Bible Dictionary

(Deut. 28:22; Matt. 8:14; Mark 1:30; John 4:52; Acts 28:8), a burning heat, as the word so rendered denotes, which attends all febrile attacks. In all Eastern countries such diseases are very common. Peter's wife's mother is said to have suffered from a "great fever" (Luke 4:38), an instance of Luke's professional exactitude in describing disease. He adopts here the technical medical distinction, as in those times fevers were divided into the "great" and the "less."

The translation in Lev. 26:16 (R.V., "fever") of the Hebrew word kaddah'ath, meaning "kindling", i.e., an inflammatory or burning fever. In Deut. 28:22 the word is rendered "fever."

A vessel made of skins for holding wine (Josh. 9:4. 13; 1 Sam. 16:20; Matt. 9:17; Mark 2:22; Luke 5:37, 38), or milk (Judg. 4:19), or water (Gen. 21:14, 15, 19), or strong drink (Hab. 2:15). Earthenware vessels were also similarly used (Jer. 19:1-10; 1 Kings 14:3; Isa. 30:14). In Job 32:19 (comp. Matt. 9:17; Luke 5:37, 38; Mark 2:22) the reference is to a wine-skin ready to burst through the fermentation of the wine. "Bottles of wine" in the Authorized Version of Hos. 7:5 is properly rendered in the Revised Version by "the heat of wine," i.e., the fever of wine, its intoxicating strength. The clouds are figuratively called the "bottles of heaven" (Job 38:37). A bottle blackened or shrivelled by smoke is referred to in Ps. 119:83 as an image to which the psalmist likens himself.

Fever, one of the Nethinim (Ezra 2:51).