Machiavelli's "fear" (in "it is safer to be feared than loved") does NOT mean the modern understanding — "nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts" (FDR). Rather, it means **reverence and awe** — the historical meaning from the Abrahamic tradition. **The "fear of God" tradition**: - Abraham's fear was loyalty, fealty, reverence — willing to sacrifice his son at God's command. God saw this and promised blessings. - Jewish philosophers distinguished two types: lower "fear of punishment" and higher "fear of greatness" (respect for an exalted person who would do no harm, analogous to the awe you feel contemplating something vastly greater than yourself). - Maimonides: fear of God as the feeling of human insignificance from contemplating divine "great and wonderful actions and creations." **Machiavelli's meaning**: "Fear" as respect grounded in recognition of genuine greatness or nobility — the opposite of Roosevelt's paralyzing terror. It implies awe toward what is "undoubtedly great and noble," closer to what we now call respect grounded in demonstrated competence and character.