Isaiah 2:3

Many people shall go and say. Here, as in the statement of v. 2 about “all nations” flowing to Jerusalem, the OT prophets repeatedly — sometimes in identical words — present what “many people shall go and say.” In recognition of the obvious superiority of Israel as a nation (Deut. 4:6, 7; 28:10; Isa. 61:9, 10; Isa. 62:1, 2; Jer. 33:9; Mal. 3:12) and admitting that their “fathers have inherited lies” (Jer. 16:19), the Gentile nations would say to one another, “Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord, and to seek the Lord” (Zech. 8:21, 22), and to Israel, “We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you” (Zech. 8:23). This promise of the ingathering of the nations to worship the true God was never fulfilled to literal Israel, owing to their failure to meet the requisite conditions, but will be fulfilled, spiritually, to God’s people in this generation (see pp. 32, 35).

Come ye, and let us go. Had Israel been faithful to God, these words would have been on the lips of the Gentiles, as men of other nations realized the desirability of honoring the true God. Compare the words of Zech. 8:21, 23, “Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord. . . . We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you.”

The mountain of the Lord. The same as “the mountain of the Lord’s house” of v. 2. This proposal is another way of saying, “Let us go to Jerusalem.” The Dead Sea scroll 1QIs (see Vol. I, p. 31; Vol. IV, pp. 86-88) omits the phrase “to the mountain of the Lord.”

The house. That is, the Temple in Jerusalem (see on v. 2).

The God of Jacob. Equivalent to “the God of Israel.” Israel was the covenant name of Jacob (see on Gen. 32:28). The fact that the Gentiles do not merely say, “Let us go up to Jerusalem,” but rather, “Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob,” indicates a true understanding of the fact that the greatness of Israel is due to the cooperation of the people with the divine plan and that they worship the true God.

He will teach us of his ways. In ch. 55:5 Isaiah speaks of the nations hastening to Jerusalem “because of the Lord thy God.” As they joined “themselves to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name of the Lord” (ch. 56:6-8), the Temple would literally become “an house of prayer for all people.” See pp. 28-30.

We will walk in his paths. From all nations men would come to unite their interests with those of Israel, saying, “We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you” (Zech. 8:23). Eventually, “he that remaineth” of all the peoples of earth, “even he, shall be for our God” (ch. 9:7) and all nations “shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts” (ch. 14:16). This state of affairs was to have come true after “all the nations which came against Jerusalem” (v. 16) had suffered divine retribution (vs. 12, 13, 19) and the Lord reigned as “king over all the earth” (v. 9). Compare Eze. 38:8-12; 39:1-3; Zech. 12:2, 3, 8, 9; 14:1-3.

Out of Zion. Jerusalem was to stand “forth in the pride of prosperity, the queen of kingdoms” and to be “established as the mighty metropolis of the earth” (DA 577). Both the Temple (PK 46) and the city “would have stood forever” (GC 19). The nations of earth would have honored the Jews, and recognized them as the trustees and expositors of the divine law to all men (Deut. 4:7, 8; Rom. 3:1, 2), The principles revealed through Israel were to have become “the means of restoring the moral image of God in man” (COL 286). And, “as the numbers of Israel increased, they were to enlarge their borders, until their kingdom should embrace the world” (COL 290).