Hebrew word · H4213

מִזְעָר

miz'ar

little

'A small amount, a trifle, a few'. It is used of time ('a very little while') and of number ('a tiny remnant').

Appears 4 times in 4 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

1) a little, a trifle, a few

1a) a trifle, a little (of time)

1b) a remnant, a very few (of number)

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Isaiah 29:17

Range of meaning

'A small amount, a trifle, a few'. It is used of time ('a very little while') and of number ('a tiny remnant').

Against the English

KJV/WEB 'yet a very little while' and BSB 'in a very short time' all catch the meaning. YLT's 'yet a very little' keeps the bare Hebrew but sounds odd in English.

Used elsewhere in the period

In the Hebrew Bible it appears only in Isaiah. The exact phrase 'yet a little, a trifle' (ʿôd məʿaṭ mizʿār) is used in Isa 10:25, where God promises that his anger against his people will soon end and turn against Assyria. Isa 16:14 has 'a very little' for Moab's tiny remnant, and 24:6 uses mizʿār for the few people left on the earth.

Where it appears

Isaiah · 4

  1. Isaiah 10:25 מִזְעָ֑ר a little

    For in just a little while My fury against you will subside, and My anger will turn to their destruction.”

    Here: A rare word for something tiny. Stacked on meʿat, it presses the time down as small as it will go: 'a very, very little while'.

  2. Isaiah 16:14 מִזְעָ֖ר smallness

    And now the LORD says, “In three years, as a hired worker counts the years, Moab’s splendor will become an object of contempt, with all her many people. And those who are left will be few and feeble.”

  3. Isaiah 24:6 מִזְעָֽר׃ smallness

    Therefore a curse has consumed the earth, and its inhabitants must bear the guilt; the earth’s dwellers have been burned, and only a few survive.

    Here: "A trifle, a small amount." Linked grammatically to the previous word, so literally "humanity of smallness," meaning only a handful of people.

  4. Isaiah 29:17 מִזְעָ֔ר a little

    In a very short time, will not Lebanon become an orchard, and the orchard seem like a forest?

    Here: A rare word for 'a tiny bit' (in the Bible only in Isaiah). Putting it next to məʿaṭ doubles the smallness: 'a little, a mere trifle', so 'a very little while'.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.