Isaiah 40:1-3

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition

God’s People Are Comforted

40 ^[a]Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
²Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
    and cry to her
that her warfare^[b] is ended,
    that her iniquity is pardoned,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
    double for all her sins.

³A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.

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Footnotes

40.1 Here begins the “Book of the Consolation of Israel,” as it has been beautifully called. It was written to comfort and console the people in their exile in Babylonia.
Isaiah 40:2 Or time of service

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE)

The Revised Standard Version of the Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1965, 1966 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.