mivtsar · fortress, fortified city

What it means

mivtsar (מִבְצָר) is a Hebrew word of the Bible that means “fortress, fortified city”.

How to say it

Approximate pronunciation. Vowels sound as in Spanish (a as in father, e as in bed, i as in machine, o as in note, u as in rule); the syllable in bold is stressed. The voice is your device's.

Its senses in the Bible

1. A city surrounded by high walls, hard to conquer.

From Brown-Driver-Briggs (1906)

How it is translated

The words this translation uses for it, most frequent first.

• fortified ×20
• fortresses ×7
• fortress ×5
• strongholds ×4
• fortifications ×1

Related words

Words of the same family, by Strong’s numbering.

Where it appears

• Numbers×3
• Joshua×3
• 1 Samuel×1
• 2 Samuel×1
• 2 Kings×5
• 2 Chronicles×1
• Psalms×2
• Isaiah×3
• Jeremiah×7
• Lamentations×2
• Daniel×3
• Hosea×1
• Amos×1
• Micah×1
• Nahum×2
• Habakkuk×1

• Numbers 13:19

  and what the land is like that they live in, whether it is good or bad, and what the cities are like that they live in, whether in camps or in fortifications,

• Numbers 32:17

  But we will arm ourselves and go ready before the sons of Israel, until we have brought them to their place; and our little ones shall dwell in the fortified cities because of the inhabitants of the land.

• Numbers 32:36

  Beth-nimrah, and Beth-haran, fortified cities, and sheep pens.

• Joshua 10:20

  And it came about, when Joshua and the sons of Israel had finished striking them with a very great blow, until they were finished, and the survivors who survived of them had entered into the fortified cities,

• Joshua 19:29

  and the border turned back to Ramah, and as far as the fortified city of Tyre; and the border turned back to Hosah, and its ends were at the sea, by the region of Achzib;

• Joshua 19:35

  And the fortified cities were: Ziddim, Zer, Hammath, Rakkath, Chinnereth,

• 1 Samuel 6:18

  and the gold mice, by the number of all the cities of the Philistines belonging to the five lords, from fortified city to unwalled village, and as far as the great Abel on which they set down the ark of YHWH; it is there to this day in the field of Joshua of Beth-shemesh.

• 2 Samuel 24:7

  They came to the fortified city of Tyre and all the cities of the Hivite and the Canaanite, and they went out to the Negev of Judah, to Beersheba.

• 2 Kings 3:19

  You will strike every fortified city and every choice city, and every good tree you will fell, and all the springs of water you will stop up, and every good plot of land you will ruin with stones.”

• 2 Kings 8:12

  Hazael said, “Why is my lord weeping?” He said, “Because I know the evil that you will do to the sons of Israel: their fortresses you will set on fire, their young men you will kill with the sword, their little ones you will dash to pieces, and their pregnant women you will rip open.”

• 2 Kings 10:2

  “Now, as soon as this letter comes to you, since with you are the sons of your master, and with you are the chariots and the horses and a fortified city and the weapons,

• 2 Kings 17:9

  The sons of Israel did secretly things that were not right against YHWH their Elohim; they built for themselves high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city.

• 2 Kings 18:8

  He struck the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territories, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city.

• 2 Chronicles 17:19

  These were the ones ministering to the king, besides those whom the king had placed in the fortified cities throughout all Judah.

• Psalms 89:40

  You have broken through all his fences; you have made his strongholds a ruin.

• Psalms 108:10

  Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?

• Isaiah 17:3

  And the fortress will cease from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus; and the remnant of Aram will be like the glory of the sons of Israel, declares YHWH Tsevaot.

• Isaiah 25:12

  And the fortress, the high refuge of your walls, he will bring down, he will lay low, he will bring it to the ground, to the dust.

• Isaiah 34:13

  And brambles will come up in its palaces, nettles and thistles in its fortresses; and it will be an abode of jackals, an enclosure for ostriches.

• Jeremiah 1:18

  And I, look, I have made you this day a fortified city and an iron pillar and bronze walls against the whole land, against the kings of Judah, against its princes, against its priests, and against the people of the land.

• Jeremiah 4:5

  Declare in Judah, and in Jerusalem make it heard, and say, ‘Blow the horn in the land; cry out, fill your voice, and say, “Gather together, and let us go into the fortified cities.”’

• Jeremiah 5:17

  And they will eat up your harvest and your bread; they will eat up your sons and your daughters; they will eat up your flocks and your herds; they will eat up your vine and your fig tree; they will shatter with the sword your fortified cities in which you trust.

• Jeremiah 6:27

  “As an assayer I have set you among my people, a fortress, that you may know and assay their way.

• Jeremiah 8:14

  Why are we sitting still? Gather together, and let us go into the fortified cities and be silent there; for YHWH our Elohim has silenced us and given us to drink water of poison, because we have sinned against YHWH.

• Jeremiah 34:7

  while the army of the king of Babylon was fighting against Jerusalem and against all the cities of Judah that were left, against Lachish and against Azekah; for these were left among the cities of Judah as fortified cities.

• Jeremiah 48:18

  Come down from glory and sit in thirst, you who dwell, daughter of Dibon; for the devastator of Moab has come up against you; he has destroyed your strongholds.

• Lamentations 2:2

  Adonai has swallowed up and has not pitied all the pastures of Jacob; he has torn down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; he has brought them down to the ground; he has profaned the kingdom and its princes.

• Lamentations 2:5

  Adonai has become like an enemy; he has swallowed up Israel; he has swallowed up all her palaces; he has destroyed its strongholds, and he has multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and moaning.

• Daniel 11:15

  And the king of the north will come and pour out a siege ramp and capture a fortified city; and the arms of the south will not stand, nor its chosen people, and there will be no strength to stand.

• Daniel 11:24

  In a time of ease, and into the richest parts of the province, he will come, and he will do what his fathers did not do, nor the fathers of his fathers: plunder and spoil and goods he will scatter among them, and against fortified places he will devise his plans, but only until a time.

• Daniel 11:39

  And he will act against the strongest fortresses with a foreign god; those who acknowledge him he will greatly increase in honor, and he will make them rule over many, and the land he will divide for a price.

• Hosea 10:14

  And a tumult will rise among your people, and all your fortresses will be destroyed, as Shalman destroyed Beth-arbel on the day of battle; the mother was dashed to pieces on her children.

• Amos 5:9

  The one who makes destruction flash against the strong, and destruction comes against the fortress.

• Micah 5:11

  And I will cut off the cities of your land and tear down all your fortresses.

• Nahum 3:12

  All your fortresses are fig trees with first-ripe fruit; if they are shaken, they fall into the mouth of the eater.

• Nahum 3:14

  Draw water for the siege for yourself; strengthen your fortresses; go into the mud and tread the clay; take hold of the brick mold.

• Habakkuk 1:10

  And it scoffs at kings, and dignitaries are a laughingstock to it; it laughs at every fortress, and heaps up dirt and captures it.