daughters.
- Genesis 20:2 φοβέω Abraham said about Sarah his wife, "She is my sister." Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah.
- Genesis 20:8 φοβέω Abimelech rose early in the morning, and called all his servants, and told all these things in their ear. The men were very scared.
- Genesis 21:17 φοβέω God heard the voice of the boy. The angel of God called to Hagar out of the sky, and said to her, "What ails you, Hagar? Don't be afraid. For God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.
- Genesis 22:12 φοβέω He said, "Don't lay your hand on the boy, neither do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me."
- Genesis 26:7 φοβέω The men of the place asked him about his wife. He said, "She is my sister," for he was afraid to say, "My wife," lest, he thought, the men of the place might kill me for Rebekah, because she was beautiful to look on.
- Genesis 26:24 φοβέω Yahweh appeared to him the same night, and said, "I am the God of Abraham your father. Don't be afraid, for I am with you, and will bless you, and multiply your seed for my servant Abraham's sake."
- Genesis 28:13 φοβέω Behold, Yahweh stood above it, and said, "I am Yahweh, the God of Abraham your father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon you lie, to you will I give it, and to your seed.
- Genesis 28:17 φοβέω He was afraid, and said, "How dreadful is this place! This is none other than God's house, and this is the gate of heaven."
- Genesis 32:8 φοβέω and he said, "If Esau comes to the one company, and strikes it, then the company which is left will escape."
- Genesis 32:12 φοβέω You said, 'I will surely do you good, and make your seed as the sand of the sea, which can't be numbered because there are so many.'"
- Genesis 42:18 φοβέω Joseph said to them the third day, "Do this, and live, for I fear God.
- Genesis 42:35 φοβέω It happened as they emptied their sacks, that behold, every man's bundle of money was in his sack. When they and their father saw their bundles of money, they were afraid.
- Genesis 43:23 φοβέω He said, "Peace be to you. Don't be afraid. Your God, and the God of your father, has given you treasure in your sacks. I received your money." He brought Simeon out to them.
- Genesis 46:3 φοβέω He said, "I am God, the God of your father. Don't be afraid to go down into Egypt; for there I will make of you a great nation.
- Genesis 50:19 φοβέω Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid, for am I in the place of God?
- Genesis 50:21 φοβέω Now therefore don't be afraid. I will nourish you and your little ones." He comforted them, and spoke kindly to them.
- Exodus 1:17 φοβέω But the midwives feared God, and didn't do what the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the baby boys alive.
- Exodus 1:21 φοβέω It happened, because the midwives feared God, that he gave them families.
- Exodus 2:14 φοβέω He said, "Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you plan to kill me, as you killed the Egyptian?" Moses was afraid, and said, "Surely this thing is known."
- Exodus 9:20 φοβέω Those who feared the word of Yahweh among the servants of Pharaoh made their servants and their cattle flee into the houses.
- Exodus 9:30 φοβέω But as for you and your servants, I know that you don't yet fear Yahweh God."
- Exodus 14:10 φοβέω When Pharaoh drew near, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them; and they were very afraid. The children of Israel cried out to Yahweh.
- Exodus 14:31 φοβέω Israel saw the great work which Yahweh did to the Egyptians, and the people feared Yahweh; and they believed in Yahweh, and in his servant Moses.
- Exodus 20:18 φοβέω All the people perceived the thunderings, the lightnings, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking. When the people saw it, they trembled, and stayed at a distance.
- Exodus 34:30 φοβέω When Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come near him.
- Leviticus 19:3 φοβέω "'Each one of you shall respect his mother and his father. You shall keep my Sabbaths. I am Yahweh your God.
- Leviticus 19:14 φοβέω "'You shall not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block before the blind; but you shall fear your God. I am Yahweh.
- Leviticus 19:30 φοβέω "'You shall keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary; I am Yahweh.
- Leviticus 19:32 φοβέω You shall rise up before the gray head, and honor the face of an old man, and you shall fear your God. I am Yahweh.
- Leviticus 25:17 φοβέω You shall not wrong one another; but you shall fear your God: for I am Yahweh your God.
- Leviticus 25:36 φοβέω Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God; that your brother may live among you.
- Leviticus 25:43 φοβέω You shall not rule over him with harshness, but shall fear your God.
- Leviticus 26:2 φοβέω "'You shall keep my Sabbaths, and have reverence for my sanctuary. I am Yahweh.
- Numbers 12:8 φοβέω with him will I speak mouth to mouth, even manifestly, and not in dark speeches; and the form of Yahweh shall he see: why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant, against Moses?
- Numbers 14:9 φοβέω Only don't rebel against Yahweh, neither fear the people of the land; for they are bread for us: their defense is removed from over them, and Yahweh is with us: don't fear them.
- Numbers 21:34 φοβέω Yahweh said to Moses, Don't fear him: for I have delivered him into your hand, and all his people, and his land; and you shall do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.
- Numbers 22:3 φοβέω Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many: and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel.
- Deuteronomy 1:21 φοβέω Behold, Yahweh your God has set the land before you: go up, take possession, as Yahweh, the God of your fathers, has spoken to you; don't be afraid, neither be dismayed.
- Deuteronomy 1:29 φοβέω Then I said to you, Don't dread, neither be afraid of them.
- Deuteronomy 2:4 φοβέω Command you the people, saying, You are to pass through the border of your brothers the children of Esau, who dwell in Seir; and they will be afraid of you: take good heed to yourselves therefore;
- Deuteronomy 3:2 φοβέω Yahweh said to me, Don't fear him; for I have delivered him, and all his people, and his land, into your hand; and you shall do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.
- Deuteronomy 3:22 φοβέω You shall not fear them; for Yahweh your God, he it is who fights for you.
- Deuteronomy 4:10 φοβέω the day that you stood before Yahweh your God in Horeb, when Yahweh said to me, Assemble me the people, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children.
- Deuteronomy 5:5 φοβέω (I stood between Yahweh and you at that time, to show you the word of Yahweh: for you were afraid because of the fire, and didn't go up onto the mountain;) saying,
- Deuteronomy 5:29 φοβέω Oh that there were such a heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children forever!
- Deuteronomy 6:2 φοβέω that you might fear Yahweh your God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, you, and your son, and your son's son, all the days of your life; and that your days may be prolonged.
These are occurrences of the same Greek lexeme (G5399) in the Septuagint — not a translation of any one Hebrew word. The store carries no word-level Hebrew↔Greek alignment, so no Hebrew original is asserted here. Counts come from the recovered LXX Strong's tagging — high-frequency vocabulary is well covered, while rare or late forms may be untagged — so they reflect tagged occurrences and may slightly undercount.
