Isaiah 40:1,2

The term of Jerusalem's servitude is accomplished; she has suffered the full penalty of her transgressions.

Comfort ye The repetition of an emphatic opening word is characteristic of the writer's style; cf. ch. Isaiah 43:11; Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 48:11; Isaiah 48:15; Isaiah 51:9; Isaiah 51:12; Isaiah 51:17; Isaiah 52:1; Isaiah 52:11 etc. (see Introd. p. xlv). It is rather idle to enquire who are the persons addressed; they might no doubt be prophets (as the clause is paraphrased by the Targ.) or the prophetically minded among the people, but certainly not the priests, as is suggested by the Sept. addition of ἱερεῖς at the beginning of Isaiah 40:2.

saith your God The verb differs in tense from the usual prophetic formula, being an impf. either of continued or of incipient action (see Introd. p. xlvii, and Driver, Tenses, § 33 (a) Obs.). To translate it by a future and take this as a proof that the words were written by Isaiah 150 years before is quite unwarranted.