Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship, Volume 63 (2025)
Author: Daniel C. Peterson et al
Date: 2025-07-08T06:00:00+00:00
Keywords: The Interpreter Foundation; apologetics; Book of Mormon; Pearl of Great Price; Bible; Doctrine and Covenants; Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; LDS; Mormonism
Description: This is volume 63 of Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship published by The Interpreter Foundation. It contains articles on a variety of topics.

Interpreter

A Journal of Latter-day Saint

Faith and Scholarship

Volume 63

The Interpreter Foundation

Board of Directors

Daniel C. Peterson, President

Steven T. Densley Jr., Executive Vice President

Allen Wyatt, Vice President of Operations

Jeffrey M. Bradshaw, Vice President of Special Projects

Larry K. Ainsworth

Matthew L. Bowen

Kristine Wardle Frederickson

James R. Graham

Jeffrey Dean Lindsay

Shirley Smith Ricks

Management

Kent Flack, Assistant Treasurer

Deborah Peterson, Secretary/Treasurer

Communications Advisor

Newell D. Wright

Board of Advisors

Kevin Christensen

Louis C. Midgley

Gregory L. Smith

Ed Snow

Ted Vaggalis

Contributing Editors

Robert S. Boylan

Jennifer C. Lane

David J. Larsen

Ugo A. Perego

Kyler Rasmussen

Stephen D. Ricks

Lynne Hilton Wilson

Mark Alan Wright

Board of Editors

David M. Calabro

Craig L. Foster

Taylor Halverson

Benjamin L. McGuire

Martin S. Tanner

Bryan J. Thomas

A. Keith Thompson

John S. Thompson

Typesetting

Emily Rogers

Media and Technology

Tyler R. Moulton

Kyler Rasmussen

Russell D. Richins

Alan Sikes

Kimberley Sorenson

Interpreter Advisory Committee

Larry K. Ainsworth, Chairman

Legal Advisor

K. Paul MacArthur

The Interpreter Foundation

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Editorial Management

Daniel C. Peterson, Editor

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Jeffrey Dean Lindsay, Executive Editor

Godfrey Ellis, Executive Editor

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Source Checking

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Deidre Marlowe

Elizabeth Wyatt

Copy Editing

Verlanne Johnson

Julie Russell

Kaitlin Cooper Swift

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Victor Worth

Interpreter Radio

Martin S. Tanner, Producer

Robert Boylan

Don Bradley

Kevin Christensen

Steven T. Densley Jr.

Kristine Wardle Frederickson

John Gee

Terry Hutchinson

Mark Johnson

Spencer Kraus

Daniel C. Peterson

Brent Schmidt

Stephen Smoot

S. Hales Swift

John S. Thompson

Bruce Webster

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Table of Contents

Prepping for the Last Battle

Daniel C. Peterson vii

The Seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman in the Standard Works

Noel Hudson 1

Birth and Rebirth: The Fish in Mesoamerican Art and Its Implication on Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico

Diane E. Wirth 51

Die Prophezeiung Henochs: Some Observations on Section 36 in the German Edition of the Community of Christ Doctrine and Covenants

Adam O. Stokes 69

“Behold, I Went to Hunt Beasts in the Forest”: An Addendum on Enos, Esau, and the Symbolic Geography of Seir

Matthew L. Bowen 75

Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon III—Behold

John Gee 83

A Deep Dive on War

Craig L. Foster 103

A Plain Exposition of Book of Mormon English by Means of Short Questions and Informed Answers

Stanford Carmack 107

A Closer Look at Transliterations in Divine Translations

Spencer Kraus 121

Trust Us, We’re Lawyers: Lucas and Neville on the Translation of the Book of Mormon

Brant A. Gardner 135

Through a Glass Darkly: Restoring Translation to the Restoration?

Jeff Lindsay 169

What Happened to Nephi at the Camp of the Broken Bow? A Book of Mormon Mystery

Godfrey J. Ellis 203

What Can Artificial Intelligence Tell Us About the Literary Skills Needed to Dictate a Text Like the Book of Mormon?

Brian C. Hales 257

Finding Nephi’s Ore

Bradley R. Larsen 297

Ring in the Christ that Is to Be: Fulfilling the Pattern of His Life

Don Bradley 323

The “Allegory” of Ruth as a Prophecy of Latter-day Gathering

Jan Francisco 329

Looking Again at the Anthon Transcript(s)

John S. Thompson 353

“Our Hands Have Handled”: Ensuring the Reassuring Doctrine of the Resurrection in the Lucan and Johannine Writings

Matthew L. Bowen 367

Small Hinges, Great Doorways: How Some Descendants of an Enslaved Youth Unexpectedly Became Prominent Utah Citizens

Jeffrey M. Bradshaw 391

“Upon Thy Belly Shalt Thou Go”: The Garden of Eden Serpent Symbology Based on the Concept of Seraphim

Noel Hudson 439

Perspectives on the Soteriological Problem of Evil: Nuancing the “Universalist” Theologies of Henri de Lubac and Joseph Smith

Timothy Gervais 467

Prepping for the Last Battle

Daniel C. Peterson

Abstract: Intellectually acute, deeply learned, brilliantly imaginative, yet popular and easily accessible, C. S. Lewis was arguably the greatest Christian apologist of at least the past century. I believe that Latter-day Saints can benefit greatly from reading him and re-reading him and that those who are unfamiliar with his writing have an enviable treat awaiting them. I’m also convinced, by my own experience, that those who return to his work after having read some of it once, long ago, will find his books at least as good as they seemed on first acquaintance. In fact, they may even find, as I did, that they’re even better than they had realized. This essay is a shameless plug for a great and greatly admired writer.

This introduction will be something of an advertisement. But it’s not an advertisement for anything of my own, nor even for the increasingly numerous products (e.g., articles, books, conferences, and films) of the Interpreter Foundation. Instead, it will be an unashamedly enthusiastic advertisement for the work of C. S. Lewis, a writer and thinker whose books I would like to be even more widely read (especially among my fellow Latter-day Saints) than they already are.

A scholar of medieval and Renaissance literature and a longtime teacher at England’s illustrious University of Oxford and then at its great rival, the University of Cambridge, C. S. Lewis died on 22 November 1963. Less than an hour later, far off in Texas, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Because of that event in Dallas, Lewis’s death was scarcely noticed by the news media or the public. Moreover, Aldous Huxley—the English author of, among many other things, Brave New World—also died that day.1 I can’t help but think that, in some ways, Lewis’s death represented the greatest loss of the three. He was only sixty-four when he passed away, and he had been in failing health for some time; I lament our loss of the brilliant books that might have been.

I’ve been a fan of C. S. Lewis, and of his good friend J. R. R. Tolkien, since my high school years. In fact, I consider them two of the greatest writers of the twentieth century. I’ve even had lunch with my family and dinner with my wife in The Eagle and Child, the Oxford pub where Lewis and Tolkien and Charles Williams and a few others used to meet in an informal group known as “The Inklings.” They would gather, in what they called “The Bird and the Boy,” in order to discuss literary, philosophical, and religious topics and, sometimes, to read their works-in-progress to each other. I’ve also had the marvelous opportunity to have spent time—though not nearly enough of it—in the Marion Wade Center at Wheaton College, in Illinois, which houses wonderful collections of materials related to Tolkien, Lewis, and Williams, as well as to Owen Barfield (a lesser known member of “The Inklings”), George MacDonald (a formative influence on Lewis), G. K. Chesterton, and the mystery novelist and translator Dorothy L. Sayers, who was a good friend of both Lewis and Williams. It was exhilarating. (While there, I put my hand into the wardrobe through which Lucy first entered Narnia in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Unfortunately, though, all I felt on that occasion was the wooden back of the wardrobe closet. No snow.2)

In this editorial “advertisement” of mine, I will focus on C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia. In order of publication, the seven books of the series are:

- The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (1950)

- Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia (1951)
- The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)
- The Silver Chair (1953)
- The Horse and His Boy (1954)
- The Magician’s Nephew (1955)
- The Last Battle (1956)

This is the order in which I first read them and in which I typically still read them, and they make perfectly good sense in this sequence. However, their publication order differs from their “historical” order, their overall narrative chronology, and, although many others disagree, some prefer to read them in the following order:

- The Magician’s Nephew
- The Horse and His Boy
- The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
- Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia
- The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
- The Silver Chair
- The Last Battle

Anybody who is interested should feel free to read them in either of these orders; they’re comprehensible either way.3

As a matter of fact, though, I’ll limit myself here to the final installment of the seven books of the Chronicles, which is The Last Battle. I read the Chronicles at least three times before I was married, and then I read each of the seven books individually to each of my children—along with Tolkien’s The Hobbit and his Lord of the Rings trilogy and Lewis’s own Perelandra trilogy and a number of other books of narrative and poetry, including Beowulf. Every day, I looked forward to those nighttime readings. They were a highlight of those years. Sharing such beloved books, such beloved worlds, with my children was, for me, one of the greatest satisfactions of being a father.

So, now that my children are off on their own and my grandchildren aren’t conveniently available for nightly readings, I want to share these things with others. And I want to disabuse anybody out there who suffers from the misconception that The Chronicles of Narnia are merely children’s books.4 They are not. Although they can surely be shared with children, who will almost certainly enjoy them, they offer a rich, imaginative, and thoughtful presentation of much of the central message of Christianity. And it is, I think, a Christianity that usually resonates with readers who are committed members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Moreover, those who think themselves sufficiently acquainted with Narnia because they’ve seen the three film adaptations that have been made from them—The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005), Prince Caspian (2008), and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010)—should understand that, entertaining though the films are, they don’t begin to convey the cleverness, the wit, the sheer brilliance, and the subtle lessons of the original books.

In this essay, I will draw three illustrative examples from The Last Battle in the hope of making my point. Before I share them, though, I offer a brief general background note that will help in understanding at least the first two specimens.

The background for much of the overall story of the “Chronicles” is the longstanding conflict between the kingdom of Narnia and, across the desert to the southeast, the much larger Empire of Calormen. In the better parts of its history, at least, Narnia is a good place that follows Aslan, the talking lion who is described as the King of Beasts, the King above all of the Narnian High Kings, and the son of the Emperor-Over-the-Sea. The Emperor never directly appears in the stories, but Aslan is an obvious representation of Christ.

On the other hand, Calormen is not a good place. Whereas Narnia is plainly an idealized version of medieval Christian England, Calormen is redolent of the pre-modern Islamic world, the longstanding military rival of medieval and early modern Europe. (Recall that C. S. Lewis was an authority on medieval and Renaissance literature. The name Calormen may even derive from the Latin calor, or “heat.”)5 The Calormenes wear flowing robes, orange-colored turbans, and wooden shoes with upturned toes, and their favored weapon is the scimitar. Their unit of currency is the “crescent.” They are an ancient people with dark skin and long beards, and they are known for their wisdom, which is often expressed in moralizing maxims and sententious poetry, their wealth and minarets and ornate palace architecture, their courtesy, and their cruelty. Every reference to their autocratic ruler, the “Tisroc,” is followed by the Arabic-sounding formula “may he live forever.” In stark distinction to Lewis’s otherwise plainly Islamic model, though, the Calormene god, Tash, is portrayed as many-armed, vulture-headed, and, appropriately for Calormene culture, fiercely cruel.6

In the final, culminating battle in the history of Narnia—precipitated by a Calormene invasion that ultimately ushers in that world’s apocalyptic end—a group of cynical dwarves refuse to commit themselves either to the good cause of Aslan and the Narnians or to the evil forces of Tash and the Calormenes, and their cynicism prevents them from seeing reality as it is:

“Aslan,” said Lucy through her tears, “could you—will you—do something for these poor Dwarfs?”

“Dearest,” said Aslan, “I will show you both what I can, and what I cannot, do.” He came close to the Dwarfs and gave a low growl: low, but it set all the air shaking. But the Dwarfs said to one another, “Hear that? That’s the gang at the other end of the stable. Trying to frighten us. They do it with a machine of some kind. Don’t take any notice. They won’t take us in again!”

Aslan raised his head and shook his mane. Instantly a glorious feast appeared on the Dwarfs’ knees: pies and tongues and pigeons and trifles and ices, and each Dwarf had a goblet of good wine in his right hand. But it wasn’t much use. They began eating and drinking greedily enough, but it was clear that they couldn’t taste it properly. They thought they were eating and drinking only the sort of things you might find in a stable. One said he was trying to eat hay and another said he had got a bit of an old turnip and a third said he’d found a raw cabbage leaf. And they raised golden goblets of rich red wine to their lips and said “Ugh! Fancy drinking dirty water out of a trough that a donkey’s been at! Never thought we’d come to this.” But very soon every Dwarf began suspecting that every other Dwarf had found something nicer than he had, and they started grabbing and snatching, and went on to quarrelling, till in a few minutes there was a free fight and all the good food was smeared on their faces and clothes or trodden under foot. But when at last they sat down to nurse their black eyes and their bleeding noses, they all said:

“Well, at any rate there’s no Humbug here. We haven’t let anyone take us in. The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs.”

“You see,” said Aslan. “They will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning instead of belief. Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid of being taken in that they can not be taken out.”7

This is, to me, a powerful representation of the state of people who have forsaken the Spirit and who can no longer properly discern the Good or the things of God. The prophet Isaiah wrote about such individuals in his day, saying,

Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight! (Isaiah 5:20–21)

I’m reminded in this context, too, of my favorite single line from among the many volumes that were published in Brigham Young University’s Middle Eastern Texts Initiative (METI). I was the founder of METI and, for years, its editor-in-chief. The project produced bilingual editions of books (mostly Islamic, but also sometimes Eastern Christian and Jewish) from the classical Islamic world; the volumes were printed at Brigham Young University Press and distributed by the University of Chicago Press. A few years after my enforced departure from METI, the series was given by the new leadership of BYU’s Maxwell Institute to E. J. Brill Publishing in the Netherlands—a move on which I will make absolutely no public comment.

One of the METI volumes includes an essay by al-Ghazālī (d. AD 1111), who ranks among the most important figures in the history of Islamic thought. He was a legendarily brilliant philosophical theologian and legal scholar who spent most of his life in Iran and Iraq but who also sojourned for a significant period in Jerusalem. In the essay to which I refer, he is talking about poorly performing students, and, in that context, he attributes the following remark to Jesus:

Even though I managed to raise the dead, I have never been able to cure an idiot!8

Now, I’ll admit that my first inclination when I came across that passage was to say that it couldn’t possibly be authentic. And that’s probably correct. But al-Ghazālī was entirely serious, and he plainly regarded the statement as genuine. Furthermore, his citation of it takes us back fully a thousand years or more—or, in other words, halfway to the time of Jesus. So, maybe! I have to confess that I rather like the idea that the Savior might have said such a thing. It humanizes him a bit. Surely, with all those long walks from Nazareth to Capernaum, and from Capernaum to Jericho, and from Jericho to Jerusalem, and from Jerusalem back up to Capernaum or Nazareth, it can’t all have been immortal sermons and solemn earnestness. (Can it? Maybe I’m just not fit for heaven.) There must have been some small talk. And the image of Jesus trudging along with the disciples down those dusty paths and confiding, at the end of a tough day, “You know what, Peter? I can raise the dead, but I just can’t cure idiots” is very appealing to me.

My second example from The Last Battle involves a valiant young Calormene warrior named Emeth who had faithfully sought to serve the god Tash according to his best understanding. In the end, though, Emeth comes face to face with Aslan—and, to his astonishment, Aslan welcomes him. Emeth relates the story himself:

Then I fell at his feet and thought, Surely this is the hour of death, for the Lion (who is worthy of all honor) will know that I have served Tash all my days and not him. Nevertheless, it is better to see the Lion and die than to be Tisroc of the world and live and not to have seen him. But the Glorious One bent down his golden head and touched my forehead with his tongue and said, Son, thou art welcome.9

Emeth—whose name is suspiciously similar to the Hebrew word ’emeth (אמת), which can be translated as “truth,” “firmness,” “faithfulness,” or “veracity”—responds to Aslan in surprise:

But I said, Alas, Lord, I am no son of Thine but the servant of Tash. He answered, Child, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me. Then by reason of my great desire for wisdom and understanding, I overcame my fear and questioned the Glorious One and said, Lord, is it then true, as the Ape said, that thou and Tash are one? The Lion growled so that the earth shook (but his wrath was not against me) and said, It is false.10

It is, in other words, not true that Aslan and Tash are one and the same. It is not true that Molech and Yahweh are identical, or that all religions really teach the same thing, that all ways lead to God, or that we are all ascending the same mountain (albeit by different paths). Aslan explains:

Not because he and I are one, but because we are opposites, I take to me the services which thou hast done to him. For I and he are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him.11

Wicked people and hypocrites who do evil, who behave wickedly in the name of God or who attempt to justify vile behavior by appealing to God, are serving and worshiping a false god.

They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service. And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. (John 16:2–3)

But those who genuinely seek to do good are, whether they know it or not, following the whisperings of the Spirit and worshiping the true God. As the Lion puts it to Emeth:

Therefore if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath’s sake, it is by me that he has truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him. And if any man do a cruelty in my name, then, though he says the name Aslan, it is Tash whom he serves and by Tash his deed is accepted. Dost thou understand, Child? I said, Lord, thou knowest how much I understand. But I said also (for the truth constrained me), Yet I have been seeking Tash all my days. Beloved, said the Glorious One, unless thy desire had been for me thou wouldst not have sought so long and so truly. For all find what they truly seek.

Then he breathed upon me and took away the trembling from my limbs and caused me to stand upon my feet. And after that, he said not much but that we should meet again, and I must go further up and further in. Then he turned him about in a storm and flurry of gold and was gone suddenly.12

I think, in this context, of the Book of Mormon teaching that there are, in a certain important sense, only two “churches:”

And he said unto me: Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations. (1 Nephi 14:10)

Sadly, there are undoubtedly those whose names are on the rolls of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who will be found in the end, by virtue of how they have actually lived and who or what they have actually served, to be communicant members of the church of the devil. Gloriously, however, there are certainly also people around the world who, although not yet members of the restored Church and very possibly not even Christian, have striven to be faithful members of the Church of the Lamb of God to the extent of their understanding—and it will be counted unto them for righteousness, even if they still “must go further up and further in.”

C. S. Lewis’s “children’s book” The Last Battle offers a helpful way for us to understand the situation of hundreds and hundreds of millions of our brothers and sisters, our Father’s children, who have not heard or accepted the fulness of the Gospel in this life.

The final chapter of The Last Battle is entitled “Farewell to Shadowlands.” To understand what happens on its final page, a reader must know that the four Pevensie children—Peter, Edmund, Susan, and Lucy—are central to the Chronicles of Narnia. Although originally from our own world, they have also spent a great deal of time in Narnia and have played vital roles in its history. Now their story concludes. Aslan speaks:

“You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.”

Lucy said, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world so often.”

“No fear of that,” said Aslan. “Have you not guessed?”

Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are—as you used to call it in the Shadow-Lands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.”

And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.13

“The dream is ended: this is the morning.” Those words had a powerful impact on me when I read them for the first time, and they still do.

If there are any out there who haven’t yet really made the acquaintance of C. S. Lewis, I have to say that I envy you. Genuinely. Good things are ahead for you. And I commend him enthusiastically to your attention. He is a great pleasure to read, but also deeply insightful and wonderfully imaginative. I wish that I could discover him for the first time all over again. That said, though, my re-readings have been extremely enjoyable, and I’m seeing treasures in his books that I had never noticed before. If you’ve already read Lewis, read him again. If you’ve only read a little, read more.

But reading this newest volume of Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship—its sixty-third—will also afford you a host of insights and, I’m confident, considerable pleasure. As I always do at this point, I want to thank all of the authors, reviewers, source checkers, editors, and donors who have made it possible. In particular, I thank Allen Wyatt, Jeff Lindsay, and Godfrey Ellis for their dedicated editorial work evident in this volume’s articles. Additionally, I thank Brant S. Gardner and Rebecca Reynolds Lambert for their equally dedicated editorial work, already underway, that will become evident in the next volume of Interpreter. The Interpreter Foundation as a whole and this journal in particular have been created and are largely sustained by the devoted contributions of volunteers. I am deeply, deeply grateful to them.

Daniel C. Peterson (PhD, University of California at Los Angeles) is a professor emeritus of Islamic studies and Arabic at Brigham Young University, where he founded the University’s Middle Eastern Texts Initiative. He has published and spoken extensively on both Islamic and Latter-day Saint subjects. Formerly chairman of the board of the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS) and an officer, editor, and author for its successor organization, the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, his professional work as an Arabist focuses on the Qur’ān and on Islamic philosophical theology. He is the author, among other things, of a biography entitled Muhammad: Prophet of God (Eerdmans, 2007). With his wife, he is executive producer of the films Witnesses (2021), Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon (2022), and Six Days in August (2024).

1. 1 . More than four decades ago, by the way, the stunningly prolific Roman Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft, of Boston College, published an interesting philosophical “novel” (of sorts) entitled Between Heaven and Hell: A Dialog Somewhere Beyond Death with John F. Kennedy, C. S. Lewis, and Aldous Huxley (Lisle, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1982).

2. 2 . The wardrobe was hand-made by Richard Lewis, C. S. Lewis’s paternal grandfather, sometime in the 1800s. For many years, it remained in the Lewis family home (“Little Lea”) in Belfast, northern Ireland. When they were children, C. S. Lewis and his brother, Warren, and various cousins would sometimes climb into it and sit silently while he told stories to the others. Eventually, it was moved to Lewis’s adult home (“The Kilns”) in Risinghurst, Oxford, England, where he wrote all of The Chronicles of Narnia and most if not all of his other books. The Wade Center purchased the wardrobe at an auction in Banbury, England, on 30 October 1973.

3. 3 . For those who enjoy audiobooks: My wife and I are very fond of a set of recordings of The Chronicles of Narnia that features an exceptionally distinguished cast of British readers: The Magician’s Nephew (Sir Kenneth Branagh), The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (Michael York OBE), The Horse and His Boy (Alex Jennings CBE), Prince Caspian (Lynn Redgrave OBE), The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Sir Derek Jacobi), The Silver Chair (Jeremy Northam), and The Last Battle (Sir Patrick Stewart). See The Chronicles of Narnia, Complete Audio Collection, performed by Kenneth Branagh et al., HarperCollins 2005, digital audio MP3, 2025 mins., harpercollins.com/products/the-chronicles-of
-narnia-complete-audio-collection-c-s-lewis?variant=40372099350562.

4. 4 . It scarcely required Michael Ward, Planet Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C. S. Lewis (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008) for me to recognize the religious depth of the Chronicles, but Ward’s demonstration that medieval cosmology, a subject that fascinated Lewis throughout his life, provides the imaginative key to the seven novels surely establishes the point. Ward argues that the Narnia stories were designed to express the characteristics of the seven medieval “planets”: Jupiter, Mars, Sol (or the Sun), Luna (or the Moon), Mercury, Venus, and Saturn. In each book of the Chronicles, the plot, the ornamental details, and especially the portrayal of Aslan, the Christ-figure, all reflect the personality of the relevant governing “planet.”

5. 5 . In J. R. R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, the people of the East also seem distinctly Middle Eastern—right down to their boats with lateen sails, very like the feluccas that still sail the River Nile—and probably for similar reasons: Tolkien, too, was a scholar of medieval Western literature, and the two friends read each other’s manuscripts as they were writing them.

6. 6 . Although I’ve done no research to prove it, I think it very likely that Lewis derived the names Aslan and Tash from some mention, somewhere, of archaeological work at the site of ancient Hadātu. Located about nineteen miles (thirty kilometers) east of the Euphrates River in northern Syria, Hadātu had been the center of an Aramaean kingdom in the Iron Age. The first excavations there were conducted in 1928 by François Thureau-Dangin for the Musée du Louvre in Paris, and Lewis, based at that time in Oxford, might have been aware of them. If so, he would have noticed the modern Turkish name of the place, which is Arslan Tash (Arslan Taş, “Lion Stone”). The occurrence of the two names Aslan and Tash in the “Chronicles” seems unlikely to be coincidental.

7. 7 . C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle (New York: HarperTrophy, 1994), 167–69.

8. 8 . Al-Ghazālī, “O Son!,” in Classical Foundations of Islamic Educational Thought, ed. Bradley J. Cook, trans. David C. Reisman (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2010), 103.

9. 9 . Lewis, Last Battle, 188.

10. 10 . Lewis, Last Battle, 188–89.

11. 11 . Lewis, Last Battle, 189.

12. 12 . Lewis, Last Battle, 189.

13. 13 . Lewis, Last Battle, 210–11.

The Seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman in the Standard Works

Noel Hudson

Abstract: The curse of the serpent in Genesis 3:15 is presented as an archetype for the battle between good and evil. An ancient Hebrew literary form that ties together multiple stories through a common set of images, situations, repeated words, and phrases, is termed a leitmotif. A biblical leitmotif based on the curse of the serpent in Genesis 3 and the curse of Cain in Genesis 4 is found throughout both the Old and New Testaments and is referred to as the seed of the serpent leitmotif. Hebrew prophets, early Christians, and protestant reformers all found the seed of the serpent leitmotif to be a compelling theme containing prophecies about the coming of the Messiah and the ultimate destruction of the wicked. Writers in the Book of Mormon and other Restoration scriptures appear to have used the same seed of the serpent leitmotif to clearly identify the protagonist of a given story as the true seed of the woman and to brand the antagonist of the story as the seed of the serpent. The paper begins with a discussion of the leitmotif in Genesis. It then extends to the rest of the Bible, using the story of Abimelech as an archetype. Following this foundation, it then shows how the leitmotif occurs in a variety of sermons and stories throughout the standard works and, in particular, the Book of Mormon. The paper concludes with a discussion of the explanatory power of this literary device for the understanding and edification of modern-day readers.

There is a brief story found in Genesis 3 whose fantastical elements such as a talking snake may seem so incredible to some that it has often been dismissed as a simple-minded, pre-scientific explanation for the origin of snakes, similar to what is found in Aesop’s fables or the “Just So Stories” from Rudyard Kipling.1 Others see in this story nothing more than an etiological explanation of the natural human horror of serpents.2 We might term these points of view the “naturalistic” explanations of the story of the serpent. A school of thought that is consistent with the doctrine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints suggests that the story of the serpent contains both literal and allegorical elements that include essential theological lessons and applications for us. The ancient Hebrews found this story so compelling that for them it became a pervasive representation of the battle between good and evil being fought across the ages, with the wicked minions of the seed of the serpent arrayed against the righteous followers of the seed of the woman.3

Among those who accept the story as scriptural, there has been nearly as much disagreement as with those who dismiss the story as simple mythology. Some believe it requisite with their faith to accept the story literally,4 while others believe it is only an allegory.5 Some say that the snake was an actual talking animal, while others suggest that it was a representation of Lucifer, a fallen angel who had been stripped of much of his power and abilities as a punishment for rebellion.6 Some believe that Eve was at best naïve, and at worst wicked, as she deceived her husband and partook of the fruit, others that she consciously made a wise decision that put the plan of redemption into effect.7 Those who have found in the story of the seed of the serpent a framework to interpret the battle between good and evil have noted that the continuity between the first five chapters of Genesis and beyond disrupts the broadly accepted source critical theories in which certain of these chapters are attributed to different authors at different time periods.8

Despite these disagreements about even the most basic elements of this story, one view that became popular among early Christians, and that has persisted for millennia, is one that finds in this story the ultimate promise of a messiah whose advent was prophesied to ultimately crush the head of a metaphorical serpent, thus triumphing once and for all over the devil. Those who take this view of the story in Genesis 3 call it the Protoevangelium, a word coined by Martin Luther to encapsulate the notion that this earliest promise of a messiah is a prototypical version of the evangelical “good news.”9

While Latter-day Saints also see in this story the promise of a messiah,10 it has primarily been used to frame the struggle between the righteous and the wicked, most notably in the temple ceremony that is at the heart of Latter-day Saint worship and theology. It is noteworthy that in addition to the version of the story enacted in the temple, an additional unique version of this story is also found in the Pearl of Great Price, complete with extensive commentary about the roles of the characters involved and the theological issues addressed therein. Together with the commentary on the stories of Adam and Eve as well as Cain and Abel found in the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants, it is safe to say that this story is one of the most influential stories found throughout the body of scripture.

Leitmotif and Leitwort as Rhetorical Devices

Before proceeding, we need a better understanding of the methods and techniques ancient Hebrew authors used to encode and transmit information because this Bible story, and many others, depend on “a referential terrain that we no longer share with the source material. . . . [T]he words we’re reading come from a world that diverges from ours because it belongs to a foreign way of life, to a place that is far away, or to a time that is long past.”11

One literary concept I will use extensively in this article is that of the motif. A motif is a rhetorical pattern that is repeated across two or more stories. Motifs make use of symbolism, imagery, and word patterns to connect stories that the author means for the reader to examine in parallel. Robert Alter has identified several different types of parallels present throughout the Hebrew Bible such as sequence of actions, type-scenes, and what I will call lead-words (sometimes termed leitwort). Such elements are often used to build themes or motifs. To many biblical scholars, what transforms a motif into a leitmotif is the repetition of lead-words that “lead” the reader to another scriptural passage where the same word or set of words also feature prominently. Robert Alter notes that:

[The lead] word-motif, as a good many commentators have recognized, is one of the most common features of the narrative art of the Bible. But in Biblical prose, the reiteration of key words has been formalized into a prominent convention that is made to play a much more central role in the development of thematic argument than does the repetition of such key words in other narrative traditions.12

Yairah Amit clearly explained the technique of identifying passages of scripture with a rhetorical relationship based on lead-words:

One story is linked to another . . . by words that are repeated in both of them and which are uncommon in their surroundings . . . the leading words . . . are the mortar which bind the stones together into a single edifice.13

Noel Reynolds has identified levels of intentional structure in Hebrew scripture ranging from low levels with pairs of matching words or phrases up to motifs that span multiple books of scripture and even larger rhetorical structures that unify vast swathes of scriptural passages.14 Identifying lead-words that may be associated with a given motif makes it easier to identify other instances of the motif. In this paper, I identify a specific motif that has a unique set of themes and imagery associated with it. I use the concept of lead-words to help identify different stories in which this motif is used. I will begin with the identification of this motif in the Bible, and then move on to identify instances of the same motif in the Book of Mormon.

Four important terms used in this paper are:

1. A leitmotif: a narrative that incorporates multiple elements such as repetition, lead-words, summary statements, the arrangement of units, intercalations, and the editing of known material in two or more different stories to facilitate the comparison of those stories.

2. A leitwort or lead-word: a word, word-root, or phrase that recurs significantly in a text so that the reader is able to decipher or grasp the meaning of the text by noting these repetitions as an aid to understanding the theme of the text.

3. The seed of the woman: the divinely sanctioned protagonist of a story who hears the word of the Lord, repents, and follows his commandments. The archetype of the seed of the woman is Jesus Christ, but all those who hearken to the prophets, believe that the Lord will redeem his people, and publish peace and salvation are the seed of the woman.

4. The seed of the serpent: the antagonist of a story who rebels against the Lord or his appointed servants. The seed of the serpent is willing to kill even his own kin in the pursuit of wealth or dominion. Lies, betrayal, and murder are the hallmarks of the seed of the serpent, as are qualities attributed to serpents such as cunning and lying in ambush. The seed of the serpent is cursed and as part of the fulfillment of that curse ends up getting trampled or having his head crushed.

Due to the fact that ancient scriptures have been translated into modern languages, there may be some variation in the exact form that a lead-word takes.15 For example, the words or phrases, kill, slay, take away life, die, and destroy may all represent substantially the same lead-word when found in conjunction with the other lead-words that constitute a given leitmotif. Jonathan Cheek shows that various English translations of the Hebrew word שוף used in Genesis 3:15 include break, crush, bruise, strike, destroy, batter, fall on, and so on.16

The way in which a lead-word is used in a narrative is to first capture the attention of readers by repeating the word in a significant way in a passage of scripture. Once the readers’ attention is captured, they may be prompted to recall a related passage of scripture that uses the same word in a similar way. This creates an intertextual linkage between the two passages of scripture in a way that allows the reader to draw new conclusions. Robert Alter gives the following example:

The confrontation between Samuel and Saul over the King’s failure to destroy all of the Amalekites and all of their possessions (1 Samuel 15) is woven out of a series of variations on the key terms “listen,” “voice,” “word.” Samuel begins by enjoining Saul to listen to the voice of God; When the king returns victorious from battle, the prophet is dismayed by the voice (or sound, qol) of the sheep and the voice of cattle that he hears. Thundering denunciation in verse, he tells Saul that what the Lord wants is “listening to the voice of the LORD, / for listening is better than sacrifice, / hearkening, than the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15: 22); and a contrite Saul apologizes that he has transgressed the word of the LORD and instead listened to the voice of the people.17

The lead-words listen, voice, and word are repeated in a way that stands out in the story, and they lead to other stories in which listening to the voice or word of the Lord features as a prominent theme.18 Lead-words are used prominently in the stories of Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel.19 Hendel notes that the lead-words rule and desire link the Adam and Eve story to the story of Cain. He says:

Cain is caught in the conflict between his own desire—kindled by jealousy and anger—and his moral self-governance. The verbal and thematic linkages of desire and rule place Eve and Cain in a complicated analogy, as subjects addressed by Yahweh regarding the difficult consequences of their moral choices.20

Hendel also sees curse as a lead-word tying these two stories together:

The curses on the snake and the soil in the Garden of Eden story verbally recur in the curse of Cain. . . . The soil was cursed because of man, now Cain is cursed in relation to the soil. The reversal of subject and object in [Genesis] 3:17 and 4:11 makes an artful link in the painful relationship between man and the soil, now stained by a brother’s blood.21

The use of the lead-words rule, desire, and curse as they relate to Cain, and the detail of Abel’s blood that was spilled on the ground will all be of great interest a bit later on as I examine an application of the seed of the serpent motif in a linked story.

Of course, there are other ways beside lead-words in which the authors of the Bible created linkages between passages of scriptures. Alter notes that “When one biblical story alludes to an earlier one, as often happens, clear textual signals are given in the citation of key words or phrases, sometimes even whole statements, from the antecedent story.”22 Alan Goff explains that another way to generate intertextual connections includes “genres defined by conventional narratives that can be used over and over as a template.”23

These methods of intertextual linkage can be found in conjunction with iterations of the seed of the serpent stories throughout the Bible. Most obvious in its applicability to the seed of the serpent are conventional narratives that are used over and over as a template and allusions when one text covertly refers to another.

The Seed Motif in the Bible

One focus of this paper is to examine the motif of the seed of the serpent or the seed of the woman within the Book of Mormon and other Restoration scriptures.24 Before doing that, however, it is necessary to develop how the “seed motif” is presented and understood in the books of the Bible. I will present a brief overview of biblical commentary from scholars outside The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and how they have applied the seed motif to their discussions. I will use one particular story as an example of the seed motif in the Old Testament. Later, in the second half of the paper, I will return to the original focus of this essay as I attempt to demonstrate that this same motif is brought to bear on stories and events in the Book of Mormon.

The seed motif in Genesis 3

The story in Genesis 3 opens with the cunning serpent attempting to get Eve to eat the fruit of the tree of life in contravention to the commandment of God. The serpent says that if she eats the fruit she will not surely die (as God warned her) but will instead become like God, knowing good and evil:

Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. (Genesis 3:1–5)

The serpent successfully convinces Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, who then convinces Adam to do the same. When God asks Adam, Eve, and the serpent to each explain themselves, the serpent ends up receiving a curse for his part in convincing Adam and Eve to do what they had been commanded not to do. For our purposes, what is said to the serpent is the most important part of the story:

And the Lord God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel. (Genesis 3:14–15)

A vast body of commentary on the curse of the serpent and its meaning has accrued throughout the ages. Early Christian commentators referred to this theme when trying to win converts,25 condemn the actions of Gentile antagonists,26 or justify attitudes toward heretics.27 The vignettes below illustrate how just a few of the many biblical scholars outside our faith tradition have viewed this narrative. I give a short quotation from a variety of viewpoints below followed by a brief comment that explains the relation of the comment to the seed of the serpent motif.

Rosenbaum notes that:

Protestant tradition sees Jesus as the ultimate “he” in [Genesis] 3:15. The Catholic tradition elevates Mary to equal status here and, indeed, visitors to Catholic churches can often find statuary depicting Mary treading upon a serpent. Understandably, Jewish tradition has no use for either of these ideas.”28

The identity of the seed of the woman is of great interest to many commentators. Some see this as a reference to all humankind (all the children of Eve), but to others it refers specifically to the seed of only the woman (and not the man) as a reference to Jesus Christ. In this article the reference will be taken as applying to all those who choose the plan of God, as opposed to those who choose to follow Satan, with Christ as the archetype of those who choose to follow God. While Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish traditions all view the curse on the serpent and the promise concerning the seed of the woman as highly significant, there is a great deal of divergence of what that significance might be. One Catholic commentator interprets the passage as follows:

In the broadest sense, the Church as a whole is Eve’s seed. . . . In addition, the Catholic Church has long seen Eve’s seed as referring to the Messiah, Jesus Christ, who conquers over sin, Satan and death through his one Sacrifice of Calvary . . . Mary is understood as the “New Eve,” bearing the Redeemer of the world . . . whereas the first Eve failed to trust and obey God.”29

In this interpretation, a theme developed in the story is a conflict between good and evil that results in a trampling, or head-crushing, outcome for the seed of the serpent. Briggs suggests that the story encompasses all of human history and represents the continuous battle between good and evil:

The term seed is a generic term for the entire race of descendants of the woman on the one hand and the serpent on the other. . . . There are those who by birthright belong to the seed of the woman who become by apostasy the children of the serpent. There are also those who are won as trophies of grace from the seed of the serpent and are adopted into the seed of redemption. These two great forces are in conflict throughout history.30

In Briggs’s view, one is not necessarily always seed of the serpent or always seed of the woman, but one can move from one designation to the other based on the choices one makes. This view of things fits in well with the Latter-day Saint view of agency, a viewpoint Mormon articulated well when he explained that “even so doth every man that is cursed bring upon himself his own condemnation” (Alma 3:19) and that “Every man receiveth wages of him whom he listeth to obey” (Alma 3:27). Wenham confirms the antiquity of the story and some of the early interpretations of the seed motif serving as a pattern for the battle between good and evil.31

Some interpretations of this story see highly significant symbolism in certain Bible stories in which a character acts in a serpentine fashion, such as lying in wait to ambush an opponent. Verrett and other commentators also see in the story of the serpent a conflict over who has the right to rule on earth.32

The Latter-day Saint view of the definition of the dominion granted to men and women includes the idea that the eternal destiny of men and women who follow the Lord is to be granted ever-increasing levels of responsibility, thus exercising the dominion and responsibility God gave them.33 The contrast between those who are granted dominion by divine decree compared to those who follow Satan (who claims to be the god of this world) is shown starkly in the book of Moses. In that revelatory work, Adam and Eve are given “dominion over the fishes of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth” (Moses 2:26). The right of Adam to exercise dominion is renewed after he leaves the Garden of Eden (Moses 5:1). However, Satan opposes Adam and his seed and exercises dominion over those who submit their will to him (Moses 6:15). In fact, Satan sought for dominion long before the Lord granted Adam dominion over the earth (Moses 4:1), and this ambition for unrighteous dominion is what led to his rebellion and fall so that “he became Satan, yea, even the devil, the father of all lies, to deceive and to blind men, and to lead them captive at his will, even as many as would not hearken unto my voice” (Moses 4:4). The issue of who holds the right of dominion continues to be disputed, with the seed of the serpent choosing Satan to rule over them while the seed of the woman hearkens to the voice of God and repents (Moses 6:1).

Beyond these views of the interpretation of Genesis 3:15, there are still other diverging opinions. Some assign the story to a much later date. They interpret the story in terms of political infighting or cultural developments within Israel. These latter views include a proposal that the crushing of the serpent was associated with Hezekiah’s reforms and the destruction of the bronze serpent mentioned in 2 Kings 18:434 or as a criticism of the internationalism adopted by Solomon, with the serpent representing surrounding pagan religions.35 However, these historico-political interpretations, as well as the naturalistic interpretation suffer from a lack of explanatory power when viewed in terms of the recurring pattern of the seed of the serpent that is seen in Genesis 4. These patterns also appear many times in subsequent stories and in the Book of Mormon, as will be shown below.

The seed motif in Genesis 4

As interesting as the various nuances of the story in Genesis chapter 3 might be, what makes it of interest for our purposes is first seen in Genesis 4. In that chapter, the curse on the serpent and the enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman are taken as a template for the interactions that occur between Cain and Abel. Smith notes that “There are important parallels between the fall and the very next chapter in Genesis, the sad story of Cain and Abel, with over a dozen thematic and verbal similarities.”36

The seed of the serpent rejects the counsel of the Lord

If Cain had remained faithful, no doubt it would have been written of him that he was in the image of his father, with all the likenesses that entails, just as it was written of Adam that he was in the likeness and image of God, and of Seth that he was in the likeness and image of Adam (Genesis 5:1–3). But Cain’s arrogance prevented him from taking correction when his sacrifice was rejected:

And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. (Genesis 4:6–7)

Cain was angry because his sacrifice was rejected, but the mild rebuke of the Lord suggests that he could still make a correction in his behavior and remain in God’s good graces. It was not too late. However, God also warned him that “sin lieth at the door.” Cain had to decide whether or not he would yield to the influence of the devil or accept God’s correction, humble himself, and repent.

The seed of the serpent behaves in serpentine fashion

Wenham sees serpentine imagery in these verses, with the idea being that the serpent was lying in ambush at the door, waiting to grab hold of Cain.37 With effort, Cain could even now avoid the danger. In the King James version of the Bible this imagery is not particularly compelling, but other translations make the serpentine imagery much more obvious. For example, the Message Bible renders this verse: “If you do well, won’t you be accepted? And if you don’t do well, sin is lying in wait for you, ready to pounce; it’s out to get you, you’ve got to master it.” Other translations render the relevant passage “sin is crouching at your door” (NIV), “sin is lurking at the door” (NRS), “sin is couching at the door” (RSV)38 or in similar terms that suggest sin is a waiting beast. Cain, however, refused to make the effort to change and ended up rebelling against God and embracing the serpent. John Ronning notes that:

Cain is actually, in the beginning of the chapter, apparently like his father Adam, a farmer, while Abel is different. . . . Yet at the end of the story we see Cain unlike his natural parents, and quite like his spiritual father the serpent. The . . . difference in the offerings turns out to be symptomatic of the difference between righteous Abel and lying, murdering Cain.39

Besides identifying the influence of the serpent in the story, Ronning notes that the story of Cain and Abel provides an interpretive key to the enmity reference:

Identifying the enmity which occurs in Genesis 4 as the enmity predicted in Gen 3:15 is the key to identifying the two seeds which are at enmity, with the result that the initial interpretation of Gen 3:15 by Adam and Eve, the naturalistic interpretation, is overthrown. . . . The two seeds therefore are not snakes and humans, but two kinds of humans—in fact, here, brothers, so those who argued for a definition of seed as moral or ethical kind are correct.40

The seed of the serpent focuses on this life only

While the case for the story of Cain and Abel fulfilling the prophecy in Genesis 3:15 can be made based on the common elements highlighted above, there is a problem here as well. The seed of the serpent is supposed to be vanquished and the seed of the woman to triumph, and yet Abel is killed. How can Abel be the seed of the woman when he is overcome by Cain? And how can Cain be the seed of the serpent when he goes on to lead an apparently long life after committing murder? Isn’t the seed of the woman supposed to triumph while the seed of the serpent has his head bruised? Ronning points out that:

The wicked interpret history and Scripture according to outward appearances, disregarding the promise and threat of God by assuming that they only pertain to this life, where in fact they are not fulfilled. . . . We have seen overwhelming evidence that Gen 3:15 . . . must have its ultimate fulfillment beyond this existence. This is the solution to the paradox of Gen 3:15 being a curse on the wicked, a blessing to the righteous, while at the same time indicating that the righteous may suffer fatal defeat.41

This focus on the here-and-now, especially in taking murderous action in order to obtain short-term gain or dominion, is an attribute that is associated with the seed of the serpent. As the first occurrence of fulfillment of the curse on the serpent, the story of Cain and Abel provides a lens through which later fulfillments of the curse can be viewed.

Ronning, Dempster, and others see a recurring pattern of creation, exile, and return associated with the seed motif.42 The stories of Noah and Abraham feature a destruction of the wicked and a new covenant made with their righteous descendants, while they also have unrighteous descendants who reject that covenant. The recurring pattern also includes the notion of people being driven out or exiled. Examples of this are Adam and Eve being driven from the garden, Cain being driven out as a fugitive and vagabond, Hagar and Ishmael being driven out, and so on. Two questions that recur in these patterns are:

- Who has the right to rule?

- What happens when individuals resist divine dominion and rebel against God?

In the story of the serpent in Genesis 3, Dempster sees the primary focus as the question of who will have dominion or power: the divinely-appointed representative of God, or the serpent? In Genesis 4, he notes that Cain as the elder has the right of rule if he reconciles himself to God, but Cain willingly submits to the dominion of the serpent.43

The question of whether the people will let God prevail,44 or will submit to the rule of the serpent, is one of the major themes encompassed in the motif. It is raised over and over again in many Old Testament accounts. Hamilton identifies instances of the seed of the serpent in the law (Balaam), in the prophets (Sisera, Abimelech, Isaiah, Jeremiah), and in the writings (Psalms). He includes many examples of classifying various biblical antagonists as the seed of the serpent based on traits they share with both Cain and the primordial serpent.45

The seed of the serpent seeks to bring the seed of the woman into bondage

While the stories in Genesis 3 and 4 do not deal with the concept of bondage, later iterations of the theme do seem to contain this concept. Ronning explains:

In later fulfillments of Gen 3:15 we will see that Ishmael corresponds to Cain, as Isaac corresponds to Abel. In Gen 25:19 Isaac is called simply “the son of Abraham” (v. 19), while Ishmael is called . . . “the son of Hagar, the Egyptian,” and Sarah says to Abraham, “drive out this slave girl and her son” [Genesis 21:10]. . . . “Slave” is an apt designation for one who is the seed of the serpent, since the animals are to be ruled over by the seed of the woman. In the first few verses of chapter 4, then, we see the themes of creation and dominion which we used to interpret Gen 3:15 in our preliminary exegesis of that verse.46

The theme of bondage or servitude is explored in greater detail in other instances of the seed motif including Canaan, Jacob and Esau, Joseph in Egypt, and especially Moses and Pharaoh.47

The seed of the serpent kills for gain or power

Matthew Bowen explains that Cain’s name “is etiologically tied to the verb qny, denoting ‘get,’ ‘acquire.’”48 Bowen notes instances of wordplay associated with Cain’s name and the concept of acquisition, a concept that is picked up on and amplified by other authors. Cain committed murder not just because he was angry or ashamed but because he was acquisitive and could kill his brother to gain his flocks. In this behavior, Cain sets the pattern for the seed of the serpent in his willingness to kill for gain, although other seed of the serpent kill for power instead.

Ronning notes that Cain is clearly like the serpent and unlike his parents. To his lying, murdering, and receiving a curse, we could add that Cain deliberately came out in open rebellion against both his father and God by offering a sacrifice (likely deliberately) that ignored the symbolic meaning of the sacrifice of the son of God and rejecting the warning of the Lord to repent. In Genesis 3 Adam and Eve are portrayed as consciously disobeying a commandment of God, acting at the urging of the serpent.

Indeed, in this instance there is an important dichotomy between how Adam, and especially Eve, are viewed by the majority of Christianity and how they are viewed in Latter-day Saint doctrine. Julie Smith has made an in-depth study of this topic and finds no way to harmonize the four different narrations of Eve’s choice in Latter-day Saint doctrine (to determine whether it was wise, neutral, or sinful). She concludes:

That if the goal had been to remove the tension, at least one of the four accounts would have done it; the fact that the tension remains weighs in favor of reading it as intentional. Biblical scholar Robert Alter suggests that Genesis 3 is a carefully designed work, purposefully presenting the audience with multiple, incompatible viewpoints because that is the best way to tell a story about a world composed of incompatible facets, a world where truths are in tension.49

The consistency of the seed motif requires that the choice at the center of the story be a sinful one. As Hamilton notes, the seed of the serpent pattern includes rebellion against the commands or laws of God.50 We might propose that the sinful choice was that of the serpent who acted to frustrate the plan of God (Moses 4:4), but the structure of the story places Eve’s decision at the heart of the narrative, and as Smith observes:

Ultimately, there are only four characters—God, the serpent, Adam, and Eve—upon whom blame (if “blame” is indeed what we have here) can be bestowed. Yet neither individually nor in any combination can an adequate apportioning of blame be made.51

An in-depth analysis of Eve’s choice is beyond the scope of the present study, so I will defer the question and observe only that we may argue many different points of view, and that ultimately, the commandment of God not to partake of the fruit creates a clear tension in the story. The decision by Adam and Eve to partake, despite God’s warning not to do so, and then to try and hide from God, is sufficient for our purposes to establish the pattern in Genesis 3 that is followed in the seed motif thereafter.

The seed of the serpent is cursed and marked

Because of his murder of Abel, Cain is “cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth (Genesis 4:11–12). Avram Shannon notes that:

Cain was no longer able to perform the agricultural farm labor that had been his livelihood until that point. . . . Whereas the ground is cursed because of Adam such that he needs to work hard to get food from it, Cain is cursed from off the ground such that no matter how hard he works, he will not be able to induce the ground to produce food.52

Spilling blood upon the ground with the result of the earth refusing to yield crops is a concept that appears elsewhere in the scriptures. It was a curse that Cain found so terrible that he complained “My punishment is greater than I can bear.” The result of the curse is that Cain became a fugitive and a vagabond, and he feared that anyone he encountered would kill him. The Lord appears to have taken pity on him and marked him, perhaps in order to avoid blood feuds and a series of retribution killings. While various theories about what the mark consisted of (ranging from dark skin to a mark on his forehead to a shaking body), Bowen and Schade say that “the mark was to remind people to leave judgment to the Lord, who would deal with Cain on his own terms.”53

A great deal of discussion of the seed motif throughout the Old Testament can be found in Ronning, Verrett, and others. Rather than examining each of the many examples they discuss, I will cover a single example from the Old Testament in some detail before turning to the main topic of this paper, which is the seed motif in the Book of Mormon and other Restoration scriptures. The story of Abimelech in the book of Judges will serve as an archetype of the pattern that is seen in many stories in the Old Testament.

The seed motif in the story of Abimelech

Judges 9 opens with the story of Abimelech, the son of the great Hebrew judge, Gideon (also known as Jerubbaal). Abimelech proposes to the men of Shechem, who are related to him on his mother’s side, that they assist him in the murder of seventy of his own brothers, the sons of his father:

And Abimelech the son of Jerubbaal went to Shechem unto his mother’s brethren, and communed with them, and with all the family of the house of his mother’s father, saying, Speak, I pray you, in the ears of all the men of Shechem, Whether is better for you, either that all the sons of Jerubbaal, which are threescore and ten persons, reign over you, or that one reign over you? remember also that I am your bone and your flesh. (Judges 9:1–2)

Here we see one attribute of the seed of the serpent, that of willingness to murder his own kin for wealth or power. The men of Shechem are amenable, and Abimelech proceeds to hire assassins using money the men of Shechem supplied:

And they gave him threescore and ten pieces of silver out of the house of Baal-berith, wherewith Abimelech hired vain and light persons, which followed him. And he went unto his father’s house at Ophrah, and slew his brethren the sons of Jerubbaal. (Judges 9:4–5)

However, one of his seventy brothers, Jotham, escapes: “Jotham the youngest son of Jerubbaal was left; for he hid himself” (Judges 9:5). Abimelech’s focus on short-term gain apparently paid off, and just as was the case with Cain killing Abel, it appears that the seed of the serpent had triumphed: With the help of the men of Shechem, Abimelech was made king: “And all the men of Shechem gathered together, and all the house of Millo, and went, and made Abimelech king, by the plain of the pillar that was in Shechem” (Judgers 9:6).

Jotham cursed both Abimelech and the men of Shechem saying:

Let fire come out from Abimelech, and devour the men of Shechem, and the house of Millo; and let fire come out from the men of Shechem, and from the house of Millo, and devour Abimelech. (Judges 9:20)

Being cursed for their wicked behavior is another of the attributes of the seed of the serpent. As the curse takes hold, Abimelech and the men of Shechem separately proceeded to engage in serpentine behavior by dealing treacherously, setting ambushes, and lying in wait for their enemies. First there was a falling out between the men of Shechem and Abimelech:

Then God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the men of Shechem; and the men of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech: That the cruelty done to the threescore and ten sons of Jerubbaal might come, and their blood be laid upon Abimelech their brother, which slew them; and upon the men of Shechem, which aided him in the killing of his brethren. (Judges 9:23–24)

Then “the men of Shechem set liers in wait for him in the top of the mountains, and they robbed all that came along that way by them: and it was told Abimelech” (Judges 9:25).

Abimelech showed that he could engage in serpentine behavior as well by laying an ambush at night: “And Abimelech rose up, and all the people that were with him, by night, and they laid wait against Shechem in four companies” (Judges 9:34). As I have noted, acting at night and laying ambushes are behaviors associated with the seed of the serpent.

The story reached its climax as Abimelech and his army faced the men of Shechem in battle. The men of Shechem fled to a defensive tower, and Abimelech continued on to literally fulfill Jotham’s curse by burning the men of Shechem:

Abimelech took an axe in his hand, and cut down a bough from the trees, and took it, and laid it on his shoulder, and said unto the people that were with him, What ye have seen me do, make haste, and do as I have done. And all the people likewise cut down every man his bough, and followed Abimelech, and put them to the hold, and set the hold on fire upon them; so that all the men of the tower of Shechem died also, about a thousand men and women (Judges 9:48–49).

We should keep in mind that all of these people of Shechem who died were “flesh and bone” of Abimelech, so the tendency of the serpent to murder his own kin is redoubled in this story. Despite all of the blood that had been spilled, Abimelech wasn’t finished yet. After dealing with Shechem he moved on to Thebez, took the city, and needed only to reduce the tower to finish off his conquest:

And Abimelech came unto the tower, and fought against it, and went hard unto the door of the tower to burn it with fire. And a certain woman cast a piece of a millstone upon Abimelech’s head, and all to brake his skull. Then he called hastily unto the young man his armourbearer, and said unto him, Draw thy sword, and slay me, that men say not of me, A woman slew him. And his young man thrust him through, and he died. And when the men of Israel saw that Abimelech was dead, they departed every man unto his place. Thus God rendered the wickedness of Abimelech, which he did unto his father, in slaying his seventy brethren: And all the evil of the men of Shechem did God render upon their heads: and upon them came the curse of Jotham the son of Jerubbaal, (Judges 9:51–57).

Of course, having one’s skull crushed is one of the most important attributes of the seed of the serpent story. Hamilton notes that:

Along with the broken heads of broken enemies who are trodden underfoot and lick dust, there are several references in the OT to serpentine foes whom Yahweh has pierced, broken, crushed, or otherwise defeated.54

The author of Judges added a postscript to the story to let the reader know that Abimelech’s demise was a direct result of the curse of Jotham and that the curse came because of the “wickedness of Abimelech, which he did unto his father, in slaying his seventy brethren.” Also of interest in this story is the poetic justice in the fulfillment of Jotham’s prophecy: the men of Shechem embraced the serpentine suggestion of murder for power, and as frequently happens when dominion is yielded to the serpent (as when the men of Shechem yielded dominion to Abimelech in a bargain of murder for power), the result was destruction for all involved. Several stories of the seed of the serpent seem to feature such poetic justice.

The themes I have discussed associated with the seed of the serpent that are seen in this story include:

- The murder of Abimelech’s paternal brothers and other maternal relatives in order to achieve power.

- The question of dominion (the rightful heir of Gideon or the ambitious Abimelech).

- Serpentine behavior (lying in wait, treachery, acting by night).

- The action of a curse (when Jotham curses the men of Shechem and Abimelech)

- A broken (or crushed) head.

Based on the template developed in Genesis 4, when these thematic elements begin to appear, the reader can anticipate the direction that the story will take. There are also additional elements of intertextual linkage that are present in this story. A specific unique phrase that is repeated several times in the story of Abimelech seems to have reference to a particular serpentine quality. Five times in the story of Abimelech we encounter variants of the phrase “lie in wait.” Three of these usages seem to occur as a lead-word in Judges 9:32–35:

Now therefore up by night, thou and the people that is with thee, and lie in wait in the field. . . . And Abimelech rose up, and all the people that were with him, by night, and they laid wait against Shechem in four companies. And Gaal the son of Ebed went out, and stood in the entering of the gate of the city: and Abimelech rose up, and the people that were with him, from lying in wait.

The Hebrew term that is translated into English as “lie in wait” is a good description for the ambush hunting approach of a serpent, and indeed, some translators of the Bible have also rendered the action of the serpent in Genesis 3:15 as “lie in wait.”55 Umberto Cassuto in his commentary on the warning the Lord gives to Cain in Genesis 4 makes particular note of the Hebrew term used and says that, “it symbolizes the evil impulse; the analogy is that of an animal lying in wait for its prey.”56

Another unique phrase that stands out in the story of Abimelech, and that seems to refer to another text, is found in verse 2 when Abimelech tells the men of Shechem that “I am your bone and your flesh.” That appears to be intended to echo Genesis 2:23 when Adam says of Eve “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh.”

As noted above, Bible commentators have found other examples of stories that feature themes similar to this example, and which, therefore, appear to have been structured as iterations of a pattern based on the seed of the serpent.57

Allusions to the seed motif in the New Testament

There are several examples from the New Testament that also seem to point back to the themes established in the curse of the serpent in Genesis 3. For example:

Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. (Matthew 23:31–35)

This example refers to people as “serpents” and a “generation of vipers.” One of their primary characteristics is that they kill the prophets and wise men (who are the seed of the woman). Because of their actions, the blood of the righteous will come upon them (which is the application of the curse that came upon Cain).

Another example is found in Luke:

Then said he to the multitude that came forth to be baptized of him, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of repentance, and begin not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, That God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. (Luke 3:7–8)

In this instance we again have the seed of the serpent designated as a “generation of vipers.” They are encouraged to bring forth “fruits worthy of repentance,” in contrast to fruits that result in the tree being chopped down and cast into the fire (Luke 3:9). The seed of Abraham can be identified with the seed of the woman, and just as Cain was chided to follow the example of his brother Abel in performing an acceptable sacrifice to the Lord, this multitude is directed to follow the Law they had received, rather than trusting their relation to their distinguished ancestor to save them.

The many examples of framing the deeds of the wicked in terms of serpentine characteristics, together with other references to the stories of Adam, Eve, Cain, and Abel (trees, fruit, shedding blood on the earth) indicate that the above examples are abbreviated references to the seed motif. This pattern was first established in Genesis 3 in the story of the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. Matthew 23:35 makes the literary allusion quite clear.

Gaps in the Seed Motif that are Filled in by the
Pearl of Great Price

The pattern of the seed of the serpent that is found in Genesis 3 contains some elements not found in Genesis 4 and vice versa. This is noteworthy because later iterations of this pattern seem to contain elements from both Genesis 3 and 4. This could suggest that a new version of the pattern emerged that is a composite of the original and the next iteration found in the story of Cain. However, it could also suggest that there are multiple versions of the stories, and that the ones in the modern Bible are missing elements that were originally present in older versions of the stories. The first element found in one story but not the other, and yet which is found in later occurrences (such as in the story of Abimelech) is conflict between relatives. Cain killed his brother just as Abimelech killed his brothers, but this element is absent from the story in Genesis 3. This raises the question of whether the conflict between relatives is an important part of the pattern, and if so, why is this detail missing from the story of the serpent in Genesis 3?

As we have seen, in the story of Abimelech he slays seventy of his own brothers, while adding the interesting comment to the men of Shechem that “remember also that I am your bone and your flesh” (Judges 9:2). This comment seems an odd thing to say to men who he is hoping to convince to aid him in killing his brothers. This unique phrase brings to mind the words of Adam concerning Eve: “This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh” (Genesis 2:23). The difference in the purposes of those who utter these similar words highlights the contrast between the seed of the woman (who actually value familial relationships) and the seed of the serpent (who exploit relationships and betray them whenever the opportunity to gain from the betrayal presents itself, as illustrated by Abimelech).

As discussed earlier, Abimelech is far from the only seed of the serpent who behaves in this fashion. Other Old Testament examples of the seed of the serpent seeking to gain wealth or power by attempting to kill family members include Ishmael,58 Esau,59 the brothers of Joseph,60 and Absalom.61 The theme of homicidal tendencies toward relatives is also widened to include related tribes who fight against Israel in order to obtain power or wealth such as the Amalekites,62 the Midianites,63 the Edomites,64 and the Moabites.65 We may conclude, therefore, that seeking to kill a brother, a father, or a related people for gain is a hallmark of the seed of the serpent. Given that observation, the account of Cain and Abel found in Moses 5 includes an added and important detail that strengthens this argument. In the Pearl of Great Price version of the story, Cain does not kill Abel in a fit of passion, but his entire aim is premeditated murder for gain. He says: “Truly I am Mahan, the master of the great secret, that I may murder and get gain” (Moses 5:31). Bowen notes that this passage contains wordplay on the name Cain and its etiological meaning to “get gain,” an aspect of the story that reinforces the attribute of the seed of the serpent of killing for gain or power.66

If this is such an important part of the pattern, why is absent from the original version of the story in Genesis 3? The Latter-day Saint temple ceremony indicates that there is a version of the story recounted in Genesis 3 that includes wording suggesting a conflict between close relatives: When Satan comes to Eve to convince her to partake of the fruit, he introduces himself as her brother.

Rosenbaum interprets the events of Genesis 3:15 as also recounting a murder. He said: “the real fruit of that deception which took place in Eden was murder. By robbing Adam and Eve of immortality the snake and its descendants are the murderers of our ancestors and, by extension, of ourselves as well.” From the Latter-day Saint perspective, Rosenbaum’s statement might seem like hyperbole, but certainly the serpent caused what we would term the “spiritual death” of Adam and Eve, for after their transgression they were cast out from the presence of the Lord (Genesis 3:24). The first missing element of the story, that of conflict and murder between relatives, therefore, may not be absent at all.

Is this the case with other elements? Hamilton and others have strongly focused on the element of the story that involves the bruising of the serpent’s head,67 yet the story of Cain in Genesis 4 lacks this element. It may be that Moses 5:28 addresses this shortcoming as well. This verse includes the detail that Cain involved some of his brethren in the secret plans of murder for gain: Satan commands him to “swear thy brethren by their heads that they tell it not; for if they tell it they shall surely die” (Moses 5:29). It also reveals that Lamech killed one of his brethren for the sake of this oath (Moses 5:49–50). These details give the impression that in order to spite God, Satan’s reaction to the curse on his own head was to deceive men into bringing that same curse upon their own heads. The additional details given by Moses 5 may therefore be interpreted as including the bruised-head element. The logic involved in making this connection combines the curse on the serpent with the short-term, gain-seeking attribute of the seed of the serpent. It can unfold as follows: The serpent is destined to have its head bruised, and while those who choose to follow the serpent may even be aware of this fact, they are willing to accept the curse in trade for the promise of short-term gain.

Like the bruised-head element, Hamilton and others identify a set of traits attributed to the serpent that are mentioned in connection with an antagonist. Some examples include cunning,68 deceiving,69or lying in wait70 for their enemies. It is the repeated use of these lead-words that creates the leitmotif. Cain, however, seems to have lacked this serpentine element, though as I have noted, the phrase “sin lieth at the door” can be seen as referring to Satan in his serpentine guise. However, in the version of the story in Moses 5, the Pearl of Great Price account shows both: 1) that Cain acted “in secret” (Moses 5:30) and 2) that those who participate in the secret combination initiated by Cain perform “their works in the dark” (Moses 5:51). I have only mentioned in passing the association of the seed of the serpent with wicked deeds performed in the dark, but that association is clear here. There are several examples in the Book of Mormon of wicked combinations acting clandestinely, in disguise, at night, and so forth. Briggs notes that the seed of the serpent has a particular penchant for acting in secrecy and by ambushing a victim:

The wounds inflicted by the serpent are in secret and in treachery, behind the back of man and beneath his heel. But the wounds inflicted by man upon the serpent are openly upon his head, crushing him to death.71

The story of Cain in Moses 5 is therefore true to this element of the pattern. This serpentine cunning and lying in wait is an element that I noted in the story of Abimelech and one that is present in many other occurrences of the pattern, such as in Absalom’s clever plot to betray and murder Amnon.72

Additionally, the seed of the serpent account in Moses leaves no ambiguity when it comes to the relationship between Satan and the seed of the serpent. Moses 7:37 states clearly about those who choose to follow Satan that “their sins shall be upon the heads of their fathers; Satan shall be their father.” This seems to indicate that Satan is ultimately responsible for influencing them to commit sins, and the rest of the verse observes that all of them together will suffer misery because of their choices.

Some lead-words, which are found in some instances of the seed pattern, are not found in other instances. This suggests that the authors of scriptural stories made adaptations they felt warranted in specific circumstances to better convey aspects of the themes they were expounding. An example of a lead-word that is found only in some instances of the pattern is related to the concept of dominion. The lead-word command only appears in some of the occurrences of the seed motif. For example, commandment is used as a lead-word in the instance of the seed motif in 1 Samuel 15, but it is not used as a lead-word in the story of Abimelech. It also features strongly in some iterations of the seed leitmotif found in the Book of Mormon but not all. While the lead-word command or commandment appears nowhere in Genesis 4, in Moses 5 it is used ten times in a way that emphasizes the various concepts of dominion seen in the seed leitmotif. It is used when God first grants dominion to Adam (Moses 5:1), to illustrate Adam’s obedience in performing the proper sacrifice (v. 5–6), when Satan and God issue opposing commands (v. 13–14), and when Cain is presented with the option of choosing whom he will follow (v. 18, 23). He elects to obey Satan’s commands (v.30), thus becoming the seed of the serpent. In other words, the use of the command lead-word is sometimes, although not always, used as a way of strengthening the linkage to the seed motif.

