Isaiah 35:10

35:10 those whom the Lord has ransomed will return that way. ¹ 

They will enter Zion with a happy shout.

Unending joy will crown them, ² 

happiness and joy will overwhelm ³  them;

grief and suffering will disappear. ⁴ 

Isaiah 60:20

60:20 Your sun will no longer set;

your moon will not disappear; ⁵ 

the Lord will be your permanent source of light;

your time ⁶  of sorrow will be over.

Isaiah 65:19

65:19 Jerusalem will bring me joy,

and my people will bring me happiness. ⁷ 

The sound of weeping or cries of sorrow

will never be heard in her again.

John 16:22

16:22 So also you have sorrow ⁸  now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you. ⁹ 

Revelation 7:17

7:17 because the Lamb in the middle of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” ¹⁰ 

Revelation 21:4

21:4 He ¹¹  will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not exist any more – or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the former things have ceased to exist.” ¹² 

¹ tn Heb “and the redeemed will walk, the ransomed of the Lord will return.”

² tn Heb “[will be] on their head[s].” “Joy” may be likened here to a crown (cf. 2 Sam 1:10). The statement may also be an ironic twist on the idiom “earth/dust on the head” (cf. 2 Sam 1:2; 13:19; 15:32; Job 2:12), referring to a mourning practice.

³ tn Heb “will overtake” (NIV); NLT “they will be overcome with.”

⁴ tn Heb “grief and groaning will flee”; KJV “sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”

⁵ sn In this verse “sun” and “moon” refer to the Lord’s light, which will replace the sun and moon (see v. 19). Light here symbolizes the restoration of divine blessing and prosperity in conjunction with the Lord’s presence. See 30:26.

⁶ tn Heb “days” (so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

⁷ tn Heb “and I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and be happy in my people.”

⁸ tn Or “distress.”

⁹ sn An allusion to Isa 66:14 LXX, which reads: “Then you will see, and your heart will be glad, and your bones will flourish like the new grass; and the hand of the Lord will be made known to his servants, but he will be indignant toward his enemies.” The change from “you will see [me]” to I will see you places more emphasis on Jesus as the one who reinitiates the relationship with the disciples after his resurrection, but v. 16 (you will see me) is more like Isa 66:14. Further support for seeing this allusion as intentional is found in Isa 66:7, which uses the same imagery of the woman giving birth found in John 16:21. In the context of Isa 66 the passages refer to the institution of the messianic kingdom, and in fact the last clause of 66:14 along with the following verses (15-17) have yet to be fulfilled. This is part of the tension of present and future eschatological fulfillment that runs throughout the NT, by virtue of the fact that there are two advents. Some prophecies are fulfilled or partially fulfilled at the first advent, while other prophecies or parts of prophecies await fulfillment at the second.

¹⁰ sn An allusion to Isa 25:8.

¹¹ tn Grk “God, and he.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation. Here καί (kai) has not been translated.

¹² tn For the translation of ἀπέρχομαι (apercomai; here ἀπῆλθαν [aphlqan]) L&N 13.93 has “to go out of existence – ‘to cease to exist, to pass away, to cease.’”