HEBREW WORD STUDY – DREAD – PACHAD פחד   Pei Cheth Daleth

 Isaiah 51:13: “And forgettest the Lord they maker, that hath stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and hast feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy and where is the fury of the oppressor?” 

Note that the fury of the oppressor has not touched Israel.  But the threat is out there and they are afraid.  It is interesting that the word for fear here is not yara’ which is used for the fear of the Lord which has the idea of respect and reverence.  This word is pached.  This is a different fear.  It is a real fear for ones own safety. This is a fear that is eating away at you.  A fear that destroys any attempt to enjoy life.  You can’t eat, you can’t sleep, all you can think about is this dread.  The Jewish Hebrew scholars like to use the word dread for pached.  I think this is the closest we can get in English.  I dread going to work tomorrow driving the disability bus because I have to drive through the hood where there has been a rash of car jackings.  Of course the only thing hijacked have been cars and not disability buses, but you have that sense of pached anyways.  However, in this study verse pached is in Piel form.  I only pached in a Qal form I just dread it. If is was a Piel form I would not be able to sleep tonight and would spend the next twelve  hours living in terror with a constant state of fear hanging over my head. 

Have you ever lived in terror for some threat that hangs over your head?  You hear layoffs are coming and you are convinced you are on the list.  You worry, you fret, you just can not enjoy anything. That is pached  in a Piel form.  Isaiah takes it further.  This pached is tamid always, continually there.  You can’t eat, you can’t sleep you can’t think of nothing but this horrible thing hanging over your head.

So, what is this dread that Isaiah is speaking about?  It is for the fury of the oppressor.  This is a little difficult to translate, particularly since the word oppressor is in a participle form hamesik.  This is distressing news, or a distressing situation. It does not necessarily refer to a person. The word for fury as the fury of the oppressor is chamath.  This means hot, burning, to hot to handle. Hence this is a terror that left the people paralyzed with fear over a distressing situation that has not even come upon them yet. 

I believe the recent pandemic is a good example of pached tamid and the pandemic or oppressor is the chamath.  I have people on my disability bus who tell me they can count on one hand the number of times they had gone outside in the past year so fearful of getting Covid.  They have groceries delivered to their house, they do not visit anyone or take visitors, they have spent the year crouched in corner living in fear. They have even cancelled doctor appointments and gone without their medications when the mail was late in delivering them.

Why are the people of God in Isaiah’s time so paralyzed by a fear of something that has not even touched them yet?  It is because they have forgotten the Lord.  Forgotten in Hebrew is shakach.  Shakach is more than just forgetting, it has the idea of a failure to obtain something.  

Here is the point that Isaiah is trying to make.  By failing to seek the Lord as their source, the people of Israel were in constant terror of some threatening situation.  They were listening to every wind of rumor of the Assyrian army which was amassing against them.  Preachers were building platforms scaring the pants off the people of the cruel things the Assyrians did to conquered nations.  Anyone who any information (real or fabricated) had instant celebrity status.

In our day the news media is playing from the same game book.  You create fear in people and once they are fearful they will listen to news for any bit of encouraging information which the media will not give. They will just keep feeding more news of fear and the more fearful people are the more they can exaggerate the threat, the more wild the threat they will believe.  Get a handful of people in Congress who are on the fringe with their beliefs and the media will make it sound like every politician has lost their minds and wants this country destroyed. The payoff are more viewers to their channel and the more viewers mean more money sponsors will pay to reach these viewers with their product.  It was no different in Isaiah day.  The people worked themselves up into a frenzy where Isaiah finally shrugged his shoulders and said; “You people are nuts, you’re all gone, crazy, your totally whacked. You have so let fear – pachad overtake you that you cannot even consider the lovingkindness and protection that God has to offer. 

Isaiah ends this passage by asking: “Where is the fury of the oppressor?”  Those in my classes, remember that paragogic Hei?  This interrogative has one.  How do you intensify the word “where?”  You can’t in English, but you can get the gist of what Isaiah is saying.  “This distressing situation that has you trembling, so fearful it has robbed you of the joy of the Lord, which, by the way is the source of your strength.” 

Note in verse 17, that this situation in verse 13 is called a “cup of trembling.”  In verse 23 God promises to  take that cup of trembling and put it in the hands of those afflicting Israel. The enemy is using one of his best weapons against the church in America today – fear. Once he has you fearful you find yourself searching cable news networks, fringe news networks, prophets who will intensify your fears with 99% talk of doom and by the time they reach the 1% of fear not for God with you – pachad tamid has so overtaken you that that 1% of truth never enters you soul.  

I am not saying we are to ignore the warnings but maybe 1% warning and 99% the promises of a loving God might work better.  Five minutes or reading and listening to the news and fifty five minutes of prayer and study of God’s word will defeat the enemy more than five minutes of prayer and studying God’s word and fifty five minutes of  news. 

For God is trying to tell you: “Where is the fury of the oppressor? The cup of trembling will end up in the hands of those afflicting you.” Just trust God.

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