Forbear

Forbear - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

FORBEAR, v.i. pret. forbore; pp. forborne.

1. To stop; to cease; to hold from proceeding; as, forbear to repeat these reproachful words.

2. To pause; to delay; as, forbear a while.

3. To abstain; to omit; to hold one's self from motion or entering on an affair.

Shall I go against Ramoth Gilead to battle, or shall I forbear? 1 Ki 22.

4. To refuse; to decline.

Whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear.

Ezek 2.

5. To be patient; to restrain from action or violence. Prov 25:15.

FORBEAR, v.t.

1. To avoid voluntarily; to decline.

Forbear his presence.

2. To abstain from; to omit; to avoid doing. Learn from the scriptures what you ought to do and what to forbear.

Have we not power to forbear working? 1 Cor 9.

3. To spare; to treat with indulgence and patience.

Forbearing one another in love. Eph 4.

4. To withhold.

Forbear thee from meddling with God, who is with me, that he destroy thee not. 2 Chr 35.

for-bar' (chadhal; anechomai): In the Old Testament chadhal, "to leave off," is the word most frequently translated "forbear" (Ex 23:5, etc.); damam, "to be silent," chasakh, "to keep back," mashakh, "to draw or stretch out," occur once each; the Revised Version (British and American) renders Eze 24:17 (damam), "Sigh, but not aloud," margin "Hebrew be silent,"; Pr 24:11 (chasakh), "See that thou hold back," margin "or forbear thou not to deliver," the King James Version "if thou forbear to deliver"; Ne 9:30 (mashakh), "bear" instead of "forbear"; 'aph literally, "breathing," the "nose," hence, from violent breathing, "anger" ('erekh, "long," understood), and kul "to hold," are translated "forbearing" (Pr 25:15; Jer 20:9, respectively).

In the New Testament we have anechomai, "to hold self back or up," "with longsuffering, forbearing one another" (Eph 4:2,; Col 3:13); aniemi "to send back," the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) "forbear threatening' (Eph 6:9); pheidomai, "to spare," "but I forbear" (2Co 12:6); meergazesthai, "not to work," "to forbear working" (1Co 9:6); stego, "to cover," "conceal": "when I could no longer forbear" (1Th 3:1,5).

W. L.Walker