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Christmas Season · Nativity of the Lord - Christmas Dawn · Year A

Isaiah 62:11-12

Behold, Your Salvation Comes

December 25, 2025

Christ's Entry into Jerusalem, Benjamin Robert Haydon
Christ's Entry into Jerusalem, Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1814–1820Athenaeum of Ohio – Mount St. Mary's Seminary of the West, Cincinnati
An enormous canvas Haydon exhibited for money and never sold at a profit. He put Wordsworth, Keats, Hazlitt and Voltaire into the crowd as spectators.Say to daughter Zion, See, your salvation comes. They shall be called the Holy People, the Redeemed of the Lord.Benjamin Robert HaydonAn English history painter of enormous ambition and no commercial sense, who exhibited his own vast canvases, went to prison for debt repeatedly, and died by his own hand.Athenaeum of Ohio – Mount St. Mary's Seminary of the West, CincinnatiA Catholic seminary in Cincinnati which acquired Haydon's enormous canvas in the nineteenth century and still has it.Athenaeum of Ohio – Mount St. Mary's Seminary of the West, Cincinnati
Roman Lectionary
GospelLuke 2:15-20Lk 2:15-20
Second ReadingTitus 3:4-7Ti 3:4-7
First ReadingIsa. 62:11-12Is 62:11-12
Responsorial PsalmPs. 97:1+6, 11-12Ps 97:1+6, 11-12

Overview & Insights

“Behold, your salvation comes.” (Isaiah 62:11)

These two verses close an oracle of Zion’s vindication in the last section of the book, where the city is renamed rather than rebuilt. Verse 11 all but repeats the earlier herald passage, “Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him” (cf. Isaiah 40:10), and the summons to the daughter of Zion reappears at Matthew 21:5, where it is blended with Zechariah 9:9 before the entry into Jerusalem. Verse 12 supplies the new names, “The Holy People, The Redeemed of the Lord”, and “Sought Out, A City Not Forsaken”, completing the series begun at 62:2-4 where the land called Desolate becomes Married. The naming is the substance of the promise: identity here is conferred from outside. The Mass at dawn takes these verses because salvation in them arrives as something already on the road and visible at a distance.

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Commentary

Commentary on Isaiah 62:6-12Commentary on Is 62:6-12 Working Preacher

Luther Seminary commentary on the Christmas Dawn first reading, covering the Sought Out and Holy People of verses 11-12.

Isaiah 62:1-5 CommentaryIs 62:1-5 Commentary Center for Excellence in Preaching

Reformed preaching commentary on the Isaiah 62 Zion oracle whose salvation shines out to the ends of the earth.

Enduring Word Bible Commentary Isaiah Chapter 62Enduring Word Bible Commentary Is Chapter 62 Enduring Word · David Guzik

David Guzik traces the promise that the redeemed will be called the Holy People and the city Sought Out.

Isaiah 62:11 CommentariesIs 62:11 Commentaries BibleHub

Aggregated classic commentary on the proclaimed word to the daughter of Zion, See, your salvation comes.

Background & Word Study

Isaiah 62:11 InterlinearIs 62:11 Interlinear BibleHub

Hebrew word by word with parsing for the herald's cry to the daughter of Zion (bat-tsiyon).

Sefaria: Isaiah 62Sefaria: Is 62 Sefaria

Hebrew text with the Jewish Publication Society translation and classical Jewish commentary on Zion's vindication.

BibleProject: Book of Isaiah OverviewBibleProject: Book of Is Overview BibleProject

Animated literary overview showing how Isaiah's promises of a restored Zion frame this reading.

The Church Fathers

Catena: Isaiah 62Catena: Is 62 Catena

Patristic comment chained to Isaiah 62 reading the Holy People and Redeemed of the Lord as the Church.

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