One of the challenges of using the lead-word method lies in determining if a common word such as “command” is intended as a lead-word, or if it is merely repeated by chance in a given passage of scripture. Yonatan Grossman notes that:

The definition of this phenomenon relies on a certain circularity—the reader first discovers this special significance of the repetition of the word in the narrative, and only then can he define the special repetition as the use of a [lead-word]. In this sense, the meaning that the reader grants to a literary phenomenon precedes the characterization of the phenomenon in the text. The beginning of the process lies, practically, in the decision of the reader about its significance. At its end, the characterization of the vessel expresses the meaning of the leitwort.73

My interpretation of the process is that a reader identifies a possible lead-word based on its salience in a text, attempts to identify a possible intertextual linkage based on how well the lead-word fits within a given motif, and if the word provides greater light and knowledge of the motif being explored. Only then is one justified in calling it a “lead-word.” As Jeff Lindsay suggested in a personal communication, we may say that a lead-word has been identified when there is a sufficient critical mass of lead words and related themes to make that connection seem likely.74

The unique and revelatory content of Moses 5 not only solves gaps in the leitmotif of the seed, but it also adds other essential information. For example, Hendel, lacking Restoration scripture, complains of other gaps in the Genesis 4 story. He worries about the lack of a wife for Cain to marry and fails to understand Cain’s fear that other men might kill him because of his murder if there were no other men to kill him.75 These problems are based on the assumption that Cain and Abel are the only other humans at that point besides Adam and Eve. Both of those perceived gaps are solved definitively by Moses 5:12 “And Adam and Eve blessed the name of God, and they made all things known unto their sons and their daughters.” Assuming a linear timeline from the start of the chapter to the end, this indicates that Cain and Abel were among many children of Adam and Eve; they were not the only children.

In their article examining intertextual linkages between the book of Moses and the Book of Mormon, Jeff Lindsay and Noel Reynolds indicate that “an ancient text with some similarities to our modern Book of Moses may have been on the brass plates, and that the brass plates version of Genesis (or something similar to the Book of Moses) may have extensively influenced the Book of Mormon.”76

The findings I have been discussing based on the seed leitmotif add more pieces of evidence to those Lindsay and Reynolds assembled. Additionally, their article contains information with a direct bearing on our current thesis. For example, they make particular note of Moses 7:37 (“But behold, their sins shall be upon the heads of their fathers; Satan shall be their father, and misery shall be their doom”). They observe that “This passage strongly implies that both mortals and Satan suffer misery for their rebellion” and that this passage of scripture “is a perfect antiparallel to the gospel message for those who follow Jesus Christ.”77 This observation perfectly captures the major theme encapsulated in the leitmotif of the seed of the serpent versus the seed of the woman illustrated in the book of Moses. Additional insights pointed out by Lindsay and Reynolds that correlate with themes present in the seed motif include Satan’s dominion over the hearts of men, cursing answered upon the heads of the parents, and Satan leading men into captivity (discussed in greater detail below).78

The applicability of their insights into the themes treated in both the book of Moses and the Book of Mormon to the seed motif can be seen in their treatment of the theme of dominion. Lindsay and Reynolds point to Moses 6:15 as a possible source for three important Book of Mormon concepts: satanic “‘secret works’ (related to ‘secret combination[s]’ in Moses 5:51), ‘seeking for power,’ and ‘wars and bloodshed.’”79 All three of these concepts are themes with a close association to the seed motif, and what is more, their insight into the link between Satan’s dominion over men and his stirring them up to anger is a unique aspect of the iterations of the seed of the serpent that is frequently and specifically mentioned in the actions of those who reject Christ. Examples in the Book of Mormon are discussed below, but I will note here that anger is mentioned as an attribute of the seed of the serpent in the cases of Laban; Laman and Lemuel; Noah and his priests; the Amlicites; and Zerahemnah, to name a few (1 Nephi 3:13, 7:19, 16:18, 18:10; Mosiah 13:4, 8; Alma 2:8; and Alma 44:2, 12, 16).

Returning to the book of Moses, one more theme addressed that is identified as a part of the seed motif but absent from Genesis 3 and 4, is that of captivity or bondage. Ronner attempts to bridge this gap using Genesis 4:7. He says, “Cain was warned with enslavement to sin as a consequence of failing to turn to do good,”80 but this view seems a bit of a stretch, given the actual wording of Genesis 4:7. However, as with the other concepts of the seed motif that are missing in Genesis, Moses fills in the gap. Moses 4:4 explains that Satan’s purpose is to “deceive and to blind men, and to lead them captive at his will.” Lindsay and Reynolds treat in detail the linked concepts of deception, captivity, and dominion as a compound parallel found in both the book of Moses and the Book of Mormon, which again suggests that the implementation of the seed leitmotif in the Book of Mormon stems from unique wording present on the brass plates.

There are significant differences between the versions of the seed leitmotif found in Genesis compared to those in Moses. A much more ancient version of the current version of Genesis was available to the Nephites. This version was written on the brass plates and would presumably be much more faithful to the original words of the Hebrew prophets than the modern Bible and could be similar to the inspired translation of the writings of Moses found in the Pearl of Great Price. Reynolds notes that “There is strong evidence that the version of Genesis contained in the Brass Plates was the same or similar to the Book of Moses as given to Joseph Smith.”81 The seed leitmotif provides evidence consistent with the thesis about the similarity of the book of Moses and the brass plates. The presence of the expected themes and lead-words in the account in Moses suggests that a fuller account endured uniquely in the brass plates, whereas parts of the narrative have been diminished or deleted from the Biblical account. This finding supports recent studies of the connection between the brass plates and the book of Moses.82

The Seed Motif in the Book of Mormon

We have seen that the seed of the serpent motif is found embedded in many different stories within the standard works. This way of framing the conflict between good and evil seems to have been very compelling for the ancient Hebrews. There is an obvious shared cultural heritage between the authors of the Old Testament (and the brass plates) and the authors of the Book of Mormon. This should lead us to expect that we would also encounter stories about the conflict between good and evil narrated within its pages and framed in the same terms. And that is exactly what we do find. By using the same tools employed above we can see that the Book of Mormon does, indeed, make use of this same seed of the serpent and seed of the woman leitmotif. Let’s consider several examples of this below.

The Amlicites as seed of the serpent

In Alma, when a civil war brings one portion of the Nephite polity into conflict with the other, the Book of Mormon author narrating the story employs the seed leitmotif as a way of framing the conflict. This is done by employing the common set of themes of the seed of the serpent. These include the serpentine characteristics, the betrayal and attempted murder of closely related people, the rejection of the word of God in favor of the pursuit of worldly wealth and power, and the prominent feature of a curse.

As the stage is set for the Amlicite civil war, Alma notes that Amlici “had, by his cunning, drawn away much people after him” (Alma 2:2). Cunning is one of the serpentine traits; it is also a lead-word.83 “It was his intent to destroy the church of God” (v. 3), a goal that Amlici shares with others who are portrayed as seed of the serpent. Seeking to destroy the righteous followers of Christ, either individually or collectively as “the church,” is an attribute of the seed of the serpent that occurs in other examples in the Book of Mormon.

Alma explains that “when Amlici was made king” over the ones who joined him, “he commanded them that they should take up arms against their brethren; and this he did that he might subject them to him” (v. 10). The idea of commanding is another lead-word discussed earlier, and it is occurring again, here. I have noted that the seed of the serpent seeks to obtain dominion over close kin through murder—another seed motif phrase. There are other elements involved in the Amlicite war that may not present an entirely convincing association with the seed motif individually, but taken as a whole, strengthen the allusion to Genesis 3 and 4. These include:

- The explicit mention that the Lamanites were naked, being covered only by skins (Alma 3:5). This is an element I have not yet touched on in our discussion but one that features prominently in the story of Adam and Eve (see Moses 4:17, 27). “Naked” in scripture usually means “without the covering of God,” an apt description for the Lamanites at this time.

- The statement that both the Lamanites and the Amlicites had come out in open rebellion: the Lamanites against “their holy brethren” (Alma 3:6), a designation that suggests the seed of the woman, and the Amlicites against God (Alma 3:18).

- The refusal to repent when offered a chance (Alma 3:14).

- Driving out the Lamanites (Alma 3:23) and the Amlicites (Alma 2:37), a possible allusion to the exile theme I mentioned briefly beginning with Adam and Eve being driven out of the garden (Moses 4:31).

- The conscious choice to listen to an evil spirit (Alma 3:26).

After the resolution of the conflict, the discussion that assigns meaning to the battles makes extensive use of multiple lead-words, and in so doing seems designed to tie this instance of the leitmotif to 2 Nephi 5 and Genesis 4 where a curse placed on the seed of the Lamanites and the mark and curse placed on Cain are discussed. The mark placed on Cain is not given much emphasis in Genesis 4 and is not used as a lead-word there. However, it is clearly emphasized in Alma 3, and these three chapters (Genesis 4, 2 Nephi 5, and Alma 3) seem to be the only chapters in the scriptures that deal with these interlinked themes of marks and curses. In the few verses selected to illustrate the lead-words below, it is clear that the words curse, seed, and mark are prominent in the discussion. In Alma 3 there are 8 instances of the word curse, 11 instances of seed, and 11 instances of the word mark.

Now we will return again to the Amlicites, for they also had a mark set upon them; yea, they set the mark upon themselves, yea, even a mark of red upon their foreheads. Thus the word of God is fulfilled, for these are the words which he said to Nephi: Behold, the Lamanites have I cursed, and I will set a mark on them that they and their seed may be separated from thee and thy seed, from this time henceforth and forever, except they repent of their wickedness and turn to me that I may have mercy upon them. And again: I will set a mark upon him that mingleth his seed with thy brethren, that they may be cursed also. And again: I will set a mark upon him that fighteth against thee and thy seed. And again, I say he that departeth from thee shall no more be called thy seed; and I will bless thee, and whomsoever shall be called thy seed, henceforth and forever; and these were the promises of the Lord unto Nephi and to his seed. Now the Amlicites knew not that they were fulfilling the words of God when they began to mark themselves in their foreheads; nevertheless they had come out in open rebellion against God; therefore it was expedient that the curse should fall upon them. Now I would that ye should see that they brought upon themselves the curse; and even so doth every man that is cursed bring upon himself his own condemnation.84 (Alma 3:13–19)

The lead words curse and mark used here in the case of the Amlicites, together with the doctrinal commentary about the nature of curses, how they are incurred, and especially the exercise of free will in rejecting God’s word, all provide substantial context to understand the stories of the curse of Cain and the curse of Laman and Lemuel in much greater depth. The use of lead-words suggests that the linkage to these other stories is intentional and that the purpose is greater understanding about the interplay between divine disapprobation and human free will in the operation of the curse. In the narrative, the link to the curse that came upon the Lamanites is made explicitly (Alma 3:6). It is important to note that the mark, as well as the curse that is associated with the mark in these stories, is not a genetic or racial trait. The Book of Mormon makes it very clear that the mark of the Amlicites and the mark of the Lamanites came as a result of their choices.85

In this instance of the seed motif there is no mention of any heads getting crushed or bruised, although the foreheads of the Amlicites feature prominently in association with the curse, similar to how Moses 5 associates the heads of the seed of the serpent with the curse without ever mentioning bruised heads. This difference may indicate a dependence on unique wording on the brass plates.

A closer look at the unique marking of the Amlicites in light of concepts in the book of Moses is warranted. Recall that Lindsay and Reynolds made particular note of Moses 7:37 in their discussion of dominion mentioned above. In that passage of scripture, the words “their sins shall be upon the heads of their fathers” features prominently immediately before the phrase “Satan shall be their father.” Lindsay and Reynolds note that “This passage strongly implies that both mortals and Satan suffer misery for their rebellion.”86 This is a concept that is found in the commentary in Alma 3. In their discussion of a linked concept (that of sins and curses answered upon the heads of the parents), Lindsay and Reynolds also observe that the Book of Mormon contains several instances of “blood coming upon the heads of the wicked.”87 Both of these concepts seem to have found literal and metaphorical fulfillment in the story of the Amlicites, who put a “mark of red upon their foreheads” (Alma 3:13) after having “come out in open rebellion against God” (Alma 3:18) so that those of their number who were slain were sent to “reap eternal misery, according to the spirit which they listed to obey” (Alma 3:26).

A probable instance of the seed of the serpent that I will not explore in this article also includes a description of a unique, self-inflicted mark, similar to that of the Amlicites. The Gadianton robbers who came up to battle against the united peoples of the Lamanites and Nephites were “dyed in blood, and their heads were shorn” (3 Nephi 4:7). This shaving of their heads and dying of their skin is an instance in which heads are marked in a way that mimics the bruising promised to the seed of the serpent.

The word seed, which is clearly used as a lead-word in Alma 3, also requires closer examination. Lead-words are termed such because they are meant to lead the reader somewhere, and although the fact that I have referred to the pattern under discussion as the “seed motif” might indicate that seed is an important part of the concept, most instances of the pattern do not emphasize the word seed. In fact, it is only touched upon lightly in Moses and Genesis. Therefore, it may make sense to look for a solution elsewhere to see the great emphasis given to the word in Alma 3. The chapters of 1 Nephi 13–15 use the word seed extensively, but the usage is future-oriented and does not appear to have any connection to the seed motif. The most likely solution is that this lead-word is meant to lead to Alma 46, where captain Moroni’s stirring speech as he hoists the title of liberty makes use of the seed leitmotif. I will not go into a detailed study here; a brief examination of Moroni’s usage of common themes from the seed motif and a sample of his employment of the seed lead-word will suffice:

Now this was the covenant which they made, and they cast their garments at the feet of Moroni, saying: We covenant with our God, that we shall be destroyed, even as our brethren in the land northward, if we shall fall into transgression; yea, he may cast us at the feet of our enemies, even as we have cast our garments at thy feet to be trodden under foot, if we shall fall into transgression. Moroni said unto them: Behold, we are a remnant of the seed of Jacob; yea, we are a remnant of the seed of Joseph, whose coat was rent by his brethren into many pieces; yea, and now behold, let us remember to keep the commandments of God, or our garments shall be rent by our brethren, and we be cast into prison, or be sold, or be slain. Yea, let us preserve our liberty as a remnant of Joseph; yea, let us remember the words of Jacob, before his death, for behold, he saw that a part of the remnant of the coat of Joseph was preserved and had not decayed. And he said—Even as this remnant of garment of my son hath been preserved, so shall a remnant of the seed of my son be preserved by the hand of God, and be taken unto himself, while the remainder of the seed of Joseph shall perish, even as the remnant of his garment. (Alma 46:22–24)

The themes from the seed motif Moroni mentions in this passage of scripture include being trodden underfoot, being sold (into bondage), and being rent (a synonym for killed in this usage) by their brethren. The context of the battle in which Amalickiah—who was “a man of cunning device and a man of many flattering words” (Alma 46:10)—causes a civil war as he seeks to proclaim himself king matches the pattern of the Amlicite rebellion quite closely. It makes sense, therefore, that Mormon would create an intertextual linkage between these stories using the seed motif.

As a final note for this instance of the leitmotif, an interesting individual mentioned as part of this story is Zeram, a spy who is sent to watch the fleeing Amlicites (Alma 2:22). His name may mean “their seed,” meaning the “chosen people,”88 which is interesting in light of the extensive discussion involving curses, seed, and marks.

Zerahemnah as seed of the serpent

Another individual whose name may have something to do with seeds is Zerahemnah. Zerahemnah may mean “seed of the chosen one,”89 which may be meant ironically since it would seem to identify Zerahemnah as seed of the woman, when in fact he is clearly identified as seed of the serpent in the narrative. Zerahemnah is identified as seed of the serpent based on his desires for dominion (including subjecting the Nephites to bondage), which he attempts to achieve through the shedding of blood. In the case of Genesis 3 and 4 we saw that Hendel identified desire, rule, and curse as lead-words, and that he further associated the spilling of a brother’s blood on the ground and the concept of the right to rule with the stories recounted in those chapters. Here we see Moroni use similar lead-words and concepts in his characterization of Zerahemnah. Moroni points out the fact that he and his army have no desire either to shed blood or submit anyone to bondage, yet these are precisely the reason for Zerahemnah’s attack:

Behold, Zerahemnah, that we do not desire to be men of blood. Ye know that ye are in our hands, yet we do not desire to slay you. Behold, we have not come out to battle against you that we might shed your blood for power; neither do we desire to bring any one to the yoke of bondage. But this is the very cause for which ye have come against us. (Alma 44:1–2)

As we have seen, the seed motif includes the theme of a contest over the rightful exercise of dominion. That Moroni’s mention of bondage is not merely an idle remark is made clear when Moroni then challenges Zerahemnah saying “we will see who shall have power over this people; yea, we will see who shall be brought into bondage,” (Alma 44:7). Moroni’s words, then, indicate that this battle is being fought over the question of who has the right to command the people, and he clearly explains that the right of command is granted based on fidelity to the word of God—command being another lead-word discussed earlier:

And now, Zerahemnah, I command you, in the name of that all-powerful God, who has strengthened our arms that we have gained power over you, by our faith, by our religion, and by our rites of worship, and by our church, and by the sacred support which we owe to our wives and our children, by that liberty which binds us to our lands and our country; yea, and also by the maintenance of the sacred word of God, to which we owe all our happiness; and by all that is most dear unto us—Yea, and this is not all; I command you by all the desires which ye have for life, that ye deliver up your weapons of war unto us, and we will seek not your blood, but we will spare your lives, if ye will go your way and come not again to war against us. And now, if ye do not this, behold, ye are in our hands, and I will command my men that they shall fall upon you, and inflict the wounds of death in your bodies, that ye may become extinct; and then we will see who shall have power over this people; yea, we will see who shall be brought into bondage. (Alma 44:5–7)

While Zerahemnah and his men came to battle because of their desires to subjugate the Nephites, and to assert their right of command over them, they instead find themselves in the reversed position where Moroni is the one making commands because of the power he has received from God. He demands that the Lamanites surrender their weapons based on their desire for life. The lead-word command is not the same lead-word associated with the concept of dominion that Hendel identified in Genesis 3 and 4. (Hendel identified rule as the lead-word there.) However, Moroni’s use of the command lead-word makes sense if, as I have asserted, the Nephites depended on a version of the story that corresponds closely with the book of Moses. As noted above, command is used ten times in Moses 5 in a way that strongly emphasizes the various concepts of dominion seen in the seed leitmotif. The use of the command lead-word in this instance is an excellent way of strengthening the linkage to the seed leitmotif.

Zerahemnah rejects Moroni’s explanations and proposes an alternative naturalistic explanation for falling into the hands of the Nephites due to their cunning (Alma 44:9), perhaps slyly suggesting that Moroni, not Zerahemnah, is the seed of the serpent. Zerahemnah then seeks Moroni’s life and is struck a powerful blow to the head (v.12). Once again, this is in accordance with the pattern from Genesis 3 about bruising or crushing the head.

That Zerahemnah fits into the seed of the serpent motif is confirmed by his seeking for power and dominion by instigating murderous war between closely related peoples, rejecting the word of God and the opportunity offered by Moroni to repent and withdraw, attempting to kill Moroni, and the blow to his head. Other possible allusions that strengthen the likelihood of an intentional intertextual link include:

- The explicit reference to the exposed nakedness of the Lamanites (Alma 43:37) similar to what was stated in the case of the Amlicites.

- Similar to Amlici, Zerahemnah seeks to destroy the people of God. This is noted twice in the build-up to the attack by Zerahemnah: Alma 43:10 explains that the Nephites knew that any true worshipper of God “the Lamanites would destroy,” and the people of Ammon also knew “if they should fall into the hands of the Lamanites they would be destroyed” (v.11).

- The mention that the intention of the Lamanites was “to destroy their brethren” and to “bring them into bondage” so that they could “establish a kingdom” for themselves, thereby hitting upon three themes linked with the seed of the serpent in a single verse (v.29).

- The reference to spilling blood upon the ground (explored in greater detail below).

As noted above, Hendel commented on the curse that Cain incurred because of spilling Abel’s blood on the earth. An interesting intertextual linkage in Alma 44 unites the concepts of dominion, the right to rule, and the power to command in the leitmotif of the seed of the serpent with an intertextual linkage to Genesis 4 in the context of relatives spilling blood on the ground. In this case, Moroni uses a phrase that points to the story of Cain as he says:

Now I cannot recall the words which I have spoken, therefore as the Lord liveth, ye shall not depart except ye depart with an oath that ye will not return again against us to war. Now as ye are in our hands we will spill your blood upon the ground, or ye shall submit to the conditions which I have proposed. (Alma 44:11)

The phrase “spill your blood upon the ground,” when considered in the context of the framework of the seed of the serpent motif that has been invoked in this narrative, again appears to echo the story of Cain. As mentioned previously, Cain was “cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand” (Genesis 4:11).

The terrible nature of Moroni’s oath and the reason that he has exposed himself and his people to greater danger by trying to convince the Lamanites to withdraw in peace is exposed by this intertextual linkage: Moroni is doing everything within his power to avoid the sin of Cain, which involved spilling the blood of his brother upon the ground. Moroni does this by metaphorically confronting the seed of the serpent in the very act and commanding them in the name of God to stop (Alma 44:5) and repent of their evil intent. This echoes God’s warning to Cain of the consequences if he would not repent. Zerahemnah behaves as Cain did, for despite warnings to both men, they persisted in their wickedness and incurred the prophesied outcome (Genesis 4:11; Alma 44:18–19). In the case of Zerahemnah, his choice exposes his people to having their heads crushed, as is the inevitable fate of the seed of the serpent. As Alma puts it,

But behold, their naked skins and their bare heads were exposed to the sharp swords of the Nephites; yea, behold they were pierced and smitten, yea, and did fall exceedingly fast before the swords of the Nephites; and they began to be swept down, even as the soldier of Moroni had prophesied. (Alma 44:18)

The seed motif in the story of Nephi and Laban

From the very beginning of his account, Nephi frames his own actions in terms that indicate that he is the seed of the woman. He hears and obeys the word of the Lord, and he refuses to turn back when things do not go as expected. For example, when Lehi tells Nephi about the Lord’s commandment to return to Jerusalem to get the brass plates (1 Nephi 3:2), Nephi utilizes a lead-word to highlight his response:

I said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them. (1 Nephi 3:7)

Nephi’s commitment is reiterated after the first attempt to get the plates results in failure and his brothers are ready to give up. His response mirrors the language of his earlier commitment: Nephi “said unto them that: As the Lord liveth, and as we live, we will not go down unto our father in the wilderness until we have accomplished the thing which the Lord hath commanded us. Wherefore, let us be faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord” (1 Nephi 3:15–16).

Nephi comes up with a plan that involves purchasing the plates, and as he and his brothers make this proposal to Laban, Nephi explains “when Laban saw our property, and that it was exceedingly great, he did lust after it, insomuch that he thrust us out, and sent his servants to slay us, that he might obtain our property” (1 Nephi 3:25). As we have seen, the seed of the serpent seek to kill the seed of the woman in pursuit of wealth and/or dominion, and it is at this point that Nephi begins to frame Laban as one of the seed of the serpent.

After it becomes clear that Nephi alone is the one to solve the conflict with Laban, Nephi burnishes his credentials as the seed of the woman by first explaining to his brothers that righteous people engaged in fulfilling the commandments of God are sure to succeed, no matter what powers are arrayed against them. He provides an illustrative example by comparing the Egyptians and the Hebrews in the story of Moses. His goal appears to be to show that the confrontation with Laban is of a similar civilization-changing magnitude as the very foundation story of Israel, that of Moses and Pharaoh (which is itself also framed in terms of the seed of the serpent motif).90 He points out the potency of the word of God in the mouth of the servants of God by noting that Moses “truly spake unto the waters of the Red Sea and they divided hither and thither” (1 Nephi 4:2). He then explains that the outcome of the conflict between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent is already defined: “the Lord is able to deliver us, even as our fathers, and to destroy Laban, even as the Egyptians” (v. 3).

With these foundational stories of Israel in mind, Nephi leverages yet one more foundational story as he takes up his narrative in a way that is clearly meant to bring to mind the story of David and Goliath. Larsen explains:

Deeply acquainted as they would have been with the story of David and Goliath, Nephi’s people surely saw the parallel between young David and young Nephi. (Nephi has carefully composed his narrative in such a way that they would see it because of multiple structural and sequential similarities, notwithstanding the very different contexts and mix of characters that clearly differentiate the two stories.) Having recognized the allusion, Nephi’s people would have understood that, in constraining Nephi to slay Laban as he did, the Lord marked Nephi as a legitimate successor to David in their new branch of Israel.91

When Nephi finds Laban drunk and passed out on the ground in his narrative, he first deftly emphasizes that Laban is the seed of the serpent by calling to mind the well-known behaviors associated with the seed of the serpent. He reasons that “I also knew that he had sought to take away mine own life; yea, and he would not hearken unto the commandments of the Lord; and he also had taken away our property.” Like Cain, Laban was willing to attempt to kill Nephi and his brothers for the sake of getting gain. Nephi warns about what is at stake by emphasizing the necessity of the scriptures in coming to know the commandments of the Lord and by once again using the word commandment as a lead-word, recalling the promise that: “Inasmuch as thy seed shall keep my commandments, they shall prosper in the land of promise. Yea, and I also thought that they could not keep the commandments of the Lord according to the law of Moses, save they should have the law. . . . And again, I knew that the Lord had delivered Laban into my hands for this cause—that I might obtain the records according to his commandments” (1 Nephi 4:11–17). As we have seen, the lead-word command or commandments is used prominently in Moses 5, and the lead-word used here is likely meant to point to the story of Cain contained therein. Nephi confirms both his own identity as seed of the woman and Laban’s identity as seed of the serpent as he “took Laban by the hair of the head, and I smote off his head with his own sword” (1 Nephi 4:18–19). The structural parallel links this to 1 Samuel 17 where David, once he had defeated Goliath “stood upon the Philistine, and took his sword, and drew it out of the sheath thereof, and slew him, and cut off his head therewith” (v. 51). As has been mentioned several times, striking the head of an enemy of Israel is a recurring theme that may indicate the seed of the serpent motif.92 Ben McGuire has the following to say of the parallels between Nephi’s killing of Laban and the story of David and Goliath:

A few of the main thematic parallels between the two accounts are that both unbelieving Israel and Laman and Lemuel are fearful of the main antagonist, both David and Nephi prophesy the death of their opponent, and both Goliath and Laban have their heads cut off and armor stripped. The implications of this allusion run deep. At a time in which the right to kingship was continually in dispute between Nephi and Laman, Nephi casting himself as David—the archetypal king of Judah, whose faith led to his supplanting Saul—could be seen as legitimizing his regal authority over Laman.93

Nephi framed his slaying of Laban in terms of the story of the seed leitmotif based on verbal, thematic, and structural parallels. He uses literary allusions to point to the story of David and Goliath, a famous instance of the rivalry between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent.94

Abinadi’s depiction of Christ as the seed of the woman

Perhaps the most important instance of the leitmotif of the seed of the serpent in the Book of Mormon is found in the story of Abinadi. What is interesting about this instance is the way in which Abinadi so deftly weaves the leitmotif into both his own preaching and his quotations of Isaiah as he expounds the doctrine of salvation through the intermediation of the Messiah. The theme of his discourse in these chapters is: “even all the prophets who have prophesied ever since the world began—have they not spoken more or less concerning these things?” (Mosiah 13:33). As he explores this theme, he quotes Isaiah in a famous passage:

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities. . . . Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief; when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. (Mosiah 14:5, 10)

As he explains the meaning of this and other passages from Isaiah, Abinadi focuses specifically on the seed of the woman, who is associated with the Messiah. In the above quote from Isaiah, the bruising that the suffering servant receives calls to mind the ability of the serpent to bruise the heel of the seed of the woman. Abinadi immediately makes clear to whom he is referring when he mentions the seed of the suffering servant:

And who shall be his seed? Behold I say unto you, that whosoever has heard the words of the prophets, yea, all the holy prophets who have prophesied concerning the coming of the Lord—I say unto you, that all those who have hearkened unto their words, and believed that the Lord would redeem his people, and have looked forward to that day for a remission of their sins, I say unto you, that these are his seed, or they are the heirs of the kingdom of God. For these are they whose sins he has borne; these are they for whom he has died, to redeem them from their transgressions. And now, are they not his seed? (Mosiah 15:10–12)

Abinadi is the Book of Mormon prophet who most clearly articulates the attributes of the seed of the woman. The seed of the woman are the followers of Christ who:

- Hear and hearken to the words of the prophets.

- Believe that the Lord will redeem his people.

- Look forward to a remission of their sins.

- Those who publish peace and salvation.

The word seed is prominent enough in this passage that it may be meant as a lead-word. If so, it may be linking this instance of the seed leitmotif to both the story of Zerahemnah and the story of the title of liberty, both of which also use seed as a lead-word. After discussing the attributes of the Savior in more detail, Abinadi quite explicitly ties his discourse back to the seed of the serpent leitmotif in Genesis chapter 3. He says:

And then shall the wicked be cast out, and they shall have cause to howl, and weep, and wail, and gnash their teeth; and this because they would not hearken unto the voice of the Lord; therefore the Lord redeemeth them not. For they are carnal and devilish, and the devil has power over them; yea, even that old serpent that did beguile our first parents, which was the cause of their fall; which was the cause of all mankind becoming carnal, sensual, devilish, knowing evil from good, subjecting themselves to the devil. Thus all mankind were lost; and behold, they would have been endlessly lost were it not that God redeemed his people from their lost and fallen state. (Mosiah 16:2–4)

The attributes of the seed motif in the foregoing quote include:

- The exile theme (being cast out).

- Refusing to hearken to the voice of the Lord.

- A contest over the question of dominion.

- Choosing the devil (the serpent) to rule over them.

In addition to these, Abinadi appears to use the command lead-word in Mosiah 13, in accordance with the established pattern.

Abinadi wraps up his teaching with a call for Noah and his priests to repent in terms that encapsulate the core of the issue of dominion in the seed motif (that of choosing Satan and granting him dominion). King Noah and company are quite clearly behaving in seed of the serpent fashion by rebelling against the commandments of God, surrendering to their carnal desires, ignoring the warnings of the consequences of their behavior, refusing to repent, and thus allowing Satan to have all power over them. Abinadi’s warning echoes God’s warning to Cain as he says:

But remember that he that persists in his own carnal nature, and goes on in the ways of sin and rebellion against God, remaineth in his fallen state and the devil hath all power over him. Therefore he is as though there was no redemption made, being an enemy to God . . . having gone according to their own carnal wills and desires; having never called upon the Lord while the arms of mercy were extended towards them; for the arms of mercy were extended towards them, and they would not; they being warned of their iniquities and yet they would not depart from them; and they were commanded to repent and yet they would not repent. And now, ought ye not to tremble and repent of your sins, and remember that only in and through Christ ye can be saved? (Mosiah 16:5, 12–13)

Of course, Abinadi himself is one of the holy prophets he mentioned in connection with the seed of the Messiah, and so it is also not surprising when Noah and his priests put him to death, as is the usual approach for the seed of the serpent when confronted by the seed of the woman. With the usual near-sightedness of the seed of the serpent, King Noah and his priests ignore Abinadi’s warnings that how they treat him after he has delivered his message will be a type of things to come. They seem to think that once Abinadi is safely silenced, the threat to their dominion will have ended. However, as we saw in the case of Abimelech, the seed of the serpent often encounters poetic justice in the manner of their demise. King Noah suffers death by fire, just as he caused Abinadi to suffer death by fire (Mosiah 19:20). The priests of Noah proceed to assert their dominion over Alma1 and the converted followers of Christ (the seed of the woman) by enslaving them (Mosiah 23:23), and later on they cause the converted followers of Christ among the Lamanites to suffer death by fire (Alma 25:5), before they themselves are burned in like fashion (Alma 25:8).

Other possible instances of the seed motif in the Book of Mormon

There are several other possible instances of stories in the Book of Mormon that are framed in the context of the seed of the serpent versus the seed of the woman. I will not examine any of these stories here but will only mention that the narratives dealing with Nephi1 confronting his brothers when they propose returning to Jerusalem, the Great and Abominable Church, Nephi1 and the construction of the ship, the story of Korihor, the preaching of Samuel the Lamanite, Nephi2 and the sealing power, and the story of Jared and Akish all contain elements that might hint at a framing within the context of the seed of the serpent.

The Seed of the Serpent in Modern-day Scripture

The Doctrine and Covenants does not possess any instances of the seed motif. This is not surprising, as the motif is based on an ancient Hebrew way of viewing the battle between the forces of good and evil. However, there is one unique passage found in Doctrine and Covenants 10:20–28 in which the Lord describes Satan and his minions as possessing the characteristics of the seed of the serpent. These attributes include an association with darkness rather than light,95 a cunning plan, attempting to destroy the works of God, deceiving and lying in wait, an intent to destroy the souls of men, stirring men up to anger, lying, flattering, and even the poetic justice we have seen elsewhere wherein they will “catch themselves in their own snare.”

Verily, verily, I say unto you, that Satan has great hold upon their hearts; he stirreth them up to iniquity against that which is good; And their hearts are corrupt, and full of wickedness and abominations; and they love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil; therefore they will not ask of me. Satan stirreth them up, that he may lead their souls to destruction. And thus he has laid a cunning plan, thinking to destroy the work of God; but I will require this at their hands, and it shall turn to their shame and condemnation in the day of judgment. Yea, he stirreth up their hearts to anger against this work. Yea, he saith unto them: Deceive and lie in wait to catch, that ye may destroy; behold, this is no harm. And thus he flattereth them, and telleth them that it is no sin to lie that they may catch a man in a lie, that they may destroy him. And thus he flattereth them, and leadeth them along until he draggeth their souls down to hell; and thus he causeth them to catch themselves in their own snare. And thus he goeth up and down, to and fro in the earth, seeking to destroy the souls of men. Verily, verily, I say unto you, wo be unto him that lieth to deceive because he supposeth that another lieth to deceive, for such are not exempt from the justice of God. (Doctrine and Covenants 10:20–28)

In addition to this reference from modern-day scripture, there is the matter of the temple endowment ceremony where the happenings narrated in Genesis 3 are at the core. I will not go into detail here, but suffice it to say that the seed motif is at the heart of Latter-day Saint theology, based on the presentation of the Genesis story in the endowment.

Conclusions—Why Should We Care
about the Seed of the Serpent?

It is interesting that the Book of Mormon authors picked up on a biblical theme and incorporated it into their own writings. But why should modern readers care? A reason that familiarity with this pattern is meaningful is because it reveals something about how the Lord operates. If, as I have argued, the lead-words and leitmotif are rhetorical strategies the Nephites consistently used, the reason we should care about them is that we will better understand their intended meanings when we understand the rhetorical strategies they used.

Several of the cases where the seed of the serpent leitmotif is used in the Book of Mormon are situations where a high degree of moral hazard is involved. Life or death decisions are made, and the outcome affects groups ranging from a handful of people to hundreds of thousands. Not only are the stakes high about who is in the right and who is in the wrong but they frequently involve closely related individuals or closely related peoples. The authors of the Book of Mormon seem to have found it necessary to label the antagonists more clearly in cases where the reader would naturally be led to question the decisions those antagonists made. Nephi’s decision to kill Laban is certainly one such case. Other cases include the brutal civil war that erupted in the Amlicite rebellion and the execution of Abinadi. The Book of Mormon authors seem to frequently employ the seed leitmotif to clarify what is at stake when difficult and potentially controversial decisions are under consideration.

Of profound importance to our spiritual survival is the concept at the heart of the seed leitmotif—that of choosing to either exercise our God-given dominion and let God prevail or else to allow Satan to rule over us. The seed motif in the Book of Mormon emphasizes that anyone can choose to become either the seed of the serpent or the seed of the woman, i.e., followers of Jesus Christ. They can “reap their rewards according to their works, whether they were good or whether they were bad, to reap eternal happiness or eternal misery, according to the spirit which they listed to obey, whether it be a good spirit or a bad one” (Alma 3:26). In this view of things, the chosen people are chosen not because the Lord is biased but because the people seek out and follow the Lord. Nephi makes this argument again and again in the context of the seed of the serpent leitmotif, and so does Mormon. Some examples include:

And now, do ye suppose that the children of this land, who were in the land of promise, who were driven out by our fathers, do ye suppose that they were righteous? Behold, I say unto you, Nay. Do ye suppose that our fathers would have been more choice than they if they had been righteous? I say unto you, Nay. Behold, the Lord esteemeth all flesh in one; he that is righteous is favored of God. (1 Nephi 17:33–35)

Now the Amlicites knew not that they were fulfilling the words of God when they began to mark themselves in their foreheads; nevertheless they had come out in open rebellion against God; therefore it was expedient that the curse should fall upon them. Now I would that ye should see that they brought upon themselves the curse; and even so doth every man that is cursed bring upon himself his own condemnation. (Alma 3:18–19)

The Book of Mormon leverages the seed motif to help build faith in God through the recognition that he guides and protects those who choose to follow him, and he curses those who come out in rebellion against him. As Nephi puts it in one of his many examples of contrasting the outcomes for the righteous with those of the wicked: “And we did observe to keep the judgments, and the statutes, and the commandments of the Lord in all things, according to the law of Moses. And the Lord was with us; and we did prosper exceedingly” (2 Nephi 5:10–11) versus “And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint” (2 Nephi 5:20).

The point is repeated so many times that it is difficult to miss. By recognizing the lead-words that identify the pattern that bridges all of the standard works, we can see that the Lord operates across the broad sweep of human history. The pattern yields insights into the nature of prophecy and how the people of the Lord react to prophecy. Understanding the pattern is of great importance in our day. As President Nelson has said:

In coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting and constant influence of the Holy Ghost. My beloved brothers and sisters, I plead with you to increase your spiritual capacity to receive revelation.96

We can leverage the knowledge gained through identifying these patterns into a greater understanding about the methods and purposes of God and choose to repent and incorporate the word of God into our lives (in our efforts to become seed of the woman) so that we can receive the Spirit and the revelations that accompany the Spirit.

[Author’s Note: I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and editorial staff of Interpreter for their assistance in editing this article. Godfrey Ellis, my Executive Editor, deserves particular mention as he spent many hours reviewing, providing suggestions, aiding to clarify, structuring, and wording things so that the final article is much more coherent and intelligible than would otherwise be the case. I am very grateful for his assistance.]

Noel Hudson was born in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and raised in Provo, Utah. He earned a BS in Zoology from BYU, an MS in Engineering Technology from BYU, and an MBA in marketing from BYU. While working as an Electrical Engineer for a company that manufactures communications equipment, he published eight books of historical and science fiction and has written articles on the Book of Mormon. He and his wife, Luciana, are the parents of three children.

1 . Austin Cline, “Absurdity of a Talking Snake in the Garden of Eden,” Learn Religions (blog), 9 March 2019, learnreligions.com/absurdity-of-a-talking-snake
-247969.

2 . Stanley N. Rosenbaum, “Israelite Homicide Law and the Term ‘Enmity’ in Genesis 3:15,” Journal of Law and Religion 2, no. 1 (1984): 146.

3 . John L. Ronning, “The Curse on the Serpent (Genesis 3:15) in Biblical Theology and Hermeneutics,” (PhD diss., Westminster Theological Seminary, 1997), 33. Note that the seed of the serpent may also be known as the “devil’s seed,” “child of the devil,” or “child of hell.”

4 . There is some debate about what is meant when a text is said to be interpreted “literally” as opposed to “figuratively,” and this debate extends to definitions of biblical orthodoxy or biblical liberalism. See Adam S. Miller, “Introduction: On Biblical Literalism,” in Fleeing the Garden: Reading Genesis 2–3, ed. Adam S. Miller (Provo, UT: Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, 2017), 1, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/37.

5 . Geerhardus Vos, Biblical Theology: Old and New Testaments (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1948), 33.

6 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 102.

7 . Julie M. Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” in Miller, Fleeing the Garden, 37,
scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/37.

8 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 92.

9 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 1.

10 . Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” 11.

11 . Miller, “On Biblical Literalism,” 1–2.

12 . Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative, 2nd ed. (New York: Basic Books, 2011), 116.

13 . Yairah Amit, “The Multi-Purpose ‘Leading Word’ and the Problems of Its Usage,” Prooftexts 9, no. 2 (1989): 100.

14 . Noel B. Reynolds, “Chiastic Structuring of Large Texts: Second Nephi as a Case Study,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 41 (2020): 193–210, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/chiastic
-structuring-of-large-texts-second-nephi-as-a-case-study/.

15 . Buber and Rosenzweig went so far in their study of lead-words as to create a special translation of the Bible with an emphasis on preserving the lead-words by choosing to always translate the same or similar words in the exact same way within a given narrative. See Leora Batnitzky, “Translation as Transcendence: A Glimpse into the Workshop of the Buber-Rosenzweig Bible Translation,” New German Critique, no. 70 (Winter 1997): 88, doi.org
/10.2307/488500.

16 . Jonathan M. Cheek, “Bruising, Crushing, or Striking: The Translation of שוף and the Promise of Victory in Genesis 3:15,” Journal of Biblical Theology and Worldview 2, no. 1 (Fall 2021): 19.

17 . Alter, Biblical Narrative, 117–118.

18 . For example, in Moses 5:16–17, Cain refuses to hearken to the words of the Lord, but Abel hearkens to the voice of the Lord.

19 . Ronald Hendel, “Leitwort Style and Literary Structure in the J Primeval Narrative,” in Sacred History, Sacred Literature: Essays on Ancient Israel, the Bible, and Religion in Honor of R. E. Friedman on His Sixtieth Birthday, ed. Shawna Dolansky (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008), 98.

20 . Hendel, “Leitwort Style,” 99.

21 . Hendel, “Leitwort Style,” 99.

22 . Alter, Biblical Narrative, 76.

23 . Alan Goff, “Types of Repetition and Shadows of History in Hebraic Narrative,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 45 (2021): 278, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/types-of-repetition-and-shadows-of
-history-in-hebraic-narrative/.

24 . For the sake of economy of space and to aid discussion, I will occasionally refer to the motif of the “seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman” as simply the “seed motif.”

25 . A. Lukyn Williams, Justin Martyr: The Dialogue with Trypho, Translation, Introduction, and Notes (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge; New York: Macmillan, 1930), 78.

26 . Williams, Justin Martyr, 210.

27 . Irenaeus, Against the Heresies, Book 5, Chapter 21, paragraph 1, newadvent
.org/fathers/0103521.htm.

28 . Rosenbaum, “Israelite Homicide Law,” 145.

29 . Tom Nash, “Genesis 3:15: Who Crushes the Serpent’s Head?” Catholic Answers (blog), catholic.com/qa/genesis-315-who-crushes-the-serpents
-head.

30 . Charles Augustus Briggs, Messianic Prophecy: The Prediction of the Fulfilment of Redemption through the Messiah (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1886), 74–75.

31 . Gordon J. Wenham, Word Biblical Commentary, vol. 1, Genesis 1–15 (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1987), 80.

32 . Brian A. Verrett, The Serpent in Samuel: A Messianic Motif (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2020) 16.

33 . Christian C. Chigbundu, “In God’s Plan, Men and Women are Valued and Needed,” Liahona, September 2023, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona
/2023/09/afw-eng-local-pages/local-news-001.

34 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 72.

35 . Knut Holter, “The Serpent in Eden as a Symbol of Israel’s Political Enemies: A Yahwistic Criticism of the Solomonic Foreign Policy?” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 1, (1990): 106–12.

36 . Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” 9.

37 . Wenham, Genesis 1–15, 80.

38 . “Compare Translations for Genesis 4:7,” Compare Translations, Bible, Bible Study Tools, accessed 26 April 2024, biblestudytools.com/genesis/4-7
-compare.html.

39 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 171.

40 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 143–44.

41 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 162, 173.

42 . See Stephen G. Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty: a Biblical Theology of the Hebrew Bible (Downers Grove, IL.: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 32; Ronning, “The Curse on the Serpent,” 79–185; Gary A. Rendsburg, The Redaction of Genesis (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1986), 8–9.

43 . Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty, 62–70.

44 . Russell M. Nelson, “Let God Prevail,” Liahona, November 2020, churchof
jesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2020/10/46nelson.

45 . James Hamilton, “The Skull Crushing Seed of the Woman: Inner-Biblical Interpretation of Genesis 3:15,” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 10, no. 2 (2006): 34–39.

46 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 165–66.

47 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 126–160.

48 . Matthew L. Bowen, “Getting Cain and Gain,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 15 (2015): 139, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/getting
-cain-and-gain/.

49 . Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” 10.

50 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 35.

51 . Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” 22.

52 . Avram R. Shannon, “The Mark and Curse of Cain,” in Old Testament Cultural Insights, ed. Taylor Halverson (Springville, UT: Book of Mormon Central, 2022): 1.

53 . Aaron P. Schade and Matthew L. Bowen, “Moses 5: Cain’s Offering and the Curse,” in The Book of Moses From the Ancient of Days to the Latter Days (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021), 250.

54 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 41.

55 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 88.

56 . Umberto Cassuto, A Commentary on the Book of Genesis, Part 1, From Adam to Noah (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1972), 211.

57 . See Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent”; Verrett, Serpent in Samuel; and Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 30–54.

58 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 33.

59 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 87.

60 . Claus Westermann, Genesis 37–50: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 2002), 37.

61 . Verrett, Serpent in Samuel, 3.

62 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 286.

63 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 288.

64 . Cheek, “Bruising, Crushing, or Striking,” 23.

65 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 249.

66 . Bowen, “Cain and Gain,” 124.

67 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 34.

68 . Verrett, Serpent in Samuel, 28.

69 . Verrett, Serpent in Samuel, 30.

70 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 34.

71 . Briggs, Messianic Prophecy, 74.

72 . Verrett, Serpent in Samuel, 96.

73 . Yonatan Grossman, “Leitwort (I),” Tanakh, Koschitsky Virtual Beit Midrash, Yeshivat Har Etzion, 24 January 2016, etzion.org.il/en/tanakh/studies-tanakh
/literary-readings-tanakh/leitwort-i#:~:text=Since%20the%20time%20of%20Martin%20Buber%2C%20we%20customarily,something%20hiding%20beneath%20the%20surface%20of%20the%20text.

74 . Jeff Lindsay, email message to author, 12 June 2024.

75 . Hendel, “Leitwort Style,” 96.

76 . Jeff Lindsay and Noel B. Reynolds, “‘Strong Like unto Moses’: The Case for Ancient Roots in the Book of Moses Based on Book of Mormon Usage of Related Content Apparently from the Brass Plates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 44 (2021): 6, journal.interpreter
foundation.org/strong-like-unto-moses-the-case-for-ancient-roots-in-the
-book-of-moses-based-on-book-of-mormon-usage-of-related-content
-apparently-from-the-brass-plates/.

77 . Lindsay and Reynolds, “Strong Like unto Moses,” 33.

78 . Lindsay and Reynolds, “Strong Like unto Moses,” 9–11.

79 . Lindsay and Reynolds, “Strong Like unto Moses,” 38.

80 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 156.

81 . Noel B. Reynolds, “A Backstory for the Brass Plates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 53 (2022): 223, journal.interpreter
foundation.org/a-backstory-for-the-brass-plates/.

82 . A. Keith Thompson, “The Brass Plates: Can Modern Scholarship Help Identify Their Contents?” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 45 (2021): 81–114, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-brass
-plates-can-modern-scholarship-help-identify-their-contents/.

83 . Cassuto, Commentary on the Book of Genesis, 1:142–43.

84 . As discussed in greater detail below, the curse described by Alma is always self-imposed. There is no genetic or racial component to a curse imposed by God.

85 . The usage of a curse in so many different instances of the seed motif also refutes that idea that the curse is a racial item, which is a recent and erroneous concern and has been debunked in recent articles. See T. J. Uriona, “‘Life and Death, Blessing and Cursing’: New Context for ‘Skin of Blackness’ in the Book of Mormon,” BYU Studies 62, no. 3 (2023): 121–40; Clifford P. Jones, “Review of Two New Theories about the Lamanite Mark Recently Presented in Two Different Forums,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 61 (2024): 144–64, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/review-of-two-new-theories-about-the-lamanite-mark-recently
-presented-in-two-different-forums; and Gerrit M. Steenblik, “Demythicizing the Lamanites’ ‘Skin of Blackness,’” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 167–258, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/demythicizing-the-lamanites-skin-of-blackness.

86 . Lindsay and Reynolds, “Strong Like unto Moses,” 33.

87 . Lindsay and Reynolds, “Strong Like unto Moses,” 51.

88 . Book of Mormon Onomasticon, s.v. “Zeram,” last edited 29 November 2023, onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php?title=ZERAM.

89 . Book of Mormon Onomasticon, s.v. “Zerahemnah,” last edited 29 November 2023, onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php?title=ZERAHEMNAH.

90 . Verrett, Serpent in Samuel, 26.

91 . Val Larsen, “Killing Laban: The Birth of Sovereignty in the Nephite Constitutional Order,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 16, no. 1 (2007): 36,
scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol16/iss1/5.

92 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 34.

93 . Ben McGuire, “Nephi and Goliath: A Case Study of Literary Allusion in the Book of Mormon,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 18, no. 1 (2009): 15, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol18/iss1/12.

94 . Hamilton, “Seed of the Woman,” 35.

95 . This attribute is only touched upon lightly in this article but mentioned by Ronning in connection with Cain. See Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 117–19.

96 . Russell M. Nelson, “Revelation for the Church, Revelation for Our Lives,” Liahona, April 2018, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2018
/04/revelation-for-the-church-revelation-for-our-lives.

Birth and Rebirth: The Fish in Mesoamerican Art and Its Implication on Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico

Diane E. Wirth

Abstract: A revealing analysis of fish iconography in Mesoamerica, in relation to the ancestral couple on Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico, holds an unforeseen element that may reveal a key to the Tree of Life referred to in the Book of Mormon. This key is supported by Mesoamerican, Hebrew, and Egyptian traditions.

There have been numerous illustrations of Stela 5, Izapa, since its discovery in 1941 by the National Geographic Society and the Smithsonian Institute. However, the latest examination of this stela with reflective or reflectance transformation imaging (RTI) technology provides evidence that the most precise drawing is Garth Norman’s rendition in 1976.1 The RTI method is based on taking numerous photographs of a surface with a low-angle light source placed in many different locations, creating a compilation of images that can be analyzed by computer to create an accurate representation of the surface topography.2 RTI has now been used in numerous archaeological contexts.3 Laser scanning can produce similar results, but it has not yet been permitted by authorities in Mexico for Stela 5. The RTI evaluation of Stela 5 was conducted in 2013 by Jason B. Jones, then a researcher at the University of Warwick, who presented the work with Garth Norman at the Society of American Archaeology.4

The consensus of opinion for dating Stela 5 in Izapa lies between the Middle Preclassic to the Late Preclassic, around 400 to 50 BC. It is very difficult to accurately date stone unless there is a phonetic writing system on or nearby, which was not developed at this time. The date established by Garth Norman is 500–400 BC.5 Norman researched this stela for almost 58 years. Stela 5 has one of the earliest depictions of fish in Mesoamerica. As will be demonstrated, the symbolic meaning of some fish patterns lasted more than a thousand years in Mexico and Central America.

For a detailed illustration of Stela 5, see figure 1.6 This stela is a complex, low-relief illustration depicting in a narrative style many unusual animals, people, items, and the World Tree or Tree of Life. Trees are often related to creation in Mesoamerica.7 Our attention will be the fish on Stela 5: two fish are to the left of the tree and above the smoke of an incense burner, and two fish hang at the top of the stela to the far left of the celestial band. The celestial band or “skyband” enables the viewer to visualize this story in stone beyond the natural realm.8

Figure 1. Garth Norman’s 1976 illustration of Stela 5, Izapa, Chiapas, Mexico.

Two Fish on Stela 5

The two fish rising from the smoke and ascending towards the skyband have what is known as a “breath bead” at the tip of their mouths, as shown in figure 2. Some have surmised this round object is a fruit from the Tree of Life. If so, it may have a dual meaning, which could be construed as having a parallel connotation for the end of a life’s cycle. The breath bead is unique; it appears only on deceased high-ranking individuals, never on fish. This strange occurrence appearing on fish, and what these fish on Stela 5 imply, will be addressed shortly.

Among both the Olmec and later Maya, a bead may appear in front of a nose depicting the deceased.9 For example, Altar Q in Copan, Honduras, is a four-sided structure showing four rulers on each side, dating from the early fifth to mid-eighth century AD. Each has a breath bead in front of its nose, as shown in figure 3.10 The bead, usually of precious jade, was considered the soul or spirit of the deceased.11 This practice endured from the Preclassic to the arrival of the Spanish—over 1,500 years. According to Allen Christenson, “breath” is figurative of “spirit,” and refers to a person’s “life force.”12

Inasmuch as the soul is being captured when an individual dies, the two fish on Stela 5 may represent human personages, which is the hypothesis presented in this study. The two fish at the top and positioned at the bottom of the celestial band are directly in line over the figures of two ancestral parents who may be Sariah and Lehi. These early progenitors in the Book of Mormon have been suggested by several Latter-day Saint researchers, but not necessarily related to the fish. The first to propose the identification of the figures at the bottom on both sides of the tree was Wells Jakeman, founder of the archaeology department at Brigham Young University.13 Not all Latter-day Saint scholars agree on this couple’s early identity. For the sake of discussion, however, it will be assumed this theory is correct.

Fish Symbolic of Birth

After comparing evidence gathered by researchers, Douglas Gillette concluded:

[W]e now know that the Maya believed the soul had a life cycle that began in paradise, continued on the earth plane as its participation in the struggle to defeat and absorb the forces of destruction and death, and that was intended to end in an eternal celebration of life and Being. The soul determined its own ultimate fate by how well it constructed a durable “Resurrection Body” during its sojourn on earth.14

Souls were sent to mortals by heavenly gods, considered a creator couple.15 Lewis Spence researched the Aztec couple Xochiquetzal and Xochipilli, viewed as jointly one, and remarked that they “must be regarded as the direct creators of the spirit of man . . . and must be comprehended as sending the human soul to occupy the body made by human procreation, giving warmth and breath to the infant before birth.”16 His remarks drew upon the work of German archaeologist Eduard Seler, who said that “Xochipilli, God of Flowers, the male counterpart of the goddess Xochiquetzal . . . is supposed to dwell in the uppermost heaven, to send children thence into the world.”17 This sounds familiar to Latter-day Saints who believe in the pre-existence of children born to heavenly parents before their mortal birth.

A scene on Altar O at Copan, Honduras, displays this tradition (see figure 418). A fish is directly over a child standing next to his father. The fish represents the child’s soul, making his association with birth and lineage apparent. Some scholars propose there is a ruling fish family at Copan.19 The father figure rests his hand on his thigh, which is a recognized symbol of fertility in Mesoamerica.20

Another depiction of this theme, corroborating this concept without a fish, is in a pre-Columbian book called the Borbonicus Codex, compiled by the Aztec in 1507 (see figure 521). This picture of the woman wearing the skin of a flayed sacrificial person is abhorrent to us, but for the people of ancient Mexico it gave a visual picture providing important elements. The soul of a child descends from heaven in a pre-mortal state to its pregnant mother, and is simultaneously born. The earliest depiction of birth from the heavens is Stela 10 at Izapa (see figure 6). Emphasis is on the main figures: a pre-existent child above, and a mortal female below.22

A comment by Karl A. Taube, a professor specializing in Mesoamerican archaeology and iconography, is important in relation to fish and birth.23 He postulates that the famous mythological mural at Teotihuacan, Mexico, depicts fish and writes that they may represent “not humans turned into fish, but fish before they became humans.”24 The fish most likely represented ancestors as they swam to the “present human world.”25 There is no doubt that fish and birth are interwoven in Mesoamerican tradition. Several stelae among the Maya portray women with a highly stylized shark head, a type of fish, placed on the abdomen area of their apron, the fish head representing an embryo (see figure 7). Below the fish head is the design of a shell. This may symbolize the womb, the place where a child will be formed waiting for birth.26 Stela 24 from Naranjo, Guatemala, with this type of apron, commemorates a woman from Naranjo marrying a Tikal king and giving birth to their son (see figure 827).

And from the Maya Dresden Codex, a newborn human emerges from a shell with a deity above (see figure 9). Eric S. Thompson wrote, “[J]ust as the fish issues from a shell, so emerges man from the womb of his mother.”28 Considering a shell may represent birth, there is a shell containing a spiral design just below the two hanging fish on the celestial band of Stela 5 (see figure 1). This shell would also have the meaning of birth, and in this case, to a state of rebirth.

Fish Symbolic of Death and Rebirth

Birth from a shell is also considered a birth for the human deceased, in other words, a rebirth or resurrection. Mesoamerican researchers rarely use the word resurrection as Egyptologists do, solely because they regard the term as reflecting a Christian origin. Nevertheless, rebirth or resurrection happens to the deceased after leaving this world. A prime example from Uaxactun, Guatemala, is an elderly man who will soon taste death. Upon death he will be resurrected from his spiritual womb, represented as a shell (see figure 10).29 Maya specialists are in agreement with this interpretation.

Taube points out the Maya group called Chorti, considered the people who were destroyed by the great flood, were transformed into fish.30 Perhaps their fish souls will be reborn again. Like the sun god who is born each morning after dying at night, the fish symbol with a shell in its body is on the sun’s back in figure 11, and intensifies the symbolism of rebirth after death. The sun glyph of this Maya god is on his head, which identifies him.31 We find the same thought in Egypt. The common bulti fish is associated with the sun because of its red color. Richard Wilkinson explains the symbolism of the bulti fish in Egypt:
“[T]he spirit of the deceased was believed to rise from the waters of the afterlife as the sun had risen from the primeval lake.”32

Figure 11. Sun god with fish and shell on back. (Drawing by the
author after Hellmuth, Monster und Menschen, 109.)

Between 1554 and 1558, a phonetic manuscript of the Popol Vuh was related to the Spanish by various members of the K’iche’ Maya lineage. In 1701, a Catholic monk named Francisco Ximenez, transcribed the Popol Vuh into Spanish from the K’iche’ language written down phonetically earlier.33 These mythological stories were considered a sacred narrative of the creation, with several episodes involving the Hero Twins, named Hunahpu and Xbalanque. There are many stela at Izapa that portray events described in the Popol Vuh. One could speculate the fish on Stela 5 represent the Hero Twins, since years later they are associated with fish. However, there are no stelae at Izapa showing the Hero Twins of the Popol Vuh as fish.

In figure 12,34 one of these accounts in the Popol Vuh of the Hero Twins is pictured on a Maya vase created hundreds of years before the K’iche’ Maya related their mythology to the Spanish. In this story told in the Popol Vuh, it was the intention of the Lords of Death in the underworld ballcourt of Xibalba, to kill the Hero Twins. However, the twins were exceedingly clever and knew of their design and devised a plan to trick the Lords of Death. The twins jumped into a fiery furnace. The Lords of Death threw their ashes into the underworld river, believing this was their demise. However, in a miraculous turn of events, the Hero Twins turned into “people-fish” and were subsequently reborn.35

Figure 12. Hero Twin and fish emerge from fish serpent-like monster on lower
portion of a Maya vase, housed at the Popol Vuh Museum, Guatemala. (Drawing
by the author after Reents-Budet, Painting the Maya Universe, 274.)

Researchers are in agreement that this story from the Popol Vuh is illustrated on the Maya vase (see figure 12). Above the figures in the water, a canoe travels through the Milky Way. Below the canoe is a young man, one of the Hero Twins, who comes face to face with a fish, both appearing to emerge from a larger fish/serpent-like creature. Dorie Reents-Budet suggests that one of the Popol Vuh Hero Twins has already been reborn, while the other appears as a fish before his metamorphosis or rebirth.36

Note that the Hero Twin is portrayed as a baby when delivered. A Maya logograph, unen, translates as “baby” (see figure 13). The Maya visualized this birthing position in several ways: as a newborn baby, a woman giving birth, or a deceased individual being reborn. The latter would apply to the Hero Twin in figure 12. The most famous portrayal of this position is on the sarcophagus lid of King K’inich Janaab Pakal in Palenque, Chiapas, Mexico (see figure 14). The deceased is transformed into the divine Maize god, who resurrects with the World Tree rising from or behind him.37

Another incident of fish and man may be significant at El Tajin, Veracruz. A stone called Panel 5 in the South Ballcourt depicts a man sitting in a temple over the waters of the underworld. He has a fish attached to his head resembling a whole fish-helmet, leaving only the features of his face showing. Taube called him a “fish-man.” Above the temple on the roof sits a deity with a large solar panel over his abdomen.38 The “fish-man” will be reborn as is indicated by the symbols surrounding him. Deduced from their mythology, Taube proposed the “fish-man” probably represents a former race of fish-men that had a rebirth resulting in the creation of mankind.39

Some Mesoamerican religious traditions influenced the American Southwest. For example, the Tewa, a linguistic Pueblo group, associated their ancestors with a lake of origin named patowa, translating as “fish-people.”40 In a Classic Mimbres bowl from the Pueblo Indians, the central figure is a man depicted in a birthing or hocker position, even though he was a male (see figure 1541). This position can also be seen in figure 5. The fish behind the man’s head in the Mimbres bowl indicates he is deceased.42 The stars above and below designate where his soul is destined to go in the heavens.

It should be noted there were many other interactions between the American Southwest and Mesoamerica.43 A web of Mesoamerican iconography exists among the southwest Indians, even to this day. For example, symbolism and goods were filtered into the southwest such as ballcourts, pyrite mirror, and copper bells.44 This was due to regional trade networks with Mesoamerica. Perhaps the most significant find were macaws (parrots) from Mexico and Central America, hundreds of miles away. The Hopi today have a Parrot Clan. Turquoise was one of the exchange items prized by Mesoamericans, as this bright colored stone was used for jewelry by high-ranking individuals and rulers. Therefore, the fish symbolism evident in figure 15 is appropriate.

We see corresponding symbolism of the fish to death and rebirth in Egypt. The tomb mural at Deir el-Medinah, Thebes, depicts a fish in the process of being embalmed by Anubis (figure 16).45 Buffie Johnson postulates that the deceased, portrayed as a fish, should be considered as winding its way through the embryonic waters of the Underworld before its rebirth at dawn.46 It may be significant that the Egyptian hieroglyph for a man’s body or corpse contains a fish sign: XA is fish and XAy.t is the word for corpse47 (see figure 17). Considering the mural in Thebes with a bier having a fish, the word for body or corpse containing a fish, and the belief that the deceased swim symbolically in the waters as fish before their resurrection,48 This concept may parallel fish symbolism held by many people in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica.

Egyptian Connection and Joseph’s Sons

Hugh Nibley was a supporter of Lehi’s family travelling to Egypt with wares from their craft of working with metals. He termed them “caravaneers,” while John Tvedtnes wrote a rebuttal to Nibley’s theory, calling his article “Was Lehi a Caravaneer?”49 Both arguments are presented by Tvedtnes in his work. Tvedtnes demonstrated that Lehi’s family were farmers, as they were very familiar with seeds of every kind (1 Nephi 8:1; 1 Nephi 16:11). However, Lehi’s son Nephi was most likely a metallurgist (1 Nephi 17:9–16; 2 Nephi 5:14), which skill he may have learned from his father.

We know the Book of Mormon was written in what the prophet Mormon called Reformed Egyptian (Mormon 9:32). It is certain they knew how to read Egyptian, inasmuch as the brass plates formerly held by Laban were written in Egyptian (Mosiah 1:3–4). Even before Nephi obtained the brass plates, he wrote, “And behold, it is wisdom in God that we should obtain these records, that we may preserve unto our children the language of our fathers” (1 Nephi 3:19). Their knowledge of Egyptian writing may be the result of Lehi’s family travelling to Egypt, or perhaps learning it from merchants visiting from Egypt, or another reason that was not explained in the Book of Mormon. This is not to say that fish traditions were known as a result of Lehi’s family understanding Egyptian, but it does remain a possibility. Can you learn a foreign country’s language without knowing some of their traditions? Whether it is a valid point for Lehi’s family being familiar with Egyptian traditions, it is an interesting supposition to note the symbol of a fish in Egyptian may sometimes have a nearly identical meaning of some fish in Mesoamerican artistic expressions.

A verse in Habakkuk 1:14 refers to men and fish, and reads that the Lord “makes men as fish of the sea.” Edward Bleiberg, curator for the Brooklyn Museum, expressed that fish not only symbolized fertility and birth, but carving a fish on a gravestone represented the hope for rebirth in the next life50 (see figure 1851). There is evidence the fish is symbolically related to a people in Israel, particularly the lineage of Joseph’s sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. The Encyclopedia of Jewish Symbols explains this concept.52 While in Egypt, Jacob blessed Joseph’s two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, when he said, “Let them multiply in the midst of the earth.” In Hebrew, the word multiply is yidgu and is derived from fish, dägim. Jewish rabbis believe this is deduced from the fact that their progeny would multiply like fertile fish and be protected as the sea protects this species. Ephraim and Manasseh, therefore, have as a symbol—the fish.

