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17 Israel has been saved by the Lord,
    saved forever!
You shall never be put to shame or disgrace
    in any future age.”

18     For thus says the Lord,
The creator of the heavens,
    who is God,
The designer and maker of the earth
    who established it,
Not as an empty waste[a] did he create it,
    but designing it to be lived in:
I am the Lord, and there is no other.
19     I have not spoken in secret
    from some place in the land of darkness,
I have not said to the descendants of Jacob,
    “Look for me in an empty waste.”
I, the Lord, promise justice,
    I declare what is right.

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Footnotes

  1. 45:18 Empty waste: an allusion to Gn 1:2, where the earth is waste and void; the same Hebrew word, tohu, is used in both passages. Here it points to devastated Judah and Jerusalem, where God wishes to resettle the returning exiles.