Isaiah locates his prophecy in time by noting that it “shall come to pass in the last days.” Of course the “last days” are indeterminate, but grouped with all other similar prophecies indicate a time in the distant future, prior to the final days of this creation. As we now understand, we are part of these last days, and are now seeing the fulfillment of these prophecies.
The specific prophecy is that the “mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains.” In some ways this is a confusing verse, as it appears to have a mountain established in the tops of the mountains. However, it is important to understand the ancient cultural context of “mountain.”
Anthropological Information, the Ancient Temple: It is important to remember that for the ancients, the temple was much more a place than a structure. For the ancient world, what made the location important was its ability to act as a bridge between this world and the next, the fact that a structure might exist on that location was secondary. For example, note the following analysis from Mircea Eliade:
“Every sacred space implies a hierophany, an irruption of the sacred that results in detaching a territory from the surrounding cosmic milieu and making it qualitatively different. When Jacob in his dream at Haran saw a ladder reaching to heave, with angels ascending and descending on it, and heard the Lord speaking from above it saying: ”I am the Lord God of Abraham,“ he awoke and was afraid and cried out: ”How dreadful is this place: this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heave.“ And he took the stone that had been his pillow, and set it up as a monument, and poured oil on the top of it. He called the place Beth-el, that is, house of God (Genesis 28:12-19). The symbolism implicit in the expression ”gate of heaven“ is rich and complex; the theophany that occurs in a place consecrates it by the very fact that it makes it open above – that is, in communication with heaven, the paradoxical point of passage from one mode of being to another.” (Eliade, Mircea. The Sacred and the Profane. Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1959:26).
It is no coincidence that Jacob sees the location of his experience not only as a “gate of heaven,” but even more importantly, as “beth-el – house of God.” For Jacob, the experience made the location the house of God even before he erected a monument to commemorate and make more permanent the location.
For the ancient world in which Israel participated, the correlation between sacred space and temple was paramount, and was typically interlinked with the concept of the mountain as a sacred location for the communication between God and man. When there is no building which is a temple, Moses meets God on the top of a mountain. This is completely in accord with the understanding of the Ancient Near East.
John M. Lundquist has collected a 19 point typology of the Ancient Near Easter conception of a temple:
1. The temple is the architectural embodiment of the cosmic mountain.
2. The cosmic mountain represents the primordial hillock, the place which first emerged from the waters that covered the earth during the creative process. In Egypt, for example, all temples are seen as representing the primordial hillock.
3. The temple is often associated with the waters of life which flow from a spring within the building itself – or rather the temple is viewed as incorporating within itself such a spring or as having been built upon the spring. The reason that such springs exist in temples is that they were perceived as the primeval waters of creation…The temple is thus founded upon and stands in contact with the waters of creation. These waters carry the dual symbolism of the chaotic waters that were organized during the creation and of the life-giving, saving nature of the waters of life.
4. The temple is associated with the tree of life.
5. The temple is built on separate, sacral, set-apart space.
6. The temple is oriented toward the four world regions or cardinal directions, and to various celestial bodies such as the polar star. As such, it is, or can be, an astronomical observatory, the main purpose of which is to assist the temple priests in regulating the ritual calendar. The earthly temple is also seen as a copy or counterpart of a heavenly model.
7. Temples, in their architectonic orientation, express the idea of a successive ascension toward heaven. The Mesopotamian ziggurat or staged temple tower is the best example of this architectural principle. It was constructed of three, five, or seven levels or stages. Monumental staircases led to the upper levels, where smaller temples stood. the basic ritual pattern represented in these structures is that the worshippers ascended the staircase to the top, the deity descended from heaven, and the two met in the small temple which stood at the top of the structure.
8. The plan and measurements fo the temple are revealed by God to the king or prophet, and the plan must be carefully carried out. The Babylonian king Nabopolassar stated that he took the measurements of Etemenanki, the temple tower in the main temple precinct at Babylon, under the guidance of the Babylonian gods Shamash, Adad, and Marduk, and that “he kept the measurements in his memory as a treasure.”
9. The temple is the central, organizing, unifying institution in ancient Near Eastern society.
a. The temple is associated with abundance and prosperity…
b. The destruction or loss of the temple is seen as calamitous…
10. Inside the temple, images of deities as well as living kings, temple priests, and worshippers are washed, anointed, clothed, fed, enthroned, and symbolically initiated into the presence of deity, and thus into eternal life. Further, New Year rites held in the temple include the reading and dramatic portrayal of texts which recite a pre-earthly war in heaven; a victory in that war by the forces of good, led by a chief deity; and the creation and establishment of the cosmos, cities, temples, and the social order. The sacred marriage is carried out at this time.
11. The temple is associated with the realm of the dead, the underworld, the afterlife, the grave. The unifying features here are the rites and worship of ancestors. Tombs can be, and in Egypt and elsewhere are, essentially temples...
12. Sacral, communal meals are carried out in connection with temple ritual, often at the conclusion of or during a covenant ceremony.
13. The tablets of destiny (or tables of the decrees) are consulted in the cosmic sense by the gods, and yearly in a special temple chamber, the ubshukinna in the temple of Eninnu in the time of the Sumerian king Gudea of Lagash. It was by this means that the will of deity was communicated to the people through the king or prophet for a given year.
14. God’s word is revealed in the temple usually in the holy of holies, to priests or prophets attached to the temple or to the religious system that it represents.
15. There is a close interrelationship between the temple and law in the ancient Near Est. The building or restoration of a temple is perceived as the moving force behind a restating or “codifying” of basic legal principles, and the ‘righting" and organizing of proper social order. The building or refurbishing of temples is central to the covenant process.
16. The temple is a place of sacrifice.
17. The temple and its ritual are enshrouded in secrecy. This secrecy relates to the sacredness of the temple precinct and the strict division in ancient times between sacred and profane space.
18. The temple and its cult are central to the economic structure of ancient Near Eastern society.
19. The temple plays a legitimizing political role in the ancient Near East.
(Lundquist, John M. “The Common Temple Ideology of the Ancient Near East.” In The Temple in Antiquity. Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1984, pp. 57-59.)
Scriptural analysis: Isaiah covers three items in this verse, a time, a place, and an action. The time is the last days. The place is a temple built on the top of the mountains. As the dual reference to mountains unfolds, this becomes an emphasis on the sacred power of this location as a mode of communication with the Lord. This is a temple of temples, a mountain on mountains. It will be the preeminent location for the communication between God and man.
Finally, Isaiah notes an action; “all nations will flow unto it.” The power of his communication between God and man will be so powerful that all nations will eventually take notice. By “flowing unto it” Isaiah is both literal and figurative. Nations will come to the location, but most importantly, they will come to the word of God that is present at that location.