Years after the blessing of Ephraim and Manasseh by Jacob, King Manasseh built one of Jerusalem’s main entrances called the Fish Gate (2 Chronicles 33:14). Zephaniah prophesied a cry would come from the Fish Gate at the end of times (Zephaniah 1:10), which is apparently a type of the Second Coming. Many Jewish homes have murals containing fish, and Louis Ginzberg discusses standards carried by each of the tribes of Israel, designating their colors, inscriptions, and figures worked on each of them. On Ephraim’s standard, Ginzberg commented this particular standard was styled in the form of a fish.53 Ishmael’s family in the Book of Mormon was invited by Lehi to join with their group to flee from Jerusalem, which they accepted (1 Nephi 7). The daughters of Ishmael married Lehi’s sons. Lehi’s forefathers were of the lineage of Manasseh and Ishmael’s family the lineage of Ephraim.54 Consequently, both lines are associated with the sign of the fish.

As has been demonstrated, fish are associated with Ephraim and Manasseh, which is a much stronger connection on Stela 5, Izapa, than the fish of the Popol Vuh. Of the twelve tribes in Israel, Joseph is the one selected for his descendants to belong to the lineages associated with the fish.

Lehi and Sariah were of the tribe of Manasseh, and they are in a direct line of the fish hanging on the celestial band of Stela 5, Izapa, representing their rebirth/resurrection and immortality. The evidence presented here is not just speculation, but a very strong possibility that Stela 5, Izapa, is a distant remembrance of Lehi’s dream of the Tree of Life. Keith H. Meservy wrote:

The distillation of a wise idea into a succinct, well-expressed form made it easy to remember; if it were easier to remember it would be easier to pass from one generation to another. And this was the intent—to pass wisdom from the parent to the child.55

Diane E. Wirth is an independent researcher specializing in Mesoamerican art history and iconography, the latter interpreting symbols in art and antiquities. Her primary works include: Weaving Golden Threads: Early Christianity and its Restoration (2015); Decoding Ancient America: A Guide to the Archaeology of the Book of Mormon (2007); and A Challenge to the Critics: Scholarly Evidences of the Book of Mormon (1986). A graduate of Brigham Young University, she has given presentations at symposiums and conferences which include: The Atlantic Conference, St. Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia (2008); Book of Mormon Archaeological Forum, Utah (2003, 2004, 2005, 2008, 2012); The Aesthetics of Enchantment sponsored by The American Society of Phenomenology, Aesthetics & Fine Arts, Harvard Divinity School (1998); The Ancient American Western Conference, Utah (1997); New England Antiquities Research Association, Massachusetts and New Hampshire (1992, 1993); and Society of Early Historic Archaeology, Brigham Young University (1977, 1979, 1987, 1990).

1 . For Garth Norman’s tracing-Illustration and photographs of Stela 5, Izapa, see V. Garth Norman, Izapa Sculpture, Part 2, Text, Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation, No. 30 (Provo, UT: New World Archaeological Foundation, Brigham Young University, 1976), 165, 237–39.

2 . See Mark Mudge, et al., “Principles and Practices of Robust Photography-Based Digital Imaging Techniques for Museums,” in VAST 2010: The 11th International Symposium on Virtual Reality, Archaeology and Cultural Heritage, ed. A. Artusi et al. (Goslar, DE: Eurographics Association, 2010), 27, repository
.si.edu/handle/10088/67710.

3 . See, for example, James Miles, et al., “New applications of photogrammetry and reflectance transformation imaging to an Easter Island statue,” Antiquity 88, no 340 (June 2014): 596–605, researchgate.net/publication/283313241
_New_applications_of_photogrammetry_and_reflectance_transformation_imaging_to_an_Easter_Island_statue; and Barbara A. Purdy, et al., “Earliest art in the Americas: incised image of a proboscidean on a mineralized extinct animal bone from Vero Beach, Florida,” Journal of Archaeological Science 38, no. 11 (2011): 2908–13, sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii
/S0305440311001828.

4 . Garth Norman and Jason Jones, “Advanced 3D Imaging for Recovery of Weathered Stone Sculpture at Izapa, Mexico,” (presentation, 79th Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archaeology, Austin, Texas, 23–27 April 2014). For details on the work, see Atzlander, “Reflective Transformation Imaging Reveals the Hidden Past at Izapa,” YouTube video, 1:12:29, 16 December 2023, youtube.com/watch?v=rXnG4o_UnV0.

5 . Supplied from Garth Norman’s widow, Cheryl Norman, on 13 August 2022.

6 . Garth Norman personally gave permission to use his 1976 illustration of Stela 5, Izapa, to Diane Wirth. The source for figure 1 is Norman, Izapa Sculpture, Part 2, Text, Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation, No. 30, 165.

7 . Elizabeth A. Newsome, Trees of Paradise and Pillars of the World (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001), 192.

8 . Tim Laughton, “Izapa: A Preclassic Codex in Stone,” Indiana Journal of Hispanic Literatures, Mexican Codices and Archaeology 13 (Fall 1998): 18.

9 . Stelae 3 and 19 from La Venta, Tabasco, Mexico, are also fine examples of the Olmec using Breath Beads.

10 . See illustration of lineage founder with bead on nose in Linda Schele and Peter Mathews, The Code of Kings: the Language of Seven Sacred Maya Temples and Tombs (New York: Scribner, 1998), 134.

11 . Karl A. Taube, “The Symbolism of Jade in Classic Maya Religion,” Ancient Mesoamerica 16 (2005): 47.

12 . Allen J. Christenson, Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Maya (New York: O Books, 2003), 66n43.

13 . M. Wells Jakeman, “Izapa Stela 5 and the Book of Mormon” The Instructor 96, no. 12, December 1961, 410–11, 429. Many other theories, but not all, by Jakeman are now considered obsolete.

14 . Douglas Gillette, The Shaman’s Secret: The Lost Resurrection Teachings of the Ancient Maya (New York: Bantam Books, 1997), 98–99.

15 . Mary Miller and Karl Taube, The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya (New York: Thames & Hudson, 1993), 127–28.

16 . Lewis Spence, The Gods of Mexico (New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1923), 151, archive.org/details/godsofmexico00spen/page/150/mode/2up.

17 . Eduard Seler, Codex Vaticanus B, trans. A. H. Keane (Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, 1902–1903), 132, archive.org/details/bub_gb_5W16AAAAMAAJ
/page/n139/mode/2up.

18 . Alfred Percival Maudslay, Biologia Centrali-Americana, or, Contributions to the knowledge of the fauna and flora of Mexico and Central America, vol. 1 (London: R. H. Porter and Dullau & Co., 1889–1902), pl. 85.

19 . Barbara Tedlock, Time and the Highland Maya (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1982), 140.

20 . Mary Ellen Miller, Maya Art and Architecture (London: Thames & Hudson, 1999), 53.

21 . Eduard Seler, Codex Vaticanus B, trans. A. H. Keane (Berlin, 1902), 23, 24, archive.org/details/bub_gb_5W16AAAAMAAJ/page/n29/mode/2up.

22 . Norman, Izapa Sculpture, Part 2, 109.

23 . Karl A. Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin: The Iconography and Architecture of Emergence Mythology in Mesoamerica and the American Southwest,” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 12 (Autumn 1986): 52–56.

24 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 53.

25 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 76.

26 . Andrea Stone and Marc Zender, Reading Maya Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Maya Painting and Sculpture (NY: Thames & Hudson, 2011), 167.

27 . Maya Stela 24, Naranjo, Guatemala, photo taken 12 June 1914 by an unknown photographer, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MA_D367_Maya
_stela_24,_Naranjo,_Guatemala.jpg.

28 . J. Eric S. Thompson, Maya Hieroglyphic Writing, pub. 589 (Washington, DC: Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1950), 133.

29 . The drawing in figure 10 is based on the burnished and painted clay piece known as “Anciano emergiendo del caracol” (“Old Man Emerging from a Shell”) at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, with a photo available at “The Photographs of Jorge Pérez de Lara,” Mesoweb, n.d., mesoweb.com
/features/jpl/53.html.

30 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 53.

31 . Nicholas M. Hellmuth, Monster und Menschen in der Kaya-Kunst (Austria: Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt, 1987), 109.

32 . Richard H. Wilkinson, Reading Egyptian Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Egyptian Painting and Sculpture (New York: Thames & Hudson, 1992), 111.

33 . Christenson, Popol Vuh, 37, 39.

34 . Based on a figure in Dorie Reents-Budet, Painting the Maya Universe: Royal Ceramics of the Classic Period (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), 274.

35 . Christenson, Popol Vuh, 120n254.

36 . Reents-Budet, Painting the Maya Universe, 274.

37 . Maize (corn) was considered the most valued vegetation for food in Mesoamerica. It was born from a seed, lived, and died. It was constantly reborn with each new crop. Because of the prominence of maize in their society, maize was considered divine. Archaeologists call him the Maize God.

38 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 55.

39 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 56.

40 . Alfonso Ortiz, The Tewa World: Space, Time, Being, and Becoming in a Pueblo Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969), 79–80, 163–64.

41 . Marc Thompson, “PreColumbian Venus,” in Religion in the Prehispanic Southwest, ed. Christine S. Vanpool, Todd L. Vanpool, and David A. Phillips Jr. (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2006), 175.

42 . Marc Thompson, “The Evolution and Dissemination of Mimbres Iconography” in Kachinas in the Pueblo World, ed. Polly Schaafsma (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1994), 102, as cited in Thompson, “PreColumbian Venus,” 173.

43 . Taube, “The Teotihuacan Cave of Origin,” 71.

44 . Mark L. Chenault and John M. Lindly, “Guanacos, Symbolism, and Religion during the Hohokam Preclassic,” in Religion in the Prehispanic Southwest, ed. Christine S. Vanpool, Todd L. Vanpool, and David A. Phillips Jr. (Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2006), 129.

45 . See “Khabekhnet mummified as abdw-fish,” painting of his tomb TT2, Deir El Medina, Western Thebes, Egypt. Image provided by Wikimedia Commons as file “Khabekhnet as abdw.jpg,” 26 June 2010, commons.wikimedia.org
/wiki/File:Khabekhnet_as_abdw.jpg.

46 . Buffie Johnson, Lady of the Beasts: Ancient Insights of the Goddess and her Sacred Animals (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1990), 252–54.

47 . Personal communication from John Gee to Diane Wirth, 15 December 1999.

48 . Erik Hornung, The Valley of the Kings: Horizon of Eternity (New York: Timken Publishers, 1990), 90.

49 . John A. Tvedtnes, “Was Lehi a Caravaneer?,” in The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Salt Lake City: Cornerstone, 1999), 96–98.

50 . Edward Bleiberg, Tree of Paradise: Jewish Mosaics from the Roman Empire (Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum, 2005), 27.

51 . Image of fish on a tombstone in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Josefov, the former Jewish ghetto in the old town of Prague. Photographed by Øyvind Holmstad, 30 April 2014, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Prague
_Praha_2014_Holmstad_Fisk_Den_j%C3%B8diske_gravlund_i_Josefov
.jpg.

52 . Ellen Frankel and Betsy Patkin Teutech, The Encyclopedia of Jewish Symbols (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1992), 55.

53 . Louis J. Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, vol. 3 (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1939), 234.

54 . Erastus Snow wrote that Joseph Smith identified Ishmael as the lineage of Ephraim, Journal of Discourses 23 (6 May 1882), 184.

55 . Keith H. Meservy, “How did proverbs come to be—and how were they used in olden times?,” Ensign, October 1973, 60.

Figure 2. Fish with breath beads.

Figure 3. Lineage founder K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’, Altar Q, Copan, Honduras. (Drawing by the author after Schele and Mathews, The Code of Kings, 134.)

Figure 4. Altar O, Copan, Honduras. (Drawing by the author after Maudslay, Biologia Centrali-Americana, vol. 1, pl. 85.)

Figure 6. Child descends for birth (with emphasis), Stela 10, Izapa.
(Drawing by the author after Norman, Izapa Sculpture, Part 2, 109.)

Figure 5. Child descends to its mother, who gives birth. (Drawing by the author after Codex Borbonicus.)

Figure 7. Shark-fish head and shell on apron of a woman, stela 24, Naranjo, Guatemala. (Drawing by the author.)

Figure 8. Stela 24, Naranjo, Guatemala. (Photograph from Wikimedia Commons.)

Figure 10. Aged man in shell of rebirth, Uaxactun, Guatemala.
(Drawing by the author.)

Figure 9. Man emerges from shell. (Drawing by the author after Dresden Codex.)

Figure 13. Maya Hieroglyph unen, translated as “baby.”

Figure 14. Sarcophagus lid of Kinich Janaab Pakal, Palenque, Chiapas, Mexico. (Drawing by Tom Weller. Permission granted for use of this illustration.)

Figure 15. Fish over the deceased in Mimbres bowl. (Drawing by the author after photograph in Thompson, “Pre-Columbian Venus,” 175.)

Figure 16. Fish as mummy, Thebes, Deir el-Medinah, Tomb of Kha’bekhet #2, (Drawing by the author after photograph from Wikimedia Commons.)

Figure 17. Egyptian hieroglyph for “body” or “corpse.”

Figure 18. Example of tombstone with fish in the Old Jewish Cemetery
in Prague, Czech Republic. (Photograph from Wikimedia Commons.)

Die Prophezeiung Henochs: Some Observations on Section 36 in the German Edition of the Community of Christ Doctrine and Covenants

Adam O. Stokes

Abstract: Multiple translations of the Doctrine and Covenants into German have been produced over the past century and a half. This essay looks at a more recent example of these translations as found in the Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse published electronically by the Community of Christ. Focusing on Community of Christ Doctrine and Covenants 36, the revelation of Zion to Enoch, the essay compares and contrasts the German text with its Vorlage. It also notes the ways in which the German translation attempts to “de-problematize” its source material, particularly in regard to its references to blackness and the racial implications of such references. The author argues that this effort resolves some issues while creating others.

There exists an extensive history of translating the Doctrine and Covenants into various languages, particularly into German. The first German translation was completed by Heinrich Carlos Ferdinand Eyring in 1876 for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.1 Several later German editions of the scripture were published by the Utah-based Church in the twentieth century including a very limited printing from the 1920s and a later printing in the 1960s that included a German translation of the Pearl of Great Price. The German versions of the standard works published in 1981 through 2013 saw extensive revisions to the grammar and syntax contained in previous editions to better conform with modern developments in the language over its immediate pre-World War II predecessor.2

The most recent example of a German Doctrine and Covenants comes, however, not from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints but from the Community of Christ. An exclusively digital edition sold through Amazon, Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse (literally, the Book of Teaching and Covenants), is one of several electronic editions of the scriptures published by the Community of Christ in the past decade.3 Released in 2019, Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse contains German translations of all of the revelations found in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine and Covenants as well as those unique to the Community of Christ as given by its various presidents. This includes the most recent revelation, CC D&C 165,4 given by the current President of the Community of Christ, Stephen Veazey, in 2016.

Most interesting is the German rendering of CC D&C 36, the revelation to Enoch regarding Zion. This section is not a part of the Doctrine and Covenants accepted by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It is, however, found in the Pearl of Great Price as Moses 7 and in the Inspired Version/Joseph Smith Translation—the official Bible translation used by the Community of Christ—as Genesis 7. This material, while foundational to Restoration theology in its emphasis on Zion as a spiritual utopia, is in some respects controversial due to its reference to the children of Cain as “black” and as being excluded from Enoch’s preaching.5 Concerning this issue, there exists considerable divergence between Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse and its English source text. Table 1 provides two examples of this divergence.

Table 1. Comparison of English, German, and English translations.

English Edition

German Edition

English Translation of German Edition

And there was blackness come upon all the children of Cainan, that they were despised among all people. (CC D&C 361i)

Verderbtheit soll über die Kinder Kenans kommen und sie sollen von allen Völkern verachtet werden.

Depravity should come over the children of Cainan and they shall be scorned by all people.

And the Lord said unto Enoch, Behold mine abode forever. And Enoch also beheld the residue of the people which were the sons of Adam, and they were a mixture of all the seed of Adam, save it were the seed of Cain; for the seed of Cain were black, and had not place among them. (CC D&C 36:4)

Und der Herr sprach zu Henoch, sieh meinen Wohnort für alle Ewigkeit. Henoch sah auch den Rest des Volkes, welche der Menschen Kinder waren und sie waren eine Mischung allen Samens der Menschenkinder; mit Ausnahme des Samens Kains, denn der Same Kains war böse und hatte keine Wohnstatt unter ihnen.

And the Lord spoke to Enoch, see my dwelling for all eternity. Enoch also saw the rest of the people which were humanity’s children and they were a mixture of all the seed of the children of men with the exception of the seed of Cain, because the seed of Cain were bad/wicked and had no dwelling among them.

As can be seen from the comparison in table 1, the racial implications presented in the original English text of CC D&C 36 with the terms “black” and “blackness” used in reference to the children of Cain have been completely removed in the recent German translation. In both examples, racial identification has been replaced with spiritual identification. The children of Cain are described as spiritually corrupt and wicked, and when depicted in this manner, the reader finds justification for their exclusion from Enoch’s preaching and the larger community of Zion. Like the Lamanites and Nephites of the Book of Mormon, the children of Cain have rejected God’s laws and turned to violence (CC D&C 36:1g), with the result that God has rejected them and literally brought upon them “depravity” (Verderbtheit).

The rendering of CC D&C 36:1i and 36:4 in Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse is not surprising given the concerns raised within the Community of Christ in recent decades regarding both the content of Restoration scriptures and their history of interpretation. One sees this most notably with the Community of Christ’s attitude toward and treatment of the Book of Mormon in the twenty-first century. Former Community of Christ President W. Grant McMurray deemed the text as racially problematic in the early 2000s. His decision was followed several years later by his successor, President Veazey, explicitly rejecting the long-standing view that the Book of Mormon was divinely inspired.6 The Community of Christ appears to have taken a slightly different approach towards the Doctrine and Covenants. Instead of rejecting its divinity, certain language in its content, as seen in CC D&C 36, has been changed to make it less racially problematic.7

The German translation complements other passages in the Restoration corpus while at the same time remaining problematic. Regarding its relation to other Restoration scriptures, CC D&C 36 in Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse follows certain trends in the Book of Mormon where the Lamanite curse is equated not with physical pigmentation but with spiritual darkness/blackness. I have proposed elsewhere that 2 Nephi 30:6 (2 Nephi 12:84 in the Community of Christ Book of Mormon) should be taken into account when interpreting and understanding other references to a “blackness” curse in the Book of Mormon.8 That verse speaks of Lehi’s descendants who one day would accept the blessings of the Gospel:

And then shall they rejoice; for they shall know that it is a blessing unto them from the hand of God; and their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes; and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a pure and a delightsome people. (2 Nephi 30:6)

Based on this argument, the curse refers to spiritual separation and blindness and not to skin color. In this respect, it can be argued that Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse retains a precedent already established in the Restoration canon in its rendering of certain phrases here in CC D&C 36.

On the other hand, one might argue that the treatment of CC D&C 36 in the German translation, by nature of the significant changes made to the text, does not adequately or effectively address the racial features of Enoch’s revelation. In other words, by eliminating racial language from the text, Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse does disservice to readers, particularly those for whom CC D&C 36 (or the related text in the Book of Moses) is sacred and divine scripture, who are struggling with the racial elements and features of the revelation. To some extent, it can be said that the German translation is itself problematic in that it assumes, perhaps unintentionally, an interpretation of “blackness” as synonymous with depravity and wickedness and hence comes full circle back to the troublesome reception history of CC D&C 36.

The German edition of the Community of Christ Doctrine and Covenants is one example of the rich tradition of translating Restoration scriptures into non-English languages. The theological implications of these translations and their consequences have often received little attention from scholars. This article has attempted to analyze one example of such consequences as seen in the German rendering of CC D&C 36. While this rendering deliberately attempts to resolve the racial language found in the original English, it is still troublesome in other respects. However, Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse indicates an awareness of the problematic reception history of the Enoch material and a deliberate effort to address those issues. The desire to make such adjustments is understandable, but may not do justice to the text nor fulfill the duty to provide an accurate translation, even when the text is problematic. Indeed, it is even possible for a well-intended adjustment to exacerbate the apparent problem that the translator sought to resolve.

Adam Oliver Stokes has degrees in religion from Duke University and Yale Divinity School. His work has been featured in numerous publications, including BYU Studies Quarterly and the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies. He is the author of Perspectives on the Old Testament: Diverse Approaches from Ancient to Modern Times and The Latin Scrolls: Selections from the Five Megilloth Translated from the Latin Vulgate, both published by Cognella Academic Press. For over a decade he has taught Old Testament at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia and currently teaches high school Latin in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. He is, additionally, an ordained Apostle and Elder in The Church of Jesus Christ with the Elijah Message—The Assured Way of the Lord.

1. 1 . “Heinrich Carlos Ferdinand Eyring,” Church History Biographical Database, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/henry-eyring-1835?lang=eng&timelineTab=missionary
-activity. The 1876 German translation is available online: Joseph Smith, Das Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse der Kirche Jesu Christi der Heiligen der letzten Tage : zusammengestellt aus den Offenbarungen Gottes, trans. Heinrich Eyring (Bern, CHE: J. U. Studi, 1876), archive.org/details/bub_gb_fTFOAAAAYAAJ.

2. 2 . To cite one of many examples, in the 1963 Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints edition of the Pearl of Great Price in German (Die köstliche Perle), reprinted from the 1921 version, Moses 4:1 reads, “Und ich, Gott der Herr, redete zu Moses und sagte.” In the most recent Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints German edition, published in 2003, the archaic preterite forms (redete and sagte) have been removed so that it reads, “Und ich, der Herr, Gott, sprach zu Mose, namlich.” See Die köstliche Perle: Eine Auswahl aus den Offenbarungen, Ubersetzungen und Schilderungen Joseph Smiths (Frankfurt: Kirche Jesu Christi der Heiligen der Letzen Tage, 1963) and Das Buch Mormon, Lehre und Bündnisse, Die köstliche Perle (Frankfurt am Main: Der Kirche Jesu Christi der Heiligen der Letzen Tage, 2003).

3. 3 . Gemeinschaft Christi, Buch der Lehre und Bündnisse (Independence, MO: Herald Publishing, 2019). The listing on Amazon is at amazon.com/Lehre
-B%C3%BCndnisse-German-Community-Christ-ebook/dp/B07SNGCBPB/.

4. 4 . To avoid potential confusion, I reference citations from the Community of Christ Doctrine and Covenants as “CC D&C” within this paper.

5. 5 . See Adam O. Stokes, “The People of Canaan: A New Reading of Moses 7,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 47 (2021): 159–80, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-people-of-canaan-a-new-reading-of
-moses-7/.

6. 6 . Andrew M. Shields, “Official Minutes of Business Session, Wednesday March 28, 2007,” in 2007 World Conference Thursday Bulletin, Community of Christ, 29 March 2007.

7. 7 . In contrast to its treatment of the Book of Mormon, a wholescale rejection of the Doctrine and Covenants as sacred scripture is unlikely in the Community of Christ given that church presidents continually add to its revelations, the most recent of these being Section 165 in 2013.

8. 8 . Adam O. Stokes, “‘Skin’ or ‘Scales’ of Blackness? Semitic Context as Interpretive Aid for 2 Nephi 4:35 (LDS 5:21),” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 27 (2018): 278–89, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol27/iss1/15/.

“Behold, I Went to Hunt Beasts in the Forest”: An Addendum on Enos, Esau, and the Symbolic Geography of Seir

Matthew L. Bowen

Abstract: Enos’s use of the onomastic wordplay in the Jacob and Esau cycle enables him to meaningfully allude to the symbolic geography of those stories and incorporate it into his New World setting (e.g., allusions to the river Jabbok and Peniel/Penuel, the site of Jacob’s “wrestle” with the divine “man”). A third instance of this type of allusion occurs with Enos’s recollection that he “went to hunt beasts in the forest[s]” (Enos 1:3), which appears to subtly allude to Mount Seir, the forested hill country in the land of Edom inhabited by Esau and his descendants.

Three earlier studies, one by John Tvedtnes and Matthew Roper and two of my own, have attempted to detail the subtle and intricate ways in which Enos “likened” the Jacob-Esau cycle to himself in writing his autobiography.1 Tvedtnes and Roper demonstrated clear intertextual links between the Jacob-Esau cycle and Enos’s writings. My studies focused more specifically on Enos’s autobiographical adaptations of Hebrew names and words. For example, I examined “wrestle” (wayyēʾābēq, Genesis 32:24) as wordplay on the name Jacob (yaʿăqōb), the name of the patriarch and Enos’s own father, and the river Jabbok (yabbōq), near the site of Jacob’s “wrestle.” Also, I examined Enos’s use of his own name ʾĕnôš (“man”) as a poetic2 synonym of, and allusion to, the divine “man” (ʾîš) who “wrestled” with Jacob. I further suggested Enos, as “man,” echoes the God and “men” (ʾănāšîm) with whom Jacob “struggled” or “had power” (Genesis 32:28). Notably, ʾănāšîm is the common plural of both ʾîš and ʾĕnôš. Moreover, I noted that Enos as “man,” identifies him with both Jacob and Esau who are both characterized as an ʾîš of starkly contrasting kinds (see also further below). What follows here will be a short addendum to that previous work.

Enos, the son of Jacob, likens his autobiography to the story of his patriarchal ancestor Jacob and Jacob’s brother Esau in telling how he received the power of the atonement of Jesus Christ into his life (Enos 1:1–8). He then adds how he later procured covenant blessings and promises for his kindred (the Nephites, Enos 1:9–10) and ultimately for his estranged “brethren,” the Lamanites, who had become his enemies (Enos 1:11–18). Just as he “wrestled” and prayed for his own soul, he “struggled” for his kindred and his estranged brothers (Enos 1:10–11, 14).

Again, Enos, as a poetic Hebrew name, transparently denotes “man.” Enos introduces himself in his autobiography with the statement that his father was a “just man,” imitating the style of Nephi’s autobiographical self-introduction.3 He then recalls having a “wrestle . . . before God” (Enos 1:2), which recalls the mysterious “man” from Genesis 32 who “wrestled” Jacob.

In likening his ancestor Jacob’s “wrestle” at Peniel to himself, Enos (“man”) indicates that the “man”4 with whom he wrestles is himself. Perhaps, too, it suggests that the divine “man” ultimately prevails over the carnal natural “man.” It should also be remembered that the divine “man” of Genesis was the subject of the verb “wrestled” (wayyēʾābēq, Genesis 32:34), and Enos “had” the wrestle in Enos 1:2. Enos’s ancestor Jacob obtained the new name, Israel (“Let El contend” or “Let God prevail”), because he “ha[d] . . . power” or “had struggled [śāritā] with God and with men, and ha[d] prevailed” (Genesis 32:32). Jacob had “wrestled” and “struggled” with Esau, Laban, the divine “man,” and himself, but only truly “prevailed” when he “let God prevail.”5

In using the phrase “the wrestle which I had before God” (Enos 1:2), Jacob’s descendant, Enos, invokes the imagery of Genesis 32:24 and recreates wordplay that alludes to two geographical locations within the Jacob-Esau story: the river Jabbok (yabbōq), which sounds like the name Jacob (yaʿăqōb) and the word for “wrestle” (wayyēʾābēq), and Peniel/Penuel (“face of El”). The expression “before God”—lipnê ʾēl/lipnê ʾĕlōhîm—literally means “to the face of God.”6

In this research note, I will highlight a third instance in which Enos appears to make an additional subtle wordplay with a geographical reference within the Jacob-Esau story: in stating that he “went to hunt beasts in the forest[s],”7 Enos seemingly alludes to Seir, the forested interior of Edom, the land associated with Esau the hunter and his descendants.8 If so, Enos invokes the symbolic geography of Seir and its forested land as the home of Esau, who, like Enos later, was a famished hunter.

Esau: A Man Who Knows Hunting
and a Man of Seir/the Forest

Early in the narrative, the narrator sharply contrasts Esau and Jacob: “And the boys grew: and Esau was a cunning hunter [ʾîš yōdeaʿ ṣayid, a man knowing how to hunt], a man of the field [ʾîš śādeh]; and Jacob was a plain man [ʾîš tām], dwelling in tents” (Genesis 25:27). Later in the narrative, as Jacob prepares to obtain his father’s blessing (in accordance with the birthright that he has already obtained from Esau), he further establishes the contrast between Esau and himself. In this passage, the similar phrase ʾîš ḥālāq is translated “smooth man”: “And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man [ʾîš śāʿir], and I am a smooth man [ʾîš ḥālāq]” (Genesis 27:11). The phrase ʾîš śāʿir (“hairy man,” “goat-like man,” “man of Seir,” or “man of [forest] overgrowth”) directly plays on the toponym Seir, the land that will be inhabited by Esau and his descendants. (The two descriptions of Jacob as an ʾîš tām and ʾîš ḥālāq are something of a triple entendre: he is at once a simple man who dwells in a tent, a smooth man, and a man of integrity9 in contrast to his brother who is a rugged, goat-like man of the forest10).

The earlier geographical functions of the allusions in the narrative become clear in Genesis 32 as the narrative hastens to Jacob’s climactic “wrestle” with the divine “man” (ʾîš): “And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother unto the land of Seir [śēʿir], the country [field] of Edom [śĕdēh ʾĕdôm]” (Genesis 32:3). Translations like the KJV often obscure what the biblical writer is doing here. The narrator mentions Seir (śēʿir) and the field of Edom (śĕdēh ʾĕdôm). The reader, at this point in the narrative, will recall that Esau is the “man of Seir/the forest” (ʾîš śāʿir, Genesis 27:11) and “man of the field” (ʾîš śādeh, Genesis 25:27) who sold his birthright for “red” lentil stew (hāʾādōm hāʾādōm)—i.e., for Edom (ʾĕdôm).

The Song of Deborah (Judges 5) is a very ancient Hebrew poem. It describes a theophany of Yahweh (Jehovah) coming from Seir in the land of Edom: “Lord, when thou wentest out of Seir [miśśēʿir], when thou marchedst out of the field of Edom [miśśĕdēh ʾĕdôm], the earth trembled, and the heavens dropped, the clouds also dropped water” (Judges 5:4). For Jacob, Esau’s coming from Seir was something like a theophany: “I have seen thy face [pānêkā], as though I had seen the face of God, and thou wast pleased with me” (Genesis 33:10). In other words, Esau (ʿēśāw) the brother and “man” before whom Jacob bowed after his “wrestle” with the divine “man” was like Enos’s “Maker” (ʿōśê).11 He was the brother-deity “before” (lipnê)12 whom Enos “wrestled” and “kneeled”—i.e., Jesus Christ. The narrator adds, “So Esau returned that day on his way unto Seir” (Genesis 33:16).

Thomas Römer writes,

In Judges 5:4 Yhwh comes from the territory of Edom, which is put in parallel to Seir. The Hebrew word śēʿir means “hairy,” and when it is used as a geographic term, it refers to the interior territory of Edom, which was forested anciently. More particularly, Seir refers to the mountain that extends from Wadi el Ḥesa (the Zered of the Bible), marking the border with Moab, down to the gulf of Aqaba (Eilat), whereas “Edom” itself may designate a much larger territory covering a large part of the area south of the Negev.13

Lexicographers and Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner include the suggestion that Semitic “*šaʿar means thicket, or small wooded region.”14 All of the foregoing prepares us to appreciate the skill with which Enos adapts the onomastic fabric of the Jacob-Esau narrative, including his allusion to the rugged forested land of Seir, which becomes the home of Esau, to whom Enos draws distinctive autobiographical parallels.15

“I Went to Hunt Beasts in the Forest”: Enos, the Spiritually Famished Hunter and “Man” of the Forest

Enos, like Jacob his father, was a “wanderer,” exiled with his family from their homeland (Jerusalem), “born in tribulation . . . and hated of [his Lamanite] brethren” (compare Jacob 7:24). Like Esau, he was a famished hunter (compare Enos 1:4 with Genesis 25:27). Enos’s statement that his “soul hungered” can be understood both as physical, spiritual, or both since Hebrew nepeš (“soul”) as the “centre and transmitter of feelings and perceptions” can also denote “a longing, desire” or even to have physical “craving for something.”16 However, in the narrative context, Enos’s hunger was, above all, spiritual—a hunger of the inner man (compare Ephesians 3:16 and Moses 6:65). Like Jacob, he would not cease from his “wrestle” without obtaining a blessing (cf. Genesis 32:26). Enos records, “Behold, I went to hunt beasts in the forest, and I remembered the words which I had often heard my father speak concerning eternal life and the joy of the saints, and the words of my father sunk deep into my heart” (Enos 1:3).17 Although living in the highlands of the land of Nephi, Enos’s “hunting beasts” places him in the symbolic geography of Esau—the forested land of “Seir,” the rugged overgrowth—engaging in the activity of Esau: hunting.

The narrator of Genesis states that when “Esau came from the field [min-haśśādeh] . . . he was faint” with physical hunger strong enough to overpower any value he placed on his birthright (Genesis 25:28–29; cf. when Esau “came in from his hunting [miṣṣêdô]” in Genesis 27:30). In contrast, Enos states that while he “went to hunt beasts in the forest,” his “soul hungered” (Enos 1:3–4), sufficient to be “blessed” in the way that his ancestor Jacob was “blessed” (compare Enos 1:5–8 with Genesis 27:1–30, 41; 32:26, 29). Like Esau, Enos was a “man of the forest”—or, “man of Seir” (cf. Genesis 27:11)—but he did not remain such. He was transformed into a new man and “made . . . whole” through the Atonement of Jesus Christ (see Enos 1:5–8).

Conclusion

Enos’s use of the Jacob-Esau cycle, as detailed here and in previous studies, demonstrates how closely ancient Israelite prophets read the writings of their predecessors and how much they cherished them. The story of Jacob and Esau was Enos’s story, though he lived half a world away from the land promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Enos had his own Jabbok, Peniel, and Seir.

If the observations here are valid, we can again discern Enos’s skillful use of the onomastic wordplay of Genesis, even down to the symbolic geography and meaning of Seir. This masterful use of the biblical narrative’s Hebrew elements stands as strong evidence of the book of Enos (and more broadly of the Book of Mormon) as ancient literature, rather than modern. As an adaptation of parts of the Jacob-Esau cycle, Enos’s short autobiography is one of the finest examples of “scripture’s use of scripture” in existence.

Matthew L. Bowen was raised in Orem, Utah, and graduated from Brigham Young University. He holds a PhD in Biblical Studies from the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, and is currently an associate professor in religious education at Brigham Young University—Hawaii. He is also the author of Name as Key-Word: Collected Essays on Onomastic Wordplay and the Temple in Mormon Scripture (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2018) and Ancient Names in the Book of Mormon: Toward a Deeper Understanding of a Witness of Christ (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2023). With Aaron P. Schade, he is the coauthor of The Book of Moses: From the Ancient of Days to the Latter Days (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021). He and his wife (the former Suzanne Blattberg) are the parents of three children: Zachariah, Nathan, and Adele.

1 . See especially John Tvedtnes and Matthew Roper, “Jacob and Enos: Wrestling before God,” Insights 21, no.5 (2001): 2–3, archive.bookofmormoncentral.org
/sites/default/files/archive-files/pdf/farms-staff/2019-10-07/insights_21-5
_may_2001.pdf; Matthew L. Bowen, “‘And There Wrestled a Man with Him’ (Genesis 32:24): Enos’s Adaptations of the Onomastic Wordplay of Genesis,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 10 (2014): 151–60, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/and-there-wrestled-a-man-with-him
-genesis-3224-enoss-adaptations-of-the-onomastic-wordplay-of
-genesis/; Matthew L. Bowen, “‘I Kneeled Down Before My Maker’: Allusions to Esau in the Book of Enos,” Interpreter: A Journal Mormon Scripture 27 (2017): 29–56, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/i-kneeled-down-before-my-maker
-allusions-to-esau-in-the-book-of-enos/. In my view, these studies sufficiently establish the intentionality of Enos’s literary adaptations, and I will proceed here under the assumption that this intentionality exists.

2 . Francis Brown, S.R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1996), 60; Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden, NL: Brill, 2001) 70. Hereafter cited as HALOT.

3 . Matthew L. Bowen, “Wordplay on the Name Enos,” Insights 26, no.3 (2006): 2, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/insights/vol26/iss3/3/.

4 . ʾîš (“man”) is a synonym of ʾĕnôš (“man”), as is ʾādām (“man,” “humankind,” including the totality of humanity). Note the juxtaposition of Adam and Enos as the father and son of the patriarch Seth in the Genesis narratives. Adam is described as ʾîš in the etiology for Eve as “woman” (ʾiššâ): “And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman [ʾiššâ], because she was taken out of Man [mēʾîš]. Therefore shall a man [ʾîš] leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife [bĕʾištô]: and they shall be one flesh.”

5 . Jeffrey M. Bradshaw and Matthew L. Bowen, “Jacob’s Temple Journey to Haran and Back” in The Temple: Plates, Patterns, & Patriarchs (Proceedings of the Sixth Interpreter Foundation Matthew B. Brown Memorial Conference, 4–5 November 2022), ed. Stephen D. Ricks and Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. Temple on Mount Zion 7 (Orem, UT: The Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2024), 171–254. On the importance of the connection between the name Israel and the concept “Let God Prevail,” see Russell M. Nelson, “Let God Prevail,” Liahona, November 2020, 92–95, churchofjesuschrist.org/study
/general-conference/2020/10/46nelson.

6 . Tvedtnes and Roper (“Wrestling before God,” 2–3) first noted the connection between “before God” and Peniel.

7 . As Royal Skousen notes, “forests” should be singular, “forest.” The pluralization of the noun was introduced in the 1902 Latter-day Saint missionary edition of the Book of Mormon and has been retained ever since. See Royal Skousen, Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part Two: 2 Nephi 11–Mosiah 16 (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 2005), 1072–73, interpreterfoundation.org/books/atv/p2/. See also Royal Skousen, ed., The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009), 180.

8 . Esau and his descendants’ connection to “Mount Seir” is explicitly mentioned in Genesis 36:8–9; Deuteronomy 2:5, 8, 12, 22, 29; and Joshua 24:4, among other places.

9 . Noah and Job are described as men of integrity. See, e.g., Genesis 6:9 and Job 1:1, 8; 2:3.

10 . In this vein, it is interesting that Jacob’s wives have “cattle” names. Leah denotes “wild cow” and Rachel denotes “ewe-lamb.” Before the end of his record Enos mentions “goats” and “wild goats” among the animals that they herded (see Enos 1:21).

11 . Bowen, “I Kneeled Down Before My Maker,” 34–38.

12 . Compare again to the name Peniel or Penuel (“the face of God”).

13 . Thomas Römer, The Invention of God, trans. Raymond Geuss (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015), 44. Emphasis added.

14 . Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 1342. They further note that “al-ʾAšʿaru ‘that which is overgrown’ is the name of a mountain in Arabia.”

15 . See Bowen, “I Kneeled Down Before My Maker,” 34.

16 . HALOT, 713.

17 . See Skousen, Earliest Text, 180.

Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon III—Behold

John Gee

Abstract: As an ancient book, the Book of Mormon employed verbal punctuation rather than typographical punctuation. An example of this verbal punctuation is the word behold, which is used in the Book of Mormon to point things out, to highlight unexpected effects of situations, and to modify a previously expressed proposition. This corresponds to ancient Hebrew usage. Joseph Smith’s usage from the time the Book of Mormon was produced, however, differs in both its frequency and how it was used, even when Joseph Smith was consciously trying to imitate the Book of Mormon.

All the modern punctuation in the published versions of the Book of Mormon has been added by later editors and was not in the original manuscript or on the plates. Its original punctuation was verbal punctuation. As an ancient book, the Book of Mormon uses words rather than marks as punctuation to structure the narrative. Though the modern punctuation is helpful to the modern reader, it can, at times, distract us from the ancient text.

In the Book of Mormon manuscripts and in the 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon, the verbal punctuation that most regularly signals a chapter break is “(and) now,” which accounts for more than two-thirds (68%) of the chapter breaks in the 1830 Book of Mormon.1 The second most common beginning for a new chapter, occurring 10% of the time, is behold.

Methodology

The methodology used in this analysis has been outlined before2 and here will only be summarized:

1. Book of Mormon usage is paramount and is therefore considered first. Normally, with hundreds of citations, only one citation is given for any book. In this case, however, more than one indicative citation is given to illustrate the usage.

2. After the Book of Mormon usage is given, ancient equivalents are considered, with special emphasis on Hebrew and Egyptian.

3. We then consider Joseph Smith’s early usage as defined by a standard set of early documents.

4. Because of both theoretical and practical problems with the Doctrine and Covenants, it is not considered among the early documentation of Joseph Smith’s usage.

Those interested in fuller details of the methodology are encouraged to consult the earlier discussion.

Book of Mormon Usage

In an examination of the strings of verbal punctuation in the Book of Mormon, “behold” usually comes after “and now” and before “it came to pass.”3

The original text of the Book of Mormon has 1,640 instances of the word behold, 14 of beholdest, 5 of beholding, and 129 of beheld.4 The present and the past tense are sometimes mixed up in the manuscripts.5 The verbal form of behold that means “to look at, or see” is distinct from the verbal punctuation, and only the latter is our concern here. There are 1,213 instances of the use of behold as verbal punctuation.

Though there has been some good work on the use of behold in the Joseph Smith Translation,6 some previous examinations of the use of behold in the Book of Mormon have been completely ad hoc and contradictory.7 The Book of Mormon uses the term behold in a variety of ways. The best way to discover that usage is by an investigation into how it is used in the text.

Deictic usage

Sometimes the Book of Mormon uses the term behold in a deictic sense (deictic deriving from Greek deiknumi, meaning “to point out, show, demonstrate”), to point out a person or group of people, a thing, a place, an event, or a state of affairs. The Book of Mormon provides numerous examples of this deictic usage. We will not look at all 1,213 examples but chose representative examples from throughout the Book of Mormon.

Though we will cite from the modern printed editions of the Book of Mormon, the reader should be aware that the modern punctuation is not consistent and may not necessarily be helpful in understanding the ancient punctuation system used in the Book of Mormon. I have therefore eliminated the inconsistent commas after the word behold.

Here are some examples of behold being used to point out a person or group of people:

Behold thou art a robber, and I will slay thee. (1 Nephi 3:13)

Behold, my sons, and my daughters, who are the sons and the daughters of my firstborn, I would that ye should give ear unto my words. (2 Nephi 4:3)

Behold, my beloved brethren, I, Jacob, having been called of God, and ordained after the manner of his holy order, and having been consecrated by my brother Nephi, (2 Nephi 6:2)

Behold, my beloved brethren, I would speak unto you; (2 Nephi 30:1)

Behold, my brethren, ye can go to the other plates of Nephi; (Jarom 1:14)

Behold, here is the man, (Mosiah 12:16)

Behold, here is the king of the Lamanites; (Mosiah 20:13)

Behold, here are many whom we have brought before thee, who are accused of their brethren; (Mosiah 26:11)

Behold, this Lehi was a man who had been with Moroni in the more part of all his battles; (Alma 53:2)

Behold, there were two thousand of those young men, (Alma 53:18)

Behold, there were men who were judges, (Helaman 8:1)

O Lord, behold this people repenteth; (Helaman 11:10)

Behold, this Lachoneus, the governor, was a just man, (3 Nephi 3:12)

Behold my Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, in whom I have glorified my name—hear ye him. (3 Nephi 11:7)

Behold your little ones. (3 Nephi 17:23)

Some of these passages begin speeches and the behold calls attention to the audience being addressed. An exception is Jesus’s presentation of the children to their parents, where “Behold your little ones” is the entire speech and is directed to their parents (3 Nephi 17:23). One might argue that behold here is the imperative form of the verb, but the deictic use of behold arguably works better.

In some cases, behold is used to point to things:

Behold the tree. (Jacob 5:23)

Behold, there are all kinds of bad fruit; (Jacob 5:32)

Behold this last, whose branch hath withered away, (Jacob 5:43)

Behold, this is my prophecy— (Jacob 6:1)

Behold, this was the desire which I desired of him— (Enos 1:13)

And behold, also the plates of Nephi, which contain the records and the sayings of our fathers from the time they left Jerusalem until now, and they are true; (Mosiah 1:6)

Behold, this is my church; (Mosiah 26:22)

Behold, this is the voice of the angel, crying unto the people. (Alma 9:29)

Behold, here are six onties of silver, (Alma 11:22)

Behold, here are our weapons of war; (Alma 44:8)

Behold, here is one thing in which we may have great joy. (Alma 56:9)

Behold, there are many books and many records of every kind, (Helaman 3:15)

Behold here is money (Helaman 9:20)

Behold, this body, which ye now behold, (Ether 3:16)

Examples of behold pointing out a place are also found in the Book of Mormon:

Behold, this land, said God, shall be a land of thine inheritance, (2 Nephi 10:10)

Behold, here are the waters of Mormon (Mosiah 18:8)

Behold, there they found all the people who had departed out of the land of Ammonihah, (Alma 15:1)

Behold, there shall ye meet them, on the east of the river Sidon, (Alma 16:6)

Behold, this great city, and also all those great cities which are round about, (Helaman 7:22)

Behold, this is a choice land, (Ether 2:12)

The Book of Mormon also uses behold to point out a time:

Behold, these many years we have suffered in the wilderness, (1 Nephi 17:21)

Behold, this long time have we nourished this tree, (Jacob 5:31)

Behold, two hundred years had passed away, (Jarom 1:5)

Behold, this day he hath spiritually begotten you; (Mosiah 5:7)

Behold, this is the first time that priestcraft has been introduced among this people. (Alma 1:12)

Behold, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet God; (Alma 34:32)

Behold, this was a critical time for such contentions to be among the people of Nephi; (Alma 51:9)

For behold, in the twenty and sixth year, I, Helaman, did march at the head of these two thousand young men to the city of Judea, (Alma 56:9)

Behold, this is the twenty and ninth year, (Alma 58:38)

Behold, four hundred years have passed away since the coming of our Lord and Savior. (Mormon 8:6)

In the following examples, behold is used to point to an event or state of affairs:

Behold, my soul is rent with anguish because of you, (1 Nephi 17:47)

Behold, my soul delighteth in the things of the Lord; (2 Nephi 4:16)

Behold, my people have not broken the oath that I made unto you; (Mosiah 20:14)

Behold, our flocks are scattered already. (Alma 17:28)

Behold, my brother and brethren are in prison at Middoni, (Alma 20:3)

Behold, my joy is full, (Alma 26:11)

Behold, your prayer is vain, and availeth you nothing, (Alma 34:28)

Father, behold our God is with us, (Alma 56:46)

Behold, your judge is murdered, and he lieth in his blood; (Helaman 8:27)

Behold, your days of probation are past; (Helaman 13:38)

Behold, my time is at hand. (3 Nephi 17:1)

Behold, my father hath made this record, (Mormon 8:5)

Behold, elders, priests, and teachers were baptized; (Moroni 6:1)

Behold, my son, I cannot recommend them unto God lest he should smite me. (Moroni 9:21)

The deictic use of behold is particularly clear in those places where the entire speech is given (3 Nephi 17:1). The example from Alma 56:46, where the vocative “Father” precedes the deictic expression, shows that it is not always clear what the behold preceding a vocative should refer to; it could point to either the individual or the state of affairs.

Unexpected effects

The Book of Mormon also uses behold to highlight unexpected effects or events. In these cases, the narrative would lead to a certain set of expectations, and behold serves to highlight the contrast.

And when the Jews heard these things they were angry with him; yea, even as with the prophets of old, whom they had cast out, and stoned, and slain; and they also sought his life, that they might take it away. But behold, I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance. (1 Nephi 1:20)

If people are trying to kill someone, one does not expect that to lead to a tender mercy.

A few more days and I go the way of all the earth. But behold, the Lord hath redeemed my soul from hell. (2 Nephi 1:14–15)

From the mortal perspective, once someone is dead, that is the end, the resurrection is not expected from that perspective.

And it came to pass that the Lord of the vineyard said unto the servant: Pluck off the branches that have not brought forth good fruit, and cast them into the fire. But behold, the servant said unto him: Let us prune it, and dig about it, and nourish it a little longer, that perhaps it may bring forth good fruit unto thee, that thou canst lay it up against the season. (Jacob 5:26–27)

One does not expect a servant to contradict his lord.

Were it not for this, all mankind must have perished. But behold, the bands of death shall be broken. (Mosiah 15:19–20)

The expectation is that death is the end. The resurrection is not expected from a mortal point of view.

And now, it came to pass in the twenty and sixth year of the reign of the judges over the people of Nephi, behold, when the Lamanites awoke on the first morning of the first month, behold, they found Amalickiah was dead in his own tent; and they also saw that Teancum was ready to give them battle on that day. (Alma 52:1)

The Lamanites were not expecting to wake up in the morning and find their king dead in the middle of an armed encampment.

And, supposing that their greatest strength was in the center of the land, therefore he did march forth, giving them no time to assemble themselves together save it were in small bodies; and in this manner they did fall upon them and cut them down to the earth. But behold, this march of Coriantumr through the center of the land gave Moronihah great advantage over them, notwithstanding the greatness of the number of the Nephites who were slain. (Helaman 1:24–25)

With Coriantumr marching through slaying everyone in sight, one does not expect that this would give his opponents an advantage.

It was Zemnarihah that did cause that this siege should take place. But behold, this was an advantage to the Nephites; for it was impossible for the robbers to lay siege sufficiently long to have any effect upon the Nephites. (3 Nephi 4:17–18)

One does not expect that the besieged would necessarily have the military advantage in a siege.

And it came to pass that when I, Mormon, saw their lamentation and their mourning and their sorrow before the Lord, my heart did begin to rejoice within me, knowing the mercies and the long-suffering of the Lord, therefore supposing that he would be merciful unto them that they would again become a righteous people. But behold this my joy was vain, for their sorrowing was not unto repentance, because of the goodness of God; but it was rather the sorrowing of the damned, because the Lord would not always suffer them to take happiness in sin. (Mormon 2:12–13)

Mormon’s expectation that the Nephites would become righteous were disappointed.

Whoso findeth them, the same will have power that he may get the full account. But behold, I give not the full account, but a part of the account I give. (Ether 1:4–5)

The reader might have hoped that Moroni would give a fuller account, but all she will get is an abridgment.

My son, I cannot recommend them unto God lest he should smite me. But behold, my son, I recommend thee unto God. (Moroni 9:21–22)

With his people so wicked that he cannot recommend them to God, one might expect a blanket condemnation by Mormon, and yet, there are exceptions.

Modifying a proposition

The Book of Mormon uses behold to indicate a statement that modifies (in the way an adjective modifies a noun) a previous statement. It can reenforce it or clarify the contents or the implications of the sentence. It can also modify a following statement. The following are examples.

Behold, I have dreamed a dream; or, in other words, I have seen a vision. And behold, because of the thing which I have seen, I have reason to rejoice in the Lord because of Nephi and also of Sam; for I have reason to suppose that they, and also many of their seed, will be saved. But behold, Laman and Lemuel, I fear exceedingly because of you; for behold, methought I saw in my dream, a dark and dreary wilderness. (1 Nephi 8:2–4)

This example gives four uses of behold. The first appears to draw attention to the speaker, which is a deictic function. The third points to those addressed. The second and fourth modify the statement about the dream or vision that Lehi has seen.

How merciful the Lord had been in warning us that we should flee out of the land of Jerusalem. For, behold, said he, I have seen a vision, in which I know that Jerusalem is destroyed; and had we remained in Jerusalem we should also have perished. (2 Nephi 1:3–4)

In this case the word behold marks the explanation of why the Lord had been merciful in having Lehi’s group flee Jerusalem and suffer for eight years in the wilderness and additionally through all the hazards of their sea voyage. These sufferings would ordinarily not seem to indicate that the Lord was being merciful to Lehi’s family, but using behold to mark the explanation that the Lord has been merciful to them because they are still alive and that had they remained they would not have been.

But the word of God burdens me because of your grosser crimes. For behold, thus saith the Lord: This people begin to wax in iniquity. (Jacob 2:23)

The sentence marked off by behold explains why Jacob felt so burdened by the revelation he had received from God.

But behold, my brethren, ye can go to the other plates of Nephi; for behold, upon them the records of our wars are engraven. (Jarom 1:14)

The first behold serves as a deictic marker pointing to Jarom’s audience. The second behold explains why his audience might want to consult the other plates.

And behold also, if I, whom ye call your king, who has spent his days in your service, and yet has been in the service of God, do merit any thanks from you, O how you ought to thank your heavenly King! (Mosiah 2:19)

This is an example of the statement following behold modifying, that is explaining the statement that follows it rather than the one preceding it. In this instance the conditional clause, which explains the exhortation, comes before it in the text.

Now, if king Amalickiah had come down out of the land of Nephi, at the head of his army, perhaps he would have caused the Lamanites to have attacked the Nephites at the city of Ammonihah; for behold, he did care not for the blood of his people. (Alma 49:10)

The sentence after behold explains why Amalickiah might have attacked the city of Ammonihah if he had been with them.

There began to be a serious difficulty among the people of the Nephites. For behold, Pahoran had died. (Helaman 1:1–2)

The reason for the serious difficulty is explained by the following statement, which is marked by behold.

Yield yourselves up unto us, and unite with us and become acquainted with our secret works, and become our brethren that ye may be like unto us—not our slaves, but our brethren and partners of all our substance. And behold, I swear unto you, if ye will do this, with an oath, ye shall not be destroyed. (3 Nephi 3:7–8)

In this passage, Giddianhi demands that Lachoneus surrender, and the reasons for doing so are marked by behold.

There have I deposited unto the Lord all the sacred engravings concerning this people. And behold, ye shall take the plates of Nephi unto yourself. (Mormon 1:3–4)

In this text, Ammaron tells Mormon the location of a deposit of records and uses behold to explain why he wants Mormon to know this information.

The winds have gone forth out of my mouth, and also the rains and the floods have I sent forth. And behold, I prepare you against these things. (Ether 2:24–25)

In this passage, the Lord tells the brother of Jared about a situation and prefaces his explanation of why the brother of Jared needs to know these things with behold.

If he offereth a gift, or prayeth unto God, except he shall do it with real intent it profiteth him nothing. For behold, it is not counted unto him for righteousness. (Moroni 7:6–7)

Mormon lays out the reasons why offering something to God might not be profitable for a person, and behold marks the explanation.

One particular example of this modifying function of behold deserves some analysis, because its interpretation has been the subject of dispute:8

And after I had made these plates by way of commandment, I, Nephi, received a commandment that the ministry and the prophecies, the more plain and precious parts of them, should be written upon these plates; and that the things which were written should be kept for the instruction of my people, who should possess the land, and also for other wise purposes, which purposes are known unto the Lord. Wherefore, I, Nephi, did make a record upon the other plates, which gives an account, or which gives a greater account of the wars and contentions and destructions of my people. And this have I done, and commanded my people what they should do after I was gone; and that these plates should be handed down from one generation to another, or from one prophet to another, until further commandments of the Lord. And an account of my making these plates shall be given hereafter; and then, behold, I proceed according to that which I have spoken; and this I do that the more sacred things may be kept for the knowledge of my people. (1 Nephi 19:3–5)

After a lengthy explanation of why he has made two sets of plates, what their purposes are, how they are supposed to be used, and why future generations should follow his directives, Nephi states his own intent to follow the plan he has made of putting the secular matters on one set of plates and the spiritual matters on the other and uses behold to mark how his intended execution complements (modifies in the sense of an adjective) the instructions that he has laid out.

As a textual break?

These categories might not exhaust all the ways that behold is used in the Book of Mormon, but they provide a framework to explain many of the uses. From these examples and uses, we can see that the term behold is used to structure the flow of the narrative within the narrative and not, like and now to divide the narrative into smaller units.9 As previously noted, there are ten places where the 1830 Book of Mormon uses behold to begin a chapter. The question thus arises of why behold is used in places where it might appear to mark a break in the text. We will consider each of these ten instances that might at first appear to be outliers.

1. In 2 Nephi 5:1, the chapter begins with, “Behold, it came to pass that I, Nephi.” The text follows “Amen” in the previous chapter. As has been shown,10 32% of the original chapter breaks in the 1830 Book of Mormon end in “Amen.” Thus, amen marks the textual break rather than behold.

2. Jacob begins his book with, “For behold, it came to pass that fifty and five years had passed away from the time that Lehi left Jerusalem” (Jacob 1:1). The title and colophon precede this clause and the previous book had ended with amen.11

3. Enos likewise starts his book, “Behold, it came to pass that I, Enos” (Enos 1:1). Enos has a title, but no colophon.

4. Omni also begins his book with, “Behold, it came to pass that I, Omni” (Omni 1:1). Omni’s book also has a title but no colophon. Later in the book, Abinadom begins his record with, “Behold, I, Abinadom, am the son of Chemish” (Omni 1:10). Amaleki also begins his record the same way: “Behold, I am Amaleki, the son of Abinadom” (Omni 1:12). These last two indicate that the use of behold in all of these beginnings can be taken to be deictic, pointing out the new individual writing.

5. Alma 7:1 is the beginning of a speech, but the header begins the chapter as is clear from the printer’s manuscript.12 In the speech to the people of Gideon, Alma uses behold to point out his audience: “Behold my beloved brethren” (Alma 7:1).

6. In Alma 23:1, behold is used to shift the focus of the narrative. The verse ending the previous chapter stated, “And now I, after having said this, return again to the account of Ammon and Aaron, Omner and Himni, and their brethren” (Alma 22:35). The account then begins with a shift of perspective: “Behold, now it came to pass that the king of the Lamanites sent a proclamation among all his people” (Alma 23:1). This is one of six instances where behold precedes now, where the order is usually the other way.

7–10. The same thing happens in all the other passages where behold begins a chapter in the 1830 Book of Mormon (Alma 30:1, 45:1, 61:1; Helaman 7:1). This is an unusual variant, but it might be that behold is being used as a deictic to point out the temporal phrase now, which is used to signal a major break in the narrative.

Of the ten chapters in the 1830 Book of Mormon that begin with behold, six of them seem to point out temporal phrases and four groups of people. All of them seem to be used in a deictic fashion, so none of them seem exceptions to the rule. Additionally, four follow a terminal amen, seven follow headers, and one follows the close of a letter. The terminal endings are stronger indicators of a chapter break than the use of behold.

Hebrew Antecedents

In Isaiah passages in the Book of Mormon, behold always translates the Hebrew word hinnēh (2 Nephi 17:14 = Isaiah 7:14; 2 Nephi 18:7 = Isaiah 8:7; 2 Nephi 22:2 = Isaiah 12:2; 2 Nephi 23:9 = Isaiah 13:9; 2 Nephi 23:17 = Isaiah 13:17).

“Despite considerable attention by scholars of Biblical Hebrew, the meaning and uses of hinnēh are not well understood.”13 Some think that “hnh is deictic.”14 Others think that it “is employed to allow the reader to view the scene through the eyes of the character.”15 Still others think that hinnēh is used to express mirativity, that is “the linguistic marking for indicating that the information conveyed is new or unexpected to the speaker.”16 There appears to be no difference in usage between behold and and behold in Hebrew usage.17

The following uses of the term hinnēh “behold” are notable:

1. To point out an entity (8%), a location (2.8%), a time, or an event or state of affairs (29%).18

2. To point out the unexpected cognitive effects of an observation on a character (whether the speaker or someone else) (25%).19

3. To point to a proposition that needs to be related to another proposition either preparing for or modifying it (26%).20

From the examples given,21 it is not clear that the use of hinnēh in preparing for a proposition is either functionally or otherwise different from pointing out a situation or state of affairs. Thus, the real point is that hinnēh “points to information (i.e., propositional content) which a speaker or narrator regards to be newsworthy as far as other discourse active propositions are concerned. The information presented modifies the content or implicatures of statements in the preceding co-text.”22

None of these functions mark a necessary break in the text.

The Ugaritic cognate, hn, is used for emphasizing part of a sentence or an entire sentence.23 The earlier Semitic use of hnny was “to open the section where [the letter sender] provides news of his circumstances.”24 “the expression introduced by hnny, denotes the situation as at present, whereas the wishes, like the expression introduced by ṯmny, are set in the future.”25

The Egyptian expression mk is also complicated, indicating some sort of emphasis,26 but this expression had largely disappeared by Lehi’s time.27

Joseph Smith’s Usage

Some have argued that “maybe Joseph Smith, acting as translator—really liked the word ‘behold.’”28 This can easily be shown not to be the case. The Z score for the use of behold in the Book of Mormon is 2.814, which is the number of standard deviations above the mean that the word behold is used in the Book of Mormon. In contrast, the Z score for the use of behold in Joseph Smith’s early writings29 is 0.162. Joseph Smith’s use of behold is about average, while the Book of Mormon’s use of behold is more than two standard deviations above average. Thus, the Book of Mormon is very frequent in its use of behold, but Joseph Smith was not.

If we look at Joseph Smith’s usage of behold in his early writings (1829–1833), 44.4% of the time he is using the word behold as a verb, which is significantly more than the 26.0% of the instances in the Book of Mormon that are verbal.

In this corpus, we find the following similarities:

- Deictic usage pointing to a person:

behold I am the Lord of glory.30

- Deictic usage pointing to a thing:

behold this is an exsample.31
and behold the thaughts of home of Emma and Julia rushes upon my mind like a flood.32

- Deictic usage pointing to a situation:

for behold the dethronement and deposition of the kings in the eastern continent,—the whirlwinds in the West India Islands, it has destroyed a number of vessels, uprooted buildings and strewed them in the air.33

Behold the prophecies of the Book of Mormon are fulfilling as fast as time can bring it about.34

<behold> the world lieth in sin and at this time and none doeth good no not one.35
behold and lo I come quickly as it [is] written of me in the cloud <clothed> in the glory of my Father.36

- Expressing surprise at something unexpected:

behold the angel appeared unto me again and said unto me.37

- Modifying a proposition:

and it came to pass when I was seventeen years of age I called again upon the Lord and he shewed unto me a heavenly vision for behold an angel of the Lord came and stood before me.38

In his own writings, Joseph Smith used behold more narrowly than the Book of Mormon. His 1832 History, which consciously imitated the Book of Mormon, contains as many examples as his letters. All of the examples, however, come closely clustered together on two pages of a six-page history. They are sparked by remembering what God had said to him and disappear after his encounter with the angel. Where the Book of Mormon contains 1,213 examples in 531 printed pages for 2.28 uses per page, Joseph Smith’s 1832 History contains 5 examples in 7 printed pages for 0.71 uses per page, about a third as much, and this is when Joseph Smith is consciously imitating the Book of Mormon.39

Conclusions

The English Book of Mormon was originally without punctuation marks. These were added by later editors. That does not, however, mean that it was without punctuation. Like most ancient texts, it had a system of verbal punctuation: words and phrases that structured the narrative instead of typographic marks.

In the Book of Mormon, the term behold is used as verbal punctuation to either point to something (a person, group of persons, thing, location, time, or situation) or to mark sentences or clauses as modifying another statement or to emphasize the unexpected effects of the narrative. The term behold in the Book of Mormon does not usually mark a major break in the narrative. In those places where its use coincides with a major break in the text, it seems to serve a deictic function and there are other indicators which more strongly indicate a break. The Book of Mormon’s usage aligns with the Hebrew Bible’s usage but does not align with Joseph Smith’s usage.

Understanding the verbal punctuation in the Book of Mormon starts with examining actual usage. While the Book of Mormon’s use of verbal punctuation does support its claim to be an ancient record, knowledge of the verbal punctuation in the Book of Mormon is more useful in understanding the Book of Mormon itself.

John Gee is the William (Bill) Gay Research Professor in the Department of Asian and Near Eastern Languages at Brigham Young University. He has authored more than 150 publications on topics such as ancient scripture, Aramaic, archaeology, Coptic, Egyptian, history, linguistics, Luwian, rhetoric, Sumerian, textual criticism, and published in journals such as Bibliotheca Orientalis, British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan, Bulletin of the Egyptological Seminar, BYU Studies, Enchoria, Ensign, FARMS Review, Göttinger Miszellen, The International Journal of Levant Studies, Issues in Religion and Psychotherapy, Journal of Academic Perspectives, Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, Journal of Egyptian History, Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities, Lingua Aegyptia, Review of Biblical Literature, Review of Books on the Book of Mormon, Studien zur altägyptischen Kultur, and Interpreter, and by such presses as American University of Cairo Press, Archaeopress, Association Égyptologique Reine Élisabeth, E. J. Brill, Carsten Niebuhr Institute of Near Eastern Studies, Czech Institute of Egyptology, Deseret Book, Franco Cosimo Panini, de Gruyter, Harrassowitz, Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale, Macmillan, Routledge, Oxford University Press, Peeters, Praeger, Religious Studies Center, and Society of Biblical Literature. He has published five books and has edited eight books and an international multilingual peer-reviewed professional journal. He served twice as a section chair for the Society of Biblical Literature.

1 . John Gee, “Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon I: (And) Now,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 50 (2022): 35–37, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/verbal-punctuation-in-the-book-of
-mormon-i-and-now/.

2 . John Gee, “Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon II—Nevertheless,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 57 (2023): 195–98, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/verbal-punctuation-in-the-book-of
-mormon-ii-nevertheless/.

3 . Gee, “Verbal Punctuation,” 36–37.

4 . Royal Skousen, The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon, Part One: Grammatical Variation (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS] 2016), 140.

5 . Skousen, Grammatical Variation, 140–44.

6 . Kent P. Jackson, “Behold I,” BYU Studies 44, no. 2 (2005): 169–75, scholars
archive.byu.edu/byusq/vol44/iss2/7/.

7 . Contrast Joseph Spencer, The Anatomy of Book of Mormon Theology (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford, 2021), 1:51, with 1:216.

