TR: chag → heortḗ (Pilgrimage Festival)

The Chain

Hebrew OT              LXX (Greek OT)          Greek NT
─────────────         ─────────────────        ──────────────
חַג (chag)       →    ἑορτή (heortḗ)      →   ἑορτή (heortḗ)
H2282, 55x            50x as translation        25x in NT
"pilgrimage feast"    of chag                   "feast, festival"

OT Usage (Hebrew)

Strong's	Word	Occurrences	Primary Meaning
H2282	חַג (chag)	55	pilgrimage festival, solemn feast
H2287	חָגַג (châgag)	16	to observe a festival, march in procession

Key OT passages: - Exo 23:14 — "Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year" — chag as the whole category of pilgrimage festivals - Deu 16:16 — Three feasts specified: unleavened bread, weeks, tabernacles — all called chag - Amos 5:21 — "I hate, I despise your feast days" — prophetic rebuke of corrupted chag

Canonical word study: H2282-chag.md

LXX Bridge

Hebrew	Greek Translation	Count	Notes
chag (H2282)	ἑορτή (G1859)	50x	Primary equivalent — 91% of LXX renderings
châgag (H2287)	ἑορτάζω (G1858)	6x	Root verb → verbal cognate
chag (H2282)	ἄζυμος (G106)	12x	"feast of unleavened bread" context
môwʻêd (H4150)	ἑορτή (G1859)	34x	Secondary Hebrew source for same Greek word

Semantic shift: The Hebrew chag carries the specific nuance of circular/processional movement (root châgag = to move in a circle). Greek ἑορτή captures the festival occasion but loses this kinetic/processional connotation. The concept of pilgrimage (going up) is preserved in context but not in the word itself.

Dominance: H2282 is the primary Hebrew source for G1859 (PMI 31.28), though H4150 môwʻêd also maps to ἑορτή (34x, PMI 19.41). The LXX essentially collapses chag and a portion of moed under the single word heortḗ.

NT Usage (Greek)

Strong's	Word	Occurrences	Primary Meaning
G1859	ἑορτή (heortḗ)	25	festival, feast, holyday
G1858	ἑορτάζω (heortázō)	1	to keep a feast (1 Cor 5:8)

Key NT passages: - Luk 2:41 — "His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the passover" — annual pilgrimage pattern of chag continues - Jhn 7:2 — (implied) "the Jews' feast of tabernacles was at hand" — Sukkot as the preeminent chag carries over - Col 2:16 — "Let no man judge you... in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days" — heortḗ in a list including sabbath and new moon, mirroring OT chag + moed contexts - Act 18:21 — "I must by all means keep this feast that cometh in Jerusalem" — Paul using heortḗ for pilgrimage observance

Direct OT→NT Connections

NT Verse	OT Echo	Shared Word	Significance
Luk 2:41	Exo 23:17; Deu 16:16	chag → heortḗ	Annual Passover pilgrimage — exact pattern commanded in Torah
Col 2:16	Hos 2:11; Eze 45:17	chag → heortḗ	Festival calendar listed with moons and sabbaths — same OT triad
1 Cor 5:8	Exo 12:14; 13:6	châgag → heortázō	"Let us keep the feast" — Paul applies Passover/Unleavened Bread language to Christian life
Zec 14:16–19	(future)	chag	Nations keeping feast of tabernacles — heortḗ carries this eschatological feast into NT horizon

Continuity and Shifts

What stays the same: - The three annual pilgrimage festivals remain the referents of heortḗ throughout the NT - The Passover and Feast of Tabernacles are the most prominent individual feasts in both OT and NT - The corporate/public character of chag (all Israel assembled) continues in NT usage - The tension between formal observance and genuine worship (see Amos 5:21) echoes in NT critique of external religion

What shifts: - Hebrew chag implies processional movement and pilgrimage to a central sanctuary; NT heortḗ is used in contexts where Jesus himself becomes the locus of the feast (Jhn 2:23; 7:37–38) - Paul's use in Col 2:16 and 1 Cor 5:8 applies the festival vocabulary to the new-covenant community, decoupling it from the Jerusalem pilgrimages - The eschatological trajectory in Zec 14 (nations keeping feast of tabernacles) appears to be in view in NT passages about universal worship

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Generated from: gather_trace_data.py, search_strongs.py (--lxx-map, --hebrew-source, --lookup) Last updated: 2026-04-02