Deuteronomy 16:16-17

16:16 Three times a year all your males must appear before the Lord your God in the place he chooses for the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks, and the Festival of Temporary Shelters; and they must not appear before him ¹  empty-handed. 16:17 Every one of you must give as you are able, ²  according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you.

Exodus 23:16-17

23:16 “You are also to observe ³  the Feast of Harvest, the firstfruits of your labors that you have sown in the field, and the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year ⁴  when you have gathered in ⁵  your harvest ⁶  out of the field. 23:17 At ⁷  three times in the year all your males will appear before the Lord God. ⁸ 

Exodus 34:24

34:24 For I will drive out ⁹  the nations before you and enlarge your borders; no one will covet ¹⁰  your land when you go up ¹¹  to appear before the Lord your God three times ¹²  in the year.

Psalms 84:7

84:7 They are sustained as they travel along; ¹³ 

each one appears ¹⁴  before God in Zion.

¹ tn Heb “the Lord.” See note on “he” in 16:1.

² tn Heb “a man must give according to the gift of his hand.” This has been translated as second person for stylistic reasons, in keeping with the second half of the verse, which is second person rather than third.

³ tn The words “you are also to observe” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

⁴ tn An infinitive construct with a preposition and a pronominal suffix is used to make a temporal clause: “in the going in of the year.” The word “year” is the subjective genitive, the subject of the clause.

⁵ tn An infinitive construct with a preposition and a pronominal suffix is used to make a temporal clause: “in the ingathering of you.”

⁶ tn Heb “gathered in your labors.” This is a metonymy of cause put for the effect. “Labors” are not gathered in, but what the labors produced – the harvest.

⁷ tn Adverbial accusative of time: “three times” becomes “at three times.”

⁸ tn Here the divine Name reads in Hebrew הָאָדֹן יְהוָה (ha’adon yÿhvah), which if rendered according to the traditional scheme of “Lord” for “Yahweh” would result in “Lord Lord.” A number of English versions therefore render this phrase “Lord God,” and that convention has been followed here.

⁹ tn The verb is a Hiphil imperfect of יָרַשׁ (yarash), which means “to possess.” In the causative stem it can mean “dispossess” or “drive out.”

¹⁰ sn The verb “covet” means more than desire; it means that some action will be taken to try to acquire the land that is being coveted. It is one thing to envy someone for their land; it is another to be consumed by the desire that stops at nothing to get it (it, not something like it).

¹¹ tn The construction uses the infinitive construct with a preposition and a suffixed subject to form the temporal clause.

¹² tn The expression “three times” is an adverbial accusative of time.

¹³ tn Heb “they go from strength to strength.” The phrase “from strength to strength” occurs only here in the OT. With a verb of motion, the expression “from [common noun] to [same common noun]” normally suggests movement from one point to another or through successive points (see Num 36:7; 1 Chr 16:20; 17:5; Ps 105:13; Jer 25:32). Ps 84:7 may be emphasizing that the pilgrims move successively from one “place of strength” to another as they travel toward Jerusalem. All along the way they find adequate provisions and renewed energy for the trip.

¹⁴ tn The psalmist returns to the singular (see v. 5a), which he uses in either a representative or distributive (“each one” ) sense.