Hebrew word · H4706
מִצְעָר
mitz'ar
(Mount )Mizar
'A small thing, a little'. Used of a small town (Gen 19:20), small beginnings (Job 8:7), a few people (2 Chr 24:24) and a short time (Isa 63:18). Here it is part of a mountain's name, 'Mount Mizar'.
Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
§ Mizar = "small"
a mountain apparently in the northern part of Transjordan near Mount Hermon
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
- Range of meaning
'A small thing, a little'. Used of a small town (Gen 19:20), small beginnings (Job 8:7), a few people (2 Chr 24:24) and a short time (Isa 63:18). Here it is part of a mountain's name, 'Mount Mizar'.
- Against the English
Most English versions transliterate it as 'Mizar'. The Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate translate it ('from a little mountain'). Transliteration is probably right for a place-name, but English readers then miss the meaning 'Little' that Hebrew hearers would have caught.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Its location is unknown. Proposals include a hill near Banias or the village of Za'ura on the slopes of Hermon, none of them certain. The Septuagint reads ἀπὸ ὄρους μικροῦ, 'from a small mountain'.
Similar words
Where it appears
Psalms · 1
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Psalm 42:6 מִצְעָֽר׃ Mizar
O my God, my soul despairs within me. Therefore I remember You from the land of Jordan and the peaks of Hermon—even from Mount Mizar.
Here: Probably a place-name, a hill near Hermon that has never been identified. The word itself means 'a little thing' (Gen 19:20; Job 8:7). Hebrew hearers would hear 'Little Mountain', perhaps set against the towering Hermons and the absent Mount Zion.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.