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The well-fed hire themselves out for bread,
    while the hungry no longer have to toil.
The barren wife bears seven sons,
    while the mother of many languishes.(A)

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Chapter 54

The New Zion

Raise a glad cry, you barren one[a] who never bore a child,
    break forth in jubilant song, you who have never been in labor,
For more numerous are the children of the deserted wife
    than the children of her who has a husband,
    says the Lord.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 54:1 Jerusalem, pictured as a wife who had been barren and deserted, now suddenly finds herself with innumerable children (the returning exiles); cf. Gal 4:27 for an application to a new context.