8 . Frederick W. Axelgard, “1 and 2 Nephi: An Inspiring Whole, BYU Studies 26, no. 4 (1986), 53–65, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol26/iss4/4/; Joseph M. Spencer, An Other Testament: On Typology, (n.p.: Salt Press, 2016), 36, 39, and 42, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/8/. See also the response in Noel B. Reynolds, “On Doubting Nephi’s Break Between 1 and 2 Nephi: A Critique of Joseph Spencer’s An Other Testament: On Typology,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 25 (2017): 85–102, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/on
-doubting-nephis-break-between-1-and-2-nephi-a-critique-of-joseph
-spencers-an-other-testament-on-typology/.

9 . Gee, “Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon I,” 33–50.

10 . Gee, “Verbal Punctuation in the Book of Mormon I,” 36.

11 . The following comment by an anonymous reviewer (included with permission of the reviewer) is worth noting:

Supporting your position is that Jacob ends with “adieu.” While not exactly “amen,” this is an interesting word. It is similar to Spanish “adios” in that both words technically mean “to God” or “until God” and roughly mean “goodbye.” But “adios” is widely used as a temporary goodbye whereas no French person would ever use this word unless the goodbye were essentially permanent (almost always in death). They have other terms such as “à demain” (until tomorrow) or “à bientôt” (until very soon) or “à la prochaine” (until next time) or “au revoir” (until the re-see) but never “adieu” (until God). To do so would be very impolite, considered terrible luck, or even approaching a curse at worse. It is widely known that Americans at the time of Joseph Smith used this term, but they may not have known this nuance of the word and used it more like “adios.” However, in the case of Jacob 7:27, it is entirely fitting, as he is dying. In fact, it perfectly completes (provides the ending inclusio) for a tiny chiasm in verse 27. In this sense, then, “adieu” (unlike “goodbye” or “adios”) is a close match to “amen.”

12 . Royal Skousen, The Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: FARMS, 2001), 1:420.

13 . Cynthia L. Miller-Naudé and C. H. J. van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity in Biblical Hebrew,” Hebrew Studies 52 (2011): 53.

14 . Sandra Landis Gogel, A Grammar of Epigraphic Hebrew (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998), 230.

15 . Gary A. Rendsburg, How the Bible is Written (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2019), 411, et seq.; Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative (Sheffield, UK: Almond Press, 1983), 62–64.

16 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity,” 56–57.

17 . Dennis J. McCarthy, “The Uses of wehinnēh in Biblical Hebrew,” Biblica 61, no. 3 (1980): 330.

18 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity” 60–70; McCarthy, “The Uses of wehinnēh,” 336–39.

19 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity,” 60, 70–74; McCarthy, “The Uses of wehinnēh,” 332–33, 341–42.

20 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity,” 61, 74–79; McCarthy, “The Uses of wehinnēh,” 333–36, 337, 339–41.

21 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity,” 75–77.

22 . Miller-Naudé and van der Merwe, “Hinnēh and Mirativity,” 77.

23 . Kjell Aartun, Die Partikeln des Ugaritischen (Kevelaer, DE: Butzon & Bercker, 1974), 69–70.

24 . Jésus-Luis Cunchillow, “The Ugaritic Letters,” in Handbook of Ugaritic Studies, ed. Wilfred G. E. Watson and Nicolas Wyatt (Leiden, NL: E. J. Brill, 1999), 365.

25 . Cunchillow, “The Ugaritic Letters,” 365.

26 . Elsa Oréal, Les particules en égyptien ancien de l’ancien égyptien à l’égyptien classique (Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale, 2011), 297–331.

27 . Karl Jansen-Winkeln, Spätmittelägyptsiche Grammatik der Texte der 3. Zwischenzeit (Wiesbaden, DE: Harrassowitz, 1996), 206–7.

28 . Spencer, Anatomy of Book of Mormon Theology, 1:216.

29 . For which, see Stanford Carmack, “Personal Relative Pronoun Usage in the Book of Mormon: An Important Authorship Diagnostic,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 10n15, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/personal-relative-pronoun-usage-in-the-book-of
-mormon-an-important-authorship-diagnostic/.

30 . In this example, Joseph Smith is quoting God. “History, Circa Summer 1832,” The Joseph Smith Papers, Histories, Volume 1: Joseph Smith Histories, 1832–1844 (Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2012), 13, josephsmithpapers
.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/3.

31 . Joseph Smith, “Letter to William W. Phelps, 31 July 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 2: July 1831–January 1833 (Salt Lake City: The Church Historian’s Press, 2013), 265, josephsmithpapers.org/paper
-summary/letter-to-william-w-phelps-31-july-1832/4.

32 . Joseph Smith, “Letter to Emma Smith, 13 October 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 2, 312, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/letter-to-emma-smith-13-october-1832/1.

33 . Joseph Smith, “Letter to the Church in Colesville, 2 December 1830,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 1: July 1828–June 1831 (Salt Lake City: The Church Historian’s Press, 2013), josephsmithpapers.org/paper
-summary/letter-to-the-church-in-colesville-2-december-1830/5.

34 . Joseph Smith, “Letter to the Church in Colesville, 2 December 1830,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 1, 217, josephsmithpapers.org
/paper-summary/letter-to-the-church-in-colesville-2-december-1830/8.

35 . In this example, Joseph Smith is quoting God. Additionally, the word behold is added above the line. “History, Circa Summer 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Histories, Volume 1, 13, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/history-circa-summer-1832/3.

36 . In this example, Joseph Smith is quoting God. Additionally, the word behold is added above the line. “History, Circa Summer 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Histories, Volume 1, 13, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/history-circa-summer-1832/3.

37 . “History, Circa Summer 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Histories, Volume 1, 14, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/4.

38 . “History, Circa Summer 1832,” in The Joseph Smith Papers, Histories, Volume 1, 13–14, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/4.

39 . See also, Stanford Carmack, “How Joseph Smith’s Grammar Differed from Book of Mormon Grammar: Evidence from the 1832 History,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 25 (2017): 239–59, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/how-joseph-smiths-grammar-differed-from-book-of-mormon-grammar
-evidence-from-the-1832-history/.

A Deep Dive on War

Craig L. Foster

Review of Morgan Deane, To Stop a Slaughter: Just War and the Book of Mormon (Middletown, DE: Morgan Deane, 2024). 138 pages. $14.99 (paperback).

Abstract: Morgan Deane’s To Stop a Slaughter: Just War and the Book of Mormon defines and discusses the concepts of war in the Book of Mormon and places “just war” within a larger context. The various aspects of just war and its impact are compared to the teachings and writings of scholars and philosophers from the early Church Fathers to Chinese military strategists. This interesting and informative book helps Latter-day Saints understand when war is necessary and justified.

William Tecumseh Sherman, a Union army general in the Civil War, is credited with saying, “War is hell.”1 War is hell, but according to Morgan Deane in To Stop a Slaughter: Just War and the Book of Mormon, there are times it is necessary. Indeed, war at times is not only needed, but it can and should be just. The purpose of To Stop a Slaughter is to discuss a “powerful, animating, Christlike love that motivates the use of force” (p. 5) at times when it is truly needed.

With that said, I’m going to do what I haven’t done in any previous book review—I’m going to start with the negatives of the book. Deane’s book, which is self-published, needed an extra set of editing eyes, or perhaps two. There were noticeable grammar and punctuation errors that could have been avoided with some professional editing. And, incomprehensibly, there was no printed pagination. I went through and manually wrote page numbers for the purpose of this review. Page numbers could have and should have been added to the text, and an index would have been helpful.

These few negatives are literally my only complaints, and these quibbles should not dissuade any potential reader. The book, which isn’t long, was an enjoyable and interesting read as the author discusses the concept of “just war,” defined as “love compelling the reluctant use of arms to stop a slaughter” (p. 6).

Morgan Deane, a military historian and former U.S. Marine, demonstrates an excellent knowledge of the literature pertaining to war, the philosophical and theological reasons for war, and the conduct of war. This is not surprising, given that some of his earlier publications include Offensive Warfare in The Book of Mormon and a Defense of the Bush Doctrine (2011) and Bleached Bones and Wicked Serpents: Ancient Warfare in the Book of Mormon (2014). In To Stop a Slaughter, he equally quotes and analyzes the writings of early Church Fathers and Chinese and other philosophers as he interweaves the writings of Book of Mormon prophets and warriors like Captain Moroni.

Among the chapters in the book are some provocative topics that encourage fascinating and meaningful discussion. These chapters include “Loving Your Neighbors by Standing Up to Their Slaughter,” “More than Angry: The Debates in Moroni’s Letter,” “Waiting for Revolution: Gideon’s Lessons,” “Kishkummen’s Dagger, Helaman’s Servant, and First Strike,” and “Renounce Peace and Proclaim War, Mormon 4 and Doctrine and Covenants 98.”

Near the beginning of the book, Deane succinctly sets the parameters of the discussion:

Just war flows from two central impulses that people recognize to varying degrees but rarely articulate. Most people understand on a fundamental level that some situations justly demand the use of force. At the same time, most [people] instinctively realize that war is an evil that should be avoided [altogether]. This seeming contradiction is at the heart of just war. (p. 6)

Deane notes how the Book of Mormon cuts through the war of words regarding the controversial topic of war and answers questions about “importance of the heart, when and how a nation should use force, the intent of people making war, preemptive war, [and] insurgency” (p. 9).

Deane sagaciously notes, “Once the pattern that a person can renounce war in their heart while wielding the sword is recognized, it becomes clear that it permeates the Book of Mormon” (p. 16). This concept is repeated throughout the book as Deane discusses Captain Moroni, Helaman, Mormon, and others. The heart of the warrior is of utmost importance, a concept echoed by modern Church leaders who encourage soldiers to “go with love in their hearts for all God’s children, including those on the opposing side.”2

In the chapter “Loving Your Neighbors by Standing Up to Their Slaughter,” Deane explains the requirements to make punishment warfare righteous. He notes that punishment war has “fallen out of favor with modern thinkers because it is too often abused and manipulated to the point that any leader can wage war against any state at any time for unjust reasons” (p. 51). This is a concept with which just war theorists have struggled, and it is found in the Book of Mormon. While arguing, as Alma did, that love cannot rob justice, Deane notes that the “Book of Mormon took a concept of punishment warfare that seems abandoned and archaic. It adds theological depth to punishment warfare, or the concept that violation of rights and other injustices must be rectified through warfare” (p. 55).

Throughout the book and in discussions of topics such as punishment warfare, preemptive war, and asymmetric war, Deane shows where he stands on these and other issues.3 While discussing Moroni’s preemptive war in Alma 46:30, Deane explains that if “an enemy shows intent, means, and imminency,” then there is “a right to strike first with preemptive and even preventive war. When faced by a charging assailant with sword in hand, an assassin with a dagger, people have the God given right to preemptively stop the attack” (p. 104).

Near the end of the book, Deane brings the discussion back around to the state of the heart of not only the warriors but the people or nation in general. He uses the Nephites’ last war as an example. While it was, as he described, their most justified war, their hearts were filled with hate and bloodthirst because of their wickedness. Thus, God would not fight their battles nor give them protection and, ultimately, they lost and were destroyed.

This powerful discussion about the imperative of a loving, peaceful heart that sometimes calls for renouncing peace and proclaiming war continues into the final chapter of the book, “The Just War.” In justifying “just war,” Deane writes, “While many modern theologians seek another Moses or Martin Luther King, Jr., society still needs a Joshua” (p. 127). In other words, there are times when our love should “motivate us to wield the sword” (p. 135). Thus, “Latter-day Saints can and should support warfare when it is an outgrowth of love and protection of rights” (p. 135).

In conclusion, Morgan Deane has taken an important and intriguing little-discussed topic and produced compelling arguments for “just war,” not only in the Book of Mormon, but in general. I heartily and strongly recommend To Stop a Slaughter: Just War and the Book of Mormon. Readers will find it thoughtful and thought-provoking.

Craig L. Foster earned a MA and MLIS at Brigham Young University. He is also an accredited genealogist and spent his career as a research consultant at the Family History Library, now FamilySearch Library, in Salt Lake City. He has published articles about different aspects of Latter-day Saint history. He is the author of two books, co-author of another and co-editor of a three-volume series discussing the history and theology of plural marriage. Foster is also on the editorial board of the John Whitmer Historical Association Journal.

1. 1 . “I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.” “William T. Sherman,” American Battlefield Trust (website), accessed 13 September 2024, battlefields.org/learn/biographies/william-t-sherman.

2. 2 . “War,” Topics and Questions of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed 9 September 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual
/gospel-topics/war.

3. 3 . For example, on page 114, Deane discusses with approval “what some LDS national security professionals have called the Teancum option,” as discussed by Ryan Chavez, “The ‘Teancum Option’ and Modern LDS National Security Thought,” in Wielding the Sword While Proclaiming Peace: Views from the LDS Community on Reconciling the Demands of National Security with the Imperatives of Revealed Truth, ed. Kerry M. Kartchner and Valerie M. Hudson (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2004), 87–100. “The Teancum option is one that targets enemy leaders instead of enemy armies.” While the thought of assassination seems terrible, “it is both justified by international law and can be considered moral.” It certainly was used in the Book of Mormon not only by Teancum but also by Helaman’s servant and, quite frankly, makes sense in terms of winning war without the high cost of lost lives and destruction.

A Plain Exposition of Book of Mormon English by Means of Short Questions and Informed Answers

Stanford Carmack

Abstract: Because many questions have arisen regarding the discovery of real early modern influence in the dictated language of the Book of Mormon, some of these are considered and answered in this essay. The answers reflect insights from an exploration of the data that drove the conclusions published in previous papers. Numerous considerations independently indicate that the Book of Mormon was dictated in language that cannot be explained as a mere imitation of King James linguistic style, nor as Joseph Smith’s Yankee dialect. While the reasons for this and the processes that may have led to such results are open for debate, the implications of the data themselves cannot be lightly brushed aside.

An examination of the language of the original Book of Mormon text by Royal Skousen (since 1988), and also by the writer of this essay (since 2014), has generated a large amount of unexpected linguistic data that undermine common assumptions about Book of Mormon English and translation, including the assumption that Joseph must have used his own archaic and uneducated grammar in constructing its language.

The discovery of a strong current of nonbiblical earlier English in the Book of Mormon was driven by the data, since the initial hypothesis for both Skousen and this author was that its English usage might approximate that of the King James Bible, and that it might be similar to what is found in roughly contemporaneous pseudo-archaic texts. But the data showed otherwise.

While discoveries in this area have made some uncomfortable, the data deserve to be considered (text-critical volumes contain analyses of a large amount of relevant data, and later papers may present additional unpublished treatments of the English-language data). Various questions and some objections have been raised in response, some of which seem to ignore much of the data. While we can’t establish exactly why so much nonbiblical Early Modern English is in the text that Joseph Smith dictated, we can answer a number of questions with clarity.

Questions and Answers

The answers presented here to a number of questions on Book of Mormon English (and translation) are based on extensive research and comparative study.1 Unfortunately, that has not been true of most comments made about Book of Mormon English through time. Thus, there has been an accumulation of layers of underinformed opinions. Some of these are incorporated in the questions found in this essay.

In the balance of this essay, I present each question as a heading for ease of reference and follow all the questions with a short summary.

Did Joseph Smith speak an ultra-archaic dialect in 1829, at the time he dictated the Book of Mormon?

No, his early writings (mainly as personal letters: 1829–1833)2 indicate that he didn’t. They reflect his speech to some appreciable degree, since he wasn’t trained to write very differently from how he spoke.3 His early writings suggest that he spoke a fairly standard nineteenth-century American dialect, along with a lesser component of grammar that had come to be regarded over the years as inferior to competing forms of expression. (Of course, Joseph had learned this bad grammar4 growing up, so it was part of his native-speaker grammatical system.) There are quite a few linguistic tendencies apparent in his early writings that are the opposite of mostly pervasive Book of Mormon English usage, and these tendencies also agree with what is known generally about American English usage of the time. Eight of these are: (1) a strong preference for infinitival over finite verb complementation (11 to 1),5 (2) almost all simple past usage without did (164 to 1),6 (3) a strong preference for the relative pronoun who over that (49 to 13), followed distantly by which (2×),7 (4) a preference for ellipsis of various linguistic elements over repetition, (5) a preference for the future auxiliary will over shall (71 to 35),8 (6) a preference for the conjunction except over save (4 to 0), (7) the use of the past participle arrived, not arriven (6 to 0),9 and (8) a preference for the verb want over desire (7 to 2).10

Even if Joseph had spoken something close to 1590s Elizabethan English,11 there are still salient aspects of Book of Mormon English that he would have been unlikely to produce, such as the pervasive pattern of heavy finite verb complementation after verbs like cause, command, and suffer. That wasn’t the pattern of 1590s English, which at that time was less than twenty-five percent finite after command and less than five percent finite after cause and suffer.12 There’s also no evidence that he would have employed “it supposeth me” (dative me), even though it’s an archaic construction.13 Such examples could be multiplied many times.

A more general point is that Joseph Smith didn’t belong to a small dialect group. His recent ancestors had not lived in an isolated geographical area for centuries, such as a few mountain valley communities. His dialect group was a large one, composed of hundreds of thousands of speakers from various regions of New England and New York. Furthermore, the broad English textual record—both British and American—indicates that English usage had undergone some universal shifts over the centuries, away from what we see so often in the Book of Mormon, such as a shift to even less finite verb complementation than before, a strong shift toward the personal relative pronoun who (and a marginalization of the personal relative pronoun which), and a nearly complete elimination of (1) subordinate that, (2) future/present subjunctive shall, and (3) positive, non-emphatic periphrastic did. As such, in order for the ultra-archaic dialect theory to be correct, a large New England–New York dialect group, which Joseph Smith was a part of, must have somehow conserved many archaic features from the 1500s that had disappeared from the textual record, including from the early American Evans corpus.

Did Joseph Smith understand the meaning of the Nephite record and then use his own language to express that meaning?

No, he didn’t—unless one subscribes to the ultra-archaic dialect theory, which is that Joseph spoke 1590s Elizabethan English in 1820s America. The original Book of Mormon text is extensively archaic in its sentence structure and very often not biblical; its level of archaism is much greater than any known pseudo-archaic text.14 The nonbiblical archaism is both lexical and syntactic. Some archaic syntactic features are ubiquitous in the text. No known pseudo-archaic author—not even a Shakespearean scholar or a medievalist15—had anywhere near the level of knowledge of Early Modern English that is exhibited in the Book of Mormon. Also, Joseph’s own linguistic preferences directly opposed Book of Mormon usage in thousands of instances (see the previous answer).

Is Book of Mormon English usage only statistically different from pseudo-archaic usage?

No, unless we take this to frequently include zero percent. In other words, the Book of Mormon has many instances of archaic vocabulary and syntactic usage which currently known pseudo-archaic texts (more than two dozen) have no examples of. Here are five simple syntactic examples out of dozens that could be mentioned. Pseudo-archaic texts don’t have pro-clausal “save it «be»” usage (125×) or the impersonal, simple dative construction “it supposeth me that . . .” (4×) or referential “of which/whom «have» been spoken” (9×) or the leveled past participle “had (been) spake” (13×) or object “they which” usage (23×).

Do the many instances of bad grammar found in the original Book of Mormon text mean that Joseph Smith worded the text?

No, there are more than one hundred instances of nonstandard grammar in the text that he was unlikely to produce, since they weren’t part of his native-speaker grammatical system. Even some types of bad grammar that he was known to use have subtypes or individual instances that he was unlikely to produce, such as “there was but few which denied the covenant of freedom” (Alma 46:35)16 (unlikely because of personal “few which”; a single match of the string “there was but few which” is currently known, from the middle of the sixteenth-century).17

Could Joseph Smith’s use of the term translate apply to him dictating words that the Lord revealed to him?

Yes, it could mean that he received words from the Lord, which agrees with a straightforward reading of 2 Nephi 27:24. To be clear, neither the revealed-ideas position nor the revealed-words position interprets the verb translate according to today’s default sense, which is “to express or convey the meaning of (a word or text) using equivalent words in a different language.”18 And it is worth mentioning that Joseph Smith could not have been a translator in the usual sense in 1829 since he was a monolingual English speaker at that time.

If Joseph received words from the Lord, does this mean that there was only one translator of the Nephite record into English?

No, the Lord might have commissioned multiple translators to carry out the task or he might have translated it in some other way we’re unfamiliar with. No one knows for sure how it was translated from the original source material into mostly English words.

If the Book of Mormon has expressions, metaphors, and images that Joseph Smith might have made, does this mean that the translation involved his mind and language?

No, the Lord could have made or directed such an English-language translation. This type of language includes phrases that appear to have been common in Joseph’s time. One reason for this perception is that the Google Books database (the source for the Ngram Viewer) currently has 20.5 billion words published between 1801 and 1829, while it has “only” 4.9 billion words published between 1470 and 1800 (less than half of what the two largest databases covering that span of time have). Thus, the early nineteenth century is represented in Google Books at nearly 50× the rate of the preceding 330 years!19

These phrases have often been called nineteenth-century phrases, even though some of them might have been more popular a century before or even centuries earlier. Joseph presumably could have worded these phrases, but the Lord could have done so as well. What Joseph was unable to produce were dozens of items of nonbiblical, obsolete vocabulary, a substantial amount of the archaic syntax, and even the biblical passages (see immediately below).

Did Joseph Smith somehow reference a printed biblical text when dictating the biblical material for the Book of Mormon, since various italicized words were changed?

No, there are 712 word or constituent differences between biblical readings and Book of Mormon readings, some of which are complex.20 There would probably be fewer than one hundred differences21 had Joseph referred to a King James Bible, whether real or eidetic (that is, crystal-clear visual imagery of biblical pages).22

Also, italicized changes were above the average change rate but were still less than one-fourth of the changes (22.9 percent). Moreover, thirty-one times there is a non-italics difference right next to an italicized word or phrase that was maintained. (And Joseph Smith might not have even known, in 1829, why some words were italicized in the Bible.)

All biblical language in the Book of Mormon, at the level of the clause or sentence, must be taken into account in order to reach reliable conclusions. Such thorough analysis reveals that there are 31 stretches of verbatim quoting of the King James text in the Book of Mormon above 100 words (ranging between 104 and 261 words). Yet at the same time there are many seemingly trivial, meaning-neutral differences, some of which go against Joseph Smith’s own English-language preferences, such as changing a biblical will to shall, and changing multiple instances of a biblical personal that to which, and inserting personal which where there wasn’t any relative pronoun in the King James text. There was no reason for Joseph to make such changes, and it is unlikely that he would have done so; yet there they are. This argues against him doing these.

In addition to these things, the biblical chapter system was ignored, biblical punctuation was ignored, and there are also a few tweaks to the biblical text, as dictated by Joseph, which are early modern in character, and which he was unlikely to have made himself. Furthermore, the insertion of the Septuagint / Coverdale phrase “upon all (the) ships of the sea” (2 Nephi 12:16) cannot be explained by Joseph somehow referencing a printed King James text. Finally, the Book of Mormon has quoted biblical language from eleven different books of the King James Bible. So he would have needed to refer to one-sixth of the books in the Bible.

Do the following excerpts (from the preface to the First Book of Nephi) contain a mixture of early and late modern English verb forms: “The Lord warns Lehi to depart out of the land of Jerusalem because he prophesieth unto the people concerning their iniquity”; “Nephi taketh his brethren and returns to the land of Jerusalem”?

No. First, verbs ending in {-s} inflection (third-person-singular, present-tense verbs) were also used in the early modern period, and this kind of inflectional variation was common back then. Second, the vast majority of Book of Mormon English usage is early modern in character. Thus, it follows that an early modern view for verbs ending in {-s} in the Book of Mormon should be privileged.

As for these two examples, the same inflectional variation of the first excerpt occurs within a span of eighty-five words in a seventeenth-century text (1685); and the same inflectional variation of the second excerpt occurs within a span of fifteen words in a sixteenth-century text (1579). This type of variation is also found in many of Shakespeare’s plays.

Does extra negation such as “there were no robbers nor no murderers, neither were there Lamanites nor no manner of ites” (4 Nephi 1:17) provide evidence that Joseph Smith worded the text?

No. First, the text has various types of extra negation, and each type has its own historical patterns of use. In this case, “nor no . . .” (which occurs six times in the Book of Mormon) was still used in the early nineteenth century by educated British and American speakers. Second, in Joseph Smith’s early writings, when he had the opportunity to use “nor no,” he didn’t.23 Third, “nor no manner of X” (4×) was phraseology that was already rare by the eighteenth century;24 it primarily appears in texts of the sixteenth century and earlier. Fourth, “nor no” occurs forty times in Shakespeare’s plays. Thus, the six instances in the Book of Mormon are more properly interpreted as early modern usage, and more likely to be the result of an English-language translation that the Lord directed.

Does the following bad grammar provide evidence for Joseph wording the Book of Mormon: “seeing that the holy scriptures testifies of these things” (Alma 34:30)?

This is further evidence of the English-language translation being the result of early modern grammatical knowledge. In this case, 23 instances of “scriptures testifies” occur in an early modern corpus of 1.4 billion words (1473–1700), but no instances occur in a late modern corpus of 4.4 billion words (1771–1800+).25

Is the Book of Mormon entirely early modern in its language?

No, but the vast majority of it is. The clearest examples of late modern usage are vocabulary items such as derangement (‘disturbance, disorder’) and transpire (‘to take place’), which entered English in the 1730s and the 1760s, respectively. However, the fact that a small amount of its lexical usage began to be used in English in the 1700s doesn’t mean that Joseph Smith chose these words. While he could have chosen almost any of the words whose meanings were current in his time, he certainly did not choose any words whose contextual meaning was obsolete in his time, such as but if meaning ‘unless’ and whereby meaning ‘why?’ and depart meaning ‘divide.’ (Those who don’t believe that any nonbiblical Book of Mormon meanings were obsolete in Joseph’s time oppose the crowd-sourced position of the Oxford English Dictionary, in dozens of instances.) He also didn’t choose almost 200 unique Book of Mormon names. These lexical facts—firmly supported by its pervasive archaic syntax—argue against him choosing even modern words like derangement and transpire.

Is “had partook” in 1 Nephi 8:25 bad grammar?

No, the phrase was used by literate authors in both the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. While “had partook” began to appear in texts in the second half of the 1600s, the much more frequent (and morphologically related) “had took” began to appear in the second half of the 1500s. The larger context in the Book of Mormon is the following:

1 Nephi 8:25

And after that they had partook of the fruit of the tree,
they did cast their eyes about as if they were ashamed.

This combination of archaic “after that” and non-emphatic periphrastic did usage was most characteristic of the second half of the sixteenth century.

The above sentence has a subordinate clause followed by a main clause. Focusing on these, we find that the above combination of a past perfect “after that” clause and a main clause with a non-emphatic periphrastic did doesn’t occur in either the King James Bible or pseudo-archaic texts, but that it does occur twelve times in the Book of Mormon, and in the textual record as well, mostly between the years 1550 and 1670.26

Is the language of 1 Nephi 8:25 a Frankenstein hybrid of early modern syntax?

No, similar to how taketh and returns, used close together, isn’t a patchwork of early and late modern morphosyntax, this passage doesn’t have a Frankenstein hybrid of early modern usage. In general, nonspecialists cannot accurately discern whether different parts of Book of Mormon sentences represent usage from different centuries. And in many cases, the popularity of specific language use, textually speaking, exhibits a complex pattern.

There are three ways to look at the syntax of the above sentence: as late sixteenth-century usage, as late seventeenth-century usage, or as a non-clashing combination of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century usage. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter which view we take; none of them mean(s) that Joseph Smith worded it.

Summary

This completes an abbreviated attempt to answer some common questions about Book of Mormon English. As one reads the original language, questions always arise about grammatical usage, but in the vast majority of instances, the nonstandard language in question occurred at some point in the early modern period, while the same cannot be said of the late modern period.27 My hope is that the foregoing will clear up some prevalent misunderstandings about this topic and lead to a greater appreciation of the language that Joseph Smith dictated in 1829.

Stanford Carmack has a linguistics and a law degree from Stanford University as well as a doctorate in Hispanic Languages and Literature from the University of California, Santa Barbara, specializing in historical syntax and textual analysis. He currently researches Book of Mormon syntax and lexis as they relate to English usage and contributes to aspects of the Book of Mormon critical text project carried out by Royal Skousen.

Notes

1. Background preparation, besides general linguistic study, has included making and searching repeatedly a very large database of eighteenth-century English (9.4 billion words), a small database of Joseph Smith’s early writings (11,000 words), a moderately sized corpus of 25 pseudo-archaic texts (whose writers were attempting to imitate King James English or archaic English: 582,500 words), and a large database of Early Modern English (1.4 billion words). I have also tagged Joseph Smith’s 1829 dictation language for part of speech (currently 270,002 words). Early English Books Online: quod.lib.umich.edu
/e/eebogroup (EEBO); Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO): gale
.com/primary-sources/eighteenth-century-collections-online; Evans Early American Imprints Online: quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans. Sixteenth-century and early seventeenth-century biblical texts (EEBO): name.umdl.umich.edu
/A13203 (1530); name.umdl.umich.edu/A68940 (1534); name.umdl.umich.edu
/A10349 (1535); name.umdl.umich.edu/A10405 (1540); name.umdl.umich.edu
/A10675 (1561); name.umdl.umich.edu/A10708 (1568); name.umdl.umich.edu
/A16049 (1582); name.umdl.umich.edu/A11777 (1609–1610). Some of the above corpora are available in WordCruncher (wordcruncher.com).

Links to relevant papers of mine published by the Interpreter Foundation can be found online at journal.interpreterfoundation.org/author/stanfordc/.

Relevant text-critical volumes by Skousen, at times with my collaboration, include: Royal Skousen, ed., The Original Manuscript of the Book of Mormon: Typographical Facsimile of the Extant Text (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS] and Brigham Young University [BYU], 2001); Royal Skousen, ed., The Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon: Typographical Facsimile of the Entire Text in Two Parts (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU, 2001); Royal Skousen, ed., The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009); Royal Skousen, Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, 6 Parts (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU, 2004–2009); Royal Skousen, Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, 2nd ed. (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU Studies, 2018); Royal Skousen, The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon: Parts 1–2, Grammatical Variation (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU Studies, 2016); Royal Skousen, The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon: Parts 3–4, The Nature of the Original Language (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU Studies, 2018); and Royal Skousen, The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon: Part 5, The King James Quotations in the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU Studies, 2019). Some of these are also available as WordCruncher ebooks.

Other relevant primary sources repeatedly searched include Google Books, books.google.com/advanced_book_search; the Ngram Viewer, books.google
.com/ngrams; The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. (CD-ROM, v4 2009); and The Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd ed. (Online, 2015), oed.com/?tl=true.

2. Joseph Smith’s Early Writings [1829–1833] (11,000 words), each of which is available in The Joseph Smith Papers collection, include “Letter to Oliver Cowdery, 22 October 1829,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/letter
-to-oliver-cowdery-22-october-1829/1#full-transcript; “Letter to the Church in Colesville, 2 December 1830,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/letter-to-the-church-in-colesville-2-december-1830/1#full-transcript; “Letter to Martin Harris, 22 February 1831,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/letter-to-martin-harris-22-february-1831/1#full-transcript; “Letter to Hyrum Smith, 3–4 March 1831,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/letter-to-hyrum-smith-3-4-march-1831/1#full-transcript; “Letter to Emma Smith, 6 June 1832,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/letter-to-emma-smith-6-june
-1832/1#full-transcript; “Letter to William W. Phelps, 31 July 1832,” josephsmith
papers.org/paper-summary/letter-to-william-w-phelps-31-july-1832/1#full
-transcript; “Letter to Emma Smith, 13 October 1832,” josephsmithpapers
.org/paper-summary/letter-to-emma-smith-13-october-1832/1#full-transcript;
“Letter to William W. Phelps, 27 November 1832,” josephsmithpapers.org
/paper-summary/letter-to-william-w-phelps-27-november-1832/1#full
-transcript; “Letter to Noah C. Saxton, 4 January 1833,” josephsmithpapers
.org/paper-summary/letter-to-noah-c-saxton-4-january-1833/1#full
-transcript; “Letter to William W. Phelps, 11 January 1833,” josephsmithpapers
.org/paper-summary/letter-to-william-w-phelps-11-january-1833/1#full
-transcript; “History, circa Summer 1832,” josephsmithpapers.org/paper-
summary/history-circa-summer-1832/1#full-transcript. Also see the free WordCruncher eBook Joseph Smith: Early Writings in the WordCruncher Bookstore, wordcruncher.com/library.php, with links to individual letters that are transcribed at The Joseph Smith Papers.

3. Joseph Smith’s training in scribal diglossia would also have had to be atypical: to write modernly, not archaically.

4. In this essay, I will use the term “bad grammar” to refer to both non-English grammar and subjectively interpreted grammar (based on prescriptive or time-dependent judgments).

5. Stanford Carmack, “The Book of Mormon’s Complex Finite Cause Syntax,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 113–36, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-book-of-mormons-complex-finite
-cause-syntax/. See note 20, which explains that one of the twelve cases in the Book of Mormon was edited out of the text, giving a total of eleven.

6. Stanford Carmack, “How Joseph Smith’s Grammar Differed from Book of Mormon Grammar: Evidence from the 1832 History,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 25 (2017): 240–41, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/how
-joseph-smiths-grammar-differed-from-book-of-mormon-grammar
-evidence-from-the-1832-history/.

7. Stanford Carmack, “Personal Relative Pronoun Usage in the Book of Mormon: An Important Authorship Diagnostic,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 5–36, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/personal-relative-pronoun-usage-in-the-book-of-mormon-an-important
-authorship-diagnostic/, and Carmack, “How Joseph Smith’s Grammar Differed from Book of Mormon Grammar,” 241–44.

8. Mentioned briefly in Carmack, “The Book of Mormon’s Complex Finite Cause Syntax,” 130–31.

9. Stanford Carmack, “A Look at Some ‘Nonstandard’ Book of Mormon Grammar,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 11 (2014): 238–40, journal.interpreter
foundation.org/a-look-at-some-nonstandard-book-of-mormon-grammar/.

10. The Book of Mormon doesn’t use the verb want to mean “desire.”

11. Of course, this view is quite unlikely on its face. It is proposed in order to say that Joseph translated or worded the text.

12. The three finite rates in the Book of Mormon after the verbs cause, command, and suffer are, in that order, 57.6, 77.2, and 62.6 percent. The finite rates in the King James Bible after these three verbs are much smaller: 1.0, 25.5, and 4.6 percent. Squaring the finite instances for each verb and dividing by the total and then taking the average gives us the level or relative intensity of finite verb complementation after these high-frequency verbs of influence. The calculated values are 72.3 and 3.6, and so the Book of Mormon’s intensity of finite usage is 20 times that of the King James text.

13. Stanford Carmack, “Why the Oxford English Dictionary (and not Webster’s 1828),” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 15 (2015): 73–77, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/why-the-oxford-english-dictionary-and-not
-websters-1828/.

14. The pseudo-archaic English corpus that I made and searched has twenty-five texts and about 582,500 words. Details are provided in Stanford Carmack, “Is the Book of Mormon a Pseudo-Archaic Text?,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 28 (2018): 177–232, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/is
-the-book-of-mormon-a-pseudo-archaic-text/.

This corpus includes twelve longer pseudo-archaic texts (close to 561,300 words total): Chronicle of the Kings (1740), Book of Jasher (1751), American Chronicles (1775), The American Revolution (1793), The First Book of Napoleon, the Tyrant of the Earth (1809), History of Anti-Christ (1811), The Late War (1816), Chronicles of Eri (1822), The Epistles of Ignatius and Polycarp (1827), A Holy, Sacred and Divine Roll and Book (1843), The Healing of the Nations (1855), New Gospel of Peace According to St. Benjamin (1863).

It also includes thirteen shorter pseudo-archaic texts (close to 21,100 words total): Book of Preferment (1742), The French Gasconade Defeated (1743), Parable Against Persecution (1755), A Fragment of the Chronicles of Nathan Ben Saddi (1758), The Fall of Samuel the Squomicutite (1763), The Book of America (1766), Chapter 37th (1782), The First Book of the Chronicles of John (1812), Book of Chronicles (1812), Chronicles of Andrew (1815), Chiefs of Muttonvillee (1830), Reformer Chronicles (1832), Chronicles of Gotham (1888).

15. Richard Grant White (1822–1885) and William Morris (1834–1896).

16. All Book of Mormon quotations in this paper are cited from Royal Skousen, ed., The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text, 2nd ed. (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2022). An online version of the 2009 first edition is at bookofmormon
central.org/content/book-mormon-earliest-text.

17. Hugh Latimer, 27 sermons [. . .], London, 1562. See Early English Books Online, University of Michigan Library Digital Collections, p. 83. name.umdl.umich
.edu/A05143,

18. OED, s.v. “translate,” verb, def. I.1.a.

19. “Google Books: Ngram Viewer Exports,” version 20200217, storage.google
apis.com/books/ngrams/books/datasetsv3.html; and “Dependencies Downloads Index: Total_counts_for_Dependencies,” storage.googleapis.com
/books/ngrams/books/20200217/eng/eng-0-ngrams_exports.html. “There [were] only about 500,000 books published in English before the 19th century.” See “Google Books Ngram Viewer Release Notes,” July 2024, books
.google.com/ngrams/info.

20. Skousen, The King James Quotations, 283–431.

21. The copying error rate of the printer’s manuscript was about three errors per manuscript page (464 pages, 270,000 words; 52 errors per 10,000 words), Skousen, The Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon, 3–4. The biblical quoting in the Book of Mormon (beyond the level of the phrase) involves close to 17,300 words. Using the copying error rate, we get 90 errors for the biblical sections. Therefore, conscious alteration by Joseph Smith would be required to reach a figure of 712 differences.

22. Some have proposed that Joseph Smith might have had eidetic recall of King James pages in order to explain the above-average change rate of italicized words.

23. History, circa Summer 1832: “there was no society or denomination” (emphasis added; not “there was no society nor no denomination”). See Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/2.

24. When I searched a few years ago for “nor no manner of X”, I found only four original instances in the eighteenth century.

25. The ECCO corpus has a relatively small number of texts published after the year 1800.

26. Based on a recent search, the text with the most examples of this syntactic combination was published in 1550; it has eight: Thucydides, The hystory [. . .] of the warre betwene the Peloponesians and the Athenyans [. . .], trans. Thomas Nicolls (London, 1550), name.umdl.umich.edu/A13758.

27. Notable exceptions include the Hebrew-like extra and usage (connecting some complex subordinate clauses to main clauses; 40+ instances), which doesn’t correspond to any time period of the language, and “it supposeth me that S” (4×), a syntactic expression that isn’t attested elsewhere, although the impersonal, simple dative construction with the verb suppose does occur once, in a late Middle English poem by John Gower. See OED, s.v. “suppose,” verb, def. I.i.2.a, a1393.

A Closer Look at Transliterations
in Divine Translations

Spencer Kraus

Abstract: The Book of Mormon contains many words left untranslated by Joseph Smith, such as cureloms, cumoms, senine, and ziff. While some might wonder why these words are left untranslated, a closer examination of the kinds of words that are simply transliterated as well as the frequency at which these phenomena occur provide evidence that Joseph Smith actually had an ancient record that he was translating into English. In this paper, I examine why some words have been transliterated in historical translations of the Bible or other ancient texts and compare these explanations to the Book of Mormon. In the end, I show that the Book of Mormon consistently transliterates the same types of words typically left untranslated in other works in ways that would have been unknown to Joseph Smith.

In the Book of Mormon, it is reported that the Jaredites had tamed multiple animals. These are mentioned in a brief list: “And they also had horses, and asses, and there were elephants and cureloms and cumoms; all of which were useful unto man, and more especially the elephants and cureloms and cumoms” (Ether 9:19). It is generally accepted by Latter-day Saint scholars that the words cureloms and cumoms are transliterations of words on the Book of Mormon plates. They may have been provided by Moroni2, Mosiah2, or by Joseph Smith, none of whom had any functionally equivalent words in their languages to designate these animals.1 Furthermore, while perhaps some of the most enigmatic examples, these are far from the only transliterations in the Book of Mormon. Multiple words are left untranslated in the text with no explanation ever given for this process by the Prophet Joseph Smith.

The presence of transliterations may be surprising to readers who assume that the Book of Mormon, translated by the gift and power of God, should, by nature, provide clear English terms throughout the text. However, this assumption is reading something into the text that is not there, and a close look at the transliterated words of the Book of Mormon will show that their presence is fitting for a translation of an ancient text where certain words do not have clear meaning to the translator. Translators can face various challenges when determining whether or not to translate some words. These challenges are,

1. the low frequency at which the words appear in the text,

2. the general fact that not all words, especially technical terms, have a one-to-one correlation with words used in different cultures, and

3. the fact that rare animal or plant names can be a particular source of confusion when translating ancient texts.

Frequency of Untranslated Words

Untranslated words may generally reflect rare or unusual words in the source text. One example of these rare words would be hapax legomena, or “words (other than proper names) which occur only once” in the text.2 This is especially true of the Book of Mormon, in which various hapax legomena are present, such as the words sheum and neas (Mosiah 9:9). Other untranslated words in the Book of Mormon, including ziff (Mosiah 11:3, 8), cureloms, and cumoms, could technically be categorized as dis legomena, that is, words that occur only twice in a given text. However, since these words occur in such close proximity to one another (and, for cureloms and cumoms, even in the same sentence), the same challenges of translating these words apply.

Hapax legomena are by nature difficult to translate, and most biblical scholars will turn to other instances in texts of the same language and cognate words in other languages to better understand the intended meaning of the words in question. While they can generally find success in doing so, there are still a myriad of issues when trying to identify how incidents of hapax legomena should be translated.

Emmanuel Tov observes that the ancient translators of the Septuagint refrained from translating many unfamiliar words. These typically fell into one of four groupings: proper nouns, technical words, common nouns mistaken as proper nouns, or “words probably unknown to the translator, which thus remained untranslated. All these are either hapax legomena or very rare.”3 This could be true for “hapax legomena in the Bible or in the book under consideration.”4

Furthermore, Tov elsewhere notes that “there is no certainty about the reason for the transliteration of a given Hebrew word, that is, whether it was transliterated because it was unknown to the translator or because of other reasons. However, it stands to reason that the former was the case when the Hebrew word is a hapax legomenon,” citing cases such as those in Genesis 36:24, Judges 8:7, 1 Kings 5:25, 2 Kings 8:15, and 1 Chronicles 21:20.5 Elsewhere, Tov provides a more complete list of untranslated words, including those done so because of their rare occurrence.6

While proper names are typically not classified as hapax legomena, a similar phenomenon of transliterating, rather than translating, personal names occurs as well. This was true anciently, but also especially since the Medieval period. However, some names (typically place names) were translated anciently to better convey the meaning of the text. In the Book of Mormon, this could explain some potential place names which may have been translated from a Jaredite to a Nephite language (e.g. the Mount Shelem or Heshlon). While personal or place names will not be discussed further in this paper, they can provide some insight into this practice overall, but they must be considered separately.7

As will be seen, other factors regarding the complexities of translating some hapax legomena also need to be considered with the Book of Mormon. However, the overall rarity of these words is one of the first factors to keep in mind when considering the translation process of the Book of Mormon.

Untranslated Technical Terms

Second, many of these untranslated words refer to technical terms found in the Book of Mormon and consists of a system of weights and measures, measurements of grains, or a specialized type of metal. These words include senine, seon, shum, limnah, senum, amnor, ezrom, onti, shiblon, shiblum, leah, and antion. These words are also rare, only occurring a handful of times in a list of weights and measures in Alma 11:3–19 or a brief reference in Mosiah 9:9 and could also be explained as transliterations based on their low frequency alone. The challenge of translating these words is further compounded when it is considered that these technical terms would have mostly been known to the Nephite culture and not a nineteenth-century American setting. The word ziff, apparently a type of metal, would also fit into this classification, as well as the words Liahona, Rameumptom, and Gazelem.

As with hapax legomena, transliterating technical terms was also typical among the Septuagint translators “because no adequate renderings could be found by the translators.”8 Significantly, this also involved transliterating weights and measures but no real consistency is shared between individual words. “Hence,” Tov notes, “a certain word may be transliterated in one translation unit, while translated in others. Moreover, even within the individual translation units there is no consistency with regard to the treatment of individual technical terms.”9 The weights and measures often transliterated in the Septuagint included an ʾēpāh (איפה),10 hîn (הין),11 ḥōmer (חמר),12 kōr (כר),13 and ʿōmer (עמר).14 While occasionally translated into measurements that would have been familiar to Greek-speaking Jews outside of Israel, the presence of these transliterations shows that there was often a reticence to provide one-to-one translations for technical terms.15 This is yet evident in later Bible translations, which typically (but not always) leave these words untranslated, including modern translations. It should thus be no surprise that the Book of Mormon’s senine, senum, onti, and so forth are all likewise untranslated technical terms.16

Other technical terms that are left untranslated may not refer to a system of weights and measures or even an unknown metal. This is true of the Bible as well as other ancient texts. For example, some translators of the New Testament leave words such as logos or kosmos untranslated given the complexities each word offers that does not offer a clean one-to-one translation.17 Regarding the word logos specifically, which David Bentley Hart leaves untranslated in his New Testament, Hart notes that this word,
in certain special instances [such as John’s prologue] is quite impossible for a translator to reduce to a single word in English. . . . The word is so capacious in its meanings and associations that it must be accounted unique; any attempt to limit it to a single English term would be to risk reducing it to a conceptual phantom of itself.18

This is not unique to the Bible, either. Gene Reeves, in a translation of the Lotus Sutra, notes that the word dharma does not equate well with a simple English translation and chose to leave the word untranslated—using similar reasoning as Hart for this choice.19

While not a weight or measure, or even a technical theological term such as logos or dharma, the words ziff or Rameumptom could also either be considered technical terms in their own right or words Tov identified as common nouns mistaken as proper nouns.20 Ziff, for instance, is only mentioned twice in the Book of Mormon and only in the context of King Noah’s taxes (see Mosiah 11:3, 8). It likely referred to a type of metal, perhaps an alloy, named for its lustrous properties that was unknown to Joseph Smith, thus meriting a transliteration.21

A potential example of a common noun mistaken as a proper noun appears to be Rameumptom.22 This word is recorded as the name of a place of worship only located once in the text (Alma 31:21). Furthermore, it is introduced specifically as a Zoramite word, and Mormon provides an interpretive gloss, something usually done to indicate it is a word foreign to the author (i.e. Mormon). Furthermore, we know that the Zoramites continued to exist following Alma2’s mission, and their wars with the Nephites, and even spread from their city of Antionum to other Lamanite-controlled lands (see, for example, Alma 43:4–5, Alma 48:4–6, 3 Nephi 1:29). It is likely that, when they did so, they built other “holy stands” or Rameumptoms, just as the Amalekites had their synagogues built for their own worship services (see Alma 21:4). As readers of a Nephite history, however, we are only introduced to this word during the moment that Zoramite religious practices are pertinent to Mormon’s record as he contrasts true and false worship.

Two other proper nouns are worth mentioning, namely Liahona and Gazelem. These words are likely left untranslated because they are actually proper names of specific items, much like the name Urim and Thummim is generally left untranslated in modern Bibles. In the case of Gazelem, it is also potentially even the name of a prophet. If this is the case, the previously noted phenomenon of some ancient writers translating a foreign name for people or places into their own language might help explain Gazelem as a Nephite translation of an originally Jaredite name.23 Potential origins of the term Liahona have also been considered by authors such as Loren Spendlove, Matthew Bowen, Calvin Tolman, Jonathan Cursi, and by the contributors of the Book of Mormon Onomasticon.24

In either case, whether we are dealing with weights and measures or names of places of worship, the presence of these words as transliterations would be natural if the Book of Mormon were actually a translation of an ancient text. What strengthens the presence of the transliterations of these technical terms, moreover, is the fact that each of them has promising etymologies regarding Old World languages that would have been unknown to Joseph Smith.

Untranslated Names of Rare Animals and Plants

Finally, a third consideration of transliterations which can help explain some transliterations is that in addition to being hapax legomena, there are some animals and plants that have no clear textual clues to determine their identities. These include the words sheum, neas, deseret, and the enigmatic cureloms and cumoms.

The inability to easily translate the names of rare animals is a feature of translations that has been noted by several scholars with regards to the Bible and other ancient texts. For example, as noted by Sagit Butbul, “Hapax legomena in general, and the nomenclature of fauna and flora in particular, are notoriously hard to identify. This alone suffices to account for the difficulties encountered by translators with these words.”25 The problems of translating animals that are also hapax legomena are further compounded when the original language is lost. Even with biblical Hebrew, Butbul observes that it became primarily written and read, and was no longer used in everyday life. As a result, “referents of many nouns, such as the nomenclature of fauna, were forgotten.”26 Because of this, many early translators of the Hebrew Bible refrained from translating the names of some animals into other languages. This can be seen, for example, in the Peshitta, an early translation of the Bible into Syriac for Christians in the Near East. Many historical translations have attempted to identify specific animals, while others have refrained from translating them with any certainty to avoid misidentification; this is especially applicable for those who abstain from eating fowl to avoid accidentally breaking a dietary law.27

A similar ambiguity appears in the Mishnah Bikkurim, which refers to an animal called a koy that is rarely mentioned elsewhere. According to this Mishnah,

There are ways in which it is like a wild animal, and there are ways in which it is like a domesticated animal; and there are ways in which it is like [both] a domesticated animal and a wild animal; and there are ways in which it is like neither a domesticated animal nor a wild animal.28

This ambiguous identification has often led to the koy being untranslated since different interpreters have debated whether the animal should be considered a deer, goat, or hybrid animal.29 It is therefore impossible to translate because no clear identity can be given for this animal. This is not unlike Reeves’s translation of the Lotus Sutra, which also leaves the name of the asura (a mythological creature) untranslated.30

The words sheum and neas are clearly types of plants and most likely types of grain, listed alongside corn, wheat, and barley (Mosiah 9:9). While it is unclear what type of grain each plant was, there are convincing etymologies for either derived from Akkadian (alongside a potential New World etymology for sheum). Ricks et al. consider the possibility that these were originally Jaredite words adopted by the Mulekites and then later by the Nephites. If this is the case, it is therefore possible that Mormon (separated by enough time and space from the Zeniffite usage of this term) was unfamiliar with these terms and opted to leave them as transliterated plant names.31

Another word connected to the Jaredites with clear Old-World origins is deseret, for which a gloss of “honey bee” is offered (Ether 2:3). Some scholars, including Hugh Nibley, have suggested that this word derives from the Egyptian dšr.t, “the name given to [Lower] Egypt, whose symbol was the bee.”32 This would have likely been introduced by Moroni2 or Mosiah2 as they translated the Jaredite text. If this is the case, it is possible that the gloss “honey bee” utilized a more familiar word to Nephite audiences. It is also possible (as Kevin L. Barney has argued) that the word derives from the Hebrew word for bee, děbôrāh (דבורה), utilizing an archaic feminine ending. This would render the word děbôrāt (דבורת).33 It would be possible that the closest approximation of Reformed Egyptian could be the sign for dšr.t, with a gloss provided as a contextual clue to help readers understand this choice.

It is also likely that the curelom and cumom of Ether 9:19 likewise fit this pattern of untranslatable animal names. It appears these animals were unknown to Moroni2 or Mosiah2. While it is possible that these animals had since become extinct when the Jaredite record was translated by the Nephite prophet, such can only be conjecture. What can be said with certainty, however, is that these represented Jaredite words for which the Nephite translator simply had no point of reference.34

Furthermore, while some apparently untranslated words in the Book of Mormon, such as the technical words mentioned above, may be comparable to other Old or New World languages, Book of Mormon readers are disadvantaged in a way not typical to the hapax legomena of the Bible when it comes to these two animals: there are no convincing cognate words that we can confidently connect with these terms from a long-lost Jaredite language, whose grammar and origin are still shrouded in mystery. Stephen D. Ricks, Paul Y. Hoskisson, Robert F. Smith, and John Gee have thus stated that “no etymology may be proposed” for either.35 This is the case despite creative attempts to find a Hebrew etymology for curelom and cumom by some readers in the past.36

This same principle can be seen in another inspired translation that was carried out by the Prophet Joseph Smith. In his translation of the Bible between in 1830–1833, one verse contains a single yet significant change that could help explain Joseph’s role as a translator of an ancient text in the context mentioned above. The King James Version of Isaiah 34:7 reads, “And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls.” The word unicorn is something of a translational anachronism though, as it typically now refers to a Celtic mythological creature rather than the wild cattle the Hebrew originally implied.37 Joseph apparently recognized that this word did not adequately describe the animal in question, and, not knowing how else to translate this, instead elected to transliterate the Hebrew word, likely with Sidney Rigdon’s help:38 “And the re-em shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls” (Isaiah 34:7 JST).39

While the nature of the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible differs from Joseph’s translation of the Book of Mormon, both were clearly dependent upon revelation and inspiration.40 In both cases, Joseph Smith came across an animal name that was unfamiliar to him and he did not have an English word to adequately capture the intended meanings of either. Instead of attempting to guess what the animal may have been, Joseph instead opted to transliterate the word, which is what one would expect regarding translated texts. Even if Moroni2 or Mosiah2 were the first to transliterate these unfamiliar Jaredite words, the principle is still the same, as he likewise dealt with a text originally written in a foreign language and would have potentially met the same challenges that Joseph Smith would face centuries later.

Conclusion

While it is possible to understand the Book of Mormon without knowing how much a senine truly weighed or what a cumom actually was, it is understandable why some readers might assume that the divine translation process used to produce the Book of Mormon would allow some words, for reasons unknown, to remain untranslated. I believe that these words rather clarify that, while Joseph was certainly relying on divine power to translate the Book of Mormon, the Book of Mormon remains a translation, given to Joseph Smith “in [his] weakness, after the manner of [his] language, that [he] might come to understanding” (Doctrine and Covenants 1:24). As such, the Book of Mormon reflects details typical of a translated text in which the translator did his best to share the original intent of the text in his native language but was left with some words that of necessity could not be adequately translated into English.

This is especially clear when the former cases are studied in their context. As has been shown, the Book of Mormon consistently provides the same types of transliterations expected of a translation of an ancient text. This conclusion is only strengthened when the words are themselves considered as remnants of a lost language, as most (with the Jaredite words being the exception) have clear links to Old World languages that would have been unknown to Joseph Smith. If Joseph Smith had left these untranslated words in as a red herring to make his claims to have translated an ancient record more believable, it would be inconceivable to get so many details consistently right. As John A. Tvedtnes described this, “If it had been written by Joseph Smith, such untranslated words, especially ones that correlate closely with ancient Old World languages wholly unknown to Joseph Smith, would almost certainly have been absent.”41 Because this is not the case, it would appear that the untranslated words in the Book of Mormon provide better clues into its nature as an ancient book in both how the words are used and how often they appear in the text.

[Author’s Note: I would like to thank Allen Hansen for providing me with some sources used throughout this paper, and most especially those relating to the Mishnah and Talmud.]

Spencer Kraus graduated from Brigham Young University with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, modern Hebrew, and Ancient Near Eastern Studies. He works with Scripture Central as a researcher and with Lincoln Blumell on topics relating to early Christianity and the New Testament.

1 . See Brant A. Gardner, The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2011), 161, 281–82; Brant A. Gardner, Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007), 6:259–60. It is unclear if Moroni2 provided his own translation or (more likely) utilized and adapted Mosiah2’s translation of the Jaredite record. I will thus use both names where appropriate in this paper.

2 . Frederick E. Greenspahn, “Hapax Legomena,” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary, 6 vols., ed. David Noel Freedman et al. (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 3:54–55.

3 . Emanuel Tov, The Greek and Hebrew Bible: Collected Essays on the Septuagint (Boston: Brill, 1999), 504; see also 204.

4 . Tov, The Greek and Hebrew Bible, 204.

5 . Emmanuel Tov, “Loan-words, Homophony, and Transliterations in the Septuagint,” Biblica 60, no. 2 (1979): 234.

6 . Tov, The Greek and Hebrew Bible, 507–12; on p. 507, Tov notes that “The majority of the words in the list [on pp. 507–10] are hapax legomena or rare words in the Bible (sometimes rare in a certain book),” with the additional words on pp. 510–12 being transliterated for other reasons.

7 . See generally Jože Krašovec, The Transformation of Biblical Proper Names (New York: T&T Clark, 2010). For the potential translation of the name Shelem or Heshlon, see Stephen D. Ricks, Paul Y. Hoskisson, Robert F. Smith, and John Gee, Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2022), s.vv. “Shelem,” “Heshlon;” see also Matthew L. Bowen and Pedro Olavarria, “Place of Crushing: The Literary Function of Heshlon in Ether 13:25–31,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 14 (2015): 230–33, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/place-of-crushing-the-literary-function-of-heshlon-in-ether-1325-31/.

8 . Tov, “Loan-words, Homophony, and Transliterations in the Septuagint,” 231.

9 . Tov, “Loan-words, Homophony, and Transliterations in the Septuagint,” 231.

10 . A “corn-measure,” or a measure for “something cooked” or a “liquid measure.” Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, trans. M. E. J. Richardson, 2 vols. (Leiden: Brill, 2001), s.v. איפה; hereafter cited as HALOT.

11 . A liquid measure. HALOT, s.v. הין.

12 . A “dry measure,” typically of wheat, barley, or seed. HALOT, s.v. חמר.

13 . A “measure of six ass-loads” or “the unit of square measure which needs one kor of seed for sowing.” HALOT, s.v. כר.

14 . Either “a small heap of cut corn” or “a measure of corn.” HALOT, s.v. עמר.

15 . A list of these and other transliterated weights and measures is found in Tov, “Loan-words, Homophony, and Transliterations in the Septuagint,” 232.

16 . See (in order of their appearance in this paper) Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.vv. “senine,” “seon,” “shum,” “limnah,” “senum,” “amnor,” “ezrom,” “onti,” “shiblon,” “shiblum,” “leah,” and “antion.”

17 . For example, David Bentley Hart, The New Testament: A Translation, 2nd ed. (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017), 549–51 discusses the difficulties of translating the word logos. Also see the renderings of passages such as Revelation 19:13; Matthew 24:21, 27; John 1:1, 9, 10, 14, 29; and John 3:16–17 in Scott McKnight, The Second Testament: A New Translation (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2023), which likewise transliterates logos as well as kosmos.

18 . Hart, The New Testament: A Translation, 549–51.

19 . See Gene Reeves, trans., The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic (Sommerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2008), ix.

20 . See Tov, The Greek and Hebrew Bible, 504.

21 . See Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.v. “ziff.” For another discussion on ziff, including an additional etymology, see Jerry D. Grover Jr., Ziff, Magic Goggles, and Golden Plates: Etymology of Zyf and a Metallurgical Analysis of the Book of Mormon Plates (Provo, UT: Grover Publishing, 2015), scripturecentral.org/archive
/books/book/ziff-magic-goggles-and-golden-plates-etymology-zyf-and
-metallurgical-analysis-book-mormon.

22 . See Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.v. “Rameumptom.”

23 . See Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.vv. “Liahona” and “Gazelem.” Also see Elliott Jolley, “Gazelem the Jaredite,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 27 (2017): 85–105, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/gazelem-the-jaredite/.

24 . See Loren Spendlove, “And the One Pointed the Way: Issues of Interpretation and Translation Involving the Liahona,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 45 (2021): 1–36, journal.interpreter
foundation.org/and-the-one-pointed-the-way-issues-of-interpretation
-and-translation-involving-the-liahona/; Matthew L. Bowen “Look to the Lord! The Meaning of Liahona and the Doctrine of Christ in Alma 37–38” in Give Ear to My Words: Text and Context of Alma 36–42: The 48th Brigham Young University Sidney B. Sperry Symposium, ed. Kerry Hull, Nicholas J. Frederick, and Hank R. Smith (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU], 2019), 275–95; Calvin D. Tolman, “Liahona: “Prepared of the Lord, a Compass,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 51 (2022): 211–52, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/liahona
-prepared-of-the-lord-a-compass/; Jonathan Curci “Liahona: ‘The Direction of the Lord’: An Etymological Explanation,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 16, no. 2 (2007): 60–67; and Book of Mormon Onomasticon, s.v. “Liahona,” onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php?title=LIAHONA.

25 . Sagit Butbul, “The Rendering of Bird Names in Early Judeo-Arabic Biblical Translations,” Aleph 10, no.1 (2010): 14.

26 . Bubtul, “Rendering of Bird Names,” 14.

27 . See Butbul, “Rendering of Bird Names,” 14–37 for a discussion on how the names of birds in Leviticus 11 have historically been translated by various interpreters.

28 . Mishnah Bikkurim 2:8, translation taken from Jacob Neusner, trans., The Mishnah: A New Translation (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1988), 171, brackets in original. See also Tosefta Bikkurim 2:1–2, available in Jacob Neusner, trans., The Tosefta, 2 vols. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2002), 1:348–49. Richard S. Sarason is also listed as a translator for Tosefta Bikkurim 2:1–7.

29 . See, for example, Heinrich W. Guggenheimer, trans., The Jerusalem Talmud, First Order: Zeraim; Tractates Kilam and Seviit (New York: de Gruyter, 2001), 280n91.

30 . See Reeves, The Lotus Sutra, ix.

31 . See Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.vv. “sheum” and “neas.” Sheum is also worth noting as having potential Old and New World etymologies.

32 . As summarized in Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.v. “deseret.” (This source indicates that the name applies to Upper Egypt, but the correct application is to Lower Egypt.) For Nibley’s full discussion, see Hugh Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, The World of the Jaredites, There Were Jaredites, vol. 5 of The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: FARMS, 1988), 189–94.

33 . See Kevin L. Barney, “On the Etymology of Deseret,” BCC Papers 1, no. 2 (November 2006): 5–6, scripturecentral.org/archive/periodicals/journal
-article/etymology-deseret; also see HALOT, s.v. דבורה.

34 . It may also be significant that these animals are listed alongside the elephant, an animal long thought to be extinct before the time of the Jaredites. However, rather than viewing this animal as an anachronism, it is possible that pockets of elephants (and perhaps even the curelom and cumom, should they also be extinct) survived into more recent times, allowing the Jaredites to declare them as especially useful for man. This has been discussed in Wade E. Miller, Science and the Book of Mormon: Cureloms, Cumoms, Horses and More (Laguna Niguel, CA: KCT & Associates, 2009), 49–53, scripturecentral
.org/archive/books/book-chapter/elephants-book-mormon. Matthew Roper has also discussed the matter of elephants in an excellent forthcoming article. See Matthew Roper, “Anachronisms: Accidental Evidence in Book of Mormon Criticisms, Part 1: Animals” (forthcoming). It is also worth mentioning that the word elephant does not appear in the Old Testament, although ivory is listed as one of Solomon’s imports in 1 Kings 10:22 and 2 Chronicles 9:21. It is therefore more likely that Moroni2 or Mosiah2 was familiar with stories about a mastodon from the New World, although an Old World connection need not be dismissed entirely, especially as we do not know what version of Israelite history (particularly relating to the royal history) was kept on the brass plates.

35 . Ricks et al., Dictionary of Proper Names and Foreign Words in the Book of Mormon, s.v. “curelom,” “cumom.”

36 . For example, George Reynolds and Janne M. Sjodahl, Commentary on the Book of Mormon, 7 vols. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1973), 6:145 suggests that the curelom was the llama based on the Hebrew garal, “to roll forth or to roll off.” They similarly propose the cumom was a bear, based on the Hebrew qūm, “to rise.” Elsewhere, the authors also suggest on p. 149 that each animal could be a mastodon, alpaca, or llama, but they do not give any etymologies for these. While creative, these etymologies carry the assumption that Moroni2 or Mosiah2 would have translated the name from the Jaredite language into a Hebrew equivalent to describe the animal’s function and should be used cautiously. Another creative proposal is found in Jerry D. Grover, Jr., The Swords of Shule: Jaredite Land Northward Chronology, Geography, and Culture in Mesoamerica (Provo, UT: Challex Scientific Publishing, 2018), 25–27, this time utilizing the Sumerian. However, his proposal is not without significant problems, and it may not accurately capture the syntax or grammar of the Sumerian language.

37 . When Marco Polo saw a rhinoceros in his travels, he found the best way to describe it as a unicorn, going on to say that it was “a very ugly beast to see and unclean. And they are not so as we here say and describe, who say that it lets itself be caught in the lap by a virgin girl: but I tell you that it is quite the contrary of that which we believe that it was.” This loan shift has become out of date, however, as few today would describe a rhinoceros (even though it has one horn) as a unicorn. One can also read in Polo’s account an uncertainty (and perhaps even a hesitancy) how to describe this animal and found the only way he could was to use the name of the Celtic mythological creature. Marco Polo, The Description of the World, 2 vols., ed. and trans. A. C. Moule and Paul Pelliot (London: Routledge, 1938), 1:166.

38 . While some (such as Thomas A. Wayment) have attempted to demonstrate that Joseph Smith was dependent upon Adam Clarke’s commentary during his translation of the Bible, such theories have been shown to be based on faulty findings, and no clear connection to Adam Clarke’s commentary can be found. See Kent P. Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship, 40 (2020): 15–60, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/some-notes-on-joseph-smith-and
-adam-clarke/. While Clarke does note the Hebrew behind the word unicorn in the King James Version, Jackson notes, “Several factors argue against Clarke’s commentary being the source” (p. 33). Furthermore, while Clarke offers some suggestions for what the unicorn likely was, it is telling that there is no attempt on Joseph’s part to replace the word unicorn for another English animal name. While Joseph likely got this word from an outside source, Adam Clarke does not appear to be the origin of this word, especially when compounded with the remainder of Jackson’s findings.

