דְּבִיר
Debir
BDB lists 5 entries for ‘Debir’ fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
From Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB)
Where this word appears
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Noun
- A naming word — a person, place, thing, or idea.
Noun type
- Proper
- A name of a specific person, place, or people (e.g. Abraham, Zion, Israel).
Every verse where H1688 appears in the Book of 1 Chronicles — 1 distinct verse. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Hebrew form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Hebrew Bible; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences are not indexed here.
1 Chronicles
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
דביר (Dᵉbîyr) is a Hebrew name most often rendered “Debir.” It clusters heavily in Joshua, which alone accounts for 83% of its uses. It turns up in 12 verses across 3 books, an uncommon footprint. Scripture first uses it in Joshua 10:3. The sections below give every occurrence and version rendering.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's H1688 catalogs a Hebrew word from the Hebrew Old Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Hebrew Old Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 12
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 12 distinct verses.
- 3 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 3 of 39 Old Testament books.
- #1,910
- by frequency
- Top 2500 most frequent Hebrew words (rank 1,910 of 8,640 Hebrew words by occurrence).
View all 12 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- Joshua 10 verses 83%
- Judges 1 verse 8%
- 1 Chronicles 1 verse 8%
By section of the Old Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Each share is this word’s portion of its verses in that division of the Hebrew canon. Each figure is a share of the word’s 12 distinct verses.
- Prophets (Nevi'im) 11 verses · 92%
- Writings (Ketuvim) 1 verse · 8%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
- King James Version: Debir 12×
- American Standard Version: Debir 12×
- Berean Standard Bible: Debir 11×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Debir 13×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders H1688 across 14 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders H1688 across 14 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 2 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders H1688 across 12 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 1 rendering that appears only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 2 further occurrences.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders H1688 across 14 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 1 rendering that appears only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in the full BDB
What do BDB’s symbols mean?
BDB uses these scholarly abbreviations:
| Symbol | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 𝔊 | the Septuagint (the ancient Greek translation, LXX) |
| 𝔙 | the Vulgate (the Latin translation) |
| 𝔖 | the Syriac version (the Peshitta) |
| 𝔗 | the Targum (the Aramaic translation) |
| ψ | the Psalms |
| √ | root (the underlying root or stem) |
| ‖ | parallel passage (a synonymous or contrasted parallel) |
| † | the dagger: every passage where the word occurs is cited |
The 5 senses and sub-senses the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency), with BDB’s own verbatim wording and sub-sense lettering. Shown in Hebrew script with BDB’s own scholarly abbreviations. The condensed entry is in the Lexicon Entry tab. See also the Forms in the corpus table below.
- 1. n.pr.m. king of Eglon Jos 10:3. e.g. Joshua 10:3
- 2. n.pr.loc.
- a. דְּבִ֫רָה c. ָהloc., N. border Judah Jos 15:7 (westward Hup ψ 28:2). e.g. Joshua 15:7
- b. לִדְבִר town of the Gadites Jos 13:26, perhaps Lôdebâr 2 S 9:4 vid. לֹא דְבָר Di MV. e.g. Joshua 13:26
- c. דְּבִיר Ju 1:11(×2) 1 Ch 6:43, דְּבִרָה Jos 10:38, 39, elsewhere דְּבִר Jos 15:15 +, a royal city of Canaanites anciently called קִרְיַת סֵפֶר Jos 15:15 Ju 1:11, קִרְיַת סַנָּה Jos 15:49; on the mountains of Judah, in region of Hebron Jos 11:21; 15:49, assigned to the Aaronite priests Jos 21:15 as a city of refuge 1 Ch 6:43; mod. Dhoherîye, 5 hours SW. from Hebron, according to Kn, so Surveyiii. 402; other conject. in Di Jos 10:39 RiHWB 265. e.g. Judges 1:11
Senses from the full Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon (Brown, Driver, Briggs; Oxford 1906 — public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). Full attribution on Sources.
Word origin
n.m. (cf. Arabic دُبُرٌ back, دَبْرٌ part behind) hindmost chamber, innermost room of the temple of Solomon = קדשׁ הקדשׁים holy of holies, most holy place, the place of the ark and the cherubic images, the throne-room of Yahweh 1 K 6:5, 16, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 31; 7:49 (= 2 Ch 4:20) 8:6, 8 (= 2 Ch 5:7, 9) 2 Ch 3:16 ψ 28:2. Prob. read דְּבִיר 2 K 10:25 also, for MT עִיר; so Klo after 𝔊L. (It is translated oracle in AV RV after Aq Sym χρηματιστήριον, 𝔙 oraculum, on the incorrect theory that it was derived from דִּבֶּר speak.)
— Brown-Driver-Briggs (Oxford 1906, public domain), digitized via Sefaria, supplemented by the OpenScriptures HebrewLexicon (CC BY 4.0). See Sources.
Derived from דביר (dᵉbîyr) (H1687) — holy of holies.
Jastrow Dictionary
A second Hebrew/Aramaic lexicon for comparison, covering Aramaic and post-biblical (Talmudic, Targumic, Midrashic) usage that the biblical-Hebrew BDB does not. Matched by lemma rather than by Strong’s number, so a lemma may carry more than one Jastrow headword (shown separately below), and the entries cover usage well beyond the Bible.
