Category: Scriptures
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Commentary on 1 Ne. 17, concluded
Continuing part 1 , part 2, and part 3. Nephi’s response to his brothers directly attacks their understanding of Moses’s significance.
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Commentary on 1 Nephi 17, pt. 3
Continuing part 1 and part 2. Laman and Lemuel offer up their gloss on the story of Moses in verse 22 and in so doing model a particular type of scriptural and legal interpretation. They say: And we know that the people who were in the land of Jerusalem were a righteous people; for they…
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Commentary on 1 Nephi 17, pt. 2
Laman and Lemuel make their appearance in chapter 17 in verse 17, where they say:
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Commentary on 1 Nephi 17, pt. 1
This is the first of a series of posts in which I will be offering some commentary on 1 Nephi 17. Why that particular chapter you ask? The answer is that I believe that chapter 17 is setting forth a method of scriptural interpretation that proved to be very important both for the Book of…
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The TRUTH about the Book of Mormon pronouncing guide EXPOSED
The Mormon Church does not want even its own members to know how to pronounce Shimnilom
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The Slaughter of the Innocents
After the wise men came, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him.
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Relics
The Book of Mormon is a reliquary in prose. In some extensive sections and at some critical moments, what drives the narrative is the question: how did a set of golden plates, a steel sword, a ball of curious workmanship, a breastplate, and two translucent stones end up inside a stone box buried in a…
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Bones
One of the subterranean threads running throughout the Book of Mormon is the mystery of whose bones are heaped upon the land northward.
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The Canonization of the Book of Mormon?
Penguin Books has just published a “Penguin Classics” edition of the Book of Mormon edited by Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp. Penguin Classics, of course, are the paperback editions of literary staples like Jane Austen or Charles Dickens. They are printed and marketed largely as texts for college classes. The assumption is that a text included in…
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M Gets a Joke
A while back our household sat down to watch an episode of Monk. We like Monk because not only is it funny, it’s also sad and tender and offers good – sometimes very good – cultural satire. As I fed M she kept turning her head to look at the TV, watching whatever it is…
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The War Chapters
And a great sleep did come over the land; yea, verily, there was much dozing and nodding of heads in all of the sabbath schools.
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Reading Psalm 137 as a Microcosm of Discipleship
Psalm 137 is one of those wonderful and paradoxical passages of scripture that contains within itself a universe.
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Jesus Said . . .
I’m reading a commentary on Psalms and in the section on the authorship of the Psalms, the writer has this to say:
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Korihor and the United States Reports
Let’s read the Book of Mormon as a commentary on American constitutional law and vice versa. Alma 30:7-10 reads:
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Egyptian Brass Plates and a naming contest
If this is common knowledge I completely missed it. So I post this in memory of all those who also slept through indecent chunks of early morning Seminary.
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Women Who Know
… grow tomatoes in their home garden, and lots of them. Men who know grow them, too.
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Amazon’s take on the Book of Mormon
Amazon.com has an algorithm for noting the “Statistically Improbably Phrases” in any given book. The idea is to look for word combinations that are uncommon generally but common in the book in the hope that this provides potential buyers some insight into what the book is about. Here are the ones for the Doubleday edition…
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Joseph and Moses
Most are acquainted with the passage in D&C 130 where God gives a fascinating response to Joseph’s query about the Second Coming:
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We Did It
We’ve finally read the entire Book of Mormon as a family, all of us (those that can read, anyway) taking turns verse by verse. It only took us four and a half years, and we’re ready to do it again.
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Scriptures as Seer Stones
To me, the most interesting thing about the seer stone that Joseph used when translating the BoM is not that he used it but that it is really just a rock. From what I understand, if you or I were to pick it up, we couldn’t tell it apart from any other smooth rock of…
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Testifying of historicity
As I was re-reading conference, I came across this closing statement by President Hinckley:
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True Neighbors
Suppose that you splurged for the $6 version of the Church’s scriptures on CDROM. It has various ancient language toys that I am in no position to evaluate but am happy to play with. It also has a fun little tool such that when you do a search, you can click on a tab “Sort…
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The KJV: A Sealed Book?
I’ve been teaching the second half of the Old Testament in Institute this semester. The KJV is a terrible obstacle to understanding the scriptures.
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Prophecy vs. History
Not too long ago, I stumbled across the PBS presentation of Jared Diamond’s book Guns, Germs, and Steel (2d ed. 1999). It reminded me of dealing with the book at college and enjoying the ideas presented and the sweeping take of world history that it offered. But while watching the presentation and contemplating the message…