My grandfather and uncle had a farm together in Southern Idaho (volcanic rock country), and my borthers, my cousins, and I used to work there as kids in the summer. We were assigned one hot July to “pick rocks”. That meant my uncle had plowed up some previously unused pasture land for planting, and we had to go through the plowed field with a flatbed trailer behind a tractor, and pick up all the rocks that the plow had turned up. It was hot, dirty, sweaty work, with lots of smashed fingers and scraped hands. It took us several days to get all through the field, and we had hauled probably five or six trailer loads of rock off to the rock pile. Just as we were getting through with the field, and had gotten all the rocks that we could see, we heard my grandfather come into the field with the disc harrow behind his tractor. Think of some two or three rows of 18 inch round metal plates each, dropped into the plowed earth. As soon as my grandfather dropped the harrow, we began to hear all sorts of clanking and ringing sounds, and realized that the harrow was turning up lots of rocks that were still hidden in the dirt that the plow had not turned up.

We went back for two more days, and now the dirt was fine powder, dust getting into our eyes, mouths, down the necks of our shirts, into our shoes. The work after the harrow was even more unpleasant than after the plowing.

Later, reading the Book of Mormon and its several references to harrow or being harrowed up, has helped me to understand. We would have been happy to quit after the first pass, leaving many rocks still uncovered and not dealt with. But the harrow uncovered all the hidden incompleteness of our work. That’s why for me, this is such a great symbolic use of harrow for repentance. All of the unseen and undealt with issues will eventually be uncovered, and have to be addressed. Harrowed up is not a distant reality for me, either figuratively or in reality.

For a better picture of a harrow of the type I remember, go here: http://www.bwimp.com/products_item_disk_offset_3point_wheelharrow.php

Thanks for the great comments, everyone. I’m learning much from your remarks.

The point is that all things hidden were turned up by the harrow that the plow (and our initial efforts) failed to remove. That is especially apt when we talk about repentance, and it is a lesson that I recall whenever I read about bieng “harrowed up” in the Book of Mormon.

ps – I hope the link works correctly for the picture of a modern harrow….

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deathly_Hallows_%28objects%29

Our teacher had Alma being “hallowed up.”