Leviticus 23:40-44

23:40 On the first day you must take for yourselves branches from majestic trees ¹  – palm branches, branches of leafy trees, and willows of the brook – and you must rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. 23:41 You must celebrate it as a pilgrim festival to the Lord for seven days in the year. This is a perpetual statute throughout your generations; ²  you must celebrate it in the seventh month. 23:42 You must live in temporary shelters ³  for seven days; every native citizen in Israel must live in temporary shelters, 23:43 so that your future generations may know that I made the Israelites live in temporary shelters when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.’”

23:44 So Moses spoke to the Israelites about the appointed times of the Lord. ⁴ 

¹ tn Heb “fruit of majestic trees,” but the following terms and verses define what is meant by this expression. For extensive remarks on the celebration of this festival in history and tradition see B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 163; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 389-90; and P. J. Budd, Leviticus (NCBC), 328-29.

² tn Heb “for your generations.”

³ tn Heb “in the huts” (again at the end of this verse and in v. 43), perhaps referring to temporary shelters (i.e., huts) made of the foliage referred to in v. 40 (J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 389).

⁴ sn E. S. Gerstenberger (Leviticus [OTL], 352) takes v. 44 to be an introduction to another set of festival regulations, perhaps something like those found in Exod 23:14-17. For others this verse reemphasizes the Mosaic authority of the preceding festival regulations (e.g., J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 390).