From H5234 (nakar, 'to recognize/regard as foreign'). Nekar refers to what is foreign, alien, or strange β applied to foreign lands, foreign gods (elohey nekar, 'strange gods'), or the sense of estrangement.
The Psalms give nekar its deepest theological resonance. Psalm 137:4 asks, 'How shall we sing the LORD's song in a strange land?' β in a land of nekar. This cry from Babylon captures the exile experience: God's people were in a place of profound alienation, cut off from the temple and the presence. But Hebrews 11 reframes this: all the faithful were 'strangers and pilgrims on the earth,' for they were seeking a heavenly country. Peter calls Christians 'strangers and pilgrims' in this world (1 Pet. 2:11). The Christian life is always lived as a holy foreigner in a land of nekar β at home only in God.