Add parallel Print Page Options

    A voice proclaims:[a]
In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord!
    Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God!(A)

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 40:3–5 A description of the return of the exiles from Babylon to Jerusalem (Zion). The language used here figuratively describes the way the exiles will take. The Lord leads them, so their way lies straight across the wilderness rather than along the well-watered routes usually followed from Mesopotamia to Israel. Mt 3:3 and gospel parallels adapt these verses to the witness of John the Baptizer to Jesus.

A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
    the way(A) for the Lord[a];
make straight(B) in the desert
    a highway for our God.[b](C)

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 40:3 Or A voice of one calling in the wilderness: / “Prepare the way for the Lord
  2. Isaiah 40:3 Hebrew; Septuagint make straight the paths of our God

23 He said:

“I am ‘the voice of one crying out in the desert,(A)
“Make straight the way of the Lord,”’[a]

as Isaiah the prophet said.”

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 1:23 This is a repunctuation and reinterpretation (as in the synoptic gospels and Septuagint) of the Hebrew text of Is 40:3 which reads, “A voice cries out: In the desert prepare the way of the Lord.”

23 John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness,(A) ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’”[a](B)

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. John 1:23 Isaiah 40:3