39 . Joseph Smith’s translation taken from Kent P. Jackson, ed., Joseph Smith’s Translation of the Bible: The Joseph Smith Translation and the King James Translation in Parallel Columns (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2022), 204. Unlike cureloms and cumoms, the word re-em is not a hapax legomena of the Bible, but it is an unknown animal name (for Joseph) that apparently merited this similar treatment on his part. For the meaning of re-em, see HALOT, s.v. ראם.

40 . For a recent discussion on Joseph’s translation of the Bible, see Kent P. Jackson, Understanding Joseph Smith’s Translation of the Bible (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2022), 14–15. The literature on Joseph’s translation of the Book of Mormon is extensive, but for a recent, approachable, and accurate summary of Joseph’s translation process, see Gerrit J. Dirkmaat and Michael Hubbard Mackay, Let’s Talk about the Translation of the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2023).

41 . John A. Tvedtnes, The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Salt Lake City: Cornerstone Publishing, 1999), 347, scripturecentral
.org/archive/books/book-chapter/untranslated-words-book-mormon.

Trust Us, We’re Lawyers: Lucas and Neville on the Translation of
the Book of Mormon

Brant A. Gardner

Review of James W. Lucas and Jonathan E. Neville, By Means of the Urim & Thummim: Restoring Translation to the Restoration (Cottonwood Heights, UT: Digital Legend Press & Publishing, 2023). 288 pages. $19.95.

Abstract: In their book, James Lucas and Jonathan Neville present two major theses relative to translation of the Book of Mormon. The first is that the translation was always done by means of the interpreters that were delivered with the plates. The second is that Joseph Smith was an active participant in the translation process. A theory is laid out for how that might happen. Although this reviewer can agree that Joseph was an active participant in the translation, neither the first thesis nor their explanation of the second thesis can be accepted by those familiar with the historical record.

This review requires a disclosure, right up front. James Lucas and Jonathan Neville wrote a book that introduces a theory on how the Book of Mormon was translated.1 I also wrote a book on that topic.2 They include my book in their book’s bibliography and in a couple of footnotes. They didn’t like my book. I return the favor: I don’t like theirs. Nevertheless, I hope to provide an analysis that can transcend my obvious personal involvement in the issues. Well, mostly avoid personal involvement.

Lucas and Neville didn’t really say “trust us, we’re lawyers.” I confess that is my translation3 of what they said: “The authors are both attorneys, and the law has long and well-tested criteria for evaluating secondhand or hearsay testimony, which we apply to sources about the origins of the Book of Mormon” (p. 27). This statement is part of the introduction to the first part of the book which takes on historical testimonies to argue that Joseph Smith never used a seer stone to translate the Book of Mormon. The assertion is important because they are also asking us to prefer their interpretation to that of trained Latter-day Saint historians.

Michael Hubbard MacKay and Gerrit J. Dirkmaat represent the opposition: “Recently, historians of the Joseph Smith Papers Project carefully analyzed all of the known accounts about the translation to document the use of the seer stone.”4 Lucas and Neville are asking us to favor their reading of their selected set of sources over the interpretations of the trained historians who have “analyzed all of the known accounts about the translation to document the use of the seer stone.” Did those trained historians really miss what the lawyers found? That would be astonishing. Perhaps it could be true, but “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” in Carl Sagan’s aphorism.5

In this review I do not discuss specifics of how the historical accounts are interpreted. The arguments that the historical accounts do not actually point to the use of a seer stone were laid out in Neville’s previous book.6 Spencer Kraus reviewed that book and went into the details sufficiently that I elect not to repeat that analysis; please see his review.7 Kraus didn’t convince Neville, as evidenced in Neville’s response to Kraus and in the nearly wholesale repetition of his arguments and evidence in By Means of the Urim & Thummim.8 I simply note that I agree with Kraus’s reviews.

What I propose in this review is not a detailed analysis of the evidence, but rather a more detailed examination of how Lucas and Neville use the evidence. I will use David Hackett Fischer’s descriptions of historians’ fallacies9 as the measure against which I evaluate Lucas and Neville’s arguments. Although Lucas and Neville are lawyers, the law isn’t history. When they enter discussions of history, they act as historians. The question is how well they, as lawyers, do that.

By Means of the Urim & Thummim presents two major theses. The first is that the translation of the Book of Mormon was only accomplished using the interpreters delivered to Joseph Smith. The second thesis is a new explanation for how the translation was accomplished. Most of the comparisons to Fischer’s historians’ fallacies therefore concentrate in the discussion of the first thesis.

The Problem of Approach

Early in his book, Fischer notes: “Historians must, moreover, develop critical tests not merely for their interpretations, but also for their methods of arriving at them.”10 Without those critical tests for their interpretations, historians are open to perhaps the most common error. Fischer calls it the “fallacy of declarative questions.” As he defines it:

If a historian goes to his sources with a simple affirmative proposition that “X was the case,” then he is predisposed to prove it. He will probably be able to find ‘evidence’ sufficient to illustrate his expectations, if not actually to sustain them.11

It is a well-known problem. G. J. Renier underlined it when he quoted the French historian Fustel de Coulanges as saying “if we approach a text with a preconceived idea we shall read in it only what we want to read.”12 John Gee underscored it specifically in reference to research on the Book of Mormon:

As anyone who has studied geometry since Nikolas Lobatchewsky knows, the entire shape of your geometrical system depends on your assumptions. So, too, with Book of Mormon scholarship: the shape of the resultant system depends upon the assumptions brought to bear on the text.13

It is difficult for anyone but the authors to know their motivation for writing, but I feel safe asserting that Lucas and Neville have a preconceived assumption that they are attempting to demonstrate. Perhaps the best explanation of their perspective comes from Neville’s previous book. In the preface to that book he states:

Long-time members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints remember being taught that Joseph Smith translated the ancient plates by using the Nephite interpreters known as the Urim and Thummim. Artwork, lesson manuals, and teachings of Church leaders uniformly presented this narrative for many decades.

Younger members (and new converts) learn instead that Joseph used a seer stone that he placed into a hat. Joseph would read out loud the words that appeared on the stone. The plates sat nearby, covered with a cloth the entire time. Artwork created in the last decade, as well as lesson manuals and other media, depict this scenario.

The dichotomy between old and new approaches leaves people with a sense of ambiguity and confusion. The current version of the anonymous Gospel Topics Essay on Book of Mormon translation muddies rather than clarifies the issue, as we’ll see in this book.

For some faithful members, the question is unimportant. They believe the Book of Mormon is the word of God and it doesn’t matter how it was produced.

But other faithful members, as well as those who have lost their faith and those outside the Church who investigate the Church’s truth claims, think the translation of the Book of Mormon is a core issue.

This is not only a matter of historical interpretation. The nature of the translation implicates theological and historical issues related to the historicity and divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon itself.14

Neville lays out the problem he wants to solve: History was taught one way for a long time, and now it has changed. Some are upset about it. Neville wants to resolve that upset by returning to the former way of understanding history. Thus, in A Man That Can Translate, Neville argued that the current historians’ understanding that Joseph Smith used a seer stone during the translation of the Book of Mormon must be wrong because it isn’t the way history used to be taught. It is not readily apparent how much Lucas contributed to or shared that perspective, but as co-author of By Means of the Urim & Thummim he is at least complicit in the commission of this historians’ fallacy.

The First Thesis: SITH and Darkness unto Light

The first major thesis in By Means of the Urim & Thummim is a defense of Lucas and Neville’s position that Joseph Smith’s seer stone was never used in the translation of the Book of Mormon. They assert that the whole of the translation was accomplished by means of the instruments delivered to Joseph Smith along with the plates. That opinion contrasts with the conclusions found in a book from two LDS historians. Michael Hubbard MacKay and Gerritt Dirkmaat published From Darkness unto Light in 2015 after working with all of the available evidence from multiple sources, including the Joseph Smith papers.

The problem of definitions

It is difficult to read anything Jonathan Neville has written about the translation of the Book of Mormon without noticing that he is fond of his creation of the acronym SITH. SITH stands for “stone in the hat” and refers to descriptions of how Joseph Smith used a seer stone in the translation process. As an acronym it has some humor, especially to those familiar with the fantasy universe in which the Star Wars sagas occur. Lucas and Neville use the acronym to characterize the opinions of the scholars that they want to contradict.

Their position, diametrically opposed to SITH, is: “In this book we will generally use the original Book of Mormon term ‘interpreters’ to avoid confusion due to recent obfuscation of the term ‘Urim and Thummim’” (p. 6). First, it is important that Lucas and Neville attempt to clarify terms. The claimed “obfuscation” is that LDS trained historians understand “Urim and Thummim” as a term created later in early Church history and applied retroactively to previous events:

Joseph Smith and members of the Church generally stopped differentiating between the seer stones and the spectacles by simply calling all of them the Urim and Thummim. By 1833, for example. W. W. Phelps published an article in the Church newspaper in Missouri, The Evening and the Morning Star, that declared that Joseph translated the plates “by the gift and power of God. . . through the aid of a pair of Interpreters, or spectacles—(known, perhaps, in ancient days as Teraphim, or Urim and Thummim).” By the time Joseph Smith’s later history was written in 1839, Joseph was using the term Urim and Thummim to reference any seer stone. Thus it is impossible to tell from his own later accounts precisely which device he was using to translate the Book of Mormon or to receive revelations.15

Lucas and Neville create a false dichotomous definition where Urim and Thummim is synonymous with interpreters. That allows them to ignore the complications of reading the texts and to insert their interpretation of meaning into them. Opposed to the position of the trained historians, Lucas and Neville use Urim and Thummim as though their assumption that it must refer to the interpreters means that any text referencing the Urim and Thummim therefore refers to the interpreters. Remember that the trained historians were much more cautious, indicating that it was “impossible” (their word) to know to what instrument(s) the later term Urim and Thummim referred. When Lucas and Neville insert the word interpreters where the source has Urim and Thummim, they are hiding the actual data from their readers. Lucas and Neville use that method to make the historical accounts they cite say something that they do not actually say.

The approach that Lucas and Neville utilize is one of the problems Fischer highlights:

The law of the excluded middle may demand instant obedience in formal logic, but in history it is as intricate in its applications as the internal revenue code. Dichotomy is used incorrectly when a question is constructed so that it demands a choice between two answers which are in fact not exclusive or not exhaustive.16

Lucas and Neville suggest that we have only two options: the seer stone or the Urim and Thummim (in their exclusive definition equating the Urim and Thummim with the interpreters). The historical record shows that Urim and Thummim is a later term and was applied more broadly than Lucas and Neville may appreciate. By restricting the meaning of Urim and Thummim to the definition that facilitates the conclusion they want their readers to reach, they create a much more critical obfuscation than the one they accuse the historians of committing.

To try to provide some clarity to the discussion, there are four terms that deal with the instrument(s) Joseph used: interpreters, spectacles, seer stones, and Urim and Thummim. Let’s look at each very briefly.

- Interpreters. Only interpreters and Urim and Thummim appear in a scriptural text. The word interpreters appears in the Book of Mormon; it does not appear in the King James Version of the Bible.17 On the other hand, Urim and Thummim does appear in the Old Testament, but never appears in the Book of Mormon.

- Spectacles. The term spectacles is an early label given to the instruments received with the plates. Mosiah’s interpreters were “two stones which were fastened into the two rims of a bow” (Mosiah 28:13). That fits the description of the instrument delivered with the plates. Joseph Smith—History 1:35 confirms that accompanying the plates “were two stones in silver bows.” Joseph Smith’s brother, William noted that they were “much like a pair of spectacles.”18 The term spectacles is only applied to the instruments delivered with the plates. It is not a scriptural term but a very human description rather than a technical device name. The use of spectacles exclusively refers to the interpreters as a descriptive term.

- Seer stones. Joseph Smith possessed at least two seer stones prior to Moroni’s visit.19 Prior to Moroni’s visit, Joseph Smith used his seer stones in the same way that other local seers used theirs. They, and he, used them to find lost objects or to see what could not normally be seen.20 In 2015, the Joseph Smith Papers Project published the photographs and transcription of the Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon. The introduction included, for the first time, photographs of Joseph’s brown seer stone, with the caption: “This stone matches some descriptions of the seer stone used by Joseph Smith during the translation of the Book of Mormon.”21 That this stone (or the white seer stone) was used in translation, is where Lucas and Neville disagree with the historians.

- Urim and Thummim. Urim and Thummim is a biblical term. As Dirkmaat and MacKay explain: “it may surprise many Latter-say Saints to learn that the term ‘Urim and Thummim,’ though certainly known by early members because of its biblical origins, is not used in any of the earliest documents to describe any of the seer stones, including the two stones found with the plates.”22

The clarification of terms is important because Lucas and Neville consistently use later documents which explicitly said Urim and Thummim as though they said interpreters. This violates a principle they emphasized themselves: “Sources written close in time to the events are generally considered more reliable than those written down long after the events” (p. 27). Here is how it plays out:

Joseph Smith—History 1:35 implies that it was Moroni who first identified the interpreters as the “Urim and Thummim.” Similarly, our earliest and most detailed account of Moroni’s visit, written by Oliver Cowdery with Joseph’s assistance and published as Letter IV in the first history of the Church, also describes Moroni using the term. However, because the term does not appear in the historical record until 1832, historians have inferred instead that Joseph (or another contemporary such as W. W. Phelps) borrowed the term from the Bible and applied it to the spectacles. (p. 77)

Lucas and Neville even admit that what they propose as evidence was written years after the fact. Of course, they do not mention the absolute absence of the term Urim and Thummim prior to Phelps’s article. This is what Fischer called the fallacy of pseudo proof, which is “committed in a verification statement which seems at first sight to be a precise and specific representation of reality but which proves, on close inspection, to be literally meaningless.”23 What they argue is that Joseph and Oliver first used the term “Urim and Thummim” because they used it when they later wrote about earlier events. Lucas and Neville invoke Joseph and Oliver because, of course, they should be the ones who know. Since they “knew,” they must have been the first to use the term “Urim and Thummim.” That appears to be a strong argument, but only on the surface.

Lucas and Neville simply assert that because it was Joseph and Oliver, their use of Urim and Thummim must carry the exclusive meaning Lucas and Neville give to the term. They then use that assertion as though it is an accepted fact. This is the “fallacy of the circular proof.” This is “a species of a question-begging, which consists in assuming what is to be proved.”24

Typically, the early descriptions called the interpreters spectacles. Martin Harris, Hyrum Smith, Lucy Smith, and even Oliver Cowdery used spectacles as a description of the instruments of translation.25 Phelps’s suggestion was actually more of a possibility than a firm identification: “a pair of Interpreters, or spectacles—(known, perhaps, in ancient days as Teraphim, or Urim and Thummim).”26 Dirkmaat and MacKay describe the history of the application of Urim and Thummim to any reference of either the interpreters or seer stones:

Most of the histories of the early Church were written after 1838, including the History of Joseph Smith, which would eventually become the History of the Church. By the time that later history was written in 1839, Joseph was using the term “Urim and Thummim” to reference any seer stone, not just the ones that had originally been found in the stone box with the plates.

This changing terminology makes it very difficult to determine which stone or device is being referenced since all seer stones, even the separate stone showed to Wilford Woodruff in 1841, were called “Urim and Thummim” by Joseph Smith. That Joseph came to see this term as a generic descriptor of a seer stone, rather than a reference only to the stones found in the stone box, is evident in the way he would later describe the planet upon which God resides, what the earth would become after its destruction and rebirth, and what each believer entering into the celestial kingdom would receive (see Doctrine and Covenants 130:6–9). In each case Joseph described the very different things as “Urim and Thummim.”27

The position of Lucas and Neville that Urim and Thummim could only mean the interpreters (or spectacles) falls before the weight of the larger body of evidence Dirkmaat and MacKay consider and bring to the argument. Of course, Lucas and Neville do understand that they are proposing a hypothesis that is contrary to that presented by the trained LDS historians. To make sure I do not misrepresent them, here is their statement:

Some proponents of replacing the canonical narrative with the SITH narrative have argued that Joseph and Oliver used the term “Urim and Thummim” to apply to both the seer stone and the Nephite interpreters. These proponents argue that Joseph’s 1843 broader use of the term should apply retroactively so that references to the Urim and Thummim even in 1834 also include the seer stone. (p. 78)

As with much of their text, this needs some unpacking. First, the conclusion of what other LDS scholars suggest about the application of the term Urim and Thummim is correct. Second, however, notice how subtly the interpretation by Lucas and Neville has become “the canonical narrative” and the scholars are proposing this new SITH narrative. This is the fallacy of the insidious analogy: “an unintended analogical reference which is embedded in an author’s language, and implanted in a reader’s mind, by a subliminal process which is more powerfully experienced than perceived.”28

In this case I would argue that it is a completely intentional analogical reference. The implication of Lucas and Neville that their interpretation is canonical borrows the term from the process of sacralizing a text as scripture. Implicitly, their interpretation thus becomes “official” while that of the scholars is clearly inferior. This is a fascinating attempt to reverse reality. The Church’s essay on the translation of the Book of Mormon is as close to canonical as the official Church gets. The essay “Book of Mormon Translation” was commissioned by the Church and vetted before being published.29 The introduction to the Gospel Topics essays explains the vetting process:

Recognizing that today so much information about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints can be obtained from questionable and often inaccurate sources, officials of the Church began in 2013 to publish straightforward, in-depth essays on a number of topics. The purpose of these essays, which have been approved by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, has been to gather accurate information from many different sources and publications and place it in the Gospel Topics section of ChurchofJesusChrist.org, where the material can more easily be accessed and studied by Church members and other interested parties.30

The Church’s as-close-to-canonical-as-it-gets resource endorses the historians’ interpretation of the evidence:

Apparently for convenience, Joseph often translated with the single seer stone rather than the two stones bound together to form the interpreters. These two instruments—the interpreters and the seer stone—were apparently interchangeable and worked in much the same way such that, in the course of time, Joseph Smith and his associates often used the term “Urim and Thummim” to refer to the single stone as well as the interpreters.31

To make it as clear as I can, Lucas and Neville use the term canonical to refer to their own interpretation, which is opposed to the Gospel Topics essay that was vetted by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve. Of course, Lucas and Neville have something to say about this particular Gospel Topics essay:

Soon even more senior historians were rejecting Joseph and Oliver’s testimonies in favor of giving priority to the SITH narrative. In 2013 the LDS Church released a Gospel Topics essay promoting the SITH narrative and in 2015 the LDS Church released photos of a seer stone of Joseph’s which it held. Today, Latter-day Saints are told by LDS academics that they should make a “paradigm shift” to accept the SITH accounts instead of what Joseph and Oliver taught in the Pearl of Great Price and elsewhere. (pp. 18–19)

The first part of the statement is factual. Senior historians examined all the historical accounts and noted that Urim and Thummim was applied to the seer stone which was used at some point in the translation of the Book of Mormon. However, the semantics of the way they couch that factual statement is telling. The senior historians are “rejecting Joseph and Oliver’s testimonies in favor of giving priority to the SITH narrative.” Remember, however, that Joseph and Oliver’s statements specifically mention the Urim and Thummim. The scholars don’t reject Joseph and Oliver; they much more carefully attempt to understand them.

Are we really to trust the lawyers who self-anoint their theory as canonical when they know that it is directly opposed to a position vetted by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve? I propose that believing Latter-day Saints are better off following the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve than these two lawyers.

The problem with stones

Neville, as evidenced in his two books, has a problem with stones—Urim and Thummim stones are good; interpreter stones are good; seer stones are bad. There is even the interesting possibility that seer stones in a hat are bad, but an interpreter in a hat might be good (p. 87). There is enough confusion that we really must understand what is going on with stones and seers.

For most Latter-day Saints, the interpreters have become linked to stones the Lord provided the brother of Jared:

And it came to pass that the Lord said unto the brother of Jared: Behold, thou shalt not suffer these things which ye have seen and heard to go forth unto the world, until the time cometh that I shall glorify my name in the flesh; wherefore, ye shall treasure up the things which ye have seen and heard, and show it to no man.

And behold, when ye shall come unto me, ye shall write them and shall seal them up, that no one can interpret them; for ye shall write them in a language that they cannot be read.

And behold, these two stones will I give unto thee, and ye shall seal them up also with the things which ye shall write.

For behold, the language which ye shall write I have confounded; wherefore I will cause in my own due time that these stones shall magnify to the eyes of men these things which ye shall write. (Ether 3:21–24)

The two stones are not named interpreters, but verses 23 and 24 associate them with being able to understand an otherwise uninterpretable language. Moroni also declares, in the book of Ether, that:

Behold, I have written upon these plates the very things which the brother of Jared saw; and there never were greater things made manifest than those which were made manifest unto the brother of Jared.

Wherefore the Lord hath commanded me to write them; and I have written them. And he commanded me that I should seal them up; and he also hath commanded that I should seal up the interpretation thereof; wherefore I have sealed up the interpreters, according to the commandment of the Lord. (Ether 4:4–5)

Moroni clearly speaks of the interpreters, and the context of the book of Ether might imply that the interpreters are the very stones that Moroni sealed up.32 Indeed, most scholars have also equated the Jaredite stones with those in Mosiah’s possession. The Book of Mormon problem is that the Jaredite stones could not have been in Mosiah’s possession until after the people of Limhi merged with those in Zarahemla. It was Limhi’s search party who looked for Zarahemla but found Jaredite ruins. That search party brought the plates of Ether to Limhi in the land of Nephi. There is no record of the Jaredite stones coming with the plates of Ether, nor do the Jaredite stones (identified specifically as the Jaredite stones) appear at all in the Book of Mormon until the mention in Ether that they were sealed up with the record of the brother of Jared (Ether 3:23).

Nevertheless, prior to the time that Mosiah could have possibly had the Jaredite stones, Ammon declared to king Limhi:

I can assuredly tell thee, O king, of a man that can translate the records; for he has wherewith that he can look, and translate all records that are of ancient date; and it is a gift from God. And the things are called interpreters, and no man can look in them except he be commanded, lest he should look for that he ought not and he should perish. And whosoever is commanded to look in them, the same is called seer. (Mosiah 8:13)

Mosiah, in Zarahemla, already had “the things . . . called interpreters” while king Limhi, who was not in Zarahemla, had the Jaredite record and artifacts. With Mosiah having interpreters and Moroni sealing up interpreters, did Moroni mean Mosiah’s interpreters or the stones originating with the brother of Jared?

It is clear that what Mosiah had was something different from those had by the brother of Jared. Mosiah’s interpreters were described as “two stones which were fastened into the two rims of a bow” (Mosiah 28:13). That is very much the description of the interpreters Joseph Smith received. When Mosiah gave over the symbols of the kingdom to Alma, the first Chief Judge, they included “the plates of brass . . . all the records, and also the interpreters” (Mosiah 28:20). It would seem to be a reasonable assumption that the Jaredite stones were included, but the text only mentions the interpreters, and the only stones receiving that label belonged to Mosiah. Based on the Book of Mormon evidence, the best interpretation is that Joseph Smith received Mosiah’s interpreters, not the stones had by the brother of Jared.

Stones and seers

Mosiah’s interpreters were stones (Mosiah 28:13). Mosiah was a seer (Mosiah 8:13). Mosiah’s interpreters were two stones joined in such a way that the modern witnesses called them spectacles. The point of calling them spectacles was to look through them. When Joseph’s brother, William, described the spectacles he said that: “they were much too large for Joseph and he could only see through one at a time using sometimes one and sometimes the other.”33 William confirms that Joseph used the spectacles for looking, and indicates that although there were two of them, he could only use one at a time.

It was the possession of the instruments that allowed Mosiah to be called a seer:

And now he translated them by the means of those two stones which were fastened into the two rims of a bow. Now these things were prepared from the beginning, and were handed down from generation to generation, for the purpose of interpreting languages; And they have been kept and preserved by the hand of the Lord, that he should discover to every creature who should possess the land the iniquities and abominations of his people; And whosoever has these things is called seer, after the manner of old times. (Mosiah 28:13–16)

Mosiah had two stones. Because he could use them, Mosiah was a seer. It isn’t much of a semantic leap to say Mosiah had two seer stones. When Joseph received them, and was able to use them, he too was a seer; he too had Mosiah’s seer stones. Trying to make some kind of exclusive separation between the interpreters and the seer stone is avoiding the obvious—regardless of whether they were called interpreters, spectacles, or even the later Urim and Thummim, the sacred instruments were seer stones.

Seers using stones

The idea that one might find things with a seer stone was not unusual in Joseph’s Palmyra. The local Chase and Stafford families had seer stones that were used for hunting treasure or finding lost objects.34 Martin Harris was familiar with the concept of using a seer stone to find lost objects. However, as a skeptic, he did not immediately accept that Joseph might be able to see what could otherwise not be seen. He spontaneously requested a demonstration:

I was at the house of his father in Manchester, two miles south of Palmyra village, and was picking my teeth with a pin while sitting on the bars. The pin caught in my teeth, and dropped from my fingers into shavings and straw. I jumped from the bars and looked for it. Joseph and Northrop Sweet also did the same. We could not find it. I then took Joseph on surprise, and said to him—I said, “Take your stone.” I had never seen it, and did not know that he had it with him. He had it in his pocket. He took it and placed it in his hat—the old white hat—and placed his face in his hat. I watched him closely to see that he did not look one side; he reached out his hand beyond me on the right, and moved a little stick, and there I saw the pin, which he picked up and gave to me. I know he did not look out of the hat until after he had picked up the pin.35

Martin recalled a scenario that was probably typical of the way a folk seer used a seer stone. What is important is the way the seer stone was used—Joseph Smith put it in a hat. William Smith described how Joseph used the spectacles. After noting that they were too large to look through both stones simultaneously, he added:

By putting his head in a hat or some dark object it was not necessary to close one eye while looking through the stone with the other. In that way sometimes when his eyes grew tires [tired] he releaved them of the strain.36

The explanations for how a seer stone and the interpreters were used is the same. Of course, the interpreters might not always have been used in that way. Nevertheless, the fact that they could be used that way continues to suggest a greater commonality with the seer stone than a qualitative difference.

Even Lucas and Neville suggest that the stones from the spectacles could be separated and used by placing one of the stones in a hat.

[There is] the possibility that the stones could be removed from the rims and used independently of the plates for purposes other than translation. In such cases, Joseph may have placed the stone from the Urim and Thummim interpreter instrument in a hat, both to exclude exterior light and to hide it from the view of unauthorized persons, as per Moroni’s instructions. (p. 88)

Neville has promoted his SITH acronym because it highlights what he considers an uncomfortable image of Joseph translating with his head in a hat as well as the pop-culture reference to the evil Sith in Star Wars. However, we now have Joseph also using the stones from the interpreters (which Lucas and Neville call the Urim and Thummim) in a hat!37

It appears that Lucas and Neville are only arguing that in the very specific case of translating the Book of Mormon do the interpreters matter. Outside of that special-use case, the interpreter stones could be used in the very same manner as any other seer stone. Also, as William Smith suggested, they could be used in the same “in-the-hat” method as Joseph’s previous seer stones.

Mackay and Dirkmaat summarize:

Lucy Smith wrote that “Joseph kept the urim and thummim constantly about his person as he could by this means ascertain at any moment if the plates were in danger.” In one instance . . . Joseph also saw Emma in the spectacles. When he was in Macedon, soon after Moroni gave him the plates, Joseph “looked into them before Emma got there [and] perceived her coming and came up out of the well and met her.”38

They further explain:

Joseph’s use of seer stones before 1827 helps us understand why he only used the Nephite interpreters to protect the plates. He used the spectacles like a seer stone, to identify or find lost items, unlike his later use of them to translate ancient characters.39

For Joseph, a seer stone enabled someone to see. It was not restricted to translation, although that was a function that Mosiah’s seer stones performed in the Book of Mormon and for at least part of the translation of the Book of Mormon. Lucas and Neville even declare “Joseph made other inquiries through the interpreters, including those leading to a number of early revelations” (p. 88). Their argument against the use of a seer stone in translation is therefore limited to only translation, a limitation they do not explain or explicitly defend.

Lucas and Neville argue that there really was a fundamental qualitative difference between the interpreters and the seer stone. The instruments were “sacred holy instruments of heavenly design,” and they assume that the seer stone was not:

We have a seer stone with a chain of custody back to Joseph Smith. It is in the LDS Church’s archives. But anyone can see it is just a common, striated rock.

We do not have the Urim and Thummim interpreters, but we are informed by the scriptures that, unlike the rock, the interpreters were specifically prepared to assist with transaction. Sacred holy instruments of heavenly design, which have existed at least since they were given to the brother of Jared untold millennia ago (see Doctrine and Covenants 17:1), they have been returned to their angelic caretakers. (p. 152)40

According to the historical record, however, the seer stone had a similar divine sanction as did the interpreters:

Brigham Young and Wilford Woodruff told others about some of the details, but instead of implying that Joseph simply happened upon the stones, they emphasized that the stones were discovered by revelation. They insisted that God delivered the stones to Joseph. Woodruff, who esteemed Smith’s seer stones throughout his life, recorded a similar story in his journal on 18 May 1888, stating that the stone was found thirty feet in the ground, “by Revelation.”41

Lucas and Neville highlight the divine circumstances of the interpreters but ignore the Church leaders who applied similar divine circumstances to the seer stones. Even with that divine sanction on the seer stones, it is quite evident that they are, as Lucas and Neville underscore, just common rocks.

To create a difference, they develop a fascinating hypothesis that the interpreters were not stones, but some kind of advanced technology. They state:

The eminent science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke, in his Third Law, famously observed that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” The interpreters represent an incredibly advanced technology—they are of the technology of the heavens. However, it is understandable that they may have seemed no different than magic to early 19th century rural Americans. (p. 156)

It is an incredibly advanced technology that was miraculous and divine. Apparently they were only an advanced technology when used in conjunction with the plates, because they functioned just as did a seer stone both prior to and after the translation. Ironically, this divinely advanced technology was not nearly as capable as Google Translate. This is discussed further in this review’s section on the translation theory of Lucas and Neville.

We don’t have the interpreters, so they cannot be examined for divine technologies that might transcend the fact that they were stones. That absence of evidence allows Lucas and Neville to create a hypothesis of how they worked that is only slightly less miraculous than the idea that Joseph had the full text to read (see the next section). This argument, which is built on an absence of the interpreters, is what Fischer calls the fallacy of the negative proof. It is “an attempt to sustain a factual proposition merely by negative evidence.”42

The Second Thesis: The Lawyers on Translation

As we begin to analyze the theory of translation proposed by Lucas and Neville, it is important to clarify their definition of SITH. The primary meaning for SITH is “stone in the hat,” and the primary reference is the suggestion that Joseph Smith used a seer stone placed in a hat as part of his process of translating the Book of Mormon. Unfortunately for readers, Lucas and Neville tack on a second definition that is not a reference to the mechanics but rather to the result. Conflated with the instrument is the resultant translation. In this aspect of their use of SITH, “some believing scholars interpret Joseph’s use of the term translate to mean a supernatural phenomenon whereby Joseph read words that appears on a seer stone at the bottom of his hat. Again, for convenience, we refer to this scenario as ‘SITH’ (stone-in-the-hat)” (p. 32).

Fischer declares: “The fallacy of ambiguity consists in the use of a word or an expression which has two or more possible meanings, without sufficient specification of which meaning is intended.”43 Lucas and Neville have created a fallacy of ambiguity not by using an existing word with two meanings, but in conflating two different meanings into their acronym of choice. The unclear separation makes it more difficult for their readers to carefully analyze the data because anything that discusses a concept of translation that Joseph read is imputed to the mechanism.

The lawyers present a theory

The new and therefore more important part of their book is the presentation of a unique theory about how the translation of the Book of Mormon took place. Lucas and Neville offer an explanation of how the interpreters were used. The method required both the interpreters and the physical and unimpeded view of the plates.44 The theory also posits that Joseph was an active participant in the creation of the English text dictated to scribes.

They lay out their task: “The unresolved question is, how did the Urim and Thummim work? Without the instrument available for examination, there can be no definitive answer” (p. 181). It is true that this is an important question. It is true that we do not have the interpreters. It is not true that we don’t have a Urim and Thummim as the early Church fathers understood it. We have at least one of Joseph’s seer stones and the one that is supposed to have been involved in the translation process. Nevertheless, it remains true that having the instrument doesn’t necessarily tell us anything about how it was used.45

Surprisingly, despite their objection to the idea that Joseph read a text that appeared on the seer stone, Lucas and Neville build an argument that Joseph did see an English text in the interpreter. They declare: “Nonetheless, they all do agree that Joseph was seeing English. . . . It would seem from all these witness statements that Joseph was seeing the exact text in English. . . . many today argue that that is exactly what happened” (p. 183).

The tension between proposing that Joseph saw an English text with their dismissal of Joseph reading the English text is resolved by creating a new definition of the nature of the English text that Joseph saw. To make certain that I do not misrepresent their ideas, here are two important explanatory paragraphs:

We propose a translation model which we believe resolves these apparently conflicting lines of evidence. We suggest that the interpreters did display English, as all the witnesses said, but that the text displayed on the two “stone” screens was not a complete, final interpretation of the engravings. Instead, the interpreters provided a literalistic English rendition of the Nephite characters. In some cases, it may have been transliterated phonetic spellings of proper names and foreign words untranslated in the Nephite text such as cureloms.

. . .

The important comparison is that the English read-out displayed on the interpreters’ double screens was not a final translation. It was left to Joseph to render the close-to-Nephite literal English presentation displayed on the interpreters into English which would be meaningful to modern readers, a deliberative process that involved myriad word and grammar choices he had to study out in his mind using his own learning and linguistic resources. (pp. 186–87)

The advantage of this theory is that it allows for the historical evidence to be correct and for the evidence that there are more modern elements in the text to reasonably be associated with the translator and not the Nephite writers. The desire is good. The result is not.

How well does their hypothesis explain the historical accounts? David Whitmer was present during some of the translation sessions and therefore able to give a firsthand account of what he could hear:

He [Joseph] put the stone in his hat and putting his face in his hat so as to exclude the light and before his eyes would appear what seemed to be parchment, on which would appear the characters of the plates in a line at the top and immediately below would appear the translation, in English, which Smith would read to his scribe, who wrote it down exactly as it fell from his lips. The scribe would then read the sentence written, and if any mistake had been made the characters would remain visible to Smith until corrected, when they faded from sight to be replaced by another line.46

Bypassing the stone-in-the-hat phrase, it is the rest of the description that is important at this point. As he described hearing it, Joseph would dictate to the scribe who wrote it down. No historical account ever hints at any time passing as Joseph worked out what to dictate. Instead, it seemed to be a flow of words.

It is at this point that a different type of evidence is important. In the historical record there is a finite amount of time during which the translation occurred. Thus, the longer Joseph would have delayed in order to work out the translation, the more it should have affected the overall time necessary for the dictation. John and Jeannie Welch experimented with reproducing the physical translation experience:

In order to test the feasibility of these calculations of how fast Joseph and Oliver actually could have worked, my wife, Jeannie, and I decided to try it out ourselves. We picked two pages in Royal Skousen’s Yale edition of the Book of Mormon, since that version breaks the text lines into thought clauses that would have been about the length of each translational unit. At first, I played the role of Joseph and read the first line slowly and distinctly, while she, playing the role of Oliver, began immediately writing those words down. When she reached the end of that line, she read it back to me, and I confirmed that it was correct or pointed out mistakes. Then I paused, gazed again at the page, uncovered the next line, and read it aloud, which Jeannie likewise recorded and read back. And so we proceeded to the end of the page. . . .

Altogether, our results showed empirically that a translation rate of right around 20 words per minute was quite possible. But we couldn’t imagine sustaining that rate hour after hour, day after day. Our hands got tired, and the one playing Joseph needed to catch his or her breath and clear his or her voice. We used ballpoint pens. We imagined Oliver dipping and using his quill pen.47

The Welchs’ experiment conforms to the time-based requirement for the speed of translation. They did not allow for any pondering or working out of the translation. Indeed, in addition to the absence of evidence for taking time to work out a translation, we have the evidence of the timing of the translation as a direct contradiction to the hypothesis offered by Lucas and Neville.

The next problem with the assertion that Joseph took a literal English translation and created the smoother translation we read is that it becomes difficult to impossible given the evidence for the number of words that Joseph appears to have dictated in a single dictation event. Royal Skousen suggests that the dictation blocks contained between twenty to thirty words at a time.48 It doesn’t take long perusing sentences in the Book of Mormon as the compositor set them to see that twenty words rarely finishes a sentence. Thus, when Joseph was translating the literal English from the language on the plates, he dictated less than a sentence at a time.

When applied to a literal translation, it becomes a question of how much of the literal English Joseph would have been able to see in order to create a smoother English sentence. The problem with literal translations is that they are, well, literal—they attempt to translate word for word. But not all languages structure their sentences as English does, with the order of elements being subject/verb/object. If the source language differs in structure, such as object/subject/verb, then elements of the sentence might be provided in an order that made the end of the English sentence come first, and Joseph might not have seen the end of the sentence in the block of words he saw.

If the source language was a case-marking language, where an element attached to the word indicates its function as a subject, verb, or object, then translation can be more difficult. Ancient Greek is an example of such a language, where word order was based on art, not grammar. Theoretically, one could cut up a Greek sentence, toss the words in a hat,49 and randomly pull them out to order the sentence. It would still make sense. It would lack any art, but one could make sense of it because the meaning isn’t carried in word order but rather in the cases. Here is a literal translation of the Greek text of Matthew 6:21:

Where for is, treasure your there will be also heart your50

Those familiar with the King James Version may still be able to understand the reference, and probably even provide the KJV rendering. If one didn’t have that reference of meaning, how easily could that be translated into English?

For another idea of the problem Joseph would have faced, I present two translations of the original Quiché of the Popol Vuh. First, Allen J. Christenson’s literal translation, which also attempts to preserve the parallelistic poetic form of the original:

Because there is not now
Means of seeing the Popol Vuh,
Means of seeing clearly
Come from across sea,
Its account our obscurity,
Means of seeing light life, as it is said.
There is original book anciently written also,
Merely hidden his face

Witness of it,
Ponderer of it.

Great its performance,
Its account as well

When will be completed
Germination,

All sky,
Earth.

Its four cornerings,
Its four sidings,
Its measurings,
Its four stakings,

Its doubling over cord measurement,
Its stretching cord measurement,

Its womb sky,
Its womb earth.51

The following is how Christenson translated that same text into smoother English. Because it is not a word for word translation, this would be what translators have come to call a functional translation:

We shall bring it forth because there is no longer the means whereby the Popol Vuh may be seen, the means of seeing clearly that had come from across the sea—the account of our obscurity, and the means of seeing life clearly, as it is said. The original book exists that was written anciently, but its witnesses and those who ponder it hide their faces.

Great is its performance and its account of the completion and germination of all the sky and earth—its four corners and its four sides. All then was measured and staked out into four divisions, doubling over and stretching the measuring cords of the womb of sky and the womb of earth.52

Just to make things easier to see, here is the literal Quiché in a sentence, followed by the smoother translation. I have removed the poetic formatting to make the comparison easier:

Literal: Because there is not now means of seeing the Popol Vuh, means of seeing clearly—come from across sea, its account our obscurity, means of seeing light life, as it is said.

Functional: We shall bring it forth because there is no longer the means whereby the Popol Vuh may be seen, the means of seeing clearly that had come from across the sea—the account of our obscurity, and the means of seeing life clearly, as it is said.

Notice how the beginning of the smoother translation required the translator to hold the meaning of the whole sentence in mind and then completely reorder the elements to provide a more intelligible English translation.

Why doesn’t the theory work that Lucas and Neville propose?

- There is no evidence that Joseph spent time working out the translation

- There is no time available to spend time working out a translation

- Joseph probably dictated in blocks of twenty words—which is smaller than most of the English sentences. The quick comparison between literal Quiché and more smoothly translated Quiché indicates how difficult to impossible that combination time and dictation would be.

Finally, Lucas and Neville’s explanation for why the interpreters only produced a deficient translation is unconvincing:

We assume that God was perfectly capable of providing a finished text in modern English. Theoretically, he could have had Mormon and Moroni engrave the text in English in the first place. Or, the interpreters could have supplied a finished English text, as contemplated by the transcription explanations.

But according to Doctrine and Covenants 9:8, the translator had to next study it out in his mind, and the NID53 research shows that the Book of Mormon is in fact sourced from Joseph’s linguistic environment. (p. 187)

Their evidence for why the interpreters were deficient in translation depends upon a revelation that was directed to Oliver Cowdery and may not have reflected Joseph’s method of translation at all.54 Essentially, their explanation requires that God miraculously provided a technology that wasn’t very good just so Joseph would have to work harder to create the translation. That is not a convincing opinion.

I must remind the reader that this negative review of their hypothesis comes from one who supports their basic position that Joseph was an active participant in the translation. I am sympathetic to what they are trying to do. They just don’t accomplish it.

The Worst of the Lawyers’ Approach

Creating a hypothesis that others don’t agree with is part of the scholarly world. Being wrong is unfortunate, but common enough that by itself isn’t an indictment. The problem with By Means of the Urim & Thummim is that it is not only incorrect in its hypothesis, it is incorrect in its processes.

Using invective as a substitute for academic argumentation

One of the threads running throughout the book is a semantic disdain for positions contrary to those held by authors. At times, language is used to diminish an argument contrary to their hypothesis. For example, historians take seriously Joseph’s use of a seer stone before, during, and after translation. Lucas and Neville suggest that “for Joseph the stone was a sort of “lucky charm” or, in more recent parlance, a “pet rock” (p. 14). That isn’t scholarship; they use ridicule rather than reason for their argument.

The most obvious example of semantically pejorative terminology is the abbreviation SITH that is used extensively throughout the book. As I already mentioned, there is some wit in the acronym. However, most of their readers will understand that the Sith were powerful bad guys in a science-fiction universe. The acronym subliminally invokes a very negative response, such as a fictional local political group branding their opponents as “neighbors against zoning initiatives,” or “NAZIs.” Whatever merits the stone-in-the-hat description might or might not have, the way it is referenced immediately diminishes it and simultaneously colors it with a dark brush.55

A similar pejorative labeling is their use of “shamanic” as a type of translation. Lucas and Neville refer to an article by Grant Hardy found in BYU Studies.56 They say of the article:

In fairness we would consider “evidence suggesting that Joseph was reading from a pre-existing translation,” such as presented in a 2021 article in BYU Studies. Unfortunately, in that article the author simply assumes the SITH narrative without considering a scenario where Joseph actually translated the engravings on the plates. The author describes ‘translation” as the kind of mythical, free-form, free-wheeling “shamanist” exercise described above, which would render precision difficult, and cites instances where the Book of Mormon is precise and detailed. (p. 110)

I suggest further problems with this paragraph in the next section, but at present the issue is the pejorative vocabulary selected to describe what Hardy had to say. There is no generous allowance for another scholar’s opinion. Suffice it to say that the words mythical, free-form, free-wheeling, and shamanist do not appear in Hardy’s analysis. They are words applied to the unquoted text and are intended to dismiss Hardy without serious consideration of his arguments.

All historians and even lawyers acting as historians should do better with language. As Christians, Latter-day Saints should be at least charitable when assessing arguments with which we disagree. Calling an argument incorrect or insufficient is categorically different from creating semantic labels that immediately create a negative association in the mind of the reader.

Violation of the reader’s trust

Readers of books that are presented as scholarly arguments tend to have an implicit trust that they are being given correct information. When a reader lacks their own expertise in the field, they have virtually no choice but to trust the authors who present the book’s arguments. In the case of By Means of the Urim & Thummim, that trust has been violated. When the lawyers Lucas and Neville tell us we should trust them because they deal with evidence, we want to agree with them. Unfortunately, their initial selection bias is not clearly explained and therefore it can be easy for a reader to miss the selections that were made favoring the initial assumptions.

Fischer explains the “fallacy of declarative questions” by noting: “If a historian goes to his sources with a simple proposition that ‘X was the case,’ then he is predisposed to prove it. He will probably be able to find ‘evidence’ sufficient to illustrate his expectations, if not actually sustain them.”57 Worse, however, is when the authors violate our trust by misrepresenting either the evidence or other scholars’ opinions.

Misrepresenting the evidence

More than once, Lucas and Neville misrepresent evidence. One type of misrepresentation occurs because they elect to be ambiguous in the use of terms. For example, they mention D. Michael’ Quinn’s work:

An example of Quinn’s questionable methodology can be seen in his treatment of the SITH accounts. Since they supported his overall theory, he accepted them whole cloth. Yet, at the same time he never cited Joseph and Oliver’s explicit statements that it was the Nephite interpreters which were used for translation. (p. 18)

They use this same argument in their discussion of the testimony of Joseph Smith III:

What does he look to as the authoritative word on how the Book of Mormon was translated? Joseph III quotes, at length, from Oliver Cowdery’s Letter I (now a note to Joseph Smith - History in the LDS Pearl of Great Price) and his father’s article for John Wentworth (best known as the source of the Articles of Faith), both of which emphatically state that the interpreters were the instrument used to translate the Book of Mormon. (p. 50)

Although there is no specific reference to Quinn’s examples, Lucas and Neville declare that Quinn ignored what were “explicit statements that it was the Nephite interpreters which were used for translation.” There are exactly zero explicit statements from either Joseph or Oliver that the interpreters were the exclusive instruments used in translation. There are, however, statements that the Urim and Thummim were used. By hiding the actual quotation and substituting their own exclusive declaration, they make the evidence say what it does not actually say.

At least in the case of their discussion of Joseph Smith III’s testimony, they tell us where to find their sources. Lucas and Neville provide the original accounts in an appendix. The footnote to the above quotation sends the reader to 15 and 20 in Appendix B. Quotation 15 does not mention the interpreters. Rather it says ”Urim and Thummim.” As with all other sources, this account was written after Urim and Thummim became the generally used generic term for the translation instruments. By misrepresenting the evidence, Lucas and Neville make the statements declare something that trained LDS historians tell us is impossible to know.

Honest scholarship would place the correct words in the accounts rather than replace them with an assigned meaning. This occurs again when they state:

Inexplicably, historians have also accepted this tale uncritically at face value without addressing the fact that it conflicts with these and dozens of other reliable accounts of Martin affirming the use of the interpreters for the translation. (p. 61)

The problem is that Martin Harris doesn’t affirm the use of the interpreters; he affirms use of the Urim and Thummim. Lucas and Neville continually hide crucial information from their readers. They misrepresent the intent of the accounts by imposing their own interpretation and declaring it to be the very meaning from the original accounts.

Notice how their assertion becomes incontrovertible fact: “If you believe Joseph and Oliver, you cannot believe the SITH narrative which David Whitmer propounded in the latter part of his life” (p. 102). In fact, it is possible to believe Joseph, Oliver, and David Witmer. One need only return to the actual accounts and note that Joseph and Oliver used the later term Urim and Thummim and retrojected it into earlier accounts. That reading of the evidence tells us why the term Urim and Thummim never appears before 1832. Lucas and Neville hide that fact. Their argument is entirely based on misrepresenting the evidence and turning that misrepresentation into a declaration of fact.

Misrepresenting other scholars’ opinions

Here I return to Lucas and Neville’s paragraph discussing the article Grant Hardy wrote about the range of arguments proposed for the translation of the Book of Mormon:58

In fairness we would consider “evidence suggesting that Joseph was reading from a pre-existing translation,” such as presented in a 2021 article in BYU Studies. Unfortunately, in that article the author simply assumes the SITH narrative without considering a scenario where Joseph actually translated the engravings on the plates. The author describes ‘translation” as the kind of mythical, free-form, free-wheeling “shamanist” exercise describe above, which would render precision difficult, and cites instances where the Book of Mormon is precise and detailed. (p. 110)

Previously, I used the paragraph as an example of the author’s choice to use semantically pejorative language. The problem with this paragraph is far greater. Frankly, it is difficult to believe that the authors actually read Hardy’s paper with an intent to understand what he wrote.

Hardy provided a description of the various positions taken with respect to the translation of the Book of Mormon. He did not specifically endorse any position, stating that “the two sides will probably remain in tension for some time.”59 His conclusion is:

Without being able to compare the original reformed Egyptian with the English version, it is impossible to know just what sort of translation the Book of Mormon is. And without observing a seer stone in use, we cannot know for certain what Joseph experienced. Perhaps new evidence will someday be uncovered, or further studies may refine our understanding of the data currently available, but in the meantime, we might well agree with Emma Smith, who said that, even as an eyewitness to the process, “it is marvelous to me, ‘a marvel and a wonder,’ as much so as to anyone else.”60

Anyone reading Hardy’s article finds that the characterization by Lucas and Neville is not only a misrepresentation, but an egregious misrepresentation.

Finally, I take issue with another of their summaries of an opposing position. In this case, I am the author of the problem they describe:

Brant Gardner wrestles with distinguishing which parts of the Book of Mormon might be formally or functionally equivalent. However, because he accepts the SITH narrative, his interpretation is unnecessarily complicated because he must add a category for “conceptual equivalence” to accommodate what we call the “shamanist” ideas of translation which arise from the SITH narrative. (p. 192n395)

I propose that I am uniquely qualified to know what Brant Gardner struggled with and what he didn’t. In this case, I have it on good authority (mine) that he didn’t struggle at all. As is very clear from even the table of contents to The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon, Gardner discusses types of translation that are used for any text. The typology is not based on the Book of Mormon. When Gardner uses the term “conceptual equivalence,” it is to describe a translation that is further distant from the source text than a functional equivalence.61 Lucas and Neville fundamentally misunderstand and misrepresent the argument surrounding “conceptual equivalence.”

They also do some amazing mind-reading to suppose that “conceptual equivalence” was somehow invented to deal with what they categorize as the shamanistic explanation for translation. Again, holding myself out as the preeminent authority on what Brant Gardner thought and thinks, that is pure fabrication.

Conclusions

Can we trust Lucas and Neville because they are lawyers? Not for that simplistic of a reason. We can’t trust them because they are untrustworthy in the way they approach and present history. While they are adamant that we should understand that the original interpreters were always used to translate the Book of Mormon rather than a seer stone, the way they use the historical texts distorts the evidence by fallaciously assuming that the later term, Urim and Thummim, must always mean the interpreters. This is the opposite of the way that trained historians see the evidence, which is that Urim and Thummim was a late invention and was then applied retroactively to stories that occurred before the term was introduced. Remember, as well, that the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve vetted the historians’ position in the Gospel Topics article, “The Translation of the Book of Mormon.”

Lucas and Neville provide a different approach to explaining the way Joseph translated. Unfortunately, the idea that Joseph translated from a literal English to a smoother English is an argument from silence. There is zero actual evidence to support the hypothesis. Nevertheless, it might be a reasonable explanation except for the fact that there is evidence contradicting it. It is simply implausible that Joseph was able to take the time to work out the translation and meet the translation timeframe evidenced in the historical record. The ability to translate also presumes a larger conceptual sentence reference than would be possible with the shorter length indicated by the evidence for the size of the translation blocks. As noted above in the comparison of the two Quiché sentences, creating the smoother translation required understanding the whole block of the literal translation, and then reversing elements to better fit expected English. Perhaps possible, but highly implausible in the case of Joseph’s translation.

Finally, we cannot trust the lawyers based on their misunderstanding or misrepresentation of sources. Any student paper exhibiting such errors would be rejected as soon as those errors were discovered. There is, perhaps, a reason that By Means of the Urim & Thummim is self-published.

In summary, I’ll take the historians over the lawyers, thank you.

Brant A. Gardner (M.A. State University of New York Albany) is the author of Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon and The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon, both published through Greg Kofford Books. He has contributed articles to Estudios de Cultura Nahuatl and Symbol and Meaning Beyond the Closed Community. He has presented papers at the FAIR conference as well as at Sunstone.

1 . James W. Lucas and Jonathan E. Neville, By Means of the Urim and Thummim: Restoring Translation to the Restoration (Cottonwood Heights, UT: Digital Legend Press & Publishing, 2023). Technically my review is of the second edition of the book, though that is not explicitly stated in the copy I have in-hand. In the front matter, the authors state “Updated May 2023 and January and August 2024 from first edition.”

2 . Brant A. Gardner, The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2011).

3 . There is no good way to explain why using the word translation here is a pun on the Lucas and Neville theory of translation. Their idea will be discussed later. But trust me, I’m the reviewer.

4 . Michael Hubbard MacKay and Gerrit J. Dirkmaat, From Darkness unto Light: Joseph Smith’s Translation and Publication of the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU]; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2015), 67.

5 . Carl Sagan, Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (New York: Random House, 1979), 62.

6 . Jonathan Neville, A Man that Can Translate: Joseph Smith and the Nephite Interpreters (Cottonwood Heights, UT: Digital Legend Press & Publishing, 2020).

7 . Spencer Kraus, “An Unfortunate Approach to Joseph Smith’s Translation of Ancient Scripture,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 52 (2022): 1–64, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/an-unfortunate
-approach-to-joseph-smiths-translation-of-ancient-scripture/.

8 . Jonathan E. Neville, “A Man That Can Translate and Infinite Goodness: A Response to Recent Reviews,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 53 (2022): 171–84, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/a-man-that-can-translate-and-infinite-goodness-a-response-to-recent
-reviews/. See also Spencer Kraus, “A Rejoinder to Jonathan Neville’s ‘Response to Recent Reviews,’” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 53 (2022): 185–98, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/a
-rejoinder-to-jonathan-nevilles-response-to-recent-reviews/.

9 . David Hackett Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies: Toward a Logic of Historical Thought (New York: HarperCollins, 1970).

10 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, xix.

11 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 24.

12 . G. J. Renier, History: Its Purpose and Method (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 219.

13 . John Gee, “La Trahison des Clercs: On the Language and Translation of the Book of Mormon,” Review of Books on the Book of Mormon 6, no. 1 (1994): 54.

14 . Neville, A Man That Can Translate, v-vi.

15 . MacKay and Dirkmaat, From Darkness unto Light, 129.

16 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 10.

17 . Interpreters in the plural is not in the KJV. The singular interpreter appears, but is not associated with an instrument of translation.

18 . “William Smith Interview with J. W. Peterson and W. S. Pender, 1890,” in Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, ed. Dan Vogel (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996), 508.

19 . Michael Hubbard MacKay and Nicholas J. Frederick, Joseph Smith’s Seer Stones (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2016), 29–44.

20 . Gardner, Gift and Power, 69–78.

21 . Partial caption. The photographs and caption cover a two-page spread in the printed volume. Revelations and Translations, Volume 3, Part 1: Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 1–Alma 35, ed. Royal Skousen and Robin Scott Jensen (Salt Lake City: The Church Historian’s Press, 2015), xx.

22 . Gerrit J. Dirkmaat and Michael Hubbard Mackay, Let’s Talk About the Translation of the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2023), 81.

23 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 43.

24 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 49.

25 . Dirkmaat and MacKay, Let’s Talk About the Translation of the Book of Mormon, 82.

26 . MacKay and Dirkmaat, From Darkness unto Light, 129.

27 . Dirkmaat and MacKay, Let’s Talk About the Translation of the Book of Mormon, 83–84.

28 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 244.

29 . “Book of Mormon Translation,” Gospel Topics Essays, accessed 4 October 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/book-of
-mormon-translation.

30 . “Gospel Topics Essays,” Gospel Topics Essays, accessed 4 October 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/essays.

31 . “Book of Mormon Translation.”

32 . The conflation of the Jaredite stones and the Urim and Thummim is not unusual. We see it in Charles Swift, “Upon Mount Shelem: The Liminal Experience of the Brother of Jared,” in Illuminating the Jaredite Records, ed. Daniel L. Belnap (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book), 127n61: “The two stones hidden with the plates of Ether will be the Urim and Thummim, called “interpreters” (see Mosiah 8:11–12), and later buried with the gold plates.”

33 . “William Smith Interview,” 508.

34 . D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 41.

35 . “Martin Harris Interview with Joel Tiffany, 1859,” in Early Mormon Documents, vol. 2, ed. Dan Vogel (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 303.

36 . “William Smith Interview,” 508.

37 . Perhaps we now need to modify Neville’s SITH label. He must now include the interpreter-stone-in-the-hat, so it is a newer “iSITH” model, designed for greater accuracy.

38 . MacKay and Dirkmaat, From Darkness unto Light, 69.

39 . MacKay and Dirkmaat, From Darkness unto Light, 67.

40 . Lucas and Neville cite Doctrine and Covenants 17:1, which clearly states that the Urim and Thummim was used. In the notes on that verse, the editors of The Joseph Smith Papers Project note:

In this version of the revelation, the use of “Urim and Thummim” (rather than the Book of Mormon term “interpreters” or the term “spectacles,” which JS used in 1829 and 1832) is probably a later redaction since “Urim and Thummim” does not appear in JS’s writings before 1833. The revisions in this section may in part be correcting errors made while copying from a source text that had itself been revised. (See Book of Mormon, 1830 ed., 172–173, 546 [Mosiah 8:13; Ether 4:5]; JS History, ca. Summer 1832; and “Joseph Smith Documents Dating through June 1831.”) “Revelation, June 1829–E [D&C 17],” p. 119n5, The Joseph Smith Papers, accessed 15 October 2024, josephsmithpapers.org
/paper-summary/revelation-june-1829-e-dc-17/1.

Another possible issue is that the verse also specifies that the Urim and Thummim was what was given to the brother of Jared. That identification represents the common association already discussed in this review. Just as the term Urim and Thummim was later applied to the text, it is plausible that the association with the Jaredite stones was also a later cultural assumption rather than a divine declaration. As noted in this paper, the description of the interpreters Joseph received matched Mosiah’s stones rather than the Jaredite stones.

41 . MacKay and Frederick, Joseph Smith’s Seer Stones, 39. Emphasis added.

42 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 47.

43 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 265.

44 . I have not discussed the objections of Lucas and Neville to the historical evidence that the plates were often covered and not necessarily used for translation. The descriptions of Joseph using either the interpreter stone or the seer stone in a hat rather preclude any direct visual interaction with the plates. Lucas and Neville object to that description and insist that the plates had to have been used. I elect not to deal with that particular issue. Those interested are referred to Spencer Kraus’s review of A Man That Can Translate, cited earlier in this review.

45 . Allowing that the interpreters were stones used by a seer and could be used in a hat strongly suggests that we actually do have some information on how they worked, as there are many records of seers from Joseph’s day and before as well as up to the present day. Critically, they allow the user to see. See Gardner, Gift and Power, 261–64.

46 . Larry E. Morris, A Documentary History of the Book of Mormon (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019), 346.

47 . John W. Welch, “Timing the Translation of the Book of Mormon: ‘Days [and Hours] Never to Be Forgotten,’” BYU Studies Quarterly 57, no. 4 (2018): 38–39. Emphasis added.

48 . Royal Skousen, “Translating the Book of Mormon: Evidence from the Original Manuscript,” in Book of Mormon Authorship Revisited: The Evidence for Ancient Origins, ed. Noel B. Reynolds (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1997), 71–72.

49 . It could be any container, but in the context of Joseph’s translation, hat seemed the best choice. Please read this with a mental smiley emoji.

50 . LDS View: Resource Edition—English Parallel Bible—Advanced. Software program available at ldsview.wordcruncher.com/LDSDnWindows.html. Ancient Greek did not use punctuation; the comma was supplied by the software in the translation process.

51 . Allen J. Christenson, Popol Vuh, Volume II: Literal Poetic Version, Translation and Transcription (Winchester, UK: O Books, 2004), 14–15.

52 . Allen J. Christenson, Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Maya; The Great Classic of Central American Spirituality, Translated from the Original Maya Text (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2007), 64–65.

53 . NID stands for “non-biblical intertextuality database,” a database Neville compiled against which he compared phrases in the Book of Mormon to contemporary or slightly earlier texts. See By Means of the Urim & Thummim pages 26–27 for a more complete definition.

54 . Gardner, Gift and Power, 210–15. Of course, my position is possibly a minority view, with most scholars accepting that the “work it out” concept applied to Joseph’s translation as well.

55 . This could also fit into Fischer’s “moralistic fallacy.” He provides an example where: “the great Roman historian, Tacitus . . . [wrote a book] punctuated with sarcastic side comments.” Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 80.

56 . Grant Hardy, “The Book of Mormon Translation Process,” BYU Studies Quarterly 60, no. 3 (2021), 203–11, website-files-bucket.s3.us-west-2
.amazonaws.com/articles/article_pdfs/The_Book_of_Mormon_Translation
_Process.pdf.

57 . Fischer, Historians’ Fallacies, 24.

58 . Hardy, “Book of Mormon Translation Process,” 203–11.

59 . Hardy, “Book of Mormon Translation Process,” 211.

60 . Hardy, “Book of Mormon Translation Process,” 211.

61 . Gardner, Gift and Power, 155–56.

Through a Glass Darkly: Restoring Translation to the Restoration?

Jeff Lindsay

Review of James W. Lucas and Jonathan E. Neville, By Means of the Urim & Thummim: Restoring Translation to the Restoration (Cottonwood Heights, UT: Digital Legend Press & Publishing, 2023). 288 pages. $19.95.

Abstract: In By Means of the Urim & Thummim, James Lucas and Jonathan Neville valiantly seek to defend Joseph Smith’s role as the divinely inspired translator, a role that they argue is incompatible with using any tool other than the Nephite “intepreters,” later called the Urim and Thummim. They offer a unique theory to account for the statements of witnesses about Joseph using a seer stone in a hat, arguing that it was a fake demonstration using memorized passages to satisfy onlooker curiosity about the translation process. They propose a translation model in which Joseph did more than just get impressions, but saw an incomplete or literal translation in the Urim and Thummim that left plenty of room for heavy mental effort to turn what he saw into acceptable English. While the authors seek to defend Joseph from what they view as the questionable theories of modern Church scholars, their misunderstanding and misinterpretation of both the historical record and scripture result in some errant assumptions and logical gaps that undermine their well-intentioned work.

I appreciate what James Lucas and Jonathan Neville seek to do with their book,1 which is to defend the character of Joseph Smith and the divinity of the Book of Mormon. Through their lengthy efforts to refute what they feel are new apostate theories on the translation of the Book of Mormon, they offer a deeply apologetic book that strives to be scholarly with extensive documentation and analysis. At the same time, the authors somewhat ironically malign the work of Latter-day Saint “apologists” and scholars who disagree with them on the issues they tackle. They are unwilling to let the work of such “academic scribblers” (p. 19n48) subvert what they see as core Latter-day Saint doctrines on the details of the translation of the Book of Mormon. The book, in spite of lofty intentions, often collides with reality.

The opening pages will resonate with readers who were taken aback when the Church publicly recognized that two kinds of tools were used in the translation of the Book of Mormon. Joseph Smith’s history makes it clear that he received an ancient tool with the gold plates known as the “interpreters,” two transparent stones set in a frame somewhat like spectacles that were had among the ancient Nephites, likely related to the two stones received by the brother of Jared (Ether 3:22–28). The interpreters would eventually be called the Urim and Thummim by Latter-day Saints, and that term was then often used to describe how the Book of Mormon was translated. But the historical record adds a complex wrinkle that some Latter-day Saints did not know about. After the loss of the 116 manuscript pages,2 the plates and presumably the Urim and Thummim were taken away from Joseph. After the items were returned to Joseph, multiple witness accounts indicated that he translated with the aid of a different revelatory tool, a seer stone he had previously found. However it functioned, the seer stone also could be called a Urim and Thummim. This raises troubling questions in the minds of some, though, because of the association of seer stones with folk magic and occult practices.

We should not be surprised that folk magic and other pagan practices imitate sacred things. Such parallels are found in crystal balls and peep stones posing as revelatory tools akin to variants of the Urim and Thummim. The world of the occult also employs imitations of ancient divine temple themes, including altars, priests, sacrifices, anointings, oaths and covenants, sacred robes, new names, prayer circles, and even temples themselves. But the allegations of Joseph’s use of folk magic in producing the Book of Mormon had been such a painful “P.R. issue” in the early days of the Church that there has long been a natural incentive to emphasize the use of the definitely-not-a-peepstone Nephite interpreters with their dual stones as the tool Joseph used, rather than even mention what so many witnesses of the translation of the Book of Mormon also observed—a different, single-stone tool, the seer stone.

Even for readers already familiar with the controversy, I believe the following passage from the Church’s statement, “Book of Mormon Translation,” provides good background for the main problem that Lucas and Neville are trying to resolve:

Joseph Smith and his scribes wrote of two instruments used in translating the Book of Mormon. According to witnesses of the translation, when Joseph looked into the instruments, the words of scripture appeared in English. One instrument, called in the Book of Mormon the “interpreters,” is better known to Latter-day Saints today as the “Urim and Thummim.” Joseph found the interpreters buried in the hill with the plates. Those who saw the interpreters described them as a clear pair of stones bound together with a metal rim. The Book of Mormon referred to this instrument, together with its breastplate, as a device “kept and preserved by the hand of the Lord” and “handed down from generation to generation, for the purpose of interpreting languages.”

The other instrument, which Joseph Smith discovered in the ground years before he retrieved the gold plates, was a small oval stone, or “seer stone.” As a young man during the 1820s, Joseph Smith, like others in his day, used a seer stone to look for lost objects and buried treasure. As Joseph grew to understand his prophetic calling, he learned that he could use this stone for the higher purpose of translating scripture.

