obscure

• POS: Adjective, Noun, Verb (transitive)
• HYPHEN: ob=scure
• COUNT in NET: 5 in 4 verses (in OT : 2 in 2 verses) (in NT : 3 in 2 verses)

CIDE DICTIONARY

obscure, a. [L. obscurus, orig., covered; ob- (see Ob-) + a root probably meaning, to cover; cf. L. scutum shield, Skr. sku to cover: cf. F. obscur. Cf. Sky.].

•  Covered over, shaded, or darkened; destitute of light; imperfectly illuminated; dusky; dim.  [1913 Webster]

  "His lamp shall be put out in obscure darkness."  [1913 Webster]
•  Of or pertaining to darkness or night; inconspicuous to the sight; indistinctly seen; hidden; retired; remote from observation; unnoticed.  [1913 Webster]

  "The obscure bird
  Clamored the livelong night."  [1913 Webster]

  "The obscure corners of the earth."  [1913 Webster]
•  Not noticeable; humble; mean.  Atterbury.  [1913 Webster]
•  Not easily understood; not clear or legible; abstruse or incomprehensible; as, an obscure passage or inscription.  [1913 Webster]
•  Not clear, full, or distinct; clouded; imperfect; as, an obscure view of remote objects.  [1913 Webster]

Obscure rays (Opt.), those rays which are not luminous or visible, and which in the spectrum are beyond the limits of the visible portion.

Syn. -- Dark; dim; darksome; dusky; shadowy; misty; abstruse; intricate; difficult; mysterious; retired; unnoticed; unknown; humble; mean; indistinct.

obscure, v. t. [L. obscurare, fr. obscurus: cf. OF. obscurer. See Obscure, a.].

 To render obscure; to darken; to make dim; to keep in the dark; to hide; to make less visible, intelligible, legible, glorious, beautiful, or illustrious.  [1913 Webster]
"They are all couched in a pit hard by Herne's oak, with obscured lights."  [1913 Webster]
"Why, 't is an office of discovery, love,
And I should be obscured."  [1913 Webster]
"There is scarce any duty which has been so obscured by the writings of learned men as this."  [1913 Webster]
"And seest not sin obscures thy godlike frame?"  [1913 Webster]

obscure, v. i. 

 To conceal one's self; to hide; to keep dark.  [1913 Webster]
"How! There's bad news.
I must obscure, and hear it."  [1913 Webster]

obscure, n. 

 Obscurity.  Milton.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

obscure, adj. & v.
--adj.
1 not clearly expressed or easily understood.
2 unexplained, doubtful.
3 dark, dim.
4 indistinct; not clear.
5 hidden; remote from observation.
6 a unnoticed. b (of a person) undistinguished, hardly known.
7 (of a colour) dingy, dull, indefinite.
--v.tr.
1 make obscure, dark, indistinct, or unintelligible.
2 dim the glory of; outshine.
3 conceal from sight.

Idiom

obscure vowel = indeterminate vowel.

Derivative

obscuration n. obscurely adv.

