Bible dictionaries

Flame

What Bible dictionaries say about “Flame”, one article after the other.

Easton’s Bible Dictionary & Webster’s 1828 Dictionary

Flame - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

FLAME, n. [L. flamma.]

1. A blaze; burning vapor; vapor in combustion; or according to modern chimistry, hydrogen or any inflammable gas, in a state of combustion, and naturally ascending in a stream from burning bodies being specifically lighter than common air.

2. Fire in general.

3. Heat of passion; tumult; combustion; blaze; violent contention. One jealous, tattling mischief-maker will set a whole village in a flame.

4. Ardor of temper or imagination; brightness of fancy; vigor of thought.

Great are their faults, and glorious is their flame.

5. Ardor of inclination; warmth of affection.

Smit with the love of kindred arts we came,

And met congenial, mingling flame with flame.

6. The passion of love; ardent love.

My heart's on flame.

7. Rage; violence; as the flames of war.

FLAME, v.t. To inflame; to excite.

FLAME, v.i.

1. To blaze; to burn in vapor, or in a current; to burn as gas emitted from bodies in combustion.

2. To shine like burning gas.

In flaming yellow bright.

3. To break out in violence of passion.

Matthew George Easton, Easton’s Bible Dictionary; Noah Webster, American Dictionary of the English Language (1828)

The article in Easton + Webster 1828

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE 1915)

flam (lahabh, and other forms from same root; phlox):

In Jud 13:20 bis; Job 41:21; Isa 29:6; Joe 2:5, the word is lahabh. Various other words are translated "flame"; mas'eth, "a lifting or rising up" (Jud 20:38,40 the King James Version), the Revised Version (British and American) "cloud" (of smoke); kalil, "completeness" (Jud 20:40 b King James Version margin, "a holocaust, or offering wholly consumed by fire"; compare Le 6:15); shalhebheth (Job 15:30; So 8:6; the American Standard Revised Version "a very flame of Yahweh," margin "or, a most vehement flame"; Eze 20:47, the Revised Version (British and American) "the flaming flame"); shabhibh (Job 18:5; the Revised Version, margin); shebhibh, Aramaic (Da 3:22; 7:9). In Ps 104:4 the American Standard Revised Version has "maketh .... flames of fire his ministers"; the Revised Version (British and American) "flame" for "snare" (Pr 29:8).

Figuratively: "Flame" is used to denote excitement (Pr 29:8 the Revised Version (British and American)), shame, astonishment, "faces of flame" (Isa 13:8); in Re 1:14, the glorified Christ is described as having eyes "as a flame of fire," signifying their searching purity (compare Re 2:18; 19:12). Flame is also a symbol of God's wrath (Ps 83:14; Isa 5:24; 10:17).