Deuteronomy 7:13-14

7:13 He will love and bless you, and make you numerous. He will bless you with many children, ¹  with the produce of your soil, your grain, your new wine, your oil, the offspring of your oxen, and the young of your flocks in the land which he promised your ancestors to give you. 7:14 You will be blessed beyond all peoples; there will be no barrenness ²  among you or your livestock.

Psalms 113:9

113:9 He makes the barren woman of the family ³ 

a happy mother of children. ⁴ 

Praise the Lord!

Psalms 127:3

127:3 Yes, ⁵  sons ⁶  are a gift from the Lord,

the fruit of the womb is a reward.

Luke 1:42

1:42 She ⁷  exclaimed with a loud voice, ⁸  “Blessed are you among women, ⁹  and blessed is the child ¹⁰  in your womb!

[7:13]  ¹ tn Heb “will bless the fruit of your womb” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[7:14]  ² sn One of the ironies about the promises to the patriarchs concerning offspring was the characteristic barrenness of the wives of the men to whom these pledges were made (cf. Gen 11:30; 25:21; 29:31). Their affliction is in each case described by the very Hebrew word used here (עֲקָרָה, ’aqarah), an affliction that will no longer prevail in Canaan.

[113:9]  ³ tn Heb “of the house.”

[113:9]  ⁴ tn Heb “sons.”

[127:3]  ⁵ tn or “look.”

[127:3]  ⁶ tn Some prefer to translate this term with the gender neutral “children,” but “sons” are plainly in view here, as the following verses make clear. Daughters are certainly wonderful additions to a family, but in ancient Israelite culture sons were the “arrows” that gave a man security in his old age, for they could defend the family interests at the city gate, where the legal and economic issues of the community were settled.

[1:42]  ⁷ tn Grk “and she.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was begun here in the translation. Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[1:42]  ⁸ tn Grk “and she exclaimed with a great cry and said.” The verb εἶπεν (eipen, “said”) has not been included in the translation since it is redundant in contemporary English.

[1:42]  ⁹ sn The commendation Blessed are you among women means that Mary has a unique privilege to be the mother of the promised one of God.

[1:42]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “fruit,” which is figurative here for the child she would give birth to.