A forerunner: "the voice of him that crieth in the wilderness" / "my messenger"
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3The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
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1Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God.
2Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.
3The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain:
5And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.
6The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field:
1Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.
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1Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.
2But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fullers’ soap:
3And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness.
4Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the LORD, as in the days of old, and as in former years.
5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:
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2But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
3And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the LORD of hosts.
4Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments.
5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:
6And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.
2As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.
3The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
4John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.
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1The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;
2As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.
3The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
4John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.
5And there went out unto him all the land of Judæa, and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins.
6And John was clothed with camel’s hair, and with a girdle of a skin about his loins; and he did eat locusts and wild honey;
7And preached, saying, There cometh one mightier than I after me, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to stoop down and unloose.
The prophets foretold one who would go ahead: "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD" (); "Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me" (); "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD" (). The Gospels see these fulfilled in John the Baptist (). The return of Elijah was a pre-Christian hope (), and the Qumran community read as a word for the last days. The strongest point is historical: a real prophet of national stature, independently attested by Josephus as a popular and righteous baptiser executed by Herod Antipas, appeared immediately before Jesus, and Jesus came out of his movement. Dale Allison judged a Jewish origin for the idea of Elijah as the Messiah's forerunner "slightly" more likely than not.
John himself chose the wilderness and the Jordan, much as the Qumran community deliberately settled in the desert to enact , and the evangelists adapted the prophets' wording. This is good evidence of how first-century figures understood themselves through scripture. But a prophet filling the forerunner role is something every explanation would expect, so it does not confirm prediction.
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All three passages prepare the way for God himself: "a highway for our God" (), "before me" (). Mark changes this to "before thy face" (), blending in , so that the forerunner can precede a second figure. No pre-Christian text directly makes Elijah the forerunner of the Messiah: Mark attributes the idea to the scribes (), and Trypho used it against Jesus. Josephus' account of John mentions no wilderness, no Elijah, no coming figure and no Jesus. The Gospels progressively heighten John's testimony to Jesus, while the question "Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?" () preserves doubt; in John's Gospel the Baptist denies being Elijah (); and a separate Baptist group persisted (Acts 19).