Augustine of Hippo : This, as I have said, is obscure: "shall possess the land and inhabit my holy mountain." After all, if we take it literally and materialistically, we won't be cleansing ourselves from every defilement of flesh and spirit; and God will have procured for us to no purpose the conjunction of the end of the reading from the prophet with the beginning of the reading from the apostle, if to possess some earthly mountain we start getting ourselves ready for avarice, not for godliness. Well, but what should we understand by the mountain? It is obscure what [Isaiah] meant by "mountain."Yes, but if God had really let us down, he would nowhere say what mountain means. Where he does tell us openly, that is where you must love the mountain. Where he openly recommends a mountain to you, and Scripture opens itself up to say what mountain means, that is where you must love it. Yes, wherever you hear such a mountain promised you, set your sights on it.… What sort of mountain really has been promised us?… The church itself is the mountain … we are going to rise again, and we shall be the holy mountain of God. On this mountain dwells whoever has given himself to God. "But those who have given themselves to me shall possess the land and inhabit my holy mountain." — SERMON 45:3-5 Jerome : (Verse 13, 14.) And the wind will carry them away: the breeze will lift them. But those who have confidence in me will inherit the land and possess my holy mountain. And I will say, Make a way, offer a path, turn aside from the path, remove stumbling blocks from my people's way. LXX: For the wind will carry away all of them, and the tempest will take them away. But those who hope in me will possess the land and inherit my holy mountain, and they will say: Make his ways clean and remove stumbling blocks from my people's way. The Jews of Babylon assert that these things are prophesied: that, by the power of God, after overcoming their enemies, the people will return to Judah and possess Mount Zion, and all obstacles of the journey will be removed, and they will not suffer any ambush from any nation, because the Lord will make a straight path for His people. And they claim that these things were fulfilled under Zerubbabel and Ezra. But we, joining what has been said before, assert that the wind and storm will remove all the idols that could not save them, and they will be like dust that the wind blows away from the face of the earth. But those who have trust in the Lord will possess the land which we will read about in this same Prophet: He will exalt you to the good things of the land. From which it is clear that this land is not below, but above. To which the holy one, lifted up by the Lord, will ascend, of which we have often said: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the land (Matthew 5:4); and I believe to see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living (Psalms 27:13). But the holy mountain of God, that is to be understood, is the one about which he speaks to the Hebrews, who wrote the Letter: You have come to Mount Zion and to the heavenly city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to the countless angels and the assembly of the firstborn who are written in heaven (Hebrews 12:22). We can understand the land and mountain of the Lord, which the saints will possess, and the holy Scriptures, which were to be carried from the Jews, the Lord threatens, saying: The kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation producing its fruits (Matt. XXI, 43); so that they may find in them that same mountain, of which we read in this same Prophet (Isaiah II), and in Micah: In the last days, the mountain of the Lord will be made manifest (Micah IV, 5). And the Lord himself commanded the Apostles and all the teachers of the Church to dissolve with their interpretation whatever seemed harsh and difficult, and to provide the way of understanding, and to remove all scandals from among them so that the people of the Lord may understand what they read without any impediment, and may progress in the fear of God. Concerning these ways, John the Baptist said: Prepare the way of the Lord, etc. (Matthew 3:3). Where we have taken the place of God, and I will say, the 70 translators have put and will say: namely those who will possess the land, and inherit the holy mountain of God. They will not be content with their own salvation, but they will also challenge others to teach the people. Symmachus interpreted this passage as follows: But whoever trusts in me will possess the land and will inherit my holy mountain, and will say: Make the way straight and the rest. Because he, who possesses the land and the mountain himself, should instruct others, so that they may obey the way of the Lord. — Commentary on Isaiah