Thus says Yahweh: "For three transgressions of Damascus, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; Because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron;
In pagan poetry also, as a trace of a mystery which they had forgotten, three is a sacred whole; from where “thrice and fourfold blessed” stands among them for something exceeding even a full and perfect blessing, a super-abundance of blessings.