דְּבִיר
- (b. h.)
- 1. the Holy of Holies in the Temple. Y. Ber. IV, 8ᶜ top.
- 2. the Book, a word in use among the Persian Jews. Ab. Zar. 24ᵇ (ref. to Jud. I, 11). e.g. Judges 1:11
A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (Marcus Jastrow; London, Luzac, 1903) — Public Domain. Digitized via Sefaria. Digitized via Sefaria. Full attribution on Sources.
Forms in the corpus
The 13 distinct written forms H1688 takes in the Hebrew Bible, most frequent first — each parse links to that state’s occurrences in the concordance. Hebrew forms include their vowel points and cantillation, so a single lemma takes many written forms.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| דְּבִ֥יר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 10:3 | 2 |
| דְבִֽר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 15:49 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֑יר | Noun, Proper | Judges 1:11 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֑ר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 15:15 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֑רָ/ה | Noun, Proper | Joshua 10:38 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֖יר | Noun, Proper | 1 Chronicles 6:58 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֖ר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 21:15 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֣ר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 11:21 | 1 |
| דְּבִ֥ר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 15:15 | 1 |
| דְּבִר֙ | Noun, Proper | Joshua 12:13 | 1 |
| דְּבִרָ/ה֮ | Noun, Proper | Joshua 15:7 | 1 |
| לִ/דְבִ֨רָ/ה֙ | Noun, Proper | Joshua 10:39 | 1 |
| לִדְבִֽר | Noun, Proper | Joshua 13:26 | 1 |
Bible dictionary
Public-domain dictionary articles matched to this entry by name (Debir). A biblical name can be shared by more than one person or place, so an article may treat several.
Easton's Bible Dictionary · M. G. Easton, 1897
Oracle town; sanctuary. (1.) One of the eleven cities to the west of Hebron, in the highlands of Judah (Josh. 15:49; Judg. 1:11-15). It was originally one of the towns of the Anakim (Josh. 15:15), and was also called Kirjath-sepher (q.v.) and Kirjath-sannah (49). Caleb, who had conquered and taken possession of the town and district of Hebron (Josh. 14:6-15), offered the hand of his daughter to any one who would successfully lead a party against Debir. Othniel, his younger brother (Judg. 1:13; 3:9), achieved the conquest, and gained Achsah as his wife. She was not satisfied with the portion her father gave her, and as she was proceeding toward her new home, she "lighted from off her ass" and said to him, "Give me a blessing [i.e., a dowry]: for thou hast given me a south land" (Josh. 15:19, A.V.); or, as in the Revised Version, "Thou hast set me in the land of the south", i.e., in the Negeb, outside the rich valley of Hebron, in the dry and barren land. "Give me also springs of water. And he gave her the upper springs, and the nether springs."
Debir has been identified with the modern Edh-Dhaheriyeh, i.e., "the well on the ridge", to the south of Hebron.
(2.) A place near the "valley of Achor" (Josh. 15:7), on the north boundary of Judah, between Jerusalem and Jericho.
(3.) The king of Eglon, one of the five Canaanitish kings who were hanged by Joshua (Josh. 10:3, 23) after the victory at Gibeon. These kings fled and took refuge in a cave at Makkedah. Here they were kept confined till Joshua returned from the pursuit of their discomfited armies, when he caused them to be brought forth, and "Joshua smote them, and slew them, and hanged them on five trees" (26).
Smith's Bible Dictionary · William Smith, 1863
king of Eglon; one of the five kings hanged by Joshua. (Joshua 10:3,23) (B.C. 1440.)
(a sanctuary), the name of three places of Palestine.
+ A town in the mountains of Judah, (Joshua 15:49) one of a group of eleven cities to the west of Hebron. The earlier name of Debir was Kirjath-sepher, "city of book," (Joshua 15:15; Judges 1:11) and Kirjath-sannah, "city of palm." (Joshua 15:49) It was one of the cities given with their "suburbs" to the priests. (Joshua 21:15; 1 Chronicles 6:58) Debir has not been discovered with certainty in modern times; but about three miles to the west of Hebron is a deep and secluded valley called the Wady Nunkur, enclosed on the north by hills, of which one bears a name certainly suggestive of Debir--Dewir-ban. + A place on the north boundary of Judah, near the "valley of Achor." (Joshua 15:7) A Wady Dabor is marked in Van Deuteronomy Velde's map as close to the south of Neby Musa, at the northwest corner of the Dead Sea. + The "border of Debir" is named as forming part of the boundary of Gad, (Joshua 13:26) and as apparently not far from Mahanaim.
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary · Roswell D. Hitchcock, 1869
an orator; a word
Classic public-domain reference works; full attribution on Sources.
Septuagint verse parallels
This word appears in 12 verses that also exist in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), out of the 12 Hebrew verses it occurs in. You can read those verses in Greek by switching the Old Testament edition to the Septuagint.
Read these verses in the Septuagint
This is a verse-level parallel only — the same verses exist in both the Hebrew and Greek Old Testaments. No word-level Hebrew↔Greek correspondence is claimed: the data carries no such alignment, so no Greek word is shown as this Hebrew word’s translation. Coverage is not total — the Septuagint omits the deuterocanon and renumbers the Psalms, so some Hebrew verses have no direct Greek parallel.
