[1] Comfort you, comfort you my people, says your God. [2] Speak
comfortably to Jerusalem; and cry to her, that her warfare is accomplished,
that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received of Yahweh`s hand
double for all her sins. [3] The voice of one who cries, Prepare you in the
wilderness the way of Yahweh; make level in the desert a highway for our
God. [4] Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall
be made low; and the uneven shall be made level, and the rough places a
plain: [5] and the glory of Yahweh shall be revealed, and all flesh shall
see it together; for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken it. [6] The voice of
one saying, Cry. One said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all
the glory of it is as the flower of the field. [7] The grass withers, the
flower fades, because the breath of Yahweh blows on it; surely the people
is grass. [8] The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God
shall stand forever. [9] You who tell good news to Zion, get you up on a
high mountain; you who tell good news to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with
strength; lift it up, don`t be afraid; say to the cities of Judah, Behold,
your God! [10] Behold, the Lord Yahweh will come as a mighty one, and his
arm will rule for him: Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense
before him. [11] He will feed his flock like a shepherd, he will gather the
lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom, [and] will gently lead those
who have their young. [12] Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his
hand, and meted out the sky with the span, and comprehended the dust of the
earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a
balance? [13] Who has directed the Spirit of Yahweh, or being his counselor
has taught him? [14] With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him, and
taught him in the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed to
him the way of understanding? [15] Behold, the nations are as a drop of a
bucket, and are accounted as the small dust of the balance: Behold, he
takes up the isles as a very little thing. [16] Lebanon is not sufficient
to burn, nor the animals of it sufficient for a burnt offering. [17] All
the nations are as nothing before him; they are accounted by him as less
than nothing, and vanity. [18] To whom then will you liken God? or what
likeness will you compare to him? [19] The image, a workman has cast [it],
and the goldsmith overlays it with gold, and casts [for it] silver chains.
[20] He who is too impoverished for [such] an offering chooses a tree that
will not rot; he seeks to him a skillful workman to set up an engraved
image, that shall not be moved. [21] Have you not known? have yet not
heard? has it not been told you from the beginning? have you not understood
from the foundations of the earth? [22] [It is] he who sits above the
circle of the earth, and the inhabitants of it are as grasshoppers; who
stretches out the heavens as a curtain, and spreads them out as a tent to
dwell in; [23] who brings princes to nothing; who makes the judges of the
earth as vanity. [24] Yes, they have not been planted; yes, they have not
been sown; yes, their stock has not taken root in the earth: moreover he
blows on them, and they wither, and the whirlwind takes them away as
stubble. [25] To whom then will you liken me, that I should be equal [to
him]? says the Holy One. [26] Lift up your eyes on high, and see who has
created these, who brings out their host by number; he calls them all by
name; by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power, not
one is lacking. [27] Why say you, Jacob, and speak, Israel, My way is hid
from Yahweh, and the justice [due] to me is passed away from my God? [28]
Have you not known? have you not heard? The everlasting God, Yahweh, the
Creator of the ends of the earth, doesn`t faint, neither is weary; there is
no searching of his understanding. [29] He gives power to the faint; and to
him who has no might he increases strength. [30] Even the youths shall
faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: [31] but those
who wait for Yahweh shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with
wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not
faint.
