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Who has ever heard of such a thing?
Who has ever seen this?
Can a country[a] be brought forth in one day?
Can a nation be born in a single moment?
Yet as soon as Zion goes into labor she gives birth to sons!
Do I bring a baby to the birth opening and then not deliver it?”
asks the Lord.
“Or do I bring a baby to the point of delivery and then hold it back?”
asks your God.[b]
10 “Be happy for Jerusalem
and rejoice with her, all you who love her!
Share in her great joy,
all you who have mourned over her!

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Footnotes

  1. Isaiah 66:8 tn Heb “land,” but here אֶרֶץ (ʾerets) stands metonymically for an organized nation (see the following line).
  2. Isaiah 66:9 sn The rhetorical questions expect the answer, “Of course not!”

Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.

Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the Lord: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God.

10 Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all ye that mourn for her:

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