Bible Strands
Judges 9:51
But there was a strong tower inside the city, and all the men, women, and leaders of the city fled there. They locked themselves in and went up to the roof of the tower.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The third-person narrator records the immediate aftermath of Abimelech’s capture of Thebez, pinpointing the moment when the surviving population abandons the open city for its last defensive structure.
The words — מִגְדַּל עֹז (migdal oz) literally renders as "tower of strength," denoting a fortified stronghold, while וַיָּנֻסוּ (vayyanusu) means "they fled," indicating a desperate retreat toward that refuge.
The thread — The phrase מִגְדַּל עֹז (migdal oz) reappears in Proverbs 18:10 and Psalm 18:2 as a metaphor for divine protection, and the tactical flight to a fortified tower mirrors the siege narratives of 2 Kings 25:4 and Jeremiah 39:4.
Why it lands — The text states that civic leaders and citizens locked themselves in a tower and climbed to its roof before describing their destruction, which asks the reader to recognize the limits of human fortifications when facing divinely sanctioned judgment.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
But there was a strong tower within the city, and thither fled all the men and women, and all they of the city, and shut it to them, and gat them up to the top of the tower.