Noah Webster's Dictionary 1. (a.) Utter; complete; steep; thin or transparent; -- applied to fabrics. 2. (v. i.) Very thin or transparent; -- applied to fabrics; as, sheer muslin. 3. (v. i.) Being only what it seems to be; obvious; simple; mere; downright; as, sheer folly; sheer nonsense. 4. (v. i.) Straight up and down; vertical; perpendicular. 5. (adv.) Clean; quite; at once. 6. (v. t.) To shear. 7. (v. i.) To decline or deviate from the line of the proper course; to turn aside; to swerve; as, a ship sheers from her course; a horse sheers at a bicycle. 8. (n.) The longitudinal upward curvature of the deck, gunwale, and lines of a vessel, as when viewed from the side. 9. (n.) The position of a vessel riding at single anchor and swinging clear of it. 10. (n.) A turn or change in a course. 11. (n.) Shears See Shear.

Multi-Version Concordance Sheer (2 Occurrences) Mark 15:10 For he could see that it was out of sheer spite that the High Priests had handed Him over. (WEY) Isaiah 28:19 As often as it passeth though, it shall take you; for morning by morning shall it pass through, by day and by night: and it shall be nought but terror to understand the message. (See JPS NAS RSV NIV)