In them is fulfilled. — The Greek verb expresses complete fulfilment, but the tense is that of a work still in progress. The prominence given to these words of Isaiah’s in the New Testament is very noticeable. Our Lord quotes them here, St. John in John 12:40. St. Paul cites them in Acts 28:26. The quotation is from the LXX. version. It is as though the words which sounded at the very opening of Isaiah’s prophecy as the knell of the nation’s life, dwelt on the minds of the Master and His disciples, and prepared them for the seeming fruitlessness and hopelessness of their work.

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