Etymology

ME f. OF obscur f. L obscurus dark

THESAURUS

obscure

Cimmerian, abstruse, adiaphanous, adumbrate, aleatoric, aleatory, ambiguous, amorphic, amorphous, amphibological, anarchic, anonymous, apply to, arcane, around the bush, back of beyond, baffling, baggy, bandage, beamless, beat about, becloud, beclouded, bedarken, bedazzle, bedim, befog, befogged, beg the question, begloom, belie, bemist, benight, beyond one, bicker, black, black as night, black out, blacken, blanket, blear, bleared, bleary, blind, blind the eyes, blindfold, blobby, block, block the light, blot out, blur, blurred, blurry, boggle, broad, brown, buried, caliginous, camouflage, canopy, cast a shadow, cavil, chance, chancy, chaotic, characterless, choplogic, clabber up, clear as mud, cloak, close, clothe, cloud, cloud over, cloud up, clouded, cloudy, complex, complicate, complicated, conceal, concealed, confuse, confused, confusing, cope, corrupt, cover, cover up, covered, covert, cowl, crabbed, cramp, cryptic, curtain, dark, dark as night, dark as pitch, darken, darken over, darkling, darksome, daze, dazzle, deform, deprive of sight, devious, difficult, dim, dim out, disguise, dismal, disorder, disordered, disorderly, dissemble, distant, distort, distract attention from, dodge, double-edged, double-faced, doubtful, dubious, dull, dusk, dusky, ebon, ebony, eclipse, eclipsed, encloud, encompass with shadow, enigmatic, enmist, ensconce, enshroud, envelop, equivocal, equivocate, esoteric, evade, evade the issue, excecate, faint, falsify, far, far-off, featureless, feeble, fence, film, filmy, fog, fog up, foggy, foreign, formless, fuliginous, fuzz, fuzzy, garble, garbled, general, glare, gloom, gloomy, gloss over, gouge, grumly, half-seen, half-visible, hard, hard to understand, haze, hazy, hedge, hid, hidden, hide, hit-or-miss, hood, hoodwink, humble, ignotus, ill-defined, illegible, impervious to light, imprecise, in a cloud, in a fog, in eclipse, in purdah, in the wings, inaccessible, inaccurate, inchoate, incoherent, incommunicado, incomprehensible, inconclusive, inconsequential, inconspicuous, indecisive, indefinable, indefinite, indeterminable, indeterminate, indistinct, indistinguishable, inexact, inexplicable, inform, inglorious, inscrutable, insignificant, intransparent, intricate, jumble, jumbled, kaleidoscopic, keep from, keep under cover, knotty, latent, lax, lay on, lay over, little known, lonesome, loose, low-profile, lowly, lumpen, make blind, make uncertain, make unintelligible, mantle, mask, mean, merely glimpsed, mess up, minor, misadvise, misdirect, miseducate, misguide, misinform, misinstruct, mislead, misrepresent, mist, misteach, misty, muddle, muddy, muffle, murk, murky, mysterious, mystic, mystical, mystify, mystifying, nameless, nebulous, night-black, night-clad, night-cloaked, night-dark, night-enshrouded, night-filled, night-mantled, night-veiled, nitpick, no credit to, nondescript, nonspecific, nubilate, nubilous, obduce, obfuscate, obfuscated, obnubilate, obscured, obumbrate, occult, occultate, occulted, odd, opaque, orderless, out of focus, out-of-the-way, overcast, overcloud, overlay, overshadow, oversmoke, overspread, overtechnical, pale, palter, parry, perplexed, perplexing, pervert, pick nits, pitch-black, pitch-dark, pitchy, prevaricate, pussyfoot, put on, puzzling, quibble, random, rayless, recondite, remote, removed, renownless, retired, roiled, roily, scramble, scrambled, screen, scum, secluded, secluse, secret, semivisible, sequestered, shade, shadow, shadowed forth, shadowy, shady, shapeless, shield, shift, shroud, shuffle, shy, sidestep, slur over, smog, smoke, snow-blind, solitary, somber, split hairs, spread over, starless, stochastic, strange, strike blind, subfusc, sunless, superimpose, superpose, sweeping, tenebrious, tenebrose, tenebrous, tergiversate, tough, transcendent, turbid, umbral, uncelebrated, uncertain, unclear, undefined, under an eclipse, under cover, under house arrest, under wraps, underground, undestined, undetermined, undistinguished, unemphatic, unfamed, unfamiliar, unfathomable, unform, unglorified, unheard-of, unhonored, unilluminated, unimportant, unintelligible, unknown, unlighted, unlit, unnamed, unnotable, unnoted, unnoticeable, unnoticed, unordered, unorganized, unplain, unpopular, unrecognizable, unremarked, unrenowned, unshape, unspecified, unsung, vague, varnish, veil, veiled, weak, whitewash, wrapped in clouds

ROGET THESAURUS

obscure

Obscurity

N obscurity, involution, hard words, ambiguity, unintelligibleness, vagueness &c, inexactness, what d'ye call 'em, darkness of meaning, obscure, crabbed, involved, confused.

Disrepute

VB be inglorious, incur disgrace, have a bad name, earn a bad name, put a halter round one's neck, wear a halter round one's neck, disgrace oneself, expose oneself, play second fiddle, lose caste, pale one's ineffectual fire, recede into the shade, fall from one's high estate, keep in the background, be conscious of disgrace, look blue, look foolish, look like a fool, cut a poor figure, cut a sorry figure, laugh on the wrong side of the mouth, make a sorry face, go away with a flea in, one's ear, slink away, cause shame, shame, disgrace, put to shame, dishonor, throw dishonor upon, cast dishonor upon, fling dishonor upon, reflect dishonor upon, be a reproach, to, derogate from, tarnish, stain, blot sully, taint, discredit, degrade, debase, defile, beggar, expel, impute shame to, brand, post, stigmatize, vilify, defame, slur, cast a slur upon, hold up to shame, send to Coventry, tread under foot, trample under foot, show up, drag through the mire, heap dirt upon, reprehend, bring low, put down, snub, take down a peg, take down a peg lower, take down a peg or two, obscure, eclipse, outshine, take the shine out of, throw into the shade, cast into the shade, overshadow, leave in the background, put in the background, push into a corner, put one's nose out of joint, put out, put out of countenance, upset, throw off one's center, discompose, disconcert, put to the blush.