Apparently for convenience, Joseph often translated with the single seer stone rather than the two stones bound together to form the interpreters. These two instruments—the interpreters and the seer stone—were apparently interchangeable and worked in much the same way such that, in the course of time, Joseph Smith and his associates often used the term “Urim and Thummim” to refer to the single stone as well as the interpreters. In ancient times, Israelite priests used the Urim and Thummim to assist in receiving divine communications. Although commentators differ on the nature of the instrument, several ancient sources state that the instrument involved stones that lit up or were divinely illumined. Latter-day Saints later understood the term “Urim and Thummim” to refer exclusively to the interpreters. Joseph Smith and others, however, seem to have understood the term more as a descriptive category of instruments for obtaining divine revelations and less as the name of a specific instrument.3

The problem is that many Latter-day Saints in recent decades were only aware of the “main” Urim and Thummim as the apparently sole tool for translation of the Book of Mormon. For some, learning that there was another stone like the “ordinary” folk magic stones was troubling. Lucas and Neville feel a need to come to the rescue with a theory aimed at defending our prophets and apostles from the work of critics and questionable voices within the Church introducing dangerous new ideas. The authors insist that we need to believe the (early) prophets and accept that the translation was only done by the one true “Urim and Thummim”—the Nephite interpreters—and not some other seer stone.

The authors strive to pin nearly all the blame on David Whitmer for the concept of using a seer stone for translating the Book of Mormon. He certainly has the largest body of statements about what Lucas and Neville have dubbed the “stone-in-the-hat theory.” His views are often cited by others, but he is definitely not the only source testifying to Joseph using the seer stone. Royal Skousen’s work on the witnesses to the translation will be discussed shortly, but for now it’s useful to consider an explanation that he gave to a reader who seemed to be promoting the theories of Lucas and Neville regarding seer stones:

To be specific: it isn’t just the Whitmers (David and Elizabeth); there are six other independent accounts of Joseph Smith using the seer stone. Three of them were never Mormons. Why should they all be lying; what’s the motive here, especially from two teenagers (at the time)?

Does Joseph Smith have a motive (and Oliver Cowdery) for avoiding any mention of the seer stone? Yes, because Joseph used it for treasure hunting, and he wants to avoid that virulent discussion. All the anti-Mormon works at the time attacked him for using the seer stone for that purpose. They still do.4

Regardless of who claimed to see the seer stones in use, Lucas and Neville claim that 1) only Joseph and Oliver should be trusted as they were the ones directly involved with the translation (though other scribes such as Emma also made statements supporting Joseph’s use of a seer stone), and 2) the claims of using a seer stone are understandable for they arise from seeing Joseph deceptively “demonstrate” the translation process by using a seer stone in a hat to give people an idea (a rather false idea, unfortunately) of what using the Urim and Thummim to translate sort of looked like. The “Demonstration Hypothesis” described by Lucas and Neville (pp. 82–86) strikes me as far more troubling than claims about using a seer stone to receive actual revelation. But while it seems like an unfortunate detour, it is really a key path toward their objective of denouncing the theory to which they assign the ominous acronym of “SITH” (Stone In The Hat).

While the Demonstration Hypothesis seeks to guide readers into ignoring what they’ve read about the use of seer stones since they were just a prop used for a fake demonstration and not for real translation, the authors go on to explain how real translation was done. In light of evidence that Joseph was a seer and saw something in the translators, they conclude that he had to see something in English, but not enough to just easily dictate the text. What he saw was a crude, possibly literal translation—I prefer the term “fractional translation” to indicate that only a fraction of the heavy lifting was done by Urim and Thummim. This way he still had to exert great effort and “study it out” in his mind (Doctrine & Covenants 9:8) to obtain the complete translation expressed in his own dialect, grammar errors and all. Fractional translation raises another set of problems on its own.

But long before the authors get so far afield with questionable peripheral theories to try to explain away counterevidence and meet the constraints that they perceive, they do provide an initial argument for the use of only one translation device that seems simple and reasonable, and may be the main appeal of the book for some readers. They explain that Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery both wrote letters indicating that the translation was done using the Urim and Thummim (pp. 5–10). The authors show statements and cite several sources arguing that the term Urim and Thummim was generally understood to be the Nephite interpreters (pp. 95–97). The authors then argue that only the Nephite interpreters were used based on these statements (pp. 77–80, 95–110). Since Joseph and Oliver knew best, we should reject other voices with other theories and accounts. Some readers will find this appealing and comforting—respect the prophets, reject the scholars and apologists (the two sets of bad actors frequently chastised in the book). What seems unresolved is how this approach squares with respect for today’s prophets and apostles who find the historical evidence compelling that a seer stone as well as the Nephite translators were involved in Joseph’s work.

Those statements from Joseph and Oliver do not explicitly say that Joseph only used the Nephite Urim and Thummim (the two stones set in a frame like spectacles) and do not rule out the possibility of also using another Urim and Thummim in the form of a seer stone.

As an aside, I agree with Lucas and Neville as they make the reasonable assumption that the Nephite interpreters held by king Mosiah2 and used to translate the Jaredites plates, described as “two stones which were fastened into the two rims of a bow” (Mosiah 28:13), were the Jaredite interpreters (or made therefrom) and the same ones that were delivered to Joseph Smith (pp. 87–88). However, Lucas and Neville do not address the problem that comes with this natural assumption: If Mosiah2’s interpreters are the same as the two stones the Lord gave to the brother of Jared and the “interpreters” mentioned in Alma 37:21–25, then how did Mosiah2 obtain them, given that they were mentioned by Ammon to king Limhi in Mosiah 8:13 before the plates of Ether were brought back to be translated by Mosiah2? They didn’t come to him with Ether’s plates. John Tvedtnes raised three possibilities: 1) the Lord could have simply given them to Mosiah2, 2) the Nephites found them, or 3) they came into possession of the Mulekites somehow, who gave them to Mosiah2.5 Brant Gardner also discusses the issue in his detailed six-volume commentary and finds Tvedtnes’s suggestions plausible.6

This problem may be best resolved by Don Bradley’s findings in The Lost 116 Pages, where he explores the provenance of the Nephite interpreters and points to a clue from the Fayette Lapham interview of Joseph Smith regarding an event that may have been described on the lost initial portion of the Book of Mormon translation (commonly called the “lost 116 pages”). That clue suggests that Mosiah1 may have found the Jaredite interpreters (possibly with the sealed record of the brother of Jared, distinct from the twenty-four plates of Ether) while leading his people from the land of Nephi to Zarahemla.7 This approach would fall under Tvedtnes’s proposal #2. I find Bradley’s proposal reasonable and seemingly capable of resolving several problems with its explanatory power, but it is still speculative. The important, thing, though, is that Joseph received the Nephite interpreters, whatever their source, though it seems likely that they were connected to the stones the brother of Jared received.

As Lucas and Neville observe, the statements mentioning the Urim and Thummim from Oliver and Joseph give no hint about the use of a single seer stone in a hat. The challenge comes when squaring those statements with many other statements, especially from witnesses of the translation process and people quoting what they said they heard from Joseph and Oliver. When Lucas and Neville seek to resolve those issues, the effort becomes problematic. When they then propose speculative details for how the translation was done, while chastising apologists and professors for proposing other possibilities, they get even further off track. To properly understand the project of Lucas and Neville, it is helpful to recall a related project over a century ago.

B.H. Roberts Revisited

The authors view the use of seer stones for translation as the modern mischief of unfaithful apologists and scholars seeking to embrace troubling secular teachings that can shatter delicate testimonies. They view the notion of Joseph reading a finished translation in seer stones or even the Nephite interpreters as a harmful doctrine that undercuts his role as a prophet. Over a hundred years ago, Latter-day Saint General Authority B.H. Roberts had similar concerns, not about new-fangled theories from apostate scholars, but about the widespread traditional views about the translation process—namely, the old notion, even the original notion, that Joseph’s use of translation tools allowed him to read the finished translation. Roberts is quoted several times by Lucas and Neville, but the historical context of Robert’s reformation campaign seems to be absent.

One source that provides the background story involving B.H. Roberts is cited by the authors, a chapter by John-Charles Duffy on the “Book of Mormon Translation” Gospel Topics Essay.8 However, Duffy is only cited as an example of another “critique” of the “Book of Mormon Translation” essay, when it might better be described as an article simply pointing out the conservative nature of the essay and its emphasis on seeing the translation rather than Joseph composing it himself. An especially valuable part of Duffy’s work is setting the historical stage for the controversy raised by the seer stones. Duffy reminds us that B.H. Roberts, one of the seven presidents of the Seventy at the time, managed to get permission from the First Presidency to publish his innovative but controversial theory on Book of Mormon translation in the 1903–1904 lesson manual for the Church’s young men’s organization.9 Due to its presence in a Church manual, this theory became known as the “Manual Theory.”

Much like the Gospel Topics essay, Roberts drew on nineteenth-century witnesses to affirm that Smith had translated the Book of Mormon with the aid of two different interpretive instruments: the Urim and Thummim and a seer stone. But that was not the innovative or controversial part of Roberts’s theory; in 1903, the seer stone was still familiar to LDS readers. What was innovative was that Roberts rejected what he called “the popular understanding among the Latter-day Saints” of how Smith had used the interpretive instruments. The popular understanding was that Smith looked into the Urim and Thummim or the seer stone and saw an English translation, which he then dictated word for word to his scribe. As Roberts described—pejoratively—this scenario: “the instruments did all, while he who used them did nothing but look and repeat mechanically what he saw there reflected.” Instead, Roberts argued for a scenario in which Smith looked at the ancient characters through the instruments, “bending every power of his mind to know the meaning thereof,” and then received mental impressions, which he had to render into “such language as [he] could command, in such phraseology as he was master of.”

In the popular scenario, Smith read an English translation that appeared to him in the interpreters; in Roberts’s new scenario, Smith composed the translation based on mental impressions he received from God. In Roberts’s scenario, the language of the English translation originated with Smith, not with the interpreters. That distinction was crucial for Roberts because it explained “the faulty English” that peppered the original edition of the Book of Mormon. It also accounted, Roberts argued, “for the sameness of phraseology and literary style which runs through the whole volume” even though the Book of Mormon supposedly contains writings by multiple ancient authors. In other words, Roberts’s aim was apologetic: he urged the LDS to abandon the idea of a read translation in favor of a composed translation in order to answer challenges to the Book of Mormon’s authenticity. Why would a revealed text contain faulty grammar? Why does the supposedly multi-authored book have only one authorial voice? Roberts’s answer: Because the language of the translation was Smith’s own, not a divine dictation.

Roberts’s composed-translation scenario “gave rise to considerable discussion within the Church,” as Roberts described the controversy later. Concerned readers of the manual wrote letters to the young men’s organization and to the church-run Deseret News. The Deseret News published an editorial supporting Roberts’s scenario, while Roberts himself responded to critics in a series of articles published in three issues of the church magazine Improvement Era in 1906.10

Roberts’s approach was not driven by data, but by an apologetic goal of defending Joseph from some misguided criticisms of his day. By understanding the errors in his assumptions and approach, we can better understand some fundamental flaws in the logic of Lucas and Neville, who in part are reinventing Roberts’s solution for similar reasons, with some similar errors, albeit with an important difference: Roberts was rejecting the traditional view of the translation of the Book of Mormon in saying that it would denigrate Joseph to have simply read the translation, while Lucas and Neville believe their similar approach is restoring the traditional view of the translation process.

Study what in your own mind? The problem with Roberts’s application of Doctrine & Covenants 9:7–9

What bothered Roberts was not the use of seer stones, but the traditional (relative to that time) understanding that Joseph saw the translation in English (or in intelligible English, unlike the crude relatively literal translation imagined by Lucas and Neville). Roberts felt that Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9 clearly showed how translation was done: it occurred in Joseph’s mind, the fruit of arduous study and inspired notions that required Joseph to compose the whole of the translation. This was needed to explain the presumed bad grammar of the dictated Book of Mormon and several elements he felt were anachronistic.

At least since the time of the Manual Theory proposed by Roberts, that passage has often been applied to suggest that Joseph needed to study the characters of the Book of Mormon—and later the Egyptian text of the Joseph Smith Papyri involved in the production of the Book of Abraham—in order to propose a translation aided somehow by impressions of the Spirit, as if many days of effort might be needed to even get a start in translating an unknown script. B.H. Roberts wrote the following in the Improvement Era in 1906 concerning Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9:

This is the Lord’s description of how Oliver Cowdery could have translated with the aid of Urim and Thummim . . . and it is undoubtedly the manner in which Joseph Smith did translate the Book of Mormon through the medium of Urim and Thummim. This description of the translation destroys the theory that the Urim and Thummim did everything, and the seer nothing; that the work of translating was merely a mechanical process of looking at a supplied interpretation, in English, and reading it off to an amanuensis. This description in the Doctrine and Covenants implies great mental effort; of working out the translation in the mind, and securing the witness of the Spirit that the translation is correct.11

But no such monumental effort appears to have been needed or noted. When Joseph Smith first got his hands on some of what came to be known as the Joseph Smith papyri, for example, the next morning he already had several pages of translation:

Arriving in Kirtland with his Egyptian artifacts, Chandler stayed at the Riggs hotel and requested an audience with Joseph Smith. According to a later recollection of John Riggs, he “was present when the Prophet first saw the papyrus from which is translated the Book of Abraham.” In examining the papyrus, the Mormon prophet was struck by what he perceived as a similarity between some of the Egyptian characters and characters of “Reformed Egyptian” that he had previously copied from the gold plates. Smith was given permission to take the papyrus home; and “the morning following Joseph came with the leaves he had translated.”12

Many indications suggest that Joseph’s translations—whether of the Bible, Egyptian papyri, other missing ancient texts, or of the Book of Mormon—did not require a lengthy period of study. True, Joseph and his peers did apply manual effort in an attempt to understand Egyptian in association with the translation of the Book of Abraham, but abundant evidence shows that this effort drew upon the already translated text rather than seeking to decipher Egyptian as a prelude to translation.13

Translation could happen quickly. The claim that he was slowly working everything out in his mind, seeking to decipher characters, and then using his own words to create the text does not fit the numerous statements of witnesses nor the meticulous analysis of the resulting texts and documents. Significant data bring together many convergent lines of analysis showing that there must have been a high level of control over the text that allows, for example, numerous traces of ancient word plays to be preserved,14 allusions to other texts within and outside the Book of Mormon to be made with precision, and influences from the brass plates to be dramatically preserved.15 Most of these would be obscured if the wording were all up to Joseph. Further, there is compelling data from Stanford Carmack and Royal Skousen that the words Joseph spoke in dictating the Book of Mormon were not his own dialect and, in fact, were not bad grammar, as B.H. Roberts mistakenly thought and as Lucas and Neville repeat.16 Just as the KJV has Early Modern English grammar and words that were already non-standard in Joseph’s day, the influences on Joseph’s dictation include Early Modern English that often predates the Bible. We don’t know why, but extensive data shows that he was not using his own dialect nor simplistically mimicking the KJV. Something else was going on that defies the model of Joseph as composer of the verbiage used in the text. Lucas and Neville dismiss the work of Carmack and Skousen, but have completely failed to engage with the extensive data. Lucas and Neville claim that the work of those who propose that Joseph read the translation instead of constantly composing the language himself are driven by a dangerous apologetic agenda (pp. 21–24; cf. p. 113), which is not true. It was the data that led Skousen and Carmack to their observations, not a previously conceived agenda. The reasons for the observed patterns are unclear, but the benefits of Early Modern English grammar for precision of meaning when translating complex sentences to other languages has been offered as a possible benefit for the large presence of Early Modern English in the Book of Mormon.17

Returning to Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9, the laborious process that would result if the passage really described how Joseph Smith translated has no support from the scribes or other witnesses of Joseph Smith’s translation. Here is another instance when Lucas and Neville would have done well to pay more attention to modern scholarship. In a 2016 paper at Interpreter, Stan Spencer provided detailed analysis of this commonly misinterpreted passage, yielding the following summary:

Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9 is conventionally interpreted as the Lord’s description of the method by which the Book of Mormon was translated. A close reading of the entire revelation, however, suggests that the Lord was not telling Oliver Cowdery how to translate but rather how to know whether it was right for him to translate and how to obtain the faith necessary to do so.18

Spencer begins by offering four reasons to question the traditional interpretation:

First, neither study nor spiritual confirmation is mentioned as a requirement for translating in the instructions to Oliver Cowdery in section 8 or anywhere else in scripture. Second, before his attempt to translate, Oliver Cowdery had been promised that he would be able to translate “according to [his] faith” (D&C 8:11). Based on this promise, his lack of success would have been due to lack of faith, not improper technique. Third, Doctrine and Covenants 9:5 observes that Oliver Cowdery “began to translate,” which suggests that he actually did translate and must have known how to do so. Fourth, Doctrine and Covenants 9:8 indicates the need to “study it out” and ask “if it be right,” but there is no obvious antecedent for the pronoun it in the revelation that is consistent with the conventional theory.19

Spencer then carefully explores the antecedents for “it” in these verses and determines that the most reasonable interpretation is that the issue is not how to translate, but whether it was the Lord’s will for Oliver to translate. Spencer concludes that “Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9 teaches us how to obtain a spiritual confirmation of a righteous desire.”20

This analysis undermines the basis of B.H. Roberts’s attack on the traditional and scriptural teaching that the work of Joseph in the role of a seer included seeing the translation. His effusive remonstrations about demeaning Joseph if the translation were simply provided to him are also misguided. Why complain about the Lord showing a vision to a seer, whether the vision is of the majesties of heaven, the needs of an individual, or a translated sentence of sacred scripture? Should we complain that the account of the crossing of the Red Sea demeans Moses if all he had to do was stretch out his staff to have the waters part without first exerting monumental strength to part the waters as much as he could on his own?

The improved understanding of Doctrine and Covenants 9:7–9 also weakens the work of Lucas and Neville, whose work of “restoring translation to the Restoration” involves denouncing a “modern” theory of Joseph reading what he saw—which turns out to be the early, traditional theory of Book of Mormon translation that offended Roberts. What they see as a restoration of tradition is actually a rejection of the traditional view before B.H. Roberts’s day, while also rejecting his Manual Theory’s model of composition without seeing text.

A critical question and Roberts’s critical response

A particularly important part of this historical background is that others in B.H. Roberts’s day already proposed the Lucas and Neville model of an imperfect, possibly literal translation being given to Joseph by sight. Roberts considered this and rejected it in light of reasonable concerns. One question that Roberts received was:

May it not have been that the Prophet did see, as related, through the Urim and Thummim the translation of each sentence from the plates into the English language, but in a so-called word for word or literal translation; and from this odd rendering, it became his task to put the sentence into readable English? Taking this view of it, we can account for how the language of the Book of Mormon is in part modern and in part decidedly ancient. The Prophet having used partly the words as they appeared, and, in order to put it into proper form, used or supplied words of his own. This will account for all errors, and place the responsibility for them where it must belong, with man and not with God. It would give due importance and credit to the sacred instruments, and would leave ample scope for the Prophet to exercise his own mental powers.21

In other words, the anonymous writer is proposing, in 1906, essentially the same translation model as Lucas and Neville, though without any express objection to a seer stone. Roberts’s response is noteworthy. After first emphasizing the absurdity of a material device having the power to translate—something that Roberts believed could only be possible with the mind—Roberts points out an obvious problem with the literal translation or “fractional translation” hypothesis:

If the Urim and Thummim possessed that intellectual power it must have been conferred upon it of God, and under that supposition, we are brought face to face again with all our old difficulties, chief of which is the question: If God created such an instrument, and conferred upon it the power to give a transliteration of the Nephite characters, how is it that he did not give it the power to translate the meaning into reasonable and readable, not to say perfect English, at first hand, and relieve us from the awkward supposition that the instrument possessed the mental power to make the literal translation from the Nephite language—which Joseph Smith was left to construct into bad English? What would be gained by the adoption of this cumbersome and, pardon me, untenable theory? And again, what occasion for it, when we have the more simple and reasonable theory of the Manual which is in accord with what God has revealed upon the subject, and not necessarily contradictory of what Messrs. Whitmer and Harris have said upon the subject? In order that this may appear, I restate the Manual theory: The Prophet saw the Nephite characters in the Urim and Thummim; through strenuous mental effort, the exercise of faith and the operation of the inspiration of God upon his mind, he obtained the thought represented by the Nephite characters, understood them in the Nephite language, and then expressed that understanding, the thought, in such language as he was master of; which language, as his mind by mental processes arranged it, was caught and held to his vision in Urim and Thummim until written by his amanuensis. That leaves all the factors involved in the work of translation in their true relation: The Urim and Thummim an aid to the Prophet in the work, yet not necessarily, and contrary to human experience and knowledge revealed of God, endowed with intellectual power; the mind of the Prophet, touched through his faith by the inspiration of God, the chief factor; the testimony of Messrs. Harris and Whitmer that both Nephite characters and the English translation appeared in the Urim and Thummim, undisturbed and unimpaired.22

Lucas and Neville are, in a sense, rekindling a debate already waged by B.H. Roberts. They rely on some of the same misunderstandings of scripture and alleged problems in the Book of Mormon, but with added concerns over seer stones that were apparently not taboo in Roberts’s day. Roberts resolved the concerns before him to achieve an apologetic goal by denying the gift of sight to the seer (no seeing of an English translation—too easy!) and requiring strenuous mental effort to translate characters in the strange way he extracted from Doctrine and Covenants 9. Lucas and Neville have similar goals and constraints, but have recognized the reality of sight in the translation. More generous than Roberts, they allow at least English text to appear as Joseph gazes into the glass, but he sees only darkly as muddled words from a literal or fractional translation of some kind are given. This still leaves us room to admire Joseph for the mighty mental struggle of piecing those clues together to make the literate, consistent, wordplay-rich text of the Book of Mormon—a text that abounds with evidence of different authors, different voices, and literary power far beyond anything Joseph could have accomplished using his language and knowledge.

Neither B.H. Roberts nor Lucas and Neville present a theory that makes sense of the scriptures, the witness statements, and the majesty of the Book of Mormon text, though they offer valuable concepts for discussion and debate.

Canonized Doctrine?

To Lucas and Neville, their beliefs about the details of the translation is a matter of canonized truth (pp. 2, 7, 13–15, 19, 21, 27, 29, 34, etc.). They state that those who spoke of using a hat were not witnesses to the actual translation and were apparently misled, albeit by Joseph and Oliver. We should rely on selected statements made about using the Urim and Thummim and believe that this can only be the Nephite interpreters. They see their views on how the translation was done as just the simple truth expressed by the canon.

Canonized doctrine? Yes, it is true that our canonized account in Joseph Smith—History refers to Joseph receiving the “Urim and Thummim” for the purpose of translating (v. 35, see also vv. 42, 52), which apparently would be later returned with the plates to Moroni (v. 59). But how those tools worked, how the translation was done, and whether or not other seer stones could be used is not a matter settled by the canon. When it comes to such details, the canon is largely silent except for the fact that it was through “the power of God” that the translation was done, for Joseph did not explain what he experienced or how he did the translation. The title page of the Book of Mormon simply says this:

To come forth by the gift and power of God unto the interpretation thereof— . . . The interpretation thereof by the gift of God.

The first question we must ask here is what gift did Joseph receive? Was it the gift to figure out the grammar and vocabulary of a foreign script in his own mind, or the gift of being a seer—i.e., one who has the gift of visions, of seeing. In fact, the scriptures are not silent on this issue. The Book of Abraham gives us insight into the nature of the Urim and Thummim:

And I, Abraham, had the Urim and Thummim, which the Lord my God had given unto me, in Ur of the Chaldees;

And I saw the stars, that they were very great, and that one of them was nearest unto the throne of God; and there were many great ones which were near unto it. (Abraham 3:1–2)

Apparently, words could also be conveyed through the Urim and Thummim, for Abraham writes of what “the Lord said unto me, by the Urim and Thummim” (v. 4), but sight is again unambiguously referenced when the Lord says, “Now, Abraham, these two facts exist, behold thine eyes see it” (v. 6).

While not explicitly a reference to a device such as the Urim and Thummim, Moses 6:35–36 describes how Enoch’s eyes were washed and anointed, enabling him to see “things which were not visible to the natural eye,” and thus he was called a “seer.”

Lucas and Neville argue that Joseph peered at the plates with the interpreters and did in fact see English text, but only a crude or literal translation that he then needed to express in his own words. A crude, literal translation, such as a word-for-word translation, is frequently unsuitable for preparing a meaningful translation. So many idiomatic and nuanced concepts are lost when crudely translated, especially when one word can have multiple meanings or when a string of words together has a meaning seemingly unrelated to the sum of the parts (e.g., common sayings such as “putting the cart before the horse”). Why would a divine translation not be at least as good as Google Translate or my preferred translation tool, ChatGPT-4o? If English text is going to be displayed, why not make it precise and accurate? This was exactly the question B.H. Roberts asked when a reader proposed that Joseph might have been given a literal translation of some kind that would get him started but still require mental effort, as discussed earlier.

While we don’t have clear statements from Joseph on what he experienced in translating, the Lord added the word “sight” in describing Joseph’s gift of translating: “God had given thee sight and power to translate” (Doctrine and Covenants 3:12). This is, of course, a canonized text indicating that the power to translate is associated with sight. This and other verses in Section 3 are quoted in Lucas and Neville’s Appendix B, but the implications of the word “sight” are not discussed by the authors.

Back to the question of what gift Joseph received, Doctrine and Covenants 5:4 addresses the issue of the gift given to Joseph: “you have a gift to translate the plates; and this is the first gift that I bestowed upon you.” Stan Spencer made an interesting observation of the implications of Joseph’s “first gift”:

According to this passage, Joseph Smith’s first and only spiritual gift up to that point was the “gift to translate.” Yet, even before he began translating, he was seeing visions (JS-H 1:21–58). It was his claim of seeing visions that provoked the persecution of ministers who believed divine visions had ceased with the apostles (JS-H 1:21–27, 58). If Joseph Smith’s “gift to translate the plates” was his “first gift,” it must have been the same as his gift for seeing visions.23

Another insight from Latter-day Saint scriptures comes from the 1843 revelation in Doctrine and Covenants 130:10, an important touchstone on what can be called a Urim and Thummim:

Then the white stone mentioned in Revelation 2:17, will become a Urim and Thummim to each individual who receives one, whereby things pertaining to a higher order of kingdoms will be made known.

This undercuts the notion that all references to the Urim and Thummim in the translation process must refer to only one specific tool, the dual-stone Nephite device. Not only does this Urim and Thummim contain a single stone, but there are multiple such devices, delivered to multiple individuals.

Finally, there may be a clue in ancient scripture about the way the translation of the Book of Mormon would work. Stanford Carmack cites three verses from 2 Nephi 27 in the opening words of his 2016 article, “Joseph Smith Read the Words,” offering linguistic evidence drawing from Royal Skousen’s work suggesting that Joseph must have seen text rather than formulating it in his own words:

Wherefore thou shalt read the words which I shall give unto thee. . . . Wherefore when thou hast read the words which I have commanded thee . . . the Lord shall say unto him that shall read the words that shall be delivered him. (2 Nephi 27:20, 22, 24)24

The coming forth of the Book of Mormon as described in 2 Nephi 27 may indeed indicate that the seer would see the words of the translation, with no hint of seeing them “darkly” in the interpeters’ glass.

The Demonstration Hypothesis

A major challenge for the “no seer stone, no hat” position held by Lucas and Neville is found in the numerous accounts of Joseph translating using a hat to look at a seer stone. To cope with this, the authors have created a novel theory called the “Demonstration Hypothesis” in which Joseph and Oliver pretended to translate with a seer stone in a hat to satisfy the curiosity of those around them regarding the translation method. Since Joseph was forbidden from letting others see the interpreters, he and Oliver would occasionally engage in mock translation with a seer stone and a hat to give others a completely misleading feel for the miraculous translation process.

This novel but strange hypothesis was introduced in a prior book of Neville, A Man That Can Translate, and was rebutted in a book review by Spencer Kraus. The theory clashes with the historical record in several ways. Kraus summarizes:

Neville’s “Demonstration Hypothesis” is explored in A Man That Can Translate, arguing that Joseph recited a memorized text from Isaiah rather than translate Isaiah from the Book of Mormon record. This hypothesis, meant to redefine how Joseph Smith used a seer stone during the translation of the Book of Mormon, however, fails to deal with the historical record seriously or faithfully. Neville, in a purported effort to save Joseph Smith’s character, ironically describes Joseph as a liar, reinvigorating old anti-Latter-day Saint claims that Joseph simply recited a memorized text, even to the point that Neville defends hostile sources while targeting Church-published histories and publications. He further attacks the witnesses of the translation in an effort to discredit their testimonies regarding the seer stone, and repeatedly misrepresents these sources.25

There is no plausible basis for the far-fetched and deceptive mechanism. Indeed, the logic of it seems outlandish. Why not use ordinary spectacles with a book if Joseph translated the way the authors insist that he did? Why mislead others with a seer stone and a hat?

I appreciate the authors’ intent of defending the Restoration by respecting the words of prophets and apostles, but their approach seems to call for disrespecting modern leaders of the Church who have approved of publications openly discussing the use of a seer stone and a hat for some of the translation process.

The Church’s Gospel Topics Essay, “Book of Mormon Translation,” recognizes Joseph’s statement in the preface of the 1830 Book of Mormon: “I would inform you that I translated [the book], by the gift and power of God.”26 This essay must offend Lucas and Neville, however, in its teachings on a seer stone being used. A footnote is provided in the essay in support of the statement that Joseph and his peers used the term “Urim and Thummim” to refer to a seer stone as well as the Nephite interpreters:

For example, when Joseph Smith showed a seer stone to Wilford Woodruff in late 1841, Woodruff recorded in his journal: “I had the privilege of seeing for the first time in my day the URIM & THUMMIM” (Wilford Woodruff journal, Dec. 27, 1841, Church History Library, Salt Lake City). See also Doctrine and Covenants 130:10.27

Wilford Woodruff was an apostle at the time that he bore witness to having seen the “Urim and Thummim” in the form of a singular seer stone. Thus, we have the words of an apostle as well as the words of scripture indicating that the Urim and Thummim can refer to a single stone, not just the Nephite interpreters.

Wilford Woodruff’s 1841 statement is important. To their credit, it is at least noted by Lucas and Neville, but only in a footnote, where it is largely dismissed and then misread. To set the stage for an apparent misuse of a reference, it is helpful to consider the context of the paragraph that ends with the problematic footnote:

Craig Ostler, a professor of religious education at Brigham Young University, has undertaken a comprehensive review of descriptions of the instruments used to translate the Book of Mormon. His research shows that until the 1843 revelation, no one used the term “Urim and Thummim“ to mean anything other than the interpreters and that, in fact, in the 1830s and 1840s, almost the only written references to the use of a lone seer stone are from Mormonism Unvailed.[159] Almost all of the seer stone claims do not appear until decades later, and none attempted to conflate the seer stone with the Urim and Thummim until modern scholars needed to confuse the two in order to account for this large time discrepancy between the early accounts of the interpreters and the much later appearance of the seer stone claims. (p. 79)

Footnote 159 refers to “Craig Ostler, ‘Book of Mormon Translation Instrument Descriptions: Interpreters, Urim & Thummim and Seer Stones.’” This is a presentation by Ostler at the April 2020 FIRM Foundation conference, available at https://www.bookofmormonevidence.org/streaming/videos/bom/dr-craig-j-ostler-book-of-mormon-translation-instrument-descriptions_-interpreters-urim-thummim-and-seer-stones/. This video is secured behind a paywall. Searching for written publications with this title has revealed nothing, nor is any seemingly related work listed on Ostler’s biography page at BYU. Such invisibility is not the typical end-product of a comprehensive investigation by a university professor. While whatever Ostler said remains unclear, Lucas and Neville infer that nobody except anti-Mormons referred to seer stones as the Urim and Thummim before 1843 when Doctrine and Covenants 130:10 was given. They try to couch their assertion in non-absolute terms (“. . . almost the only written references . . .”), without discussing those written references—such as Wilford Woodruff’s 1841 statement—that disprove the argument they attempt to make. In any case, Doctrine and Covenants 130:10 makes it clear that the term “Urim and Thummim” can refer to a seer stone.

In the course of trying to prove that early statements about the translation of the Book of Mormon rule out the possibility that Joseph used seer stones in some way in a significant part of his translation work, they require the faithful reader to believe that Joseph’s widely attested use of seer stones viewed in a hat was a matter of deception. They propose a mere hypothetical demonstration of the use of the divine interpreters, the Urim and Thummim. Lucas and Neville insist that when Joseph and Oliver talked about the Urim and Thummim, they only meant one thing—the Nephite interpreters.

Ironically, in their effort to take the words of the prophets and apostles seriously (more specifically, the words of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery), they run the risk of demeaning the words of modern prophets and apostles who have approved publication of information about the use of both the Nephite interpreters and a seer stone in the translation of the Book of Mormon.

Twisting and Turning

A frequent frustration for this reader is the way in which counterevidence is often turned about, especially in summary statements, as if it supported the various positions the authors take. These twistings and turnings can be frustrating, if not aggravating.

For example, we have a passage discussing what Oliver may have said about the translation method:

Although many speculated about the operation of the interpreters, only the actual translation team—Joseph and possibly Oliver—could speak from firsthand experience. Neither left a formal description of the operation of the interpreters.

However, an 1831 article claimed to relate Oliver’s testimony in a trial that Joseph “found with the plates, from which he translated his book, two transparent stones, resembling glass, set in silver bows. That by looking through these, he was able to read in English, the reformed Egyptian characters, which were engraved on the plates.”

And in 1848, as he was returning to the Church, Oliver discussed the subject with Samuel W. Richards. Years later Richards left an account of how he remembered Oliver describing the use of the Urim and Thummim. According to Richards, Oliver said the translation was “done by holding the translators over the words of the written record,” upon which “the translation appears distinctly in the instrument, which had been touched by the finger of God and dedicated and consecrated for the purpose of translating languages.”

In both of these cases, it is not clear whether Oliver spoke as an eyewitness, inferred what he thought Joseph saw, or was reporting what Joseph told him. Regardless, Oliver’s testimony is the closest we will come to an accurate account of what Joseph experienced. The key point is that Joseph was using the interpreters instrument to interact with the engravings on the plates. He was not merely reading words off a stone in a hat, unconnected with the plates. (pp. 181–82, emphasis added)

In this passage, Lucas and Neville cite Samuel Whitney Richards, who waited until 1907 to write of his 1848 conversation with Cowdery (p. 181n380), about six decades after the conversation and eight decades after the translation work. This is a second-hand account of what Oliver said and a third-hand account with respect to Joseph, if Joseph ever explained what he saw to Oliver. Further, this was recorded at an extraordinary length of time after the conversation and longer still after the translation. How can this count as meaningful evidence for what Joseph experienced? But there is an even bigger gap when the authors only see confirmation of their theory, even as it is being contradicted.

Two sources report Oliver explaining that a divine translation was seen (“was able to read in English” and “the translation appears distinctly in the instrument”). Then the authors summarize this work by restating their own opinion, as if it naturally followed from Oliver’s words: Joseph used the Urim and Thummim to “interact” with the engravings, followed with their assurance that Joseph “was not merely reading words off a stone in a hat.” No hat may have been needed with the Nephite instrument, but to say he was not reading words and not seeing the actual translation flies in the face of these two quotes. Evidence against their hypothesis is turned about and twisted violently. This would not pass academic scrutiny.

As another example, in arguing that Joseph’s mind did much of the heavy lifting in the translation, the authors discount the evidence that he was not a highly literate student. They consider his mother’s well-known statement about her family listening carefully to Joseph’s teachings, a boy “who had never read the Bible through in his life; for he was much less inclined to the perusals of books then any of the rest of our children, but far more given to meditation and deep study.”28 The meaning here should be clear: Joseph was not a bookworm and had not yet read the whole Bible. But Lucas and Neville still manage to see confirmation of their thesis in yet another statement that undermines it. They note that the original draft of Lucy’s history used the word “study,” and then offer a clever twist on a possible reason for the change:

Perhaps Lucy realized that the first draft conveyed a misunderstanding and she wanted to make the point that Joseph did not read/study/peruse as many books as the other children, but focused on meditation and deep study of the books he did access. (p. 167, emphasis added)

It seems more reasonable that the change, whoever made it, was to improve readability by not using “study” twice in the same sentence. Lucy does not talk about deep study of books at all, but merely of “meditation and deep study,” in contrast to the “perusals [or study] of books” by her other children. But then Lucas and Neville argue that Lucy meant that Joseph was indeed a very deep student of books, a nearly 180-degree turn in meaning achieved by adding a phrase not found in the text, “of the books he did access.” This, too, would not pass academic scrutiny.

Further, the authors turn to a current dictionary to show that “peruse” can mean to read something carefully or to read something casually. Thus, the authors argue that:

Lucy contrasted “the perusals of books” with “meditation and deep study.” This suggests she meant that the other children’s perusals were more relaxed and informal than Joseph’s “deep study.” This connotation is consistent with her observation that Joseph had not “read the Bible through,” because “meditation and deep study” requires more detailed examination of cross-references and commentaries than merely reading it through like a novel. (p. 168)

“Peruse” today can be used to refer to casual reading, just as the verb “read” can refer to casual skimming of the text. But the initial draft’s plural form, “perusals,” seems to echo the non-casual nature of the reading. Indeed, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the original meaning of “peruse” is “to go through searchingly or in detail, run over with careful scrutiny,” with a later meaning of “read casually” apparently first attested sometime in the nineteenth century.29 However, the Grammarist website notes that “Examples of peruse used in the newer sense (to browse or to skim) are easily found in sources from the middle 20th century, but they are rare or nonexistent before then.”30 As evidence, one can see that various forms of the word “peruse” occur four times in Lucy’s first draft, none of which require the meaning of casual reading. Further, the final version changes an instance of “reading” in the first draft to “perused” in a context that clearly involves serious effort. In the initial draft, the sentence “To accomplish this, I spent much of time my time in reading the Bible and praying”31 was changed in the final draft to: “In order to this I perused the Bible and prayed incessantly.”32 There is no hint of casual reading in her use of this word.

The point of Lucy’s passage about Joseph is how unusual it was that a son much less interested in books than her other children would suddenly have so many stories and religious teachings to share with her family. Lucas and Neville seem so bent on advancing their hypothesis that they fail to see how their novel reading does so much injustice to the text.

A Failure to Consider Related Scholarship

Lucas and Neville’s work claims to be comprehensive in considering original sources, but clearly is lacking. Several relevant and important sources are neglected, and skewed interpretations are given to accounts that don’t fit their narrative.

For example, in 2021, Royal Skousen released a 91-page pre-print of a chapter of his work on witness statements about the translation of the Book of Mormon.33 I wish that chapter had been carefully considered by the authors of By Means of Urim & Thummim. This is just a small fraction of the massive work of Royal Skousen on the translation of the Book of Mormon, a lifetime of work that has taught us much about the dictation of the Book of Mormon with implications on the translation process. Important conclusions have been elicited from the intricate details of the scribal work in the Original Manuscript which are highly consistent with Joseph reading text to a scribe, typically in chunks of about twenty words at a time, and sometimes spelling out names. A large body of evidence suggests that Joseph did indeed see text that was being revealed to him.

Skousen also carefully explores statements of witnesses and associates about the translation process, concluding that there were two methods used: a first process in which Joseph looked through the Nephite interpreters with the plates before him, and a second process in which he peered into a seer stone without the need for the plates to be exposed before him. In both processes, there is evidence that he saw something that he could read aloud. This account is by Nancy Towle, a non-member, who visited Kirtland in October 1831:

He accordingly went; and was directed by the angel to a certain spot of ground, where was deposited a ‘Box,’ and in that box contained ‘Plates,’ which resembled gold; also, a pair of ‘interpreters,’ (as he called them,) that resembled spectacles; by looking into which, he could read a writing engraven upon the plates, though to himself, in a tongue unknown.34

This statement suggests that reading was involved in the translation during the first stage (while using the interpreters).

Skousen also provides detailed documentation regarding the witnesses of the translation process during the second stage, with a stone and a hat. Here is a summary:

All eight primary witnesses of the translation independently refer to Joseph Smith using the seer stone to translate the Book of Mormon, from the beginning in the spring of 1828 in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, to the end in June 1829 at the Peter Whitmer home in Fayette, New York; that is, from some portion of the 116 pages containing the book of Lehi to the small plates of Nephi; and from the first scribes, Emma Smith, Reuben Hale, and Martin Harris, to the final scribes, Oliver Cowdery and two Whitmers, John and Christian. Nearly all mention obscuring the light or at least having the viewing occur in darkness; all explicitly state that the seer stone was placed in a hat. In these statements, there is some variety in how the seer stone is referred to: once as “the Urim and Thummim” (Joseph Knight), once as “the director” (Elizabeth Anne Whitmer), three times as simply “the stone” (Emma Smith, Elizabeth McKune, and Joseph McKune), and three times as “the seer stone” (Michael Morse, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris). By implication, there was no curtain or blanket separating Joseph Smith and his scribe. Nor did Joseph have any books, manuscripts, or notes that he was consulting.35

At the same time, we have statements from Joseph and Oliver (these are included and discussed in Skousen’s chapter, along with many other witness statements) that don’t mention the seer stone and only speak of the Urim and Thummim. Skousen proposes that both men felt a need to downplay the role of the seer stone given the trouble Joseph had already faced in that area. There’s no way to eliminate tension here: either many witness statements need to just be disregarded, or we must accept incomplete or inaccurate reporting on some details of the translation from Joseph and Oliver. Again, I appreciate the desire of Lucas and Neville to create a tidy scenario, but I feel they create more problems than they believe they have solved.

They also fail to consider the convincing arguments of other scholars. For example, one work that needs to be considered for their arguments to be taken seriously is that of Stan Spencer in his 2017 publication, “Seers and Stones: The Translation of the Book of Mormon as Divine Visions of an Old-Time Seer.” Spencer’s opening paragraphs clearly lay out the case for references to “Urim and Thummim” including seer stones:

Joseph Smith and some of his associates referred to the interpreter stones as well as other seer stones as urim and thummim, considering urim and thummim to be a class of revelatory instruments. The term Urim and Thummim was used in this sense by Joseph Smith in his comment on the white stone mentioned in the Book of Revelation: “The white stone mentioned in Revelation 2:17 will become a Urim and Thummim to each individual who receives one” (D&C 130:10). The “Urim and Thummim” mentioned in the introductory headings of some of the early sections of the Doctrine and Covenants was, according to David Whitmer, the brown seer stone. In a meeting on December 27, 1841, Joseph Smith taught some of the apostles about urim and thummim. Regarding the meeting, Brigham Young wrote in his journal:

I met with the Twelve at brother Joseph’s. He conversed with us in a familiar manner on a variety of subjects, and explained to us the Urim and Thummim which he found with the plates, called in the Book of Mormon the Interpreters. He said that every man who lived on the earth was entitled to a seer stone, and should have one, but they are kept from them in consequence of their wickedness, and most of those who do find one make an evil use of it; he showed us his seer stone.

Since Joseph Smith had given his brown seer stone to Oliver Cowdery, the stone he showed the apostles was most likely his white one. Wilford Woodruff recorded the same experience in his journal, but used a different label for the seer stone: “The twelve or a part of them spent the day with Joseph the Seer. . . . I had the privilege of seeing for the first time in my day the Urim and Thummim.” Less than two months later, Woodruff again called Joseph Smith’s seer stone “the Urim and Thummim” in reference to its use in translating the Book of Abraham, and apostle Parley Pratt made a similar statement in a church newspaper a few months later. In 1959, apostle Joseph Fielding Smith also referred to Joseph Smith’s seer stone as a urim and thummim. According to a journal entry of Wandle Mace, Joseph Smith even applied the term urim and thummim to a pair of stones brought over from England that had been “consecrated to devils.” For Joseph Smith, a urim and thummim was an object used to obtain revelation, and “the Urim and Thummim” was whatever object he was currently using for that purpose.36

The term Urim and Thummim can obviously be used for two different kinds of instruments—the Nephite “spectacles” and a lone seer stone. There is no need to insist that all references to the Urim and Thummim must be dual stones in a frame from the Nephites.

Many other errors evident in By Means of the Urim & Thummim could have been avoided with peer review. For example, the authors draw upon the “discontinuity theory” that the small plates of Nephi were largely unknown for centuries among the Nephites until Mormon, at the end of his work, finds and attaches the brass plates. This misses important finds about the “continuity” of the influence of the small plates on later writers such as Alma. See, for example, Matthew Scott Stenson’s work on Alma and his thorough review of prior works in the continuing debate of discontinuity vs. continuity.37

Other errors could have been avoided by recognizing that Mormon did not find the small plates at the end of his editorial work with the large plates, but near the beginning of that work, as Clifford Jones has shown with multiple lines of evidence.38 Jones’s work is one of the more important scholarly advances in our understanding of the Book of Mormon and its influences, including the influence of the small plates on Mormon and Moroni, and greatly clarifies a number of relevant details.

Further, one of several important but neglected sources is Orson Pratt, a witness of Joseph’s translation of the Bible:

Elder Pratt said he was present when this revelation was given. No great noise or physical manifestation was made; Joseph was as calm as the morning sun. But he noticed a change in his countenance that he had never noticed before, when a revelation was given to him. Joseph’s face was exceedingly white, and seemed to shine. The speaker had been present many times when he was translating the New Testament, and wondered why he did not use the Urim and Thummim, as in translating the Book of Mormon. While this thought passed through the speaker’s mind, Joseph, as if he read his thoughts, looked up and explained that the Lord gave him the Urim and Thummim when he was inexperienced in the Spirit of inspiration. But now he had advanced so far that he understood the operations of that Spirit, and did not need the assistance of that instrument.39

The translation of the Bible may have been much different than that of the Book of Mormon, but Pratt’s statement at least merits consideration when discussing the role of aids for interpretation.

Conclusion

Lucas and Neville wish to underscore the remarkable and divine work of Joseph Smith as the translator of the Book of Mormon. In so doing, they should be aligned with many faithful scholars, members, and leaders of the Church who affirm that the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God. How that translation occurred might seem of secondary import, but it is vitally important to the authors of By Means of the Urim & Thummim. Unfortunately, the authors’ zeal takes them past the bounds of the historical data and beyond the scope of scripture as they focus on the wrong enemies. The enemies of faith are not faithful scholars who observe the data and recognize evidence that Joseph read the words and dictated even complete chapters of Isaiah by revelation, without notes, without the use of a Bible, without prompting, and impossibly dictating (for most of the text we have) while looking at a seer stone in a hat. This translation process defies any theory of Joseph as the author or even the composer, especially when the details of the remarkably consistent text are examined.

The authors do not achieve their goal of restoring early theories of translation by joining B.H. Roberts in his disdain for theories in which Joseph read the translated text. Rather, they ironically reject the same traditional model Roberts attacked, offering instead a new version of Robert’s “Manual Theory” in which Joseph’s work as a composer gets a boost with the “through a glass darkly” model by presuming a view of a poor initial translation. Roberts seemed justified in rejecting that in 1906, as he did not have access to information disclosed through the work of later scholars. We do, however, have greater knowledge and should probably reject Roberts’s conclusions. We also seem justified in rejecting, as well, the conclusions of those like Lucas and Neville who want to return to the mistakes now evident in Roberts’s work. These mistakes, unfortunately, are only exacerbated by the painful “Demonstration Hypothesis” model that seeks to resolve the problems of witness accounts of a seer stone in a hat by saying that the stone and the hat were real, but the translation was deceptive.

By Means of the Urim & Thummim strikes me as a case of well-intentioned zeal that has gone too far.

[Author’s Note: I wish to thank Stan Spencer, Royal Skousen, and Godfrey Ellis.]

Jeffrey D. Lindsay has been providing online materials defending the Church for more than twenty years, primarily at JeffLindsay.com. His Mormanity blog on Church topics began in 2004 and was recently converted to ArisefromtheDust.com. He is currently on the Board of Directors for The Interpreter Foundation. Jeff has a PhD in chemical engineering from BYU and is a US patent agent. Jeff has been a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers since 2014. Every year since 2015 he has been named as one of the world’s leading intellectual property strategists on the IAM 300 Strategy List by IAM Media Group in the UK. He is currently president of Planet Lindsay, LLC, assisting a variety of clients with intellectual property and innovation. From 2011 to 2019 he was the head of Intellectual Property for Asia Pulp and Paper in Shanghai, China, one of the world’s largest forest product companies. Formerly, he was associate professor at the Institute of Paper Science and Technology (now the Renewable Bioproducts Institute) at Georgia Tech, then went into R&D at Kimberly-Clark Corporation, eventually becoming corporate patent strategist and senior research fellow. Jeff served a mission in the German-speaking Switzerland Zurich Mission. He and his wife Kendra are the parents of four boys and have fourteen grandchildren. They are both serving as ministering specialists for African immigrants in their community and are learning Swahili. Jeff also serves as a board member for Hope and Help Together, a community organization in Appleton, Wisconsin, which works to assist refugees and immigrants in the Fox Cities region.

1 . James W. Lucas and Jonathan E. Neville, By Means of the Urim & Thummim: Restoring Translation to the Restoration (Cottonwood Heights, UT: Digital Legend Press & Publishing, 2023). It seems there have been multiple editions of the book, as the front matter of the book reviewed here states “Updated May 2023 and January and August 2024 from first edition.” All quotes in this review are from this printed edition of the book.

2 . Don Bradley presents the possibility that even more than 116 pages was lost. Don Bradley, The Lost 116 Pages: Reconstructing the Book of Mormon’s Missing Stories (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2019), 91–96.

3 . “Book of Mormon Translation,” Gospel Topics Essays, accessed 6 October 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/book-of
-mormon-translation.

4 . Royal Skousen, email correspondence to author, 27 August 2024.

5 . John A. Tvedtnes, The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Salt Lake City; Cornerstone Publishing, 1999), 322.

6 . Brant A. Gardner, Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, vol. 3, Enos through Mosiah (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007), 220–21.

7 . Bradley, The Lost 116 Pages, 196–99, 253–58.

8 . John-Charles Duffy, “The ‘Book of Mormon Translation’ Essay in Historical Context,” in Matthew Harris and Newell G. Bringhurst, eds., The Latter-day Saint Gospel Topics Series: A Scholarly Engagement (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2020), 97–130.

9 . Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations Manual, 1903–1904, vol. 2, New Witnesses for God, part 1, The Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1903), archive.org/details/ymmia1903/page/66/mode/2up. See especially pp. 66–72.

10 . Duffy, “The ‘Book of Mormon Translation’ Essay in Historical Context,” 101–2.

11 . B.H. Roberts, “Translation of the Book of Mormon: Answers to Questions Respecting the Theory in the Senior Manual,” Improvement Era 9, no. 6 (April 1906): 429–30, archive.org/details/improvementera0906unse/page/428/mode/2up.

12 . Terryl Givens and Brian M. Hauglid, The Pearl of Greatest Price: Mormonism’s Most Controversial Scripture (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019), 120, citing Tullidge’s Quarterly Magazine 3, no. 3 (July 1884): 283. In the cited article from Tullidge’s, it indicates that when Joseph brought the leaves he had translated, they were read that morning by Oliver Cowdery, who was also present. “History of Provo City,” Tullidge’s Quarterly Magazine 3, no. 3 (July 1884): 283.

13 . See John Gee, “Fantasy and Reality in the Translation of the Book of Abraham,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 42 (2021): 127–70, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/fantasy-and-reality-in-the
-translation-of-the-book-of-abraham/; John Gee, An Introduction to the Book of Abraham (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2017 ); and Jeff Lindsay, “A Precious Resource with Some Gaps,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 33 (2019): 13–104, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/a-precious-resource-with-some-gaps/.

14 . See, for example, Matthew L. Bowen, Name as Key-Word: Collected Essays on Onomastic Wordplay and the Temple in Mormon Scripture (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2018) and Matthew L. Bowen, Ancient Names in the Book of Mormon: Towards a Deeper Understanding of a Witness of Christ (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2023).

15 . Jeff Lindsay and Noel B. Reynolds, “‘Strong Like unto Moses’: The Case for Ancient Roots in the Book of Moses Based on Book of Mormon Usage of Related Content Apparently from the Brass Plates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 44 (2021): 1–92, journal.interpreter
foundation.org/strong-like-unto-moses-the-case-for-ancient-roots-in-the
-book-of-moses-based-on-book-of-mormon-usage-of-related-content
-apparently-from-the-brass-plates/, and Jeff Lindsay, “Further Evidence from the Book of Mormon for a Book of Moses-Like Text on the Brass Plates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 61 (2024): 415–94, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/further-evidence-from-the-book-of
-mormon-for-a-book-of-moses-like-text-on-the-brass-plates/.

16 . See, for example, Stanford Carmack, “A Look at Some ‘Nonstandard’ Book of Mormon Grammar,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 11 (2014): 209–62, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/a-look-at-some-nonstandard-book-of
-mormon-grammar/; Stanford Carmack, “Joseph Smith Read the Words,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 18 (2016): 41–64, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/joseph-smith-read-the-words/; Stanford Carmack, “Personal Relative Pronoun Usage in the Book of Mormon: An Important Authorship Diagnostic,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 5–36, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/personal
-relative-pronoun-usage-in-the-book-of-mormon-an-important-authorship
-diagnostic/; Stanford Carmack, “The Book of Mormon’s Complex Finite Cause Syntax,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 49 (2021): 113–36, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-book-of-mormons
-complex-finite-cause-syntax/; Stanford Carmack, “Bad Grammar in the Book of Mormon Found in Early English Bibles,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 36 (2020), 1–28, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/bad-grammar-in-the-book-of-mormon-found-in-early-english-bibles/; Stanford Carmack, “The More Part of the Book of Mormon Is Early Modern English,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 18 (2016): 33–40, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/the-more-part-of-the-book-of-mormon-is-early
-modern-english/; Stanford Carmack, “What Command Syntax Tells Us About Book of Mormon Authorship,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 13 (2015): 175–217, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/what-command-syntax
-tells-us-about-book-of-mormon-authorship/; and Stanford Carmack, “Why the Oxford English Dictionary (and not Webster’s 1828),” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 15 (2015): 65–77, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/why-the-oxford-english-dictionary-and-not-websters-1828/.

17 . For a summary of Stanford Carmack’s comments in a March 2015 presentation, see Kirk Magleby, “English in the Book of Mormon,” Book of Mormon Resources (blog), 23 March 2015, bookofmormonresources.blogspot
.com/2015/03/english-in-book-of-mormon.html. Also see Jeff Lindsay, “Possible Benefits of the Broad Early Modern English Elements in the Book of Mormon,” Arise from the Dust (blog), 26 September 2024, arisefromthedust
.com/possible-benefits-of-the-broad-early-modern-english-elements-in
-the-book-of-mormon.

18 . Stan Spencer, “The Faith to See: Burning in the Bosom and Translating the Book of Mormon in Doctrine and Covenants 9,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 18 (2016): 219, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-faith
-to-see-burning-in-the-bosom-and-translating-the-book-of-mormon-in
-doctrine-and-covenants-9/.

19 . Spencer, “The Faith to See,” 224–25.

20 . Spencer, “The Faith to See,” 232.

21 . “Book of Mormon Translation: Interesting Correspondence on the Subject of the Manual Theory,” Improvement Era 9, no. 9 (July 1906): 706–7, archive
.org/details/improvementera0909unse/page/706/mode/2up.

22 . “Book of Mormon Translation: Interesting Correspondence,” 709, emphasis (bold) added; italic in original.

23 . Stan Spencer, “Seers and Stones: The Translation of the Book of Mormon as Divine Visions of an Old-Time Seer,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 24 (2017): 50, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/seers-and-stones
-the-translation-of-the-book-of-mormon-as-divine-visions-of-an-old-time
-seer/.

24 . Carmack, “Joseph Smith Read the Words,” 41.

25 . Spencer Kraus, “An Unfortunate Approach to Joseph Smith’s Translation of Ancient Scripture,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 52 (2022): 1, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/an-unfortunate-approach-to-joseph-smiths-translation-of-ancient-scripture/. See also Neville’s response to Kraus’s review in Jonathan E. Neville, “A Man That Can Translate and Infinite Goodness: A Response to Recent Reviews,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 53 (2022): 171–84, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/a-man-that-can-translate-and
-infinite-goodness-a-response-to-recent-reviews/. This response was, in turn, provided in Spencer Kraus, “A Rejoinder to Jonathan Neville’s ‘Response to Recent Reviews,’” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 53 (2022): 185–98, journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/a-rejoinder-to-jonathan-nevilles-response-to-recent-reviews/.

26 . “Book of Mormon Translation,” Gospel Topics Essays.

27 . “Book of Mormon Translation,” Gospel Topics Essays, n21.

28 . Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1844–1845, page 1, book 4, The Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith
-history-1844-1845/43.

29 . Online Etymology Dictionary, s.v. “peruse,” updated 15 April 2020, etymonline
.com/word/peruse.

30 . Grammarist, s.v. “peruse,” 2024, grammarist.com/usage/peruse/.

31 . Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1845, chapter 4, p. 28, josephsmithpapers.org
/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1845/94#full-transcript.

32 . Smith, History, 1844–1845, p. 2, book 2, josephsmithpapers.org
/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1844-1845/43#full-transcript.

33 . Royal Skousen, “The Witnesses of the Book of Mormon,” in The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon, vol. 3, part 7 (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2024). A pre-print of this article has been available for over three years at “Update of the Pre-Print of a Discussion of the Book of Mormon Witnesses,” Interpreter Foundation Blog, 25 August 2021, interpreterfoundation.org/blog-update-of
-the-pre-print-of-a-discussion-of-the-book-of-mormon-witnesses-by-royal
-skousen/.

34 . Skousen, “Witnesses of the Book of Mormon,” 11. Skousen cites the statement to “Joseph Smith Addendum,” in Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, ed. Dan Vogel (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996), 204; and “Documents of the Translation of the Book of Mormon,” in Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations, 1820–1844, 2nd ed., ed. John W. Welch (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2017), 132. The original is Nancy Towle, Vicissitudes Illustrated in the Experience of Nancy Towle, in Europe and America (Charleston, SC: James L. Burges, 1832), 138–39, contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/BOMP/id/1341. The emphasized word is in all four sources cited.

35 . Skousen, “ Witnesses of the Book of Mormon,” 12. See the witness accounts for the second method on pp. 12–19.

36 . Spencer, “Seers and Stones,” 28–29.

37 . Matthew Scott Stenson “‘According to the Spirit of Revelation and Prophecy’: Alma2’s Prophetic Warning of Christ’s Coming to the Lehites (and Others),” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 55 (2023): 107–68, https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/according-to-the
-spirit-of-revelation-and-prophecy-alma2s-prophetic-warning-of-christs
-coming-to-the-lehites-and-others/.

38 . Clifford P. Jones, “That Which You Have Translated, Which You Have Retained,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 43 (2021): 1–64, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/that-which-you-have-translated-which-you-have-retained/.

39 . Orson Pratt, “Two Days’ Meeting at Brigham City, June 27 and 28, 1874,” Millennial Star 36 (11 August 1874): 498–99, contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital
/collection/MStar/id/13925.

What Happened to Nephi at the
Camp of the Broken Bow?
A Book of Mormon Mystery

Godfrey J. Ellis

Abstract: Nephi started as the youngest son of Lehi and Sariah and ended up as the king or king-like leader of the Nephite nation. While he, in some sense, obviously grew into the role over time, there was likely some key time or event when the transition from the leadership guidance of the prophet Lehi transferred to the restrained leadership guidance of his son, Nephi. A low-key leadership style was necessitated by the absolute imperative that the group be held together. This article briefly discusses four possible time frames for that transition but favors the idea that it happened in an area often called “the Camp of the Broken Bow.” This choice is based on (1) the symbolic meaning of Nephi breaking his bow, (2) the importance of Lehi murmuring “against his God,” (3) Nephi’s ascension to the “top of a mountain,” and (4) the subsequent near disappearance of Lehi from the narrative. These four critical events all occurred at the Camp of the Broken Bow. Evidence appears to suggest that it may have been at that time that there was a replacement of Lehi’s tenure, not as a prophet, but as the recognized leader of the expedition.

There have been several recent publications concerning the journey of the Lehites through the Arabian Peninsula and into Bountiful.1 Recent research has identified 1) the Wadi Tayyib al-Ism as the Valley of Lemuel, 2) the likely setting of Shazer, 3) the burial area of Nahom and 4) the location of Bountiful in the Dhofar region of southern Oman—most likely at Khor Kharfot.2 However, there is another Lehite camping halt about which we know much less. Yet, it may prove to be of immense importance and a major turning point in Nephite social and political history. It concerns the location and events where Nephi’s steel bow failed.

At the surface level, Nephi’s account of the events at what is often called the “Camp of the Broken Bow” are simple and well known.3 In brief, the exiles follow Lehi to a rest area to replenish the food supply. Then Nephi’s bow catastrophically breaks, leaving the family with no food. Nephi then constructs a new bow, asks his father where he should go for food, and returns with “beasts which I had slain” (1 Nephi 16:32). They then move on.

As is often true of scripture, there may be multiple layers of meaning below that surface story. The typical lesson that is drawn from their stay at the Camp of the Broken Bow is that of Nephi’s example of humble submission to his father’s prophetic and parental authority. Even though his father, the great prophet Lehi, had startlingly joined with the others in murmuring (“all . . . did murmur against the Lord”—1 Nephi 16:20), Nephi still respected the seniority of his father. Compliance with the will of one’s father played a greater role in family life at that time and place than it appears to play today. Thus, many teachers and speakers have appropriately pointed to his deference for his father’s position as a much-needed pattern for readers in modern times. However, in addition to this masterful lesson on respect, the story of the broken bow offers other information that has not yet been fully explored.

Definitions and Sequences

One important consideration hints of the succession of leadership. Specifically, when did the transfer of leadership from Father Lehi to his youngest son, Nephi, actually occur? Could it have been at the Camp of the Broken Bow?

Definition of leadership

Before taking up this question, it is important to consider the meaning of the complex word leadership. This is a multi-faceted term. Entire books have been written to explain the meaning of this concept with its various nuances and permutations.4 One set of scholars has noted the astonishing existence of “more than 4,000 documented definitions of leadership.”5 Indeed, many entire higher-education graduate programs exist that are based solely on training for leadership.6 Therefore, defining this term for this paper is somewhat difficult.

I will begin by saying that I will not use the words monarch, king, or sovereign, at least for the trip through Arabia and across the sea. It’s worth pointing out that others do use those terms. For example, Val Larsen, in an article exploring the “birth of sovereignty” among the Nephites, uses such language over sixty times, arguing that Nephi in effect became the rightful king as early as his slaying of Laban in Jerusalem.7 Benjamin McGuire uses such terms over thirty times in an article comparing Nephi and Goliath.8

I do not see that level of leadership in Nephi’s account of their travels. The word sovereign is never used in his account, and the word king appears only one time in the entire description of their travels, and that was when Laman falsely accused Nephi of having that future goal in mind (1 Nephi 16:38). In fact, that accusation seems to demonstrate that Nephi was not a king, at least until after the settlement of the City of Nephi (2 Nephi 5:18), and possibly not even then (see below).

Webster’s 1828 dictionary provides the definition that was in use at the time of Joseph Smith. A leader is “one that leads or conducts; a guide.”9 This definition appears to fit well. Considering the first part, “one that leads or conducts,” Lehi himself credits his son Nephi as the one responsible for “bringing us forth into the land of promise” (2 Nephi 1:24–26). That sounds like leading. And Mosiah tells us that Nephi “took the lead of their journey” (Mosiah 10:13). As for the second aspect of Webster’s definition, “a guide,” Neal Rappleye, head of research at Book of Mormon Central, asserts that Nephi “used the Liahona to guide him.”10 Timothy Gervais and John Joyce agree, writing that Nephi “took the compass, and it did work whither [he] desired it’” and, further, “he was the one working the compass” (1 Nephi 18:21).11 Nephi may well have also been the one to lead, conduct, or guide such things as travel stops (although that is never stated), decisions of directions of travel (using the Liahona), and worship services (with Lehi presiding). The latter seems significant because Alma knew that “the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people” (Alma 31:5), and Nephi was noted for preaching, exhorting, and admonishing Laman and his followers (for example, 1 Nephi 7:21; 16:1–4; 17:15, 25; 19:22; 2 Nephi 4:14).

For this paper, my working definition of a leader is based on Webster’s statement. I thus define a leader (of a group) as the principal person who conducts and guides others.

With this definition, I am not considering a natural charismatic presence—there is no question that Nephi was overflowing with that. I am talking about the named or readily identifiable role of guiding his fellow exiles and conducting the travel of the group. Before the Camp of the Broken Bow, that was clearly the role of Father Lehi. He was named as, and acted as, the group’s guide. At some point, that leadership role transferred to Nephi. The question is when exactly that happened. There are four times when Nephi could have assumed the named leadership (conducting and guiding) of the group. They are:

1. At the time Nephi’s people established the City of Nephi.

2. At the time of Lehi’s death and burial in the New World.

3. At the time of the execution of Laban in Jerusalem by the young Nephi.

4. At the time of the breaking of Nephi’s bow with its likely symbolic meaning.

1. In the City of Nephi

The chronology of the founding of the City of Nephi is quite clear in Nephi’s account. Following the split between the two factions, which occurred at the time immediately following Lehi’s death, the ones who left with Nephi “did journey in the wilderness for the space of many days” before they “did pitch [their] tents” (2 Nephi 5:7). Elsewhere, I have given the logic for the space of many days to be approximately two months.12 There is absolutely no question that Nephi was the one who guided and directed their travel to that spot, almost certainly using the Liahona. Upon their arrival, “My people would that we should call the name of the place Nephi . . . and did take upon them to call themselves the people of Nephi” (vv. 8–9), whereupon “I, Nephi, did cause my people to be industrious, and to labor with their hands” (v. 17). Undoubtedly under his direction, the small group planted and then “reaped in abundance” (v. 11) over at least one growing season. They also raised “flocks, and herds” (v. 11). As a proven metal worker, Nephi would have been the one who guided the manufacturing of numerous reproductions of Laban’s sword (v. 14). He also conducted the construction of numerous buildings using wood and metal. Some of those buildings were decorated with precious materials (v. 15). Additionally, this building boom included an undoubtedly impressive temple constructed “after the manner of the temple of Solomon” (v. 16). Although we are told of this in just three verses, all this production would have taken considerable time—likely years—during which he was viewed and understood to be the guide and leader. He guided the people; he conducted the activities—he led in every way.

