They kept the feast of booths: The feast of booths (Good News Bible “the Festival of Shelters”) was an eight-day festival that started on the fifteenth day of the seventh month (see the comments on verse 47). The Jewish name for this festival is Sukkoth (the Hebrew word for “shelters”). It was originally an agricultural festival at the harvest of fruit and grapes and was one of three annual festivals (see Exo 23.14-17; 34.22-23; Deut 16.13-17). Later it was associated with the exodus from Egypt. During this festival the people lived in temporary huts made of tree branches. In this way they remembered the time that their ancestors lived in booths during their wanderings in the desert (Lev 23.43). Good News Bible‘s name for this feast is “the Festival of Shelters.” Another possible rendering is “the feast when they lived in shelters.”

As it is commanded in the law: The law refers to the Law of Moses, the Torah (compare verse 49). The instructions for the observance of this festival are in Lev 23.33-36, 39-43; Num 29.12-38; Deut 16.13-17.

And offered the proper sacrifices every day means they offered the feast’s daily sacrifices that the Law required (see Num 29.12-38).

Good News Bible provides a good model for this verse.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on 1-2 Esdras. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2019. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.