N disrepute, discredit, ill repute, bad repute, bad name, bad odor, bad favor, ill name, ill odor, ill favor, disapprobation, ingloriousness, derogation, abasement, debasement, abjectness, degradation, dedecoration, a long farewell to all my greatness, odium, obloquy, opprobrium, ignominy, dishonor, disgrace, shame, humiliation, scandal, baseness, vileness, turpitude, infamy, tarnish, taint, defilement, pollution, stain, blot, spot, blur, stigma, brand, reproach, imputation, slur, crying shame, burning shame, scandalum magnatum, badge of infamy, blot in one's escutcheon, bend sinister, bar sinister, champain, point champain, byword of reproach, Ichabod, argumentum ad verecundiam, sense of shame, disgraced, blown upon, shorn of its beams, shorn of one's glory, overcome, downtrodden, loaded with shame, in bad repute, out of repute, out of favor, out of fashion, out of countenance, at a discount, under a cloud, under an eclipse, unable to show one's face, in the shade, in the background, out at elbows, down at the elbows, down in the world, inglorious, nameless, renownless, obscure, unknown to fame, unnoticed, unnoted, unhonored, unglorified, shameful, disgraceful, discreditable, disreputable, despicable, questionable, unbecoming, unworthy, derogatory, degrading, humiliating, infra dignitatem, dedecorous, scandalous, infamous, too bad, unmentionable, ribald, opprobrious, errant, shocking, outrageous, notorious, ignominious, scrubby, dirty, abject, vile, beggarly, pitiful, low, mean, shabby base, to one's shame be it spoken, Int, fie!, shame!, for shame!, proh pudor!, O tempora!, O mores!, ough!, sic transit gloria mundi!.

Commonalty

N commonality, commonalty, democracy, obscurity, low condition, low life, low society, low company, bourgeoisie, mass of the people, mass of society, Brown Jones and Robinson, lower classes, humbler classes, humbler orders, vulgar herd, common herd, rank and file, hoc genus omne, the many, the general, the crowd, the people, the populace, the multitude, the million, the masses, the mobility, the peasantry, king Mob, proletariat, fruges consumere nati, demos, hoi polloi, great unwashed, man in the street, mob, rabble, rabble rout, chaff, rout, horde, canaille, scum of the people, residuum of the people, dregs of the people, dregs of society, swinish multitude, foex populi, trash, profanum vulgus, ignobile vulgus, vermin, riffraff, ragtag and bobtail, small fry, commoner, one of the people, democrat, plebeian, republican, proletary, proletaire, roturier, Mr, Snooks, bourgeois, epicier, Philistine, cockney, grisette, demimonde, peasant, countryman, boor, carle, churl, villain, villein, terrae filius, son of the land, serf, kern, tyke, tike, chuff, ryot, fellah, longshoreman, swain, clown, hind, clod, clodhopper, hobnail, yokel, bog-trotter, bumpkin, plowman, plowboy, rustic, hayseed, lunkhead, chaw-bacon, tiller of the soil, hewers of wood and drawers of water, groundling, gaffer, loon, put, cub, Tony Lumpkin, looby, rube, lout, underling, gamin, rough, pot- wallopper, slubberdegullion, vulgar fellow, low fellow, cad, curmudgeon, upstart, parvenu, skipjack, nobody, nobody one knows, hesterni quirites, pessoribus orti, bourgeois gentilhomme, novus homo, snob, gent, mushroom, no one knows who, adventurer, man of straw, beggar, gaberlunzie, muckworm, mudlark, sans culotte, raff, tatterdemalion, caitiff, ragamuffin, Pariah, outcast of society, tramp, vagabond, bezonian, panhandler, sundowner, chiffonnier, Cinderella, cinderwench, scrub, jade, gossoon, Goth, Vandal, Hottentot, Zulu, savage, barbarian, Yahoo, unlicked cub, rough diamond, barbarousness, barbarism, boeotia, ignoble, common, mean, low, base, vile, sorry, scrubby, beggarly, below par, no great shakes, homely, homespun, vulgar, low-minded, snobbish, plebeian, proletarian, of low parentage, of low origin, of low extraction, of mean parentage, of mean origin, of mean extraction, lowborn, baseborn, earthborn, mushroom, dunghill, risen from the ranks, unknown to fame, obscure, untitled, rustic, uncivilized, loutish, boorish, clownish, churlish, brutish, raffish, rude, unlicked, barbarous, barbarian, barbaric, barbaresque, cockney, born within sound of Bow bells, underling, menial, subaltern, below the salt, dummodo sit dives barbarus ipse placet.