But he was not yet their king. Nephi’s account clearly states that these many significant and time-consuming activities occurred before “it came to pass that they would that I should be their king” (v. 18).

This is Benjamin McGuire’s position. Although he notes that “killing Laban has significant implications for his [future] kingship,” the position and title of king was not yet in play. Prior to the separation of the sons, the question of who would assume that future role “was a particularly divisive issue between the two separate factions of Lehi’s children. And the issue of who had the right to be king is brought up frequently in the text.”13 McGuire is clear that Nephi did not “accept the role of king” until he was requested to do so by the people (v. 18). Even then, he “seems to show some hesitancy” with that title.14 In fact, Nephi may never have been a king, per se. This question of whether Nephi actually became a king or not has been debated by scholars for years. Taylor Halverson points out that “Nephi aspired to emulate the prophet Moses while downplaying or eschewing the kingly aspects and actions of David. . . . Nephi did not want to be a king like David.”15 Nephi’s brother, Jacob, tells us that later kings were anointed (Jacob 1:9) and took upon themselves the name of Nephi (v. 11), but that does not necessary mean that Nephi was similarly anointed and coronated. True, Nephi “did for them according to that which was in my power,” and that could be taken as a capitulation to their request, but that is an assumption. Larsen asserts that he was already the sovereign but was formally anointed and crowned a king at this time, but that is speculation.16 We are only told that his people desired a coronation and that Nephi did not desire that (v. 18). Pointedly, Grant Hardy writes that the Nephites were “establishing a monarchy over his [Nephi’s] explicit objections.”17 It is true that, whether Nephi “eschewed” or rejected the title of king or not, the people considered Nephi “a king or a protector” (2 Nephi 6:2). Whether Nephi accepted that title for himself at that time is simply not known. Reynolds states, “While Nephi may not have been formally installed as a king, he clearly performed the important functions served by kings in the world known to the Nephites.”18 In other words, it seems clear that Nephi had already been the group’s acknowledged leader—and had been for many years. All of this is to say that item #1 on the list cannot be correct. He had already been acting as the named leader long before his people in the City of Nephi desired to give him the title of king. In Halverson’s words, he had already fulfilled “God’s expectations of kingship” as defined in the book of Deuteronomy “in an exemplary fashion.”19 So, he did not become the leader at this late time; he had clearly acted as their leader long before this question of the title arose.

2. At the death of Lehi

That brings us to item number two: the proposal that Nephi transitioned to replace Lehi as the leader (conducting the affairs, guiding the people) at the death of his father—as Lehi’s replacement. According to this proposal, prior to Lehi’s passing, Nephi was presumably just one of the sons. This seems to be a common assumption among casual readers of the Book of Mormon: Lehi died; Nephi replaced him as leader. But that does not appear to be correct.

It is true that, in a patriarchal society such as theirs, a father generally binds a family together, and that seems to be particularly true for Lehi, whose sons formed two disparate groupings who were usually united in action, if not in attitude and belief. Once the emotional glue that had held the Lehites together died, the bond was broken, and the family quickly collapsed. However, to say that Lehi was the emotional hub and even the spiritual leader of the group does not preclude the possibility that the transfer of logistical leadership (defined in this paper as leading, guiding, and directing) had not occurred much earlier. One cannot seriously read First Nephi without seeing that Nephi was much more than just “one of the boys.” He was central to the activities in Nahom, in Bountiful, crossing the sea, and during the brief period of settling into the New World. He was the leader much earlier than the death of their father, as I will discuss later in this paper. This is not to say that Nephi exercised sovereign control, was the ruler of the exiles, and issued binding directives and commands to Laman or anyone else. Clearly, that was not the case. His leadership had, by necessity, to be low key and in the background. It is my thesis that his leadership was usually executed with suggestions, persuasion, and encouragements—but it was clearly leadership, nonetheless. Later I will provide evidence that he was named and recognized as the logistical leader—albeit quite reluctantly—by Laman and his followers years earlier. As Mosiah later stated, Nephi “took the lead of their journey” (Mosiah 10:13), and that journey was well before Lehi’s passing in 2 Nephi 4:12.

Immediately following Lehi’s passing, the tension between the brothers boiled over, creating an imminent crisis. If Laman had believed that his father’s demise would finally become his time to rise to the top, he would have been sorely disappointed. Nephi was already there. He had been for many years, although apparently leading from behind as much as he could. Lehi’s death only made Nephi’s ongoing shadow leadership more difficult to ignore; it brought it to the forefront. It was “not many days after his [Lehi’s] death” (2 Nephi 4:13) that Nephi felt “constrained to speak unto them . . . many things” (v. 14) and those “things” were primarily “admonitions” (v. 13). This fueled an immediate backlash and intense resistance, as it had earlier in Nahom, again in Bountiful, and yet again on the ocean crossing. What was different at the passing of the figure head, Lehi, was that Nephi’s all-too familiar admonishing with “many words” appears to have been seen by Laman and his followers as a final insult and escalation—their proverbial last straw. It confirmed what Laman already knew: he was not going to emerge as the leader of the people. Nephi reports, “Their anger did increase against me, insomuch that they did seek to take away my life” (2 Nephi 5:2). While Nephi may have been leading from behind prior to Lehi’s death; with that sudden void, his leadership was now on full display. With Lehi gone, Nephi must have appeared as a usurper trying to replace their father. Although Nephi was in no way trying to do that, his leadership could no longer be denied. However, abundant evidence exists that nothing really had changed other than cosmetics; Nephi did not suddenly become, but had already been, the leader—and for a long time. Thus, item number two on the list does not appear to be correct.

3. At the execution of Laban as early as Jerusalem

Item number three in the list above maintains that Nephi became the leader, indeed the “sovereign,” at the time of his execution of Laban in Jerusalem. A chief proponent of this position is Val Larsen20 who asserts that:

A close reading of the text makes it abundantly clear that the killing of Laban was not an individual act, but rather a sovereign act that had a clear political purpose. That Nephi acts as a sovereign is an overdetermined fact in the text. It is demonstrated by multiple layers of implication.21

The principal symbols of his sovereignty were the sword of Laban and the brass plates. Thus, it would have been obvious to the original audience that Nephi’s status or lack of status as a sovereign would be in play in the moment when he acquired the national symbols of sovereignty.22

In killing Laban, Nephi acted not as an individual but as a sovereign. . . . Multiple indicators mark Nephi as being sovereign at the moment when he kills Laban. . . . [H]e has become emblematically sovereign, a crown prince whose actions are not those of an ordinary private citizen but rather the governing and protecting acts of a king.23

By such statements, Larsen has promoted possibility three: that Nephi became the leader (defining leader as a sovereign king) when he executed Laban as the “lawful act of a sovereign lawgiver.”24 While it is true that Nephi was told by the Lord that he, Nephi, would eventually be “led to a land of promise” and that he “shalt be made [future tense] a ruler and a teacher over thy brethren” (1 Nephi 2:20, 22), Larsen appears to be saying that it happened much earlier in the story: on the sons’ first return to Jerusalem to obtain the brass plates.

The Oxford dictionary defines a sovereign as “a supreme ruler, especially a monarch.”25 During the Old World travels and on the sea crossing, Nephi was far from “a supreme ruler” and definitely did not act as a monarch. He did not command anyone, issue any royal edicts, sentence anyone to punishment, sit on any kind of throne, create any legislation, command any military operations, or rule over the Lehites in any way. If he had the right and ability to make decisions that were binding on the entire colony of Lehites, and that is questionable, he did not exercise that right. At least one reason for that is because Laman, Lemuel, and the sons of Ishmael (likely supported by their wives) would never have accepted such behavior. The travelers were already severely divided in many ways, and anything approaching those behaviors on the part of Nephi would have shattered any semblance of their fragile unity. Laman and his followers would have immediately pushed back even harder than they already had. They would have likely rebelled, mutinied, and returned to Jerusalem.

Supporting my interpretation that Nephi was not a sovereign at that early time is that Nephi did not claim to have obtained the brass plates for his own kingdom. Instead, he reported back to his father and delivered the brass plates to him, neither of which sounds like the acts of a sovereign. Neither did Nephi initially search the records himself; that was undertaken by Lehi. Plus, he credits the success of the mission to their joint obedience to the directives of the Lord. He writes,

And when we had returned to the tent of my father . . . my father, Lehi, took the records which were engraven upon the plates of brass, and he did search them from the beginning . . . Thus far I and my father had kept the commandments wherewith the Lord had commanded us. And we had obtained the records which the Lord had commanded us. (1 Nephi 5:7, 10, 20–21)

For these reasons, and the absence of any king-like behavior on the part of Nephi during the journey, it does not seem correct to suggest that Nephi became the sovereign at the time of the execution of Laban. Readers can judge the credibility of Larsen’s idea for themselves. His article is certainly well-written and well documented. The bottom line is that Larsen offers one interpretation and defends it very well. I am merely offering a different interpretation.

4. At the Camp of the Broken Bow

This brings us to the fourth possible timing of Nephi’s assuming leadership over the colony. The remainder of this paper will attempt to support the idea that the transition of leadership happened, not as early as the execution of Laban and not as late as the death of Lehi in the New World. It happened at the breaking of the symbolic bow and the visit to the top of the mountain while they were sojourning at the Camp of the Broken Bow.

Foreshadowing of Nephi’s Future Leadership

We begin with the assertion that Nephi was not the leader, or even a leader, prior to the events of the Camp. Some readers, familiar with the final outcome, may think they see leadership on the part of Nephi prior to the Camp but that was nothing more than future foreshadowing and a charismatic and outgoing personality. The leader was Lehi. In 1 Nephi 2:1, we read, “The Lord spake unto my father (Lehi): . . . Blessed art thou Lehi . . . because thou hast been faithful . . . [now] take [your] family and depart into the wilderness.” This implicitly appears to be recognizing Lehi’s leadership role based on his faith. Later, in the same chapter, we read parallel wording: “The Lord spake unto me (Nephi), saying: Blessed art thou, Nephi, because of thy faith . . . ye shall prosper [and] thou shalt be made a ruler and a teacher” (1 Nephi 2:19–22). “Shall prosper” and “shalt be made” are stated in the future tense. However, the proximity and similarity in these pronouncements of the Lord, suggest that the parallel wording may be intended to highlight the similarity between Lehi and Nephi and to point to Nephi’s forthcoming roles. In the case of Lehi, the Lord was referring to the things which Lehi had already done in his teaching and prophetic roles. In the case of Nephi, the Lord is referring to things that lie ahead for him: a future teaching and prophetic role and serving as a future ruler. Prior to the events at the Camp of the Broken Bow, specifically during the two trips back to Jerusalem, Nephi was only obeying his father’s instructions. It was Lehi who made all decisions that were binding on the colony, not Nephi. Even when events pushed the younger son into persuading and admonishing his brothers, any leadership activity, as defined in this paper, was simply not there. Another way of saying this is that “no autonomous decision making was going on at this time—his activities were being carried out on behalf of Lehi. Nephi was only seeking to carry out Lehi’s commands and decisions.”26

A brief summary of those early events and trips back to Jerusalem may demonstrate this point. On the sons’ first trip back in Jerusalem, Lehi made the decision, based on revelation, that his sons should return to Jerusalem to obtain the brass plates (1 Nephi 3:1–7). Once there, Nephi did not issue any directives or commands. In fact, following a mutual discussion and the casting of lots (vv. 10–11), it was Laman who was given the opportunity to assume the leadership position for this action. Although modern readers may assume that casting lots reflects random luck, that was not how they would have seen it.

In the ancient world, however, casting lots was universally viewed as a form of divination by which the will of God was revealed. The book of Proverbs assures us that “the lot is cast (‘goral’) into the lap (of the diviner); but the decision (‘mishpat’) is from the Lord” (16:33). That is to say, the result of the casting of lots is controlled or manipulated by God so that his will is manifest through the lot-taking. . . . Casting lots was intimately connected with Israelite temple practice and with assigning temple duties. The high priest was selected by lots at the time of David (1 Chronicles 24:31); the selection of Matthias as an apostle by casting lots (Acts 1:26) is undoubtedly based on this ancient temple practice. . . . Ancient Jews and Christians believed that, when invoked with proper purpose, method and authority, lot-taking was a mechanism for determining the will of God.27

The brothers may have considered the choice of Laman as providential since it was consistent with the law of primogeniture. However, Laman’s attempt was a near fatal failure (1 Nephi 3:13). Discouraged, and possibly concluding that the Lord did not mean them to have the plates after all, Laman and Lemuel were ready to abandon their father’s command and return to the Lehite camp empty handed. Note that Nephi did not take over at that point and begin making decisions for the incalcitrant older brothers. Nor did he attempt to control their actions or act in any way as a sovereign. He is clear that he “did persuade my brethren” (v. 21) to try again—and this time as a group. (Note that verses 22 through 27 use the words we, our, or us 22 times; Nephi never uses the words, me or I in describing this second attempt to buy the plates.)

This second foray also failed, and Laman became furious, with Lemuel backing him up as usual (v. 28). But Laman’s intense anger had nothing to do with any decision-making leadership on the part of Nephi. Rather, Laman and Lemuel were upset at the loss of their anticipated inheritance.28 As Grant Hardy puts it, “Apparently, they had already begun to think of the family property as ‘their inheritance, and their gold, and their silver.’” In their sideways-directed fury, Laman and Lemuel began to beat Nephi. But note that, tellingly for this discussion, they also beat Sam. Why Sam? He was nobody’s leader. In fact, they were angry “also with my father” who was not even present (v. 28). It appears that Lehi was recognized as the actual, though absent, leader who was waiting back in the Valley of Lemuel.

At the point of the beating of Nephi and Sam, an angel intervened to prophesy about Nephi becoming a ruler over them – again at some point in the future. “Know ye not that the Lord hath chosen him to be a ruler over you, and this because of your iniquities?“ (v. 29). While it is true that the angel used the past tense, “hath chosen,” that is true of all prophets and leaders who were foreordained to their future positions long ago in the Divine Council of the premortal spirit world. That was the timing of “the intelligences that were organized before the world was; and among all these there were many of the noble and great ones; And God . . . stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers” (Abraham 3:22–23). That Nephi was foreordained, likely at that premortal time, to eventually become the ruler does not indicate that he became their ruler then and there during the trip to procure the brass plates. Abundant evidence indicates that that was not the case.

As a group, the sons returned to the walls of Jerusalem, whereupon Nephi succeeded in securing the brass plates in a dramatic and well-known account. Unlike a sovereign or even a decision-making leader, young Nephi had nothing in mind when he started on this third approach to Laban —no plan, no strategy (1 Nephi 4:6). He had faith. In the beheading of Laban, which both Larsen and McGuire point out parallels the story of the young David, he accomplished his mission, but he did not suddenly take over as king. Continuing the parallel with the young David, Larsen writes that “though he [David] did not formally assume the throne for some years, David became king in the people’s hearts when he chopped off Goliath’s head.”29

Even if Larsen is correct that the execution of Laban fell under the sovereign rights of a new state, those rights would have belonged to his father, not to Nephi. Nephi certainly did not become a king in the hearts of Laman and Lemuel. The fact that nobody thought of Nephi as a new king, or even a leader, is further illustrated in the invitation Nephi extended to Zoram after obtaining the plates. He did not invite Zoram to join me, or even join us. He tells Zoram, “if thou wilt go down into the wilderness to my father thou shalt have place with us” (1 Nephi 4:34). Later, Nephi summarized the event by saying that “thus far I and my father had kept the commandments . . . and had obtained the records” (1 Nephi 5:20–21). Nephi had been operating under the decision-making direction of his father. He still had no leadership position over his brothers. I cannot see textual evidence that he became a king at that time.

For the second return to recruit Ishmael and his daughters as wives for Lehi’s sons, everyone knew exactly what to do, where to go, and even whom to ask—the Lord had named the exact family. There is every indication that Lehi and the sons already knew Ishmael. In fact, the children of the two families may have been first cousins. Hugh Nibley suggests that Lehi and Ishmael could have even been brothers. In Nibley’s words, “it has ever been the custom among the desert people for a man to marry the daughter of his paternal uncle (bint ‘ammi).”30 Nibley may have gotten that idea from Sidney Sperry, who quotes Erastus Snow. Snow claimed that not only did Lehi’s sons later marry Ishmael’s daughters (which was the main goal of the trip), but that Lehi’s unnamed daughters had already married Ishmael’s sons. He writes, “Joseph Smith says the record of Lehi in the 116 missing manuscript pages refers to at least two of Ishmael’s sons marrying Lehi’s daughters. . . . In other words, Lehi was the father-in-law of Ishmael’s sons.”31 Some writers have claimed that these daughters are the same “sisters” who followed Nephi much later—at the time of the final separation following the death of Lehi (2 Nephi 5:6). That seems unlikely and Nephi never refers to those later sisters who followed him as the wives of Ishmael’s sons. On the contrary, those older, and already married sisters, had rebelled along with the sons of Ishmael from the time they first came out of Jerusalem. It is unlikely that they would have suddenly supported Nephi, abandoned their husbands and possibly their children, to flee with Nephi. Nephi would have mentioned that, had it been the case. A more likely explanation is that the later sisters in 2 Nephi 5:6 were additional, unmarried, younger maidens. They may have filled the otherwise huge birth gap of some twenty or more years between Nephi’s birth in Jerusalem and Jacob’s and Joseph’s births later in Bountiful.32

The point, though, is that Nephi was still not in any decision-making or guiding position; the four sons acted together in rare harmony. On their way home, Laman and Lemuel apparently experienced a change of heart and “were desirous to return unto the land of Jerusalem” (1 Nephi 7:6–7). Noel Reynolds writes, “They were not far into the journey before the rigors of desert travel brought Ishmael’s sons and Laman and Lemuel to their citified senses. Grasping the seriousness and even insanity of this life-changing flight, they made a stand and insisted on returning to the good life in Jerusalem.”33 Note that Laman and Lemuel did not rebel against Nephi. They “did rebel against us” (v. 6). Who is “us?” Nephi answers that question when he adds that it was “against me, Nephi, and Sam, and their father, Ishmael, and his wife, and his three other daughters” (v. 6). (Note that the “us” did not include Ishmael’s sons, who may have been married to Lehi’s older daughters, if Erastus Snow is correct, and who all presumably backed Laman and Lemuel.)

The abrupt reversal seems to have come as a shock to Nephi who recognized Laman’s and Lemuel’s superior birth status but cries out in disbelief, “Ye are mine elder brethren . . . how is it that ye . . . have need that I, your younger brother, should . . . set an example for you?” (v. 8). He is obviously not claiming to be their leader. In fact, deferring to their agency, Nephi acknowledged their “choice [to] go up to the land” but is “constrained” by the Spirit of the Lord to add that, “if ye go ye will also perish” (v. 15). Laman and Lemuel were instantly infuriated, not with Nephi having made any binding decision for them since he clearly had not, but with Nephi’s negative warning, which may have sounded like a prophetic curse. They were so angry that they bound him and would have abandoned him to die. This development echoes another set of older brothers who left another younger brother, Joseph, to die (Genesis 37:20–34). In the case of Nephi, others in the company interceded with passionate pleas on his behalf. Consequently, and in yet another startling change of attitude, Laman and Lemuel “did bow down before me, and did plead with me that I would forgive them” (1 Nephi 7:20). That extreme reversal, almost unbelievable in our day, had nothing to do with Nephi exercising any kind of leadership over his brothers. Hugh Nibley makes that abundantly clear, teaching that,

When you’ve done a serious wrong to someone, the only way to apologize is to bow down to them. That’s another custom. Bowing down was an act of apology and not of submission. They were not bowing down in submission at all. They were still the older brothers, but they apologized for the wrong they had done. They reversed it, and they pleaded with him that he would forgive them. You ask, ‘Is that plausible?’ Well, this happens all the time; it’s classic.”34

Supporting Nibley’s contention was Nephi’s immediate response to his brothers. “I did frankly forgive them all they had done, and I did exhort them that they would pray unto the Lord for forgiveness” (1 Nephi 7:21).

During the next eight chapters, we again read nothing about Nephi making decisions for the colony or even conducting or guiding it. Lehi tells the family about his doctrinally rich dream or vision, and Nephi experiences his own amazing follow-up theophany on “an exceedingly high mountain” (1 Nephi 11:1). Nowhere in either vision is Nephi given, or even promised, leadership authority.

Following his sacred theophany, Nephi returned not to his own tent, and not even just to the camp, but “to the tent of my father” (1 Nephi 15:1). This is an important detail that is easy to miss, yet it may add appreciably to our understanding. Hugh Nibley notes that “Nephi . . . refers constantly to his father’s tent as the center of his universe. To an Arab, ‘My father dwelt in a tent’ says everything.”35 This implies, again, that Lehi, not Nephi, was the recognized and acknowledged decision-making leader. Nephi refers to the “tent of my father” thirteen times prior to the Camp of the Broken Bow, and most of them (ten) are after the execution of Laban.

- “He [Lehi] pitched his tent in a valley” [of Lemuel] (1 Nephi 2:6)

- “My father dwelt in a tent” (1 Nephi 2:15)

- “I, Nephi, returned from speaking with the Lord, to the tent of my father” (1 Nephi 3:1)

- “[We] journeyed unto the tent of our father” (1 Nephi 4:38)

- “When we had returned to the tent of my father” (1 Nephi 5:7)

- “Down into the wilderness to the tent of our father” (1 Nephi 7:5)

- “We did again travel on our journey towards the tent of our father” (1 Nephi 7:21)

- “We did come down unto the tent of our father” (1 Nephi 7:22)

- “And all these things did my father see, and hear, and speak as he dwelt in a tent” (1 Nephi 9:1)

- “And all these things . . . were done as my father dwelt in a tent” (1 Nephi 10:16)

- “I returned to the tent of my father” (1 Nephi 15:1)

- “All these things were said and done as my father dwelt in a tent” (1 Nephi 16:6)

- “My father . . . went forth to the tent door” (1 Nephi 16:10)

It seems significant that, when Nephi returned from the top of the mountain at the Camp of the Broken Bow with his game, he no longer referred to the tent of his father as he had been adamant about specifying prior to the Camp. Instead, he wrote, “I did return to our tents, bearing the beasts which I had slain” (1 Nephi 16:32). Is the change from “the tent of my father” to “our tents” just a meaningless wording difference, or is it one small hint that the base of authority and guidance of the colony had shifted at the Camp of the Broken Bow? Moreover, after the events at the Camp, Nephi never again refers to his father’s tent.

Returning to the narrative, after the Valley of Lemuel, the family then traveled to Shazer. There is still no special mention of Nephi. The sons of Lehi, and presumably of Ishmael, hunted as equals along the way and again at Shazer. “We did take our bows and our arrows, and go forth into the wilderness to slay food for our families; and after we had slain food for our families we did return again to our families . . . slaying food by the way, with our bows and our arrows” (1 Nephi 16:14).

Changes at the Camp of the Broken Bow

The Lehites eventually arrived at the Camp of the Broken Bow, located somewhere in a much more arid section of the Arabian desert. The young men again went hunting for food but, this time, as Nephi went forth to slay game, his “fine steel” bow broke (1 Nephi 16:18). It is at this point that everything changed. It is the thesis of this article that the power structure also changed. This can be seen in the concrete and symbolic meanings of a broken bow, in the behavior and possible consequences of Lehi’s murmuring, in Nephi’s concrete and symbolic solo climb to the top of the mountain, and in Lehi’s virtual disappearance from the narrative. Each will be discussed below.

The catastrophe and symbolism of the broken bow

Nephi tells us that the bows of the other men also lost their springs around this same time (1 Nephi 16:21). A scholarly consensus is that the loss of the spring in the wooden bows was due to a radical change in the humidity and heat between the two desert ecosystems.36 But that was only the beginning of the crisis. It was bad enough for the wooden bows to fail, but it was absolutely devastating that “as I, Nephi, went forth to slay food, behold, I did break my bow, which was made of steel” (v. 18). Note the specific mention of the composition of his bow as opposed to the bows of the others. When engraving on metal, every word must be considered important.

Although artistic representations of this event may dramatically portray Nephi’s “fine steel” bow as having snapped in half, that is likely just artistic license. Nibley points out that “a steel bow was not necessarily a solid piece of metal, any more than the Canaanites’ ‘chariots of iron’ were solid iron.”37 Hamblin points out that Nephi’s bow was almost certainly also a wooden bow though “reinforced in certain parts . . . with bronze. . . . A pure steel bow . . . would be essentially impossible to break by human muscle power alone.”38 Warren Aston concurs, writing, “When the Old Testament refers to bows of ‘steel’ (2 Samuel 22:35) the phrase should probably be translated as bows of ‘bronze.’ Nephi’s account of his bow made of “fine steel” (16:18) may actually refer to a wooden double-convex, or composite, bow that had bronze parts or plating for extra strength.”39 The point is that Nephi’s composite bow appears to have been the main bow, the most powerful weapon, for which the other all-wooden bows were merely appendages. It is interesting that Nephi called it “my bow,” an ownership phrase that he emphasized three times in 1 Nephi 16:18, and once in verse 21. The likely explanation for why it was Nephi who owned the most powerful bow is not that he was already their king—he was not—but only that he fabricated this composite bow himself. Scholars have asserted that Nephi, and possibly also Lehi, were both skilled metal workers.40

Nephi immediately set about replacing his steel bow with a home-made wooden one. The first problem was that he could not use just any wood. Building a lethal bow required a particular kind of wood. In fact, as Hugh Nibley notes, “According to the ancient Arab writers, the only bow-wood obtainable in all Arabia . . . grew only” in an area “situated in the very region where, if we follow the Book of Mormon, the broken bow incident occurred.” He adds that “the finding of bow-wood [was] viewed as something of a miracle by the party.”41

But finding the right wood was only the first problem. Next, he had to know how to construct a bow. A replacement bow had to be lethal at a distance, i.e., it had to be more than just a bent branch with a string of animal gut. The record does not indicate that anyone other than Nephi, and possibly Lehi, had the knowledge to create a suitable weapon. Still, constructing a lethal bow in a workshop in the large city of Jerusalem was not the same thing as constructing a lethal bow in a temporary camp in the middle of a desert. If Nephi had been the one who originally built his “fine steel [or composite] bow,” he already knew something about making a workable weapon. Even so, Nibley continues quite dramatically: “Though it sounds simple enough when we read about it, it was almost as great a feat for Nephi to make a bow as it was for him to build a ship, and he is justly proud of his achievement.”42

In addition to the new bow, Nephi constructed at least one arrow to match the weight of the new bow (1 Nephi 16:23). Warren Aston notes, “There is another significant detail that only an archer would appreciate: Nephi . . . also reports making a new arrow. The arrows for a heavier ‘steel’ bow would have been unsuitable for a lighter wooden bow, thus the need to match a new arrow to the new bow.”43 Hamblin marvels that this added detail was “another bull’s-eye for the Book of Mormon.”44 That the combination was lethal is proven by Nephi’s two-time use of the plural: “I did slay wild beasts” (1 Nephi 16:31) and “I did return . . . bearing the beasts which I had slain” (v. 32).

In addition to whatever miracles were involved in finding the right wood and constructing a lethal bow, there are also significant symbolic meanings to a broken bow. Ample documentation explains that, in the Ancient Near East, a bow was a powerful symbol of leadership, decision-making, and even royalty. Joseph Russo notes that, “Symbolic use of the bow as a royal weapon is frequent in traditional narratives” and that “the bow is by far the weapon most characteristic of royalty.”45 Richard Wilkinson adds that “In Mesopotamia the bow . . . was used as an attribute of immediate and potential power fit for gods and kings. . . . Literary evidence also suggests a close symbolic connection between the bow and the institution of kingship.”46 This symbolism especially applied to a composite bow like Nephi’s “fine steel” bow (1 Nephi 16:18).

“For a considerable period after the composite bow was introduced, it remained primarily a weapon of royalty.” Relatively few composite bows have survived from the ancient Near East. . . . [A]midst the treasures of Tutankhamun’s tomb, 27 composite bows were found. . . . One of these, the so-called “Bow of Honour” was beautifully decorated . . . Howard Carter, who first discovered and excavated the tomb, described it as a “work of almost inconceivable fineness,” reminding us of Nephi’s description of his own bow of “fine steel.”47

Further, conquerors often broke the bows that belonged to the leaders of their enemies in an act that symbolically destroyed their reign and authority. “In the ancient Near East, kingly status, military power, and the right to rule were all symbolized by the bow. Thus ‘to break the bow’ was a common idiom which meant to bring an enemy or ruler into submission.”48 Example from the Old Testament include Jeremiah 49:35, 51:56; Psalm 37:15; and 1 Samuel 2:4.

Noel Reynolds has convincingly demonstrated that part of Nephi’s intent in writing the small plates some thirty years after the actual events was to validate Nephite claim to the leadership of the people. In Reynold’s words,

The writings of Nephi can be read in part as a political tract or a “lineage history,” written to document the legitimacy of Nephi’s rule and religious teachings. . . . Nephi carefully structured his writings to convince his own and later generations that the Lord had selected him over his elder brothers to be Lehi’s political and spiritual successor.49

If that is the case, could the account of the breaking of the bow have been seen and presented by Nephi, written many years later, as symbolic of the transfer of leadership at the Camp of the Broken Bow? Scholars at Book of Mormon Central support both this symbolic interpretation of the new bow as well as the idea of Nephi’s leadership occurring as early as the Camp of the Broken Bow where, in their words, Nephi was “taking the lead.” They write:

Although this story [of the broken bow] may seem rather unremarkable, it may actually be loaded with symbolic importance. . . . [It] helps confirm the Lord’s promise that Nephi would be a teacher and ruler over his brothers. . . . Nephi’s newly created bow symbolized that he was Lehi’s rightful prophetic successor. . . . And it demonstrated that, according to divine appointment, he was [present tense] “taking the lead of their journey in the wilderness” (Mosiah 10:13).50

In the breaking of the bow, which was a literal event, Nephi may have recognized an embedded symbolic event. The breaking of authority gave him an opportunity to symbolically demonstrate the validity of Nephite government when that validity was later vigorously challenged by the Lamanites who saw Nephi as nothing more than a thief and a usurper (see Mosiah 10:16).

A clarification is needed here. Does this symbolic meaning support the idea that Nephi became the king earlier—as early as when he executed Laban? I don’t believe so. Even though it was Nephi’s bow, its climate-related breaking could not be taken as a symbol of the breaking of his own authority. At the point when the bow broke, Nephi does not appear to have had any authority. In fact, this detail, that it was not Lehi’s bow but his own bow that broke, adds another sprinkling of authenticity. If the account of the journey through Arabia had been mere fiction by Nephi writing a political tract thirty years later, he might have claimed that it was his father, Lehi’s, bow that broke since it was Lehi who was the leader. But the account is not fiction.

Nephi may have seen, in the breaking of a bow and the replacement by another bow, an overall metaphor for a general transition of leadership—not a perfect metaphor, as metaphors never are, but useable nonetheless. Nephi’s remaking of a new, replacement bow, then, could be used as a symbolic representation of a new structure of logistical leadership under Nephi. Symbolically, the breaking of the old bow and the replacement with a new bow may have been a useful and convenient way to express that transfer of leadership. This is not my observation only. In addition to the scholars at Book of Mormon Central, as mentioned above, Noel Reynolds also asserts that “this story demonstrates the emergence of Nephi” (emphasis added). In Reynolds’s words, “only Nephi holds the all-important bow.”51 Yes, symbolically, only Nephi held the new bow. And he used it immediately in the service of his people.

The chastisement of Lehi

Returning to the concrete story level, we know that following the breaking of the composite bow, the hunters returned to the camp with no meat. Laman and Lemuel predictably began to complain bitterly (1 Nephi 16:20). In fact, the entire colony “were all exceedingly sorrowful, even that they did murmur against the Lord” (v. 20). That is not surprising; it must have seemed as if all hope was suddenly gone and that this was truly the end of the line. As dire as that situation appeared, Nephi then drops the surprising additional news that “and also my father began to murmur against the Lord his God” (v. 16). The phrase, “and also my father” could reasonably be understood as “and even my father” (v. 16). This faith crisis of the spiritual and psychological leader, Lehi, was a major and totally unanticipated blow. Worse, with Lehi now joining Laman and Lemuel in murmuring, there was an immediate leadership vacuum. That left Nephi with a major dilemma. One response was for him to follow suit, join in a rebellion against the Lord, and follow the decisions of the leader, Lehi, who had now murmured “against the Lord his God” (v. 16). That would have spelled the end of the exiles. The other option was to allow himself to be thrust into the unwanted position of assuming de facto control of the colony, find some solution to the crisis when no solution seemed possible, and presume to guide the other members of the colony, something he had not yet ever done. In the face of starvation, and the entire company—including his father—murmuring, he had little choice but to rise to the challenge and fill the leadership vacuum. Nephi had to “speak much unto my brethren” (v. 22) to try to buoy them up in the face of what appeared to be a devastating and life-ending crisis.

Nephi’s initial intervention was to try what Alma later used among the poorer Zoramites in Antionum. Alma knew that “the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people to do that which was just—yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than . . . anything else . . . therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God” (Alma 31:5). Apparently, Nephi knew that as well because he recalls, “I, Nephi, did speak much unto my brethren” (1 Nephi 16:22)—and to great effect—for “they . . . humbled themselves because of my words; for I did say many things unto them in the energy of my soul” (v. 24).

Of course, what his not-yet-born younger brother, Jacob, later called “the pleasing word of God” (Jacob 2:8) is always best combined with, or leads to, action and behavior. So, as mentioned above, along with his exhortations and admonishings, Nephi began constructing a replacement bow. He then consulted with his father as to where to go to hunt game. This was the same Lehi who had, in Nephi’s words, “began to murmur against the Lord his God” (1 Nephi 16:16). That Laman and his followers murmured is hardly surprising but that “and also my father,” (or “and even my father”) implies that Nephi was surprised and surely disappointed. The use of the phrase “his God” and not “our God” may also be meaningful. It suggests the possibility that murmuring from all of the others was unfortunate but understandable given their own progress on what President Russell M. Nelson calls, “the covenant path.”52 However, murmuring by the prophet and presiding priesthood holder—well, that crossed a line. It is worth noting the exact wording. Lehi had not murmured against the breaking of the bow—and he had not murmured against hunger. He had murmured against “his God.”

Nephi is quite clear about what put an end to the murmuring in the group. It was not Nephi’s bringing home meat and it was not his asking his father where to go to hunt—Nephi had not yet done either of those. It was Nephi’s admonitions and reprimands. This is important; they were humbled because of Nephi’s preaching to them as their de facto leader. “They [the entire company] had humbled themselves because of my words” (1 Nephi 16:24). And Lehi was particularly humbled. Nephi reports that his father was now “truly chastened because of his murmuring against the Lord, insomuch that he was brought down into the depths of sorrow” (v. 25). With a surface reading, it is easy to conclude that everything was now just fine, and everything had returned to normal. However, a deeper examination suggests a different conclusion.

Much has been made of Nephi’s humbly acknowledging his father’s position as the decision-making leader of the colony. He went to his father and asked him, “Wither shall I go to obtain food?” (1 Nephi 16:23). This deference to his father is often pointed out in talks and lessons as an outstanding act of humility, trust, and respect—and rightly so. However, more may be going on. Nephi did not say that the others were chastened—rather that it was the leader, Lehi, who “was truly chastened” (v. 25). An example had to be set when it was the leader who lost faith in the Lord. Now, in modern usage, the phrase “was truly chastened” would mean that he was emotionally humbled and undoubtedly embarrassed. Many modern readers might interpret this situation as, “he felt chastened” rather than “he was chastened.” There is a subtle but significant difference between the two phrases. According to the dictionary in use in Joseph Smith’s day, chasten was defined as “to correct by punishment; to punish.”53 The first and main definition in the more modern Merriam-Webster similarly expresses that the verb, chasten, is “to correct by punishment or suffering: to discipline.”54

In a three-volume commentary on the Book of Mormon, McConkie and Millet assert that Nephi’s humble deference “had [1] the desired effect on Lehi, who [2] felt truly chastened [3] by his son’s request” (emphases, mine).55 The three italicized phrases may exhibit very important misreadings.

- First, the phrasing of “had the desired effect” implies that Nephi’s main goal in turning to his father was not to defer to his father’s authority and wisdom after all. Rather, it implies that Nephi was somehow trying to manipulate his father in order to achieve a “desired effect.” That kind of manipulation on the part of Nephi would be totally out of character. It would place Nephi in a superior position as his father’s teacher or spiritual superior, which is an unacceptable reading of the text.

- Second, the phrase, Lehi “felt truly chastened” implies an internal emotion like regret and sorrow; and it implies a feeling. Yes, Lehi was “brought down into the depths of sorrow” (16:25)—he had disappointed his family as well as disappointed the Lord and himself. But that leaves out any external consequences beyond Lehi merely feeling sorry. Nephi does not say that his father “felt truly chastened” (implying an internal feeling). He says his father “was truly chastened” (implying an external consequence).

- Third, the phrase, “by his son’s request” implies that Nephi’s deference to him is what caused Lehi to pick himself back up spiritually. But that is not correct. Nephi clearly pointed out that the group already “had humbled [past tense] themselves because of my [previous] words” (v. 24). That had happened prior to Nephi’s deferential and respectful question to his father about where to go to hunt.

The implication is that everything then returned to normal. However, that conclusion ignores that, in addition to just feeling sorrow, there needed to be an example made. It is reasonable to believe that the entire colony needed to visibly see that there are consequences for a leader to “murmur against the Lord his God” (v. 20) and to essentially lose trust in the Lord.

In considering the idea that Lehi faced very public chastisement for joining Laman and Lemuel in murmuring, it is worth noting that this situation is not without precedent. Other prophets or leaders were also chastised by the Lord. Just a few of many examples include:

- Moses. Received chastisement when he assumed the credit for producing water out of a rock at Meribah-Kadesh (Numbers 20:10–12; Deuteronomy 32:51). Although he continued as a great prophet, his very public chastisement was that Moses was not allowed to lead his people into the promised land (Numbers 20:12). An object lesson had to be shown as an essential teaching tool for his people who were transitioning from the servitude in Egypt to the service of the God of Israel.

- Eli, the high priest. Received chastisement when he failed to rein in his own wild adult sons who “knew not the Lord” (1 Samuel 2:12). Although he continued as the high priest, Eli’s chastisement was that he lost his future place and was to physically lose his children and his posterity “for ever” (vv. 27, 30, 35; 1 Samuel 3:13–14). Significantly, Eli’s chastisement served as a public object lesson for the people. Said the Lord, “I will do a thing in Israel, at which both the ears of every one that heareth it shall tingle” (1 Samuel 3:11 - KJV) or “ring” (New American Standard), or “be stunned” (Good News),56 or “shudder” (Christian Standard Bible).57 The emphasis was on a public object lesson for parents to “set thine house in order” (Isaiah 38; D&C 93:44).58

- King Saul. Divinely anointed as the first king of Israel and who received chastisement when he made a burnt offering without priesthood authority and spared the king of the Amalekites (1 Samuel 15:3). The prophet, Samuel, proclaimed Saul’s public chastisement: Although he continued as the king, his kingdom was to be given to another—to David, of the house of Jesse (1 Samuel 16:12–13).

- King David. Saul’s successor and who received chastisement because of his well-known sin with Bathsheba, including the murder of Uriah. The entire country needed to see an object lesson: “For thou didst it secretly: but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun” (2 Samuel 12:12). Although David continued as king, “he hath fallen from his exaltation” (Doctrine and Covenants 132:39).

- Joseph Smith. Received chastisement when he failed to trust the will of the Lord in the case of Martin Harris and the lost 116 pages of transcript. Although Joseph continued to receive revelations and restore the Church (Doctrine and Covenants 3–10), he lost his ability to translate for some nine months, which was publicly revealed (Doctrine and Covenants 10:1–3).59 He, along with his current and future followers needed an object lesson to learn to trust in, and accept, the will of the Lord.

In all of this, our God has no desire to punish; he wants to teach. “Whom I love I also chasten that their sins may be forgiven, for with the chastisement I prepare a way for their deliverance in all things out of temptation” (Doctrine and Covenants 95:1). There is no question that Lehi fully repented and was fully forgiven. And there is no question that Lehi continued as a great prophet of God. He still heard “the voice of the Lord” (1 Nephi 16:25), was able to read the directions in the Liahona (1 Nephi 16:26), and received the command to board the ship for the promised land (1 Nephi 18:5). Once in the Promised Land, Lehi shone as a great prophet who received direct revelation in a vision (2 Nephi 1:4), revealed some of the most doctrinally rich teachings in the Book of Mormon (especially 2 Nephi 2–3), and pronounced powerful blessings on the members of the colony (2 Nephi 2–4). However, there still needed to be some kind of public chastisement or consequence in the eyes of all the exiles. McConkie and Millet also recognized that there would be “consequences” that went beyond just feeling sorrow. They wrote that the words in the Liahona contained “a very sobering message, possibly foreshadowing the consequences of their faithless and disobedient behavior.”60 Although they use that word, consequences, they do not attempt to identify what those consequences were.

Of course, nobody knows what those consequences were because we don’t know what was written on the Liahona. All Nephi tells us is that “when my father beheld the things which were written upon the ball, he did fear and tremble exceedingly, and also my brethren and the sons of Ishmael and our wives [did fear and tremble exceedingly]” (1 Nephi 16:26–27). Their trembling is reminiscent of the people at the time of Eli (see above) whose ears “tingled, rang, and shuddered” at the news. Although we don’t know what the writing on the Liahona said, one speculation is that the wording may have had something to do with Lehi’s logistical leadership of the colony. Lehi had broken the trust of the faithful members of the group and challenged their faith when he joined Laman and Lemuel in murmuring. He had also emboldened those who were already not faithful by essentially agreeing with Laman and Lemuel in their lack of trusting the Lord. It was to Lehi that the entire colony, both the faithful as well as the complainers, looked for decisions and for logistical leadership. Lehi’s murmuring affected every member of the colony. Even though specific consequences and chastisements are not outlined in the text, it seems clear that something significant happened at the Camp of the Broken Bow. It is a reasonable speculation, as noted by Scripture Central and Noel Reynolds (discussed above) that the consequence changed Nephi’s position from one of Lehi’s followers to a position of making at least some, if not all, of the guiding decisions for the camp.

Noel Reynolds convincingly explains that the events that happened at the Camp of the Broken Bow were “a significant turning point in Nephi’s account, for it is here [at the Camp] that Nephi emerges undeniably as co-leader with his father.”61 That is a bold assertion. I obviously concur that the “turning point” occurred at the Camp of the Broken Bow, although I would not frame it as co-leader. The evidence suggests, at least to me, that Nephi transitioned to replace Lehi as the logistical leader, but the recognition of that change, which was initially shocking to the whole party (1 Nephi 16:26–27) was softened, even downplayed, by Lehi’s continuing presence. It was also mitigated by Nephi’s extraordinary tact and desire to maintain unity among the travelers. We have already seen that scholars at Book of Mormon Central have connected the breaking of the bow with Nephi’s taking the lead and guiding the trek. In addition, Neal Rappleye quotes these same verses and concludes that “From a narratological perspective, these complaints appear to allude . . . [to] where Nephi’s bow broke, the family suffered from hunger and fatigue, and Nephi made himself a new bow—a symbol of kingship in the ancient Near East—and used the Liahona to guide him.”62 If becoming the leader and conducting much of the action and guiding the group was, in fact, the divinely stated consequence of Lehi’s murmuring, it may well have caused the ears of everyone to “tingle, ring, shudder” or “tremble exceedingly.”

If Lehi’s chastisement was a public change of leadership, was that truly a “punishment”? It may or may not have felt like that for Lehi. On the one hand, having the whole camp tremble because of one’s behavior would have seemed a very public humiliation. On the other hand, having a righteous son “take the baton” of leadership is something that might, after time and upon reflection, have actually brought Lehi and Sariah much joy. It seems clear that, for the members of the small colony who were essentially alone in the desert, a transfer of leadership would have been a powerful object lesson that would have changed everything.

The continued presence of Lehi would have softened the blow but in the case of Laman and Lemuel, having Nephi named as the leader, even if the leadership were expressed with incredible reticence and tact, would have engendered intense resentment, bitterness, and “eternal hatred.” And that is apparently what happened. Those negative emotions lasted not only for the rest of their lives but became an overarching manifesto that they “taught their children” for hundreds of years (see Mosiah 10:16). In fact, Zeniff recounts this Lamanite “tradition of their fathers, which is this—Believing that they were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers, and that they were wronged in the wilderness by their brethren because he had taken the ruling of the people out of their hands” (v. 12). The blame apparently shifted from the “fathers” (presumably Lehi and possibly Ishmael) and was placed on the “brethren” (presumably Nephi and possibly Sam) and this all happened “in the wilderness” prior to the New World, but well after the slaying of Laban in Jerusalem.

Zeniff continues that the Lamanites were “wroth with him” (Nephi, not Lehi) “upon the waters” (v. 14) and were “wroth with him [Nephi, not Lehi] when they arrived in the promised land, because they said that he [Nephi] had taken the ruling [past tense] of the people out of their hands” prior to the Nephite and Lamanite separation (v. 15). In other words, the Lamanite tradition saw Nephi as the primary leader even before the death of Lehi. Although I have defined a leader as just someone who conducts and guides, the Lamanites appear to have gone beyond that to claim that Nephi was a decision-maker for the group, although they defined that as being a usurper. That is why they taught their children to have “an eternal hatred towards the children of Nephi” (v. 17).

Notice, also, Zeniff’s wording and description of the wilderness journey—all in past tense: “Nephi was . . . faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord—therefore he [Nephi] was favored of the Lord, for the Lord heard his prayers and answered them, and he [Nephi] took the lead of their journey in the wilderness” (Mosiah 10:13). That seems clear; taking the lead meant that he guided the group—although by necessity very gently and tactfully. His leadership was recognized in a very limited way, buffered by the continued presence of Lehi. It could still be ignored by Laman and his followers, and it apparently was at least to some degree, because Nephi’s leadership was nothing like an overt sovereign whose decisions are binding. Nephi had to hold the group together, but he may have been named by the Lord to assume the leadership of the colony and that, stated on the Liahona. Again, Zeniff does not say that Lehi took the lead, with Nephi as his able-bodied assistant, or proxy, or even co-leader—one who was gradually learning to become a future leader after Lehi died. No, Zeniff says that Nephi, not Lehi, took the lead of their journey in the wilderness. Zeniff was an outstanding record-keeper and there is no reason to doubt his contemporary assessment of the traditions of the Lamanites.

It is also worth reminding the reader that, as stated earlier, Nephi was never seeking such leadership. Even later, after the final separation and in the City of Nephi when his followers wanted him to be their king, Nephi’s desire was to only serve as a prophet and teacher, not a king who gave orders, made laws, and commanded his subjects.

Thus far, the evidence suggests that Lehi may have lost his place as the logistical leader of the colony as a public chastisement or consequence of his murmuring. However, that is only half of the equation. The other half of the equation requires evidence that Nephi received his place as the new group leader. We turn to that evidence now.

Nephi’s calling to the “top of the mountain”

Let’s begin with Nephi leaving the Camp alone (1 Nephi 16:30). In every other activity, the young men all worked as a group. This time, Nephi left alone. He did not even take his faithful brother, Sam. One reasonable explanation is that the writing on the Liahona may have directed him to go alone, and he “did go forth . . . according to the directions which were given upon the ball” (v. 30). The Lord may have intended to give him another personal and individual spiritual theophany. With only a few exceptions, prophets are usually alone at the time of significant holy experiences.63 Examples include Jacob who was alone when he wrestled/embraced an angel (Genesis 32:24), Moses at the burning bush (Exodus 3:1–4), Elijah in the cave on Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19:4–9), Christ in Gethsemane (Matthew 26:36–45), Moroni for 36 or 37 years,64 and Joseph Smith in the Sacred Grove (Joseph Smith—History 1:15).

In addition to leaving alone, Nephi “did go forth up into the top of the mountain, according to the directions which were given upon the ball” (1 Nephi 16:30). Significantly, he was not directed down to the relatively fertile and watered Camp oasis to find the game that certainly lived down there. Instead, he was to make an ascent and “go forth up into the top of the mountain” (1 Nephi 16:30). Skyler Smith has written convincingly that “Book of Mormon prophets (at least Jacob and Nephi) viewed the plan of salvation within a heavenly ascent model. In other words, whether an ascension occurs in mortality (2 Nephi 11:2–3) or after death at the Final Judgment (2 Nephi 28:23), salvation in the Book of Mormon should likely be interpreted as redemption from the fall by entering back into the presence of God.”65

To be sure, there was also game at the top of the mountain, so the account also works well at the level of a simple story. The most likely kosher animal to be found high in the barren terrain of an Arabian mountain was the ibex, or mountain goat.66 The desert-dwelling Nubian goat (Capra nubiana) is native to northwestern Arabia where the exiles were sojourning.67 This Nubian ibex was a small breed so Nephi, a strong young man, could have carried at least two cleaned and trimmed carcasses, or possibly one goat and rabbits or other animals down to the camp (1 Nephi 16:31–32).

Although the immediate crisis was to procure meat protein, which Nephi did, that does not preclude the possibility of other significant events also occurring at that same time and place. What else might have happened on that mountain top? That may be another example of what Grant Hardy calls “gaps (conspicuous absences)” in the record. He refers to these gaps as places were Nephi intentionally omitted information in his text.68 If this is, in fact, one of those gaps, we may justifiably wonder what might fill that gap. According to Hardy, such speculation is justifiable. In his words, “ordinary readers take it for granted that inferences beyond what is explicit are not just permissible but indispensable in understanding.”69 His own methodology is that he “tries to make sense of the actions and thoughts of the narrators in order to provide a coherent, comprehensive reading of the Book of Mormon as a whole (all the while acknowledging that other interpretations are possible).”70

What strongly invites just such a search for the filling of a gap is the wording of the “top of the mountain” (1 Nephi 16:30). It may be noteworthy that the word mountain is singular. That specific and divine directive, which appeared on the Liahona (v. 30), has a particular meaning for people of faith—it is often a kind of code phrase for a temple experience. Going forth into the tops of mountains, when there was not a physical building to enter, often suggests temple imagery, as numerous scholars have pointed out. Here are just a few such statements:

- “The visions in the ancient ascent apocalypses often involved mountains . . . [because] ancient Jewish understanding [was] that the earthly temple was . . . modeled on the god’s house in heaven or on a sacred mountain.”71

- “The top of the sacred mountain is typically depicted as the most holy place, and the degree of holiness decreases in proportion to the distance from the center (or the top).”72

- “The link between divine presence and mountain tops is a well-documented phenomenon.73 . . . [It was] the place where god meets man, a place of theophany.”74

- “The mountain peak represents a pristine and therefore undesecrated region. It is a ‘natural temple’ a place of altar, of consecration, of ordination, even of coronation.” 75

Nor is the gospel as taught in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the only one to offer such lofty ideas. Mountains have been seen as holy places throughout antiquity and in many religious traditions all over the world. That may be why so many Buddhist monasteries, Hindu temples, and Asian pagodas are built on the tops of mountains around the world and why architecture intended for religious rituals, such as pyramids, ziggurats, and even the Rameumpton (Alma 31:13–14), often assume the shape of mountains.

It therefore seems improbable that Nephi was commanded to “go forth into the top of the mountain” merely to obtain meat, although that is the story-level emphasis in these verses. Factor in also that Nephi received instructions from the Lord multiple other times on the tops of mountains, and all the other times had divine significance. The first was his theophany in 1 Nephi 11:1, 11, 21, another was his receiving the commandment to build the ship (1 Nephi 17:7); and there were frequent additional occasions where he “did go into the mount oft” and where “the Lord showed unto me great things” (1 Nephi 18:3). Later, in his Psalm of Nephi, he writes that “upon the wings of his Spirit hath my body been carried away upon exceedingly high mountains. And mine eyes have beheld great things, yea, even too great for man” (2 Nephi 4:25). In fact, if Nephi’s being called to ascend the mountain near the Camp of the Broken Bow and, specifically, to the “top of the mountain,” did not include a sacred experience, that would be the only time it did not. Thus, it is reasonable to believe that more happened at the top of the mountain than merely the slaying of ibex goats as meat for the Lehites. Was it on top of this mountain that Nephi learned God’s will about him taking over as the leader of the exiles? Could Nephi have received a divine commission—what Blake Ostler calls a “throne-theophany”76—to become the leader of the colony on this mountain, confirming what might have been written on the Liahona?

A scriptural reference to going up to a mountain, and especially, up to the top of a mountain, is usually a temple text, not only in the Book of Mormon but throughout all scripture and Restoration writing. Table 1 presents references to a prophet being called up into high mountains or the tops of mountains. The table demonstrates that, in most cases, that calling is to a sacred, temple-like experience.

Table 1. Sacred experiences of prophets on the tops of the mountains.

Prophet

Textual Wording

Reference

Abram

“And he removed from thence unto a mountain on the east of Beth-el”

Genesis 12:8

Abraham

“And get thee into the land of Moriah . . . upon one of the mountains”

Genesis 22:2

Moses

“Came to the mountain of God . . . and the angel of the LORD appeared unto him”

Exodus 3:1–2

Moses

“This shall be a token unto thee . . . Ye shall serve God upon this mountain”

Exodus 3:12

Moses

“The Lord called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up”

Exodus 19:20

Moses

“Come up to me into the mount . . . and Moses went up into the mount”

Exodus 24:12–13

Elisha

“And, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire”

2 Kings 6:17

Psalms

“Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place?”

Psalm 24:3

Psalms

“Great is the Lord . . . in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness”

Psalm 48:1

Isaiah

“The mountain of the Lord’s house shall be . . . in the top of the mountains”

Isaiah 2:2–3

Isaiah

“O Zion . . . get thee up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem”

Isaiah 40:9

Jesus

“And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain”

Matthew 5:1

Peter, James, John

“Jesus . . . leadeth them up into an high mountain and was transfigured”

Mark 9:1

John the Revelator

“He carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain”

Revelation 21:10

Brother of Jared

“Went forth . . . upon the top of the mount, and cried again unto the Lord”

Ether 3:1

Moses

“Moses was caught up into an exceedingly high mountain . . . and he saw God”

Moses 1:1–2

Enoch

“Get ye upon the mount . . . [and] I saw the Lord; and he stood before my face”

Moses 7:2–4

Nephi

“I was caught away in the Spirit of the Lord, yea, into an exceedingly high mountain”

1 Nephi 11:1

Nephi

“Arise, and get thee into the mountain . . . I arose and went up into the mountain”

1 Nephi 17:7

Nephi

“I, Nephi, did go into the mount oft . . . [and] the Lord showed unto me great things”

1 Nephi 18:3

Nephi

“Carried away upon exceedingly high mountains . . . [and] beheld great things”

2 Nephi 4:25

Joseph Smith

“A sacred cosmic mountain”77 “most elevated . . . not far from the top”

JS—H 1:51

Spencer Kimball78

“The mountain-top experience in which . . . I knew that I was an apostle”79

Journal

Nephi at the Camp

“Did go forth up into the top of the mountain according to the directions”

1 Nephi 16:30

If it is correct that Nephi had a significant spiritual experience or theophany at the top of the mountain, this is yet another time, among several, in which he shadows the great prophet, Moses. As an interesting aside, it would also be a time when he shadowed the great prophet, Abraham, as well.

A Abraham went up into a mountain

B and had a spiritual experience

C after which the Lord provided a ram goat

D for a sacrifice

E and possibly to also eat

(Genesis 22:13)

A Nephi went up into a mountain

B and may have had a spiritual experience

C after which the Lord provided ibex goats

E to eat

D and possibly to sacrifice as they “gave thanks”

(1 Nephi 16:32)80

Returning to our discussion, it is fair to question why Nephi did not speak more directly about his experience at the top of the mountain. If Nephi did downplay a spiritual experience on that mountain top, there are at least three reasons that could account for his creating what Hardy calls intentional gaps that are “deliberately omitted.”81

- Nephi may have wanted to avoid any appearance of self-aggrandizement and/or any risk of tarnishing his father’s good name and marvelous legacy. The focus of the ever-humble Nephi was never on claiming credit but rather to write about Christ.

- Claiming that he had been given the right to make decisions for the travelers, including for Laman and his followers, would have risked further stoking his brothers’ jealousy and anger. Nephi would not have emphasized a significant and divine “assignment” at a time when the colony members needed to be as united as possible.

- Nephi may have been specifically commanded not to detail a sacred experience. Like other prophets before and after him, he was commanded to not reveal sacred situations and events (see, for just a few examples, 1 Nephi 14:28, 2 Nephi 4:25, Ether 3:27–28, and Doctrine and Covenants 19:21).

Changes After the Camp of the Broken Bow

If the discussion about his experience on top of the mountain is correct, we would expect to see other significant changes following the events at the Camp of the Broken Bow. And that is, indeed, what we do see.

Nahom and the death of Ishmael

Although Nephi did not tell us exactly what happened on the top of that mountain, other members of the colony seem to have been well aware of some kind of change. The very next verse following Nephi’s return with meat, the colony left to travel south “for the space of many days” where “Ishmael died, and was buried in the place which was called Nahom” (1 Nephi 16:33–34). Ishmael’s daughters “did mourn exceedingly . . . and they did murmur against my father because he “had brought them out of the land of Jerusalem” (v. 35). Inevitably joined by Laman and Lemuel, the group also murmured against Nephi. While the complaint against Lehi was an old one—namely, taking them away from their comfortable homes in Jerusalem—the complaint against Nephi was an entirely new one. No mention of Nephi claiming to be a sovereign was made at the time of the killing of Laban or at any time prior to the Camp of the Broken Bow. However, just after the Camp of the Broken Bow, Laman and his followers now claim that Nephi has suddenly, “taken it upon him to be our ruler and . . . has thought to make himself a king and a ruler over us, that he may do with us according to his will and pleasure” (vv. 37–38). The words in that new, and false, accusation are particularly meaningful in light of the symbolism of a bow representing royalty. It was their perception that Nephi had suddenly, immediately following the events at the Camp, become not just a leader of the group, which would have been bad enough in their eyes, but also intended to become a king and, presumably, to render directives over his “subjects.”

This is the first textual association of Nephi with the word king, and it occurs long after he executed Laban. It occurs immediately following the events at the Camp of the Broken Bow. This may be the reason why, many years later, Laman and Lemuel’s descendants taught their children the remarkably similar accusation (discussed earlier) that they “were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers” (Mosiah 10:12), presumably Lehi and Ishmael. The scripture then adds that they were “wronged in the wilderness by their brethren” (v. 12) because Nephi “had taken the ruling of the people out of their hands” (v. 15). Since Laban was killed in the streets of Jerusalem, it is hard to reconcile that Nephi took the ruling of the people at that time. It seems to have been later, in the wilderness (i.e., the Camp of the Broken Bow), where that occurred.

In this same new and false accusation by Laman, notice the verb tenses. The angel had earlier prophesied to Laman and Lemuel that Nephi was chosen to one day be a ruler over them (1 Nephi 3:29) and the Lord had told Nephi the same thing: “thou shalt be made a ruler [future tense]” (1 Nephi 2:22). By contrast, this new accusation is not stated in the future tense but in the present tense. “Now. . . he worketh many things . . . thinking, perhaps, that he may lead us away into some strange wilderness; and after he has led us away, he has thought to make himself a king” (1 Nephi 16:37–38). This implies a new and immediate reality and neither a past nor a future event. Something important had clearly happened at the Camp of the Broken Bow and some writing on the Liahona had caused the entire camp to fear and tremble exceedingly (1 Nephi 16:26–27). Could it have been a divinely written announcement on the Liahona of a new leadership position for Nephi and a reduced position for Lehi? We obviously do not know.

How else can we understand Father Lehi’s apparent inaction in Nahom? Although the daughters of Ishmael blamed Lehi for the death of their father, Ishmael, we hear nothing of Lehi mounting any defense to that accusation. Why not? He was right there. Nor do we hear of Lehi offering any consolation to those daughters in their grief. Again, why not, if he were their leader? And what of Lehi’s own grief and mourning? Ishmael was at least his good friend, if not his cousin and possibly, as discussed earlier, his brother. Nephi writes nothing of that. Even more pointedly, there is no mention of Lehi confronting the horrific threats to “slay our father and also our brother” (16:37). Would we not expect some reaction or correction if he were still the principal leader of the colony? Perhaps some of that was included in the large plates or the lost plates of Lehi, but at this point, we simply do not know.

The disappearance of Lehi from the record

This lack of mention of Lehi in Nahom is only the beginning of Lehi’s disappearance from the record. He is barely mentioned anywhere else, either. In fact, the narrative reads as if there were two “Father Lehis” who made the trek from Jerusalem on into the New World. The first Father Lehi is featured prominently and powerfully prior to the Camp of the Broken Bow. Up to that time, he was front and center in all the action. But we find a second, and quite different, Father Lehi, following his murmuring. After the events at the Camp of the Broken Bow, Lehi’s presence and voice diminish sharply. A second Father Lehi is very much in the background of the narrative. Even if he is less mentioned because it is, after all, Nephi’s account, that doesn’t explain Lehi’s leadership being so noticeably absent. Had Lehi acted as the colony leader, Nephi would likely have mentioned that. He didn’t. In the very few times that Lehi does appear in the narrative, he is noticeably ineffectual. Although he continues to be a faithful prophet of God, nowhere after the events at the Camp of the Broken Bow, is he described, or does he act, as the effective leader of the group. Following the Camp of the Broken Bow, it is all Nephi.

This assertion of Lehi’s lesser presence in Nephi’s narrative is not merely conjecture; it can be seen statistically in the number of references to him. Prior to the Camp he is mentioned or quoted 128 times. However, during all the years following the Camp and through the remainder of First Nephi, Lehi is mentioned in the text by name only one time. And he is never quoted directly after the Camp (prior to the New World), not even once. Moreover, he is mentioned indirectly (by reference only) just eight times. We never again hear directly from Lehi, only about Lehi—and not much of that. Table 2 provides the breakdown of verses related to Lehi. The table reveals significant differences between Lehi’s degree of prominence prior to the Camp and his lack of prominence in events that follow the Camp.

Table 2. References to Lehi in First Nephi.

Location and Time During the Trek

Mention by Name

Directly Quoted

Mentioned Indirectly and in the Third Person82

Jerusalem up to the Broken Bow incident

8

10

110

After Broken Bow and to Nahom area

0

0

2

1 Nephi 16:35–37

1 Nephi 17:49

Travel to entrance to Bountiful

0

0

1

1 Nephi 18:7

Living in Bountiful, building the ship

0

0

1

1 Nephi 18:5

Crossing the ocean

1

0

3

1 Nephi 18:17–18

As table 2 demonstrates, other than the sprinkling of brief, third-person references to Lehi, we hear absolutely nothing of him doing anything significant following the events at the Camp. The latter time frame includes the journey down to Nahom, the events surrounding Ishmael’s death, the deadly desert crossing to Bountiful, and the myriad activities in Bountiful where they may have lived for as many as six years.83 That begs to be explained.

Some have suggested that the explanation for Lehi’s “absence” is simply that Nephi, who was the one writing the record, does not mention his father after the Camp because that did not suit Nephi’s writing objectives. They point out that we are reading the account of the trek from Nephi’s small plates, not Lehi’s own account, an abridgment of which would have been included on the missing large plates (1 Nephi 1:17).84 Nephi makes it clear that “I, Nephi, do not make a full account of the things which my father hath written, for he hath written many things . . . of which I shall not make a full account [on the small plates] (v. 16) and that “a more history part are written upon mine other plates [the large plates]” (2 Nephi 4:14). This suggests the possibility that Lehi’s activities may have had a greater presence on the large plates.85 Scholars are somewhat divided on the question of the role of Lehi’s record. S. Kent Brown gives it as his understanding that “Lehi’s record . . . served as a source for Nephi’s two accounts, those on the large and small plates.”86

Even granting the obvious fact that we are reading Nephi’s record, not Lehi’s record, that does not fully explain the abundance of references to Lehi prior to the Camp and the paucity afterwards. Nephi seemed happy to include his father as a major presence prior to the events at the Camp. Why would he drop that emphasis afterwards, only to pick it back up in the first chapters of Second Nephi, where he is still not mentioned as a logistical leader but as a prophet giving revelations and final patriarchal blessings? In addition, Noel Reynolds has demonstrated that one of Nephi’s agendas in creating his record was not just bringing people to Christ but also “establishing Nephi as the legitimate ruler and the successor of Lehi.”87 Lehi would have been a major part of Nephi’s authority chain. Why did Nephi not pick that low-hanging fruit?

The unforgiving desert from Nahom to Bountiful

The changes following the events at the Camp continue during the especially arduous leg of the journey as they headed eastward through the sand desert toward Bountiful. Lehi is again absent from the record. It should be clearly noted that the record that we have in the small plates was Nephi’s record, not Lehi’s writings. Nevertheless, it seems noteworthy that Nephi writes nothing that alludes to leadership by his father during this period. There is no mention of Lehi marveling at the Lord’s protection and grace during that torturous final leg of the trek and the Lord’s providing means for their survival. There is no mention of Lehi praising the women in the group for being strong, which seems a comment befitting a group leader. There is no mention of Lehi’s rejoicing at the dramatic change from the sand desert to the oasis of Bountiful with its fruit and wild honey. Even granted that this is Nephi’s record, the absence of Lehi’s comments seems conspicuous.