Darkness

VB be dark, darken, obscure, shade, dim, tone down, lower, overcast, overshadow, eclipse, obfuscate, offuscate, obumbrate, adumbrate, cast into the shade becloud, bedim, bedarken, cast a shade, throw a shade, spread a shade, cast a shadow, cast a gloom, throw a shadow, spread a shadow, cast gloom, throw gloom, spread gloom, extinguish, put out, blow out, snuff out, doubt, turn out the lights, douse the lights, dim the lights, turn off the lights, switch off the lights.

N darkness, absence of light, blackness, obscurity, gloom, murk, dusk, Cimmerian darkness, Stygian darkness, Egyptian darkness, night, midnight, dead of night, witching hour of night, witching time of night, blind man's holiday, darkness visible, darkness that can be felt, palpable obscure, Erebus, the jaws of darkness, sablevested night, shade, shadow, umbra, penumbra, sciagraphy, obscuration, occultation, adumbration, obumbration, obtenebration, offuscation, caligation, extinction, eclipse, total eclipse, gathering of the clouds, shading, distribution of shade, chiaroscuro, noctivagation, black body, hohlraum, black hole, dark star, dark matter, cold dark matter, dark, darksome, darkling, obscure, tenebrious, sombrous, pitch dark, pitchy, pitch black, caliginous, black, sunless, lightless &c (sun) (light), somber, dusky, unilluminated &c (illuminate), nocturnal, dingy, lurid, gloomy, murky, murksome, shady, umbrageous, overcast, cloudy, darkened, dark as pitch, dark as a pit, dark as Erebus, benighted, noctivagant, noctivagous, in the dark, in the shade, brief as the lightning in the collied night, eldest Night and Chaos, ancestors of Nature, the blackness of the noonday night, the prayer of Ajax was for light.

Dimness

VB be dim, grow dim, flicker, twinkle, glimmer, loom, lower, fade, pale, pale its ineffectual fire, render dim, dim, bedim, obscure, darken, tone down.

Blackness

VB be black, render black, blacken, infuscate, denigrate, blot, blotch, smutch, smirch, darken, black, sable, swarthy, somber, dark, inky, ebony, ebon, atramentous, jetty, coal-black, jet-black, fuliginous, pitchy, sooty, swart, dusky, dingy, murky, Ethiopic, low-toned, low in tone, of the deepest dye, black as jet, black as my hat, black as a shoe, black as a tinker's pot, black as November, black as thunder, black as midnight, nocturnal, nigrescent, gray, obscure.

Invisibility

N invisibility, invisibleness, nonappearance, imperceptibility, indistinctness, mystery, delitescence, concealment, latency, invisible, imperceptible, undiscernible, indiscernible, unapparent, non-apparent, out of sight, not in sight, a perte de vue, behind the scenes, behind the curtain, viewless, sightless, inconspicuous, unconspicuous, unseen &c (see), covert, eclipsed, under an eclipse, dim, mysterious, dark, obscure, confused, indistinct, indistinguishable, shadowy, indefinite, undefined, ill- defined, ill-marked, blurred, fuzzy, out of focus, misty, delitescent, hidden, obscured, covered, veiled (concealed), full many a flower is born to blush unseen.

Unintelligibility

N unintelligibility, incomprehensibility, imperspicuity, inconceivableness, vagueness, obscurity, ambiguity, doubtful meaning, uncertainty, perplexity, spinosity, obscurum per obscurius, mystification, latency, transcendentalism, paradox, oxymoron, riddle, enigma, puzzle, diagnus vindice nodus, sealed book, steganography, freemasonry, pons asinorum, asses' bridge, high Dutch, Greek, Hebrew, jargon, unintelligible, unaccountable, undecipherable, undiscoverable, unknowable, unfathomable, incognizable, inexplicable, inscrutable, inapprehensible, incomprehensible, insolvable, insoluble, impenetrable, illegible, as Greek to one, unexplained, paradoxical, enigmatic, enigmatical, puzzling (secret), indecipherable, obscure, dark, muddy, clear as mud, seen through a mist, dim, nebulous, shrouded in mystery, opaque, dense, undiscernible, misty, hidden, latent, indefinite, garbled, perplexed, undetermined, vague, loose, ambiguous, mysterious, mystic, mystical, acroamatic, acroamatical, metempirical, transcendental, occult, recondite, abstruse, crabbed, inconceivable, inconceptible, searchless, above comprehension, beyond comprehension, past comprehension, beyond one's depth, unconceived, inexpressible, undefinable, incommunicable, unpredictable, unforeseeable, it's Greek to me.