The building of the ship in Bountiful

The exiles had been in the lush inlet of Bountiful “for the space of many days” when Nephi tells us, “the voice of the Lord came unto me, saying: Arise, and get thee into the mountain . . . And it came to pass that the Lord spake unto me” (1 Nephi 17:7). The profound revelation to construct, by hand, a seemingly impossible ocean-going vessel in the inlet of Bountiful did not come to Lehi to then be executed by Nephi as a delegated assignment. The latter was the chain of command for the earlier trips back to Jerusalem. No, this time the stunning command to build a ship that would carry the colony, their seeds, and their supplies across many thousands of miles of ocean to a New World came directly to Nephi. One might have expected that such a momentous decision—one that affected every single member of the colony—would have still come to Lehi if he were the leader of the group. It did not. It was a direct revelation to Nephi—and merely one of many revelations where the “Lord did show me from time to time after what manner I should work the timbers” (1 Nephi 18:1). Indeed, Nephi “did go into the mount oft, and I did pray oft unto the Lord; wherefore the Lord showed unto me great things” (v. 3). In this regard, yet again, Nephi does not sound like merely one of several young men, and this was long before the final separation of the brothers in the New World.

When the brothers heard that Nephi had received a vision to hand-build a ship, that brought instant ridicule and mockery. They not only discounted it; they refused to labor on the project.

Our brother is a fool, for he thinketh that he can build a ship . . . and [they] were desirous that they might not labor . . . and now when they saw that I began to be sorrowful they were glad in their hearts, insomuch that they did rejoice over me, saying . . . thou art like unto our father, led away by the foolish imaginations of his heart. (1 Nephi 17:17–18)

It was Nephi, not their father, who handled that latest rebellion. Nephi’s response was a long admonition and comparison with Moses, which ended by his warning to Laman that “I fear lest ye shall be cast off forever” (1 Nephi 17:47). That statement brought about impetuous Laman’s instant fury and an attempted murder. There is nothing written about any response from their patriarch father. However, Nephi came as close as he ever did to issuing anything like an overt directive statement. “In the name of the Almighty God, I command you that ye touch me not . . . [and] I, Nephi, said unto them that they should . . . [not] withhold their labor from me” (1 Nephi 17:49). That “command” to an older brother, an unthinkable insubordination in Hebrew culture, shows a voice of authority that is without precedent in Nephi’s record. That unequivocal command, and the Lord shocking or shaking them (vv. 53–54), was enough that “they fell down before me, and were about to worship me, but I would not suffer them” (v. 55). Instead, Nephi says, “I am thy brother, yea, even thy younger brother; wherefore, worship the Lord thy God, and honor thy father and thy mother” (v. 55). This was Nephi’s first (and only) “command,” and the follow-up admonition, redirecting Laman and Lemuel to God, does not sound like one we might expect a king to say. And this also did not come from Lehi.

Nor is Lehi mentioned as providing any kind of physical help for Nephi in the building of the ship even though we might speculate that Lehi was in good physical shape from the rigors of the brutal desert trek. We do not know Lehi’s age, but Chadwick estimates that Lehi may have only been in his mid-fifties by that time.88 Lehi did not even supply direction for the project “from the sidelines,” which Nephi would surely have acknowledged had that been the case. And we are told that it was not constructed with the help of Arabian ship builders; we are told that the ship was constructed under the direction of the Lord (1 Nephi 18:2).

In fact, Lehi is so nearly absent in the up-to-six-years in Bountiful89 that many scholars speak of the oasis as “Nephi’s Bountiful,” not “Lehi’s Bountiful.” For a few examples among several, Warren Aston includes that wording distinction in the title of his video: “Lehi in Arabia: The Search for Nephi’s Bountiful.”90 He similarly titles at least three of his other articles: “Identifying Our Best Candidate for Nephi’s Bountiful,”91 “Nephi’s Bountiful: Contrasting Both Candidates”92 and “Accessing Nephi’s Bountiful.”93 George Potter refers to “Nephi’s Harbor”94 and Scott and Maurine Proctor call their article, “Nephi’s Archaeological Dig: Was There a Holy Place of Worship at Nephi’s Bountiful?”95

Later, upon completion of the ship-building project, Nephi, who is usually a model of humble deference to his beloved father, does not hesitate to state the fact that he built the ship himself (with labor assistance from the others). At the completion of that monumental task, he says, “after I [not “we” but “I”] had finished the ship, according to the word of the Lord, my brethren beheld that it was good” (1 Nephi 18:4). Those sound like the words of a leader, not merely one of the workers, but neither does that sound like a king, who might have merely commanded others to build the ship. And it was Nephi and, surprisingly, the brothers—not Lehi—who admired the completed project (v. 4). One would expect that, if Lehi were still the leader, he would have complimented Nephi, and that Nephi would have acknowledged that compliment, especially given that he was writing, in part, to justify the legitimacy of a Nephite government as Reynolds has explained.96 But Lehi, once again, seems silent on the matter.

Navigating the crossing of the ocean

The next major change in tone following the Camp of the Broken Bow took place during the ocean crossing. Demonstrating that Lehi was still very much a prophet of God is that the revelation to board the ship came to Lehi along with a specific, structured manner of boarding. This does not sound as much like a decision that Lehi made as a leader as much as a revelation he transmitted as a prophet. Further, it sounds as if it could have been an ordinance of some kind. We read, “And it came to pass that the voice of the Lord came unto my father, that we should arise and go down into the ship. . . . everyone according to his age, wherefore, we did all go down into the ship, with our wives and our children” (1 Nephi 18:5–6). But while Lehi was still a prophet, he did not appear to be functioning as a logistical decision-maker during the many months of ocean crossing any more than he had functioned as a decision-maker after the Camp of the Broken Bow in the desert portion or in the six or so years in Bountiful. During the ocean voyage, Laman and his followers “began to make themselves merry, insomuch that they began to dance, and to sing, and to speak with much rudeness, yea, even that they did forget by what power they had been brought thither” (1 Nephi 18:9)—perhaps a drunken revelry. There was still no response from Lehi, but Nephi again began to exercise his leadership more overtly and directly. He “began to speak to them with much soberness” (v. 10). Interesting, they were drunk; Nephi was sober.

Similar to the time that Nephi shared his intent to build the ship, Laman and Lemuel flew into another rage. They shouted, “We will not that our younger brother shall be a ruler over us” (v. 10). They clearly saw his admonitions as the voice of a leader and ruler. They seized him and bound him so tight that he “could not move” (v. 12) and his wrists and ankles became “much swollen, and great was the soreness thereof” (v. 15). It was at that point that the Liahona stopped working and “there arose a great storm, yea, a great and terrible tempest” (v. 13).

At this point, and to his credit, Lehi then tried to exercise his parental authority, but that was an abject failure. It was immediately shut down by Laman’s group who “did breathe out much threatenings” (v. 17) against Lehi. So much so that he and Sariah “were brought down, yea, even upon their sick-beds . . . near even to be carried out of this time to meet their God; yea, their grey hairs were about to be brought down to lie low in the dust; yea, even they were near to be cast with sorrow into a watery grave” (v. 17). Laman’s intransigence was a significant turn of events. Threatening the authority of a father in a patriarchal society was rare. Threatening his life was unthinkable (although it had also happened at Nahom). It displayed their utter disregard for cultural tradition and revealed the depths of their disrespect. It also demonstrated that they did not consider their father as the colony’s leader. By any rubric, Lehi was not the leader at this time.

A second indicator that Nephi was already the leader of the group, albeit leading very tactfully, comes from another easily missed detail. While it is true that Nephi, like his father, was ineffective in controlling Laman on the ship, he had at least resisted strongly enough that he had to be tightly bound hand and foot and likely gagged to restrain him. Lehi was neither tied up nor gagged.

After four days, the storm had escalated to become so violent that the ship almost broke apart and capsized. The exiles were “about to be swallowed up in the depths of the sea” (v. 20). Nephi’s brothers were forced to “repent of the thing which they had done, insomuch that they loosed [him]” (vv. 15, 20). It was only “after they had loosed [him] . . . [that] the winds did cease, and the storm did cease, and there was a great calm” (v. 21). These events again sound as if Nephi was the ship’s leader, not a secondary player to Lehi.

A third indicator of Nephi’s leadership at this time was suggested by the work of Timothy Gervais and John Joyce (noted earlier). They claim that “shortly after Nephi is released from his bondage, he states: ‘Behold, I took the compass, and it did work whither I desired it’ (1 Nephi 18:21, emphasis added).”97 They continue, “The usually deferential Nephi is careful to detail that he was the one working the compass after his release.” Notably, they add, “The compass worked only for him.” They conclude by emphasizing that it was Nephi who was the sole and only one in charge of navigation at the time of the great tempest. Later, after the storm had died down and during the remaining crossing of the Pacific, “Nephi states: ‘I Nephi, did guide the ship, that we sailed again towards the promised land.’”98 This wording sounds as if Nephi was the leader and guide for the company, as I proposed. He was directing the ship and possibly making smaller decisions such as when to stop for water and supplies. Note that although the steering of the ship involved the Liahona, this was not primarily spiritual guidance but rather navigational guidance. “Nephi appears to have had a much more integral role in manipulating the compass than a casual reading of the text would suggest.”99

Past-Tense Indicators of Nephi’s
Leadership in the New World

Similar to the situation in the Old World (at least, after the Camp of the Broken Bow), Lehi stands out as a prophet of God in the New World but no longer as a logistical decision-maker. His marvelous visions, prophesies, and powerful blessings are beautifully presented in 2 Nephi 1–4. However, the new spiritual prophesies and blessings are all presented in the capacity of a prophet and family patriarch giving death-bed final blessings. They were not presented in the capacity of a functioning logistical leader of an establishing colony. Although, as said earlier, many readers of the Book of Mormon believe Nephi took over as leader only after Lehi’s death in 2 Nephi 4:12, essentially everything written about Nephi’s leadership is consistently in the past tense.

Past-tense in Lehi’s dying blessing and admonition

During his dying blessing and admonition to his sons, Lehi does not promote Nephi’s leadership as a future condition. Rather, he praises Nephi’s previous leadership in the Old World. His verbs are written in the past-tense and refer to Nephi’s previous guidance and discrete decision-making that were subtly demonstrated in past events. He admonishes the young men and women:

Rebel no more against your brother, whose views have been glorious, and . . . who hath been an instrument in the hands of God, in bringing us forth into the land of promise; for were it not for him, we must have perished with hunger in the wilderness, nevertheless, ye have sought to take away his life . . . ye have accused him that he sought power and authority over you; but I know that he hath not sought for power nor authority over you, but he hath sought the glory of God, and your own eternal welfare. . . . And ye have murmured because he hath been plain unto you. Ye say that he hath used sharpness; ye say that he hath been angry with you; but behold, his sharpness was the sharpness of the power of the word of God. (2 Nephi 1:24–26)

That seems crystal clear. Nor does Lehi assume even shared credit for “bringing us forth” out of the Old World; he gives all the credit to Nephi.

The wording of Lehi’s blessing could not have gone down well with Laman and Lemuel, but it seems certain that Lehi is presenting his son, Nephi, as the one who had already been in charge, even if somewhat transparently, not just the one who was to take over after his death. It does not sound like he is granting new authority to Nephi after his imminent passing. Lehi’s endorsement sounds like a reiteration of an existing status—one that evidence suggests could have happened at the Camp of the Broken Bow. It is not a new coronation and not a passing on of authority, as is often presented in talks and books. To the contrary, Lehi’s blessings and admonitions reiterate Laman’s earlier observation that Nephi had, indeed, led the colony, even if that was resented and resisted. Lehi is essentially saying that Nephi had been the functioning leader of the exiles for many years.

Past-tense leadership at the final separation

After Lehi dies (2 Nephi 4:12), and Laman and Lemuel again threaten Nephi’s life, the justification given by the brothers is notably also written in the past tense. Only a few days after their patriarch father’s death, the one who had been the emotional glue that had had held the fragile family together, Laman and Lemuel reasoned one to another: “We have had much trial because of him [Nephi]” (2 Nephi 5:3). There is no mention of trials because of their father. They continue, “wherefore, now let us slay him, that we may not be afflicted [any] more because of his words” [again, no mention of the words of Lehi]. “For behold, we will not have him to be our ruler” (v. 3).

Their wording is again all in the past tense. This may strongly indicate that the transfer of leadership had previously happened.

Past-tense leadership in the Psalm of Nephi

The full weight of now being totally alone appears to fall upon Nephi at this point. Much has been written about the Psalm of Nephi. In this psalm, which seems a clearly parallelistic, even chiastic, baring of his heart, Nephi tells the reader that “upon these [small plates] I write the thing of my soul” (2 Nephi 4:15). In discussing the psalm, the emphasis is often placed on Nephi recognizing his own sins and then calling upon God in repentance. For example, Noel Reynolds states, “Nephi does not pretend immunity to the emotional battle with his brothers. He candidly confesses the great anger that has seized his heart from time to time . . . because of his enemies (Laman and Lemuel?).” He continues, “The sturdy Nephi, who has reported his constant faithfulness, also deliberately shows his descendants and us his completely credible humanity.”100 McConkie and Millet assert that,

The idea that prophets or their writings are infallible is an old sectarian notion and is false. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). . . . Never has there been a prophet who has been excused from the frailties and temptations of the flesh. We see in Nephi a keen sensitivity to his weaknesses.101

While these interpretations are surely also valid, an interesting additional take on the Psalm of Nephi may come from a psychological perspective. It is highly unlikely that Nephi had anything close to a major depressive disorder as described in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5-TR), the manual used to diagnose mental health issues.102 However, some of Nephi’s wording in the psalm could be seen as meeting the DSM symptomology of a single depressive episode.103 The DSM requires “five (or more)” of nine symptoms, “at least one of the symptoms is either (1) depressed mood or (2) loss of interest or pleasure. Of course, it is impossible to make a diagnosis from the limited material available in the psalm, but Nephi’s wording could be seen as matching seven of the nine symptoms. Some symptoms are obviously more apparent than others, as noted in table 3.

Table 3. DSM symptoms and the Psalm of Nephi.104

DSM: Major Depression

Wording in 2 Nephi 4:17–29

Symptom #1: Depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day . . . (e.g., feels sad, empty, hopeless)

My heart sorroweth (v. 17); My soul grieveth (v. 17); my heart weep[s] and my soul linger[s] in the valley of sorrow (v. 26)

Symptom #2: Markedly diminished interest or pleasure in all, or almost all, activities

I am encompassed about (v. 18); When I desire to rejoice, my heart groaneth (v. 19)

Symptom #3: Significant weight loss . . . or weight gain

The consuming of my flesh. (v. 21); my flesh waste away (v. 26)

Symptom #4: Insomnia or hypersomnia nearly every day

The evil one have place in my heart to destroy my peace and afflict my soul (v. 27)

Symptom #5: Psychomotor agitation . . . or irritable mood105

Why am I angry? (v. 27); do not anger again (v. 29)

Symptom #6: Fatigue or loss of energy nearly every day

My strength slackens (v. 26); slacken my strength (v. 29)

Symptom #7: Feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt . . . (not merely self-reproach)

O wretched man that I am! (v. 17); temptations and sins do so easily beset me (v. 18); I yield to sin (v. 27); give way to temptations (v. 27); droop in sin (v. 28)

Nephi’s depressive feelings likely reflected his grieving over the loss of his father combined with a reaction to now bearing the overwhelming load of leadership totally alone. He was able to climb out of that temporary depression by using what is often referred to by psychologists as “positive self-talk.”106 During that self-talk, he reflected on the many blessings he had received from the Lord who he saw as “my rock and mine everlasting God” (2 Nephi 4:30–35).107 Important for our discussion, those blessings involved events that all took place in the Old World and during the crossing of the oceans (“in the wilderness; and . . . upon the waters of the great deep,” 2 Nephi 4:20). They were all events that occurred after they left Jerusalem and before his father died. He writes about these events completely in the past tense:

My God hath been my support; he hath led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness; and he hath preserved me upon the waters of the great deep. He hath filled me with his love. . . . He hath confounded mine enemies [presumably Laman and his followers]. . . . Behold, he hath heard my cry by day, and he hath given me knowledge by visions in the night-time. And by day have I waxed bold in mighty prayer before him; yea, my voice have I sent up on high; and angels came down and ministered unto me. And upon the wings of his Spirit hath my body been carried away upon exceedingly high mountains [see 1 Nephi 11:1]. And mine eyes have beheld great things, yea, even too great for man; therefore I was bidden that I should not write them. (2 Nephi 4:20–25)

After his psalm, Nephi notes that the two factions separated permanently. Now living in the newly settled land of Nephi and in a final summary of his leadership in the Old World, he wrote, also in the past-tense:

And behold, the words of the Lord had been fulfilled unto my brethren, which he spake concerning them, that I [not his father] should be their ruler and their teacher. Wherefore, I had been their ruler and their teacher, according to the commandments of the Lord. (2 Nephi 5:19)

Could that be any clearer?

In Conclusion

This paper is not meant to disrespect or disparage Lehi or Nephi in any way—just the opposite. They were two of the greatest prophets in all of scripture. Neither should this article be read as suggesting or implying that Lehi, the great prophet, lost his place as a prophet of God. Lehi’s prophetic legacy and eternal glory is certain. To remove any doubt of that, consider Lehi’s own final and moving testimony, with its clear suggestion of temple language and the divine embrace: “Behold, the Lord hath redeemed my soul from hell; I have beheld his glory, and I am encircled about eternally in the arms of his love” (2 Nephi 1:15).108 Likewise, nobody is suggesting that Heavenly Father stopped loving Lehi. Joseph Smith was told by the Lord, “Whom I love I also chasten . . . [and] with the chastisement I prepare a way for their deliverance” (Doctrine and Covenants 95:1). Lehi’s chastisement seems to have primarily been a public example for the people who had seen his murmuring against his God; it was not about punishment. However, just as other great prophets received chastisements because of the “foolish errors . . . and the foibles of human nature” (Joseph Smith—History 1:28), so Lehi appears to have lost his place, not as a prophet of God, but as the functional leader of his own people, the Lehites.

The reader can decide if this paper has added in some small measure to our understanding of Lehi’s and Nephi’s leadership. In an attempt to follow the admonition of Nephi to “liken all scriptures unto us, that it might be for our profit and learning” (1 Nephi 19:23), this paper hopefully strengthens our commitment to trust in the Lord even as we face great challenges just as the Lehites did because of the breaking of the bow in the desert. One of the great joys of the Gospel in general, and the Book of Mormon specifically, is that there is always so much more to see and so much more to learn, even about passages that we have read so often. There are still more lessons left to learn from the account of the trek through Arabia and on to the promised land and we may look forward with anticipation to future discussions and discoveries.

[Author’s Note: This paper started out as merely a footnote in my article on Nephi’s eight years in the wilderness.109 It mushroomed as I tried to explain and defend the idea of Nephi’s transition to the leadership occurring at the specific time of the Camp of the Broken Bow. Several people offered caveats and objections to parts of the logic, which I then tried to elaborate and defend. The footnote became a short paper and then a long paper. Others contributed fascinating ideas and even some specific wording. I especially wish to thank T. Woodrow Huntamer, Newell Wright, Jeff Lindsay, and several anonymous reviewers for significant help along the way.]

Godfrey J. Ellis was born in Plymouth, England, and raised in Vancouver, Canada, and then Los Angeles, California, before returning to Vancouver. He served as a missionary in the France Paris Mission and returned to Brigham Young University where he earned his BA in French and an MA in Family Relations. He completed his PhD in Family Sociology and Social Psychology from Washington State University. He then served as a professor of Family Relations or of Psychology in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and Lacey, Washington, during a career of 41 years. For 34 of those years he also served as a marriage and family therapist in private practice. During those years, he taught in both France and China and published articles in the Ensign magazine (now Liahona) and BYU Studies along with publishing various articles and books. At the time of his retirement, he was serving as the director of the master’s program in Counseling Psychology and the chair of a Department of Leadership and Counseling Psychology. In his very happy retirement, he published several articles in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship and became a reviewer for the journal. He currently serves as an executive editor. His latest book is Into Arabia: Anchoring Nephi’s Account in the Real World (with Warren Aston and Neal Rappleye). He also enjoys painting acrylic portraits of friends, missionaries, and family (see GodfreyEllisArt.com). He and his wife are blessed with four sons and four daughters-in-law, fourteen grandchildren, four grandchildren-in-law, and four great-grandchildren.

1 . See, for example, Warren P. Aston, Godfrey J. Ellis, and Neal Rappleye, Into Arabia: Anchoring Nephi’s Account in the Real World (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2024).

2 . Some writers consider Khor Rori as another possibility, but that candidate has serious limitations, thus making Khor Kharfot more likely. Aston provides an excellent comparison of the two; see Warren P. Aston, “Nephi’s ‘Bountiful’: Contrasting Both Candidates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 55 (2023): 219–68, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/nephis
-bountiful-contrasting-both-candidates/. Also see Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia.

3 . Although some scholars have speculated about a modern specific geographical location for where Nephi broke his bow, I will follow the lead of Book of Mormon Central in utilizing the more conservative name, the “Camp of the Broken Bow.” See Jasmin Gimenez, “Archaeological Evidence for 7 Locations on Lehi’s Journey to the Promised Land,” Book of Mormon Central (blog), 28 January 2020, bookofmormoncentral.org/blog/archaeological-evidence-for
-7-locations-on-lehi-s-journey-to-the-promised-land.

4 . For example, Peter G. Northouse, Leadership: Theory and Practice, 9th ed. (Los Angeles: Sage, 2022).

5 . Neelam Azad et al., “Leadership and Management Are One and the Same,” American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education 81, no. 6 (2017): 102, ncbi.nlm
.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5607712.

6 . For just three examples: the Chicago School’s “Organizational Leadership,” Gonzaga University’s “School of Leadership Studies,” and Brigham Young University’s “Educational Leadership.”

7 . Val Larsen, “Killing Laban: The Birth of Sovereignty in the Nephite Constitutional Order,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 16, no. 1 (2007): 26–41, scholars
archive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1416&context=jbms&fbclid=IwAR3OlR4O0cdPlyE0wCfDxpC75Zurvsb8D8mvnXfJFn1dtsEa4hy7zHHkK8E.

8 . Benjamin L. McGuire, “Nephi and Goliath: A Case Study of Literary Allusion in the Book of Mormon,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 18, no. 1 (2009): 16–31, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1535&context=jbms.

9 . Noah Webster, American Dictionary of the American Language (1828), s.v. “leader.”

10 . Neal Rappleye, “The Nahom Convergence Reexamined: The Eastward Trail, Burial of the Dead, and the Ancient Borders of NIHM,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 60 (2024): 22, journal.inter
preterfoundation.org/the-nahom-convergence-reexamined-the-eastward
-trail-burial-of-the-dead-and-the-ancient-borders-of-nihm. See also, Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia.

11 . Timothy Gervais and John L. Joyce, “’By Small Means’: Rethinking the Liahona,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 30 (2018): 223, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/by-small-means-rethinking-the-liahona/.

12 . Godfrey J. Ellis, “Nephi’s Eight Years in the ‘Wilderness’: Reconsidering Definitions and Details,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 57 (2023): 326–27, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/nephis
-eight-years-in-the-wilderness-reconsidering-definitions-and-details/. See also Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia.

13 . McGuire, “Nephi and Goliath,” 25

14 . McGuire, “Nephi and Goliath,” 25.

15 . Taylor Halverson, “Nephi Wanted to Be a Prophet Like Moses, Not a King Like David,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 59 (2023): 290, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/nephi-wanted-to-be-a
-prophet-like-moses-not-a-king-like-david/.

16 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 29.

17 . Grant Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon: A Reader’s Guide (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 35.

18 . Noel B. Reynolds, “Nephite Kingship Reconsidered,” BYU Faculty Publications (1997): 18, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/1488.

19 . Taylor Halverson, “Deuteronomy 17:14–20 as Criteria for Book of Mormon Kingship,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 24 (2017): 5, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/deuteronomy-1714-20-as-criteria-for-book-of
-mormon-kingship/.

20 . To repeat an important nuance: although McGuire asserts that the killing of Laban had “significant implications for his [future] kingship,” he does not assert that Nephi became their king at that time (McGuire, “Nephi and Goliath,” 25).

21 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 28–29.

22 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 29.

23 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 30–31.

24 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 37.

25 . Oxford Reference, s.v. “sovereign,” oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093
/acref/9780199891580.001.0001/acref-9780199891580-e-7656#:~:text=sovereign%20%CB%88s%C3%A4v(%C7%9D)r%C7%9Dn
%20n.&text=a%20supreme%20ruler%2C%20especially%20a%20monarch.

26 . I am indebted to Jeff Lindsay for this wording and for his noting the parallel between the Lord’s wording vis-à-vis Lehi and his wording to Nephi—both were sent to the author in May and August 2024.

27 . William Hamblin and Daniel Peterson, “Casting Lots: Definition, Biblical References and Context in Ancient Israel,” Deseret News, 27 January 2023, deseret.com/2015/10/2/20573546/the-casting-of-lots-in-ancient-israel/.

28 . Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon, 35.

29 . Larsen, “Killing Laban,” 35, emphasis added.

30 . Hugh W. Nibley, Lehi in the Desert; The World of the Jaredites; There were Jaredites (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS], 1988), 40, archive.org/details
/lehiindesertworl0000nibl .

31 . Sidney Sperry, “Did Father Lehi Have Daughters Who Married the Sons of Ishmael?,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 4 (1995): 235–36, scholars
archive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1109&context=jbms.

32 . The idea that Jacob and Joseph were born in Bountiful is based on Jeffrey Chadwick’s commentary on 1 Nephi 18:19 that they were still breast feeding during the ocean voyage. See Jeffrey R. Chadwick, “An Archeologist’s View,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15, no. 2 (2006): 75, scholarsarchive.byu
.edu/jbms/vol15/iss2/8/.

33 . Reynolds, “Nephite Kingship Reconsidered,” 7.

34 . Hugh W. Nibley, Teachings of the Book of Mormon, Semester 1: Transcripts of Lectures Presented to an Honors Book of Mormon Class at Brigham Young University, 1988–1990 (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1993), 133, scholarsarchive.byu
.edu/mi/70/.

35 . Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, 51.

36 . Warren Aston wrote that the loss of the bows was “almost certainly the result of the change from the milder, moister climate of Jerusalem to the dry desert heat.” Warren P. Aston, Lehi and Sariah in Arabia: The Old World Setting of the Book of Mormon (Bloomington, IN: Xlibris Publishing, 2015), 48–49. In an interesting website discussion, Ron Smith explains how “the movement of moisture into or out of the wood can cause it to shrink, expand, warp, or crack.” Ron Smith, “How Wood Responds to Changes in Temperature and Humidity Wood’s Tumultuous Relationship with the Elements,” Wagner Meters (website), 17 October 2023, wagnermeters.com/moisture-meters/wood-info
/how-temp-affects-wood/.

37 . Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, 59.

38 . William J. Hamblin, “The Bow and Arrow in the Book of Mormon,” in Warfare in the Book of Mormon, ed. Stephen D. Ricks and William J. Hamblin (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: FARMS, 1990), 374.

39 . Aston, Lehi and Sariah in Arabia, 48–49.

40 . This claim is supported by the observation that Nephi was enamored by and highly appreciative of fine metal working. Evidence for that was that he took the time and space on the precious plates to laboriously engrave his admiration for the fine workmanship of Laban’s sword (1 Nephi 4:9) as well as the workmanship of the Liahona (1 Nephi 16:10). Note also that Nephi’s first question when the Lord revealed that he was to construct a ship in Bountiful was not, “Where can I find tools?” but “Whither shall I go that I may find ore to molten, that I may make tools” (1 Nephi 17:8–10). He apparently “already knew how to make tools that were capable of standing up to constant use in heavy construction over several years.” Ellis, “Nephi’s Eight Years,’” 343. See also John Tvedtnes, The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Springville, UT: Horizon, 2004), 93–95, storage.googleapis.com/scripturecentral-prod-strapi
-uploads/john_a_tvedtnes_the_most_correct_book_1999_db028ec87f
/john_a_tvedtnes_the_most_correct_book_1999_db028ec87f.pdf; Warren P. Aston, “Into Arabia: Lehi and Sariah’s Escape from Jerusalem—Perspectives Suggested by New Fieldwork,” BYU Studies Quarterly 58, no. 4 (2019): 10, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol58/iss4/4/; Aston, Lehi and Sariah in the Wilderness, 12; Warren P. Aston, “Across Arabia with Lehi and Sariah: ‘Truth Shall Spring Out of the Earth,’” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15, no. 2 (2006): 20, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol15
/iss2/4/; and Jeffrey R. Chadwick, “Lehi’s House at Jerusalem and the Land of His Inheritance,” in Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem, ed. John W. Welch, David Rolph Seely, and Jo Ann H. Seely (Provo, UT: FARMS, 2004), 81–130, scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book/glimpses-lehis-jerusalem
?searchId=8d12a2450a3f2b3a0238b782a4cd56b09c68f3c880b1713cf9d612ccd0305c2c-en-v=e32bc4b.

41 . Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, 61.

42 . Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, 60–61.

43 . Aston, Lehi and Sariah in Arabia, 49.

44 . William J. Hamblin, “Nephi’s Bows and Arrows,” in Reexploring the Book of Mormon, ed. John Welch (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1992), 41–43, scholars
archive.byu.edu/mi/66/.

45 . Joseph Russo, “Odysseus’ Trial of the Bow as Symbolic Performance,” in Antike Literatur in neuer Deutung, ed. Anton Bierl, Arbogast Schmitt, Andreas Willi (Leipzig: K.G. Saur Munchen, 2004), 98, 100; classics.yale.edu/sites
/default/files/files/downloads/parry/Odysseus__trial.pdf.

46 . Richard H. Wilkinson, “The Representation of the Bow in the Art of Egypt and the Ancient Near East,” Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society 20, no. 1 (1991), 83, janes.scholasticahq.com/article/2366-the-representation-of-the
-bow-in-the-art-of-egypt-and-the-ancient-near-east.

47 . Scripture Central Staff, “Why Did Nephi’s ‘Fine Steel’ Bow Break?,” KnoWhy 548, 19 January 2024, scripturecentral.org/knowhy/why-did-nephis-fine-steel
-bow-break.

48 . Scripture Central Staff, “Why Did Nephi Include the Story of the Broken Bow?,” KnoWhy 421, 21 August 2019, scripturecentral.org/knowhy/why-did
-nephi-include-the-story-of-the-broken-bow. See also Noel Reynolds, “The Political Dimension in Nephi’s small plates,” BYU Studies 27, no.3 (1987): 28, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol27/iss4/3.

49 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension,” 15.

50 . Scripture Central, “Why Did Nephi Include the Story of the Broken Bow?,” emphasis added.

51 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension,” 29.

52 . Russell M. Nelson, “As We Go Forward Together,” Ensign, April 2018, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2018/04/as-we-go-forward-together.

53 . Webster, American Dictionary (1828), s.v. “chasten,” webstersdictionary1828
.com/Dictionary/chasten.

54 . Merriam-Webster, s.v. “chasten,” merriam-webster.com/dictionary
/chasten.

55 . Joseph Fielding McConkie and Robert L. Millet, Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon, vol. 1, First and Second Nephi (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1987), 126.

56 . Good News Translation Bible, c.v. 1 Samuel 3:11, biblehub.com/1_samuel
/3-11.htm.

57 . Christian Standard Bible, c.v. 1 Samuel 3:11; read.csbible.com/?book=1%20samuel&chapter=3.

58 . See also then-Elder Russell M. Nelson, “Set in Order Thy House,” Ensign, October 2001, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2001/10
/set-in-order-thy-house.

59 . See also, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, “Lost Manuscript of the Book of Mormon,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study
/history/topics/lost-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon.

60 . McConkie and Millet, Doctrinal Commentary, 126, emphasis added.

61 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension,” 28.

62 . Neal Rappleye, “The Nahom Convergence Reexamined: The Eastward Trail, Burial of the Dead, and the Ancient Borders of NIHM,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 60 (2024): 22, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/the-nahom-convergence-reexamined-the
-eastward-trail-burial-of-the-dead-and-the-ancient-borders-of-nihm. See also, Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia.

63 . As stated, there were exceptions such as the appearance of the Lord to Saul/Paul on the road to Damascus, which his traveling companions could not see (Acts 9:3–7), the appearance of divine messengers to Joseph Smith when he was with Oliver Cowdery and others who were to receive a divine ordinations (Doctrine and Covenants 13:1), and the appearances to the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon (Doctrine and Covenants 17 Headnote).

64 . Glen L. Rudd, “The Angel Moroni,” Brigham Young University—Idaho Devotional, 11 March 2003, byui.edu/Presentations/transcripts/devotionals
/2003_03_11_rudd.htm#:~:text=We%20know%20that%20Moroni%20lived,except%20that%20he%20did%20die.

65 . Skyler Smith, “Heavenly Ascent in Jacob’s Writings in Second Nephi: Addressing the Question of What the Plan of Salvation is in the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 60 (2024): 182, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/heavenly-ascent-in-jacobs
-writings-in-second-nephi-addressing-the-question-of-what-the-plan-of
-salvation-is-in-the-book-of-mormon/.

66 . AZ Animals, s.v. “Ibex,” a-z-animals.com/animals/ibex/.

67 . Sandro Lovan, “Ibex: mammal,” Britannica (2020), britannica.com/animal
/ibex#ref241041.

68 . For example, Hardy asserts that “Lehi’s response to the killing of Laban is a gap.” Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon, 20.

69 . Hardy, Understanding, 24.

70 . Hardy, Understanding, 25.

71 . Barry R. Bickmore, “‘Show Them unto No Man’: Part 2. The Book of Moses and the Early Jewish Christian Esoteric Tradition,” BYU Studies Quarterly 62, no. 2 (2023): 122. (See his entire discussion of “The Sacred Mountain” on pp. 122–23.)

72 . Jeffrey M. Bradshaw and Matthew L. Bowen “Jacob’s Temple Journey to Haran and Back,” forthcoming.

73 . Richard J. Clifford, “The Temple and the Holy Mountain,” in The Temple in Antiquity: Ancient Records and Modern Perspectives, Truman G. Madsen, ed. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU], 1984), 108.

74 . Richard J. Clifford, The Cosmic Mountain in Canaan and the Old Testament (Cambridge: Harvard University Press), 5, books.google.com/books?id=egD1DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA5&dq=%22the+mountain+can+be+a+center+of+fertility,+the+primeval+hillock+of+creation%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjEzNaOjo6EAxWvj4kEHWcrBGgQ6AF6BAgIEAI#v=onepage&q=%22the%20mountain%20can%20be%20a%20center%20of%20fertility%2C%20the%20primeval%20hillock%20of%20creation%22&f=false.

75 . Truman G. Madsen called a mountain “a natural temple” in his introduction to Clifford, “The Temple and the Holy Mountain,” in The Temple in Antiquity, 107, emphasis added.

76 . Blake Thomas Ostler, “The Throne-Theophany and Prophetic Commission in 1 Nephi: A Form-Critical Analysis,” BYU Studies 26, no. 4 (1986): 67–95, scripturecentral.org/archive/periodicals/journal-article/the-throne-theophany
andpropheticcommissionin1nephiaformcriticalanalysis?searchId=8c633a3707513a66777aafa30691b5f30fd6209244ee00b93b56711a8b95b000-en-v=e32bc4b.

77 . George Mitton writes that, “Although Cumorah is a substantial hill, it is, of course, nowhere near the height of Sinai. But there was nothing like Sinai in the area where Joseph lived.” George Mitton, “Joseph Smith at the Veil: Significant Ritual, Symbolism, and Temple Influence at Latter-day Saint Beginnings,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 58 (2023): 61, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/joseph-smith-at-the-veil-significant-ritual
-symbolism-and-temple-influence-at-latter-day-saint-beginnings/.

78 . Dennis Horne calls Spencer W. Kimball’s apostolic calling a “mountain-top experience in which Elder Kimball received, after much mental anguish, spiritual confirmation and assurance.” Dennis B. Horne, “Elder Spencer W. Kimball’s Apostolic Call Experience from his Own Writings,” Interpreter Blog, 15 April 2023, interpreterfoundation.org/blog-elder-spencer-w-kimballs-apostolic
-call-experience/#:~:text=He%20climbed%20up%20a%20mountain
,that%20I%20was%20an%20apostle.

79 . See Oscar W. McConkie Jr.’s interview by Mark L. McConkie, 26 June 2017, in Horne, “Elder Spencer W. Kimball.”

80 . Although I have underscored the wording similarities with letters, I am not trying to suggest that there is any kind of Hebrew parallelism going on here because, clearly, there is not.

81 . Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon, 23.

82 . Three references to “father” during the later portion of the trek refer to activities prior to the Camp of the Broken Bow. See 1 Nephi 17:20, 22, 44.

83 . Ellis, “Nephi’s Eight Years,” 281–356; Chadwick, “An Archeologist’s View, 75.

84 . Manuscript pages were much larger than our own 8½ x 11 pages as Don Bradley points out in Bradley, The Lost 116 Pages: Reconstructing the Book of Mormon’s Missing Stories (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford, 2019), 155.

85 . Bradley clearly points out that, “To the extent that Lehi’s story is told in this account, it is first filtered through Nephi’s perspective. . . . Thus, the kind of detail regarding Lehi that Nephi says he is not including from his father’s record . . .the details of his exodus—very likely were included in the lost manuscript.” See Bradley, The Lost 116 Pages, 113.

86 . S. Kent Brown, “Recovering the Missing Record of Lehi,” in A Book of Mormon Treasury: Gospel Insights From General Authorities and Religious Educators (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 2003), 148, scripturecentral.org
/archive/books/book-chapter/recovering-missing-record-lehi-0.

87 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension,” 36.

88 . Chadwick, “An Archeologist’s View, 75.

89 . See Ellis, “Nephi’s Eight Years,” 281–356; Chadwick, “An Archeologist’s View, 75.

90 . Aston, “Lehi in Arabia: The Search for Nephi’s Bountiful,” Living Scriptures Streaming, 15 December 2015, stream.livingscriptures.com/movies/lehi-in
-arabia.

91 . Warren P. Aston, “Identifying Our Best Candidate for Nephi’s Bountiful,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, 17, no. 1–2 (2008): 58–64, scholarsarchive
.byu.edu/jbms/vol17/iss1/7/.

92 . Warren P. Aston, “Nephi’s Bountiful: Contrasting Both Candidates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 55 (2023): 219–68, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/nephis-bountiful-contrasting-both-candidates/.

93 . Warren P. Aston, “Accessing Nephi’s Bountiful: A New Proposal for Reaching Irreantum,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 62 (2024), 429–38.

94 . George D. Potter, “Khor Rori: A Maritime Resources-Based Candidate for Nephi’s Harbor,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 51 (2022): 254, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/khor-rori-a
-maritime-resources-based-candidate-for-nephis-harbor/.

95 . See Scott and Maurine Proctor, “Nephi’s Bountiful: Archaeological Dig: Was There a Holy Place of Worship at Nephi’s Bountiful?,” Meridian Magazine, 29 February 2016, ldsmag.com/day-2-was-there-a-holy-place
-of-worship-at-nephis-bountiful.

96 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension.”

97 . Gervais and Joyce, “By Small Means,” 223.

98 . Gervais and Joyce, “By Small Means,” 224.

99 . Gervais and Joyce, “By Small Means,” 224.

100 . Reynolds, “The Political Dimension,” 36

101 . McConkie and Millet, Doctrinal Commentary, 217.

102 . American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th ed., Text Revision (Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Publishing, 2022). Hereafter referred to as DSM.

103 . The symptom list is from DSM, 177.

104 . The symptoms that Nephi does not exhibit include symptom #8 (“diminished ability to think or concentrate, or indecisiveness” and symptom #9 “thoughts of death or suicidal ideation . . . or suicide attempt”), DSM, 183.

105 . “Irritable mood” is added as a “common feature” (see DSM, 177).

106 . See, for one example, Elaine Mead, “What is Positive Self-Talk? (Incl. Examples),” PositivePsychology, 26 September 2019, positivepsychology.com
/positive-self-talk/.

107 . One is reminded of a favorite LDS hymn: “Count Your Blessings,” Hymns, no. 241.

108 . Matt Bowen has written an inspiring and extremely well-documented treatment of the divine embrace in a recent issue of Interpreter. See Matthew L. Bowen, “‘Encircled About Eternally in the Arms of His Love’: The Divine Embrace as a Thematic Symbol of Jesus Christ and His Atonement in the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 59 (2023): 109–34, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/encircled-about-eternally
-in-the-arms-of-his-love-the-divine-embrace-as-a-thematic-symbol-of
-jesus-christ-and-his-atonement-in-the-book-of-mormon/.

109 . Ellis, “Nephi’s Eight Years.” Also see Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia.

What Can Artificial Intelligence Tell Us About the Literary Skills Needed to Dictate a Text Like the Book of Mormon?

Brian C. Hales

Abstract: The first oral draft of the Book of Mormon dictated by Joseph Smith reflected remarkable literary refinement and complexity. Such observations demonstrate that he exhibited highly developed composition and oratory skills. To date, no scholar has attempted to describe the specific skills Joseph manifested while dictating. This essay addresses whether Artificial Intelligence (AI) could generate an accurate list of the skills necessary. It begins by identifying and informally testing eleven chatbots to see if they can accurately predict the skills needed to perform a task. Seeing success, they are next asked a long question about the skills needed to dictate a book like the Book of Mormon. Fifteen skills are common in the responses from the eleven chatbots, which are compiled into a list. The list is then validated by appealing to experts in the field of literary composition. Next, his documentable 1829 skills are cross-referenced to the list. The historical reality is that none of Joseph’s personal acquaintances describe him as accomplished with the skills that AI calculated would be needed. This AI “fail” deserves additional investigation. If eyewitnesses accurately reported he lacked the predicted skills, what skills did AI miss and what skills enabled him to dictate the Book of Mormon?

[Editor’s Note: This article is an updated version of a paper first presented at the 2024 FAIR Virtual Conference. Those interested in the original presentation can find it at fairlatterdaysaints.org/conference
/virt_2024-history/skills-needed-to-dictate-book-of-mormon.]

For nearly three months in 1829, Joseph Smith dictated a 269,320-word manuscript that became the 1830 Book of Mormon.1 He attributed his ability to produce the words to supernatural assistance—the “gift and power of God.”2 Predictably, most secular observers reject these claims. Some postulate Joseph Smith received outside help from collaborators or a preexisting manuscript. Others hypothesize that mental illness, trances, or hallucinogens enhanced his cognitive abilities. Most of those theories have been debunked, and skeptics have moved on to other speculations.3

Currently, the most popular secular theory describes how Joseph Smith’s natural cognitive abilities were sufficient to accomplish the task.4 As Eran Shalev observes: “Historians have long denied Smith the image of the ignorant rural boy who could not have acquired all the material that he would have needed to write The Book of Mormon.”5 Similarly, after mentioning “some 6,000-plus titles” that scrutinize the “empirical claims” of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, Richard S. Van Wagoner declared: “The main conclusion of this particular growing body of work is that there is no element in the Book of Mormon that cannot be explained naturalistically.”6 Fawn Brodie agreed: “The source of his [Joseph Smith’s] power lay not in his doctrine but in his person, and the rare quality of his genius was due not to his reason but to his imagination. He was a mythmaker of prodigious talent.” And “His talent, it is true, was not exceptional, for his book lacked subtlety, wit, and style. He was chiefly a tale-teller and preacher.”7 In his biography, The Making of a Prophet, Dan Vogel consistently reflects this idea, explaining that the process “was a more-or-less stream-of-consciousness composition,” dictated “mostly impromptu and without the aid of notes.”8

Beyond the supernatural versus natural debate, it is undeniable that Joseph Smith exhibited proficient literary skills every day for almost three months in 1829 as he spoke the first draft of the Book of Mormon.9 Curiously, among the thousands of research studies exploring the book and its origin, none have attempted to identify those skills generally or specifically. Admittedly, such an approach assumes a naturalistic origin for the word-stream, which Latter-day Saint researchers might consider faithless. However, secular scholars have similarly avoided this inquiry (with one exception discussed below). The question, “What literary skills did Joseph Smith exhibit while dictating the Book of Mormon?” remains unanswered and largely unaddressed.

Recently, Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots have boasted their ability to answer complex questions using English language interfaces. Part of the new usefulness of AI is advancements in natural language processing that enable it to understand and reply in everyday speech. These advancements, coupled with its training on large amounts of data, sometimes measured in petabytes, from text-based sources like websites, books, articles, and other publications, allow AI modules to respond to questions regarding the skills a person would need to accomplish a specific task. Recognizing this, I explored what AI might contribute to the question regarding the skills Joseph Smith manifested while dictating the Book of Mormon.

The remainder of this article is divided into four parts. Part One identifies eleven chatbots and informally tests them for accuracy. Part Two discusses the challenges of formulating the proper question (regarding the skills needed to dictate the Book of Mormon) to pose to the AI modules. Part Three compiles fifteen of the most popular skills mentioned by the chatbots and tests their validity. Part Four then brings us back to Joseph Smith to identify which skills the historical record shows he possessed in 1829 and whether they correlate to AI predictions.

Part One: Choosing and Testing
Artificial Intelligence Chatbots

This study queried only free-of-charge and free-trial AI modules. Included were Microsoft Bree, ChatGPT 4o, Anthropic’s Claude, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini, LDSBot, iAsk.AI, Meta AI, Inflection’s PI, Quora’s POE, and Perplexity.10 Some of these chatbots are derivatives of others. For example, LDSbot is based on an older version of ChatGPT, which means that posing questions to LDSbot might be considered more as a second query to ChatGPT. However, all the chatbots were accessed through distinct online portals, supporting differences in their use of the underlying AI programming. Regardless, their answers consistently reflected beneficial diversity and were included.

In all, nine different questions were posed to the eleven chatbots. This essay only mentions five of them. However, all of the 99 raw responses can be downloaded at ldsperspectives.com/wp-content
/uploads/2024/09/11-AI-Chatbot-Answers-to-9-Questions-BofM.pdf.

Informally testing chatbot accuracy

For the past few years, Artificial Intelligence has received increasing media coverage. Reports outlining AI chatbots’ remarkable abilities are usually accompanied by accounts of occasional errors and even extreme blunders. Aware of these reports, I sought to first test their responses informally by asking them four questions:

1. What skills would I need to safely anesthetize a person for surgery?

2. What skills would I need to be a chef in a restaurant?

3. What skills would I need to fix an automobile?

4. What skills would I need to play for the Los Angeles Lakers?

As a retired anesthesiologist, I felt competent evaluating the accuracy of the answers to the first question. Having less expertise with the remaining three questions, I could only detect obvious inaccuracies. My review of all 44 responses (one from each chatbot for each of the four questions) failed to identify even one egregious error. Regarding anesthesia, the chatbots provided consistently correct information; the responses to the other three questions seemed equally defensible. In summary, all of the answers offered by the individual chatbots seemed accurate to me.

After this initial exercise, I concluded that AI responses can provide a starting point for thinking about task-related skills. The possibility of error requires that their predictions be treated as suggestions, like brainstorming-level ideas to address a problem. But their responses are far from useless. The potential for inaccuracy is real but should not be interpreted as expected inaccuracy. Expert validation or invalidation is always required, but the initial responses can provide a valuable jumpstart to answering the questions at hand.

Part Two: Formulating the Proper
Book of Mormon Author-Skills Question

A key to successful AI chatbot interactions is providing accurate details in the wording of the original questions. As with all computer programming, the AI output depends on the input. The saying, “garbage in, garbage out” consistently applies. Consequently, multiple variables, including the syntax and composition of the question, may significantly influence the answers. The AI module’s previous learning input is also vital.

Accordingly, formulating a question with the proper phrasing and content is integral to obtaining useful data from the chatbots. Initially, I wanted to ask: “What skills would I need to dictate in three months a 269,320-word book with the literary characteristics of the Book of Mormon?”11 However, since no scholar has published a comprehensive list of Book of Mormon literary characteristics, AI chatbots would have to guess at that part of the question. Possibly, they could glean a characteristic or two from available published writings. Yet, borrowing an entire list is currently impossible. Neither would AI algorithms automatically perform their own deep textual analyses of the Book of Mormon in order to generate a list of literary characteristics. They are not programmed to function that way.

Identifying Book of Mormon literary characteristics

To improve the chances of receiving useable responses, specific Book of Mormon literary characteristics were identified so they could be included in the question posed to the AI chatbots:

- 269,320 words.12
- Unique words: about 5,600.
- College-level vocabulary words: dozens.13
- Reading level: eighth grade.14
- Storylines: 77 major plus more minor.15
- Characters: 207.16
- Socio-geographic groups: 44.17

- Geographical locations in the “promised land” world: 147. 18

- Number of separate travels between specific locations: over 400.19

- Original proper nouns: 170.20

- Distinct titles for the primary protagonist: over 100.21

- Chronological systems: 3.22

- Flashbacks and embedded storylines: 5.23

- Genealogies greater than twenty generations: 2.24

- Ecological references: 2,065.25
- Sermons: 63 comprising over 87,000 words.26
- Sermon topics: over 80.27

- Parallel poetic devices like chiasmus: over 400.28

- Bible intertextuality: at least 650 allusions and similar phraseology.29

- Subjects discussed with precision include biblical law, olive tree husbandry, and warfare tactics.30

An additional characteristic is that no full-sentence edits have been applied to the original dictation.31

Combining literary characteristics into the form of a question

Most of these Book of Mormon literary features are objective qualities found in the text of the book, although subjectivity is evident in some. These can be compiled into one question:

What skills would be needed to mentally create and dictate in three months without written notes a book with 269,320 words using about 5,600 unique words, including dozens of college-level vocabulary words, and reads at an eighth-grade level with the following characteristics: 77 storylines; 207 named characters; 44 socio-geographic groups; over 100 geographical locations in the imagined world; over 400 geographic movements by characters; over 170 original English proper nouns; over 100 distinct titles for the primary protagonist; three chronological systems; several lengthy flashbacks; two genealogies with greater than twenty generations; 100s of ecological references; at least 63 religious speeches comprising over 87,000 words discussing over 80 Christian themes; hundreds of parallel poetic devices like chiasmus; hundreds of intertextual King James Bible phrases; and discussing with precision subjects like biblical law, olive tree husbandry, and warfare tactics. Also, no full-sentence edits are afterward permitted.

This question was presented verbatim to the eleven AI chatbots through their the interfaces on their respective websites.32

Part Three: Compiling and Testing the
Most Commonly Predicted Skills

Ten of the chatbots seemed oblivious to the possibility that the question above described an actual historical event. Only LDSBot connected it to Joseph Smith, reporting: “The skills required to accomplish something like that would be pretty remarkable. From a Latter-day Saint perspective, Joseph Smith’s translation of the Book of Mormon is often seen as a remarkable accomplishment, attributed to divine inspiration.”33 Of the eleven responses, ChatGPT 4o provided the most comprehensive reply:

Creating and dictating such a complex book in three months, without written notes and without permitting full-sentence edits afterward, is a monumental task. It requires a combination of advanced skills and capabilities in various areas. Here’s a detailed list of the skills and attributes needed:

Cognitive and Memory Skills

- Exceptional Memory: Ability to retain vast amounts of detailed information about storylines, characters, locations, and other elements without written notes.

- Mental Organization: Organize the entire book structure, including intricate details, in your mind.

Advanced Language and Vocabulary Skills

- Vocabulary Management: Use a diverse vocabulary of around 5,600 unique words, including advanced terms, while maintaining an eighth-grade reading level.

- Language Simplification: Simplify complex ideas and vocabulary to make them accessible to an eighth-grade audience.

- Precision and Clarity: Communicate ideas clearly and precisely, avoiding ambiguity.

Dictation Proficiency

- Clear Articulation: Speak clearly to ensure accurate transcription by dictation software.

- Consistent Pacing: Maintain a steady pace that balances speed with clarity and accuracy.

- Natural Speech Patterns: Dictate in a way that sounds natural and engaging, avoiding overly complex sentence structures.

Creative and Analytical Skills

- Creative Visualization: Vividly imagine scenes, characters, and settings to describe them in detail.

- Complex Plotting: Weave multiple storylines, character arcs, and flashbacks seamlessly into the narrative.

- Analytical Thinking: Ensure logical consistency and coherence in the story, characters’ actions, and plot developments.

Planning and Structuring

- Comprehensive Mental Outline: Develop a detailed mental outline of the book’s structure before starting.

- Story Structure Management: Ensure the book has a coherent structure with a clear beginning, middle, and end.

- Chronological Management: Handle multiple chronological systems and flashbacks with precision.

Concentration and Focus

- Sustained Focus: Maintain deep concentration for extended periods to dictate large volumes of text.

- Distraction Management: Minimize distractions and maintain mental clarity during dictation sessions.

Self-Discipline and Motivation

- Daily Commitment: Dictate consistently every day to meet the word count goal (approximately 2,993 words per day).

- Resilience: Stay motivated and push through any mental fatigue or writer’s block.

Time and Stress Management

- Effective Scheduling: Allocate specific times each day for dictation to ensure consistent progress.

- Stress Reduction Techniques: Use techniques to manage stress and prevent burnout.

Technological Proficiency

- Dictation Software: Use high-quality dictation software that can accurately transcribe your speech.

- Error Handling: Quickly correct minor transcription errors during the process to maintain the flow of dictation.

Specific Subject Matter Expertise

- Biblical Knowledge: Deep understanding of biblical law, themes, and the ability to integrate King James Bible phrases.

- Specialized Knowledge: Expertise in subjects like olive tree husbandry and warfare tactics.

- Ecological Understanding: Familiarity with a wide range of ecological references relevant to the story.

Literary and Rhetorical Skills

- Poetic Devices: Ability to use parallel poetic devices like chiasmus effectively.

- Intertextuality: Integrate intertextual references to the King James Bible seamlessly.

- Speech Writing: Craft compelling religious speeches that discuss Christian themes with depth and clarity.

Organizational and Tracking Skills

- Character Management: Keep track of 207 named characters, their movements, and interactions.

- Geographic Awareness: Manage over 100 geographical locations and over 400 geographic movements by characters.

- Proper Nouns and Titles: Remember and consistently use over 170 original English proper nouns and 100 distinct titles for the primary protagonist.

- Genealogical Tracking: Maintain accuracy in genealogies spanning over twenty generations.

Religious and Thematic Integration

- Thematic Consistency: Integrate and discuss over 80 Christian themes with precision.

- Religious Discourse: Compose and deliver lengthy religious speeches that are coherent and impactful.

Environmental and Support Systems

- Conducive Environment: Create a quiet, distraction-free environment for dictation.

- Support Network: Engage with a support network for encouragement and feedback, if possible.

Problem-Solving Skills

- On-the-Fly Editing: Make immediate minor adjustments to ensure the overall quality and coherence of the dictated content.

- Adaptability: Quickly adapt to any issues that arise during the dictation process.

By mastering these skills and maintaining a disciplined approach, you can tackle the daunting task of creating and dictating such a complex and detailed book within the specified constraints.

Summarizing chatbot responses

Table 1 summarizes the fifteen most commonly mentioned skills across the chatbot responses.34

Table 1. Summary of the most popular skills identified by eleven AI chatbots.

AI-identified skills needed to dictate a book with characteristics of the Book of Mormon

Bree AI

Chat GPT 4o

Claude

Copilot

Gemini

LDSBot

iAsk.AI

Meta AI

Perplexity

PI

POE

Attention to detail

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Biblical and religious knowledge

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Creativity-imagination

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Discipline-stamina

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Editing

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Memory

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Mental focus

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Organizational

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Religious composition

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Research-specialized knowledge

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Speaking—dictation

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Storytelling

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Time management

X

X

X

X

X

X

Vocabulary-language

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

World-building

X

X

X

X

X

X

The eleven chatbots identified dozens of additional major and minor skills, but the chart is representative of those most commonly reported.

Validating the list of skills—appealing to author-experts

As discussed above, AI predictions require independent validation from experts for their results to be considered correct. While less scientific, I corroborated the results through four exercises. For the first, I reasoned that such endorsement could be made by authors who have written long, complex books, even if not dictated. Over the past two decades, Three of the books I have authored have more than 200,000 words: Modern Polygamy and Mormon Fundamentalism: The Generations after the Manifesto (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2006) with 240,864 words; Joseph Smith’s Polygamy: History and Theology, 3 vols. (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2013), volume one with 274,402 words and volume two with 235,367 words. After carefully reviewing the list of fifteen skills and having read the Book of Mormon dozens of times, I concluded that all are needed, and the list is reasonably accurate.

William L. Davis’s Visions in a Seer Stone validates most of the list

A second validation comes unintentionally from William L. Davis’s 2020 book, Visions in a Seer Stone: Joseph Smith and the Making of the Book of Mormon. Davis is the only author to approach Joseph Smith’s production of the Book of Mormon by looking at it through the lens of skill sets. He also considers the Book of Mormon to be “the result of Smith’s individual creative efforts,” the result of Joseph’s natural intellect and abilities.35 Despite flaws in documentation and logic, Visions in a Seer Stone represents a milestone in Book of Mormon studies and hopefully a watershed moment in naturalistic treatments of its origin (see Appendix B).

The skills-based approach in Visions in a Seer Stone focuses primarily on one specific oratorical ability. Called “laying down heads,”36 Davis portrays how the ability enabled Joseph Smith to dictate the Book of Mormon.37 “Laying down heads” is composed of three skills linked together. First is the ability to compose summary headings (of the material to be recited) and to organize them into outlines; second is to memorize and recall the outlines in real time; and third is to speak extemporaneously to fill in the outlines with pre-memorized or spontaneously-invented narrative details. The word “outline” is mentioned over 300 times in Visions in a Seer Stone and is a primary theme in the theory Davis presents.38

Throughout its pages, Visions in a Seer Stone depicts Joseph Smith exhibiting more than the three skills needed to lay down heads. Most of these abilities are not directly discussed or highlighted. Instead, they show up when needed, generally without exploring how he might have learned or acquired them. In all, twelve of the fifteen skills identified by AI chatbots are attributed by Davis to Joseph (directly or indirectly) as he dictates the Book of Mormon, as demonstrated in table 2.

Table 2. AI-identified skills and the page numbers in Visions in a Seer Stone where it is asserted that Joseph demonstrated those skills.

AI-identified skills needed to dictate a book with characteristics of the Book of Mormon

Was the skill attributed to Joseph Smith in Visions in a Seer Stone?

Page numbers depicting Joseph Smith needing or demonstrating the skill

Attention to detail

Yes

105, 122, 146, 150, 155, 156, etc.

Bible and theology

Yes

3, 7, 108, 110, 113, 125, 178, etc.

Creativity-imagination

Yes

xi, 58, 61, 90, 108, 158, 162, etc.

Discipline-stamina

Not mentioned

-

Editing

Yes

2, 135, 143, 163, 190, 224, etc.

Memory

Yes

23, 24, 34, 46, 51, 80, 138, 143, etc.

Mental focus

Not mentioned

-

Organizational

Yes

16, 17, 80, 86, 105, 121, 131, 140, etc.

Religious composition

Yes

8, 17, 22, 25, 81, 90, 117, 120, etc.

Research-specialized knowledge

Yes

44, 48, 57, 173, etc.

Speaking—dictation

Yes

4, 36–38, 49, 105, 110–16, etc.

Storytelling

Yes

vii, 3, 4, 87, 127, 158, 168, 193, etc.

Time management

Yes

49, 58, 61, 163–65, 190, 192, etc.

Vocabulary-language

Yes

x, 113, 133, 163, 92, 168, 175, etc.

World-building

Not mentioned

-

By describing Joseph Smith employing twelve of these fifteen skills during the dictation, Visions in a Seer Stone indirectly corroborates the necessity of the AI-generated skills list.

Additional validation of the fifteen skills

A third validation is implied by consulting books written by experts on composition, creative writing, and oratory.39 These fifteen skills are repeatedly discussed in the respective books and referenced in their indexes, which illustrate that the list seems highly defensible from a literary standpoint.

The final observation involves how critics of any specific skill would need to successfully argue it was nonessential. They would need to explain how a long, complex, and literarily refined first draft narrative could be mentally created and dictated by an author lacking that particular skill. It appears such reasoning would be unsuccessful since all the skills can be rationally defended as at least contributory. Alternatively, skeptics could provide a reliable historical account describing how an author has duplicated this process using their intellect but without employing that particular skill.40

Part Four: Comparing to Joseph Smith’s
Documentable Skills

The final portion of this paper compares the fifteen AI chatbot skills to Joseph Smith’s 1829 documentable skills.41 Due to limitations in the documentary record, some skills are evaluated together in the sections below.

Attention to detail, discipline and stamina, mental focus, organizational, and time management skills

Unfortunately, most accounts describing Joseph Smith before age twenty-three do not directly address his attention to detail, personal discipline and stamina, mental focusing capability, organizing ability, or time management skills. However, historical references to his general ambition and resourcefulness in the 1820s reveal a common theme of alleged laziness.42 Neighbor Christopher M. Stafford related in 1885: “Jo was the laziest one of the family.”43 Pomeroy Tucker wrote:

The larger proportion of the time of the Smiths, however, was spent in hunting and fishing, trapping muskrats (“mushrats” was the word they used), digging out woodchucks from their holes, and idly lounging around the stores and shops in the village. Joseph generally took the leading direction of the rural enterprises mentioned, instead of going to school like other boys—though he was seldom known personally to participate in the practical work involved in these or any other pursuits.44

Another writer, Orsamus Turner, also used the terms “lounging” and “idle” to describe Joseph, but he admitted, “Joseph had a little ambition; and some very laudable aspirations.”45 Neighbor Orlando Saunders remembered Joseph “was a good worker.”46

In 1831, James Gordon Bennett toured upstate New York with Martin Van Buren (the future United States President) and Nathaniel S. Benton.47 Bennett did not personally meet Joseph Smith during that visit but soon after, published the rumors he heard:

Young Joe, who afterwards figured so largely in the Mormon religion, was at that period a careless, indolent, idle, and shiftless fellow. He hung round the villages and strolled round the taverns without any end or aim—without any positive defect or as little merit in his character. He was rather a stout able bodied fellow, and might have made a good living in such a country as this where any one who is willing to work, can soon get on in the world. He was however, the son of a speculative Yankee pedlar, and was brought up to live by his wits.48

Bennett, then a freelance newspaper writer, had little to gain by misrepresenting the gossip he encountered; neither was he apparently worried about its accuracy. Whether true or not, this glimpse into the general tales describing Joseph Smith in 1831 supports that he was not then known as energetic or enterprising. If he had been training in the years before 1829 to acquire the skills needed to dictate a long book, he evidently was successful at keeping his efforts secret from the general neighborhood.

Bible and theology skills

Conflicting historical accounts from Joseph Smith’s contemporaries describe his early familiarity with the Bible. John Stafford, who grew up with the Smiths in Manchester, recalled that the Smith family “studied the Bible” in their home school.49 Similarly, an unidentified Western New Yorker told William Kelley in 1881: “they [the Smith family] had school at their house and studied their Bible.”50

In 1882, Stephen S. Harding wrote to Thomas Gregg saying Joseph “was familiar with the Scriptures, and never tired of reading the miracles in the Old Testament and in the New.”51 A. W. Cowles recalled: “He [Joseph Smith] read the Bible, especially its historical narratives and prophecies.52 Pomeroy Tucker provided this description:

As he [Joseph Smith] further advanced in reading and knowledge, he assumed a spiritual or religious turn of mind, and frequently perused the Bible, becoming quite familiar with portions thereof, both of the Old and New Testaments; selected texts from which he quoted and discussed with great assurance when in the presence of his superstitious acquaintances. The Prophecies and Revelations were his special forte. His interpretations of scriptural passages were always original and unique, and his deductions and conclusions often disgustingly blasphemous, according to the common apprehensions of Christian people.53

Tucker added: “The final conclusion announced by him [Joseph Smith] was, that . . . the Bible [was] a fable.”54 In contrast, Joseph taught that the Bible was “the word of God as far as it is translated correctly” (Article of Faith 8). So, it is unclear whether Tucker based his report upon firsthand recollections or possibly derived it from the Book of Mormon’s criticism of the Bible.55 In contrast, Orson Pratt, who first met Joseph Smith in 1830, summarized:

This young man was not learned, like those educated in colleges and theological institutions; indeed, he was a farmer’s boy, unacquainted with the arguments, and the tenets, and the creeds, and the institutions of religion that existed around him . . . a young man not versed in the Scriptures any more than most of the common lads of that age. And we all know that there are but a very few among farmers that have the opportunity of informing their minds at so early a period—at the age of twenty-one, in regard to the doctrines and prophecies contained in the Scripture.56

Additional accounts from eyewitnesses corroborate Joseph Smith’s limited biblical knowledge. Lucy Mack Smith quoted a youthful Joseph saying: “I can take my Bible, and go into the woods and learn more in two hours than you can learn at meetings in two years, if you should go all the time.”57 But she also noted that by 1823 Joseph had “never read the Bible through in his life.”58 Similarly, David Whitmer remembered that “Smith was ignorant of the Bible” at the time of translation of the Book of Mormon.59 Emma Smith told Edmund C. Briggs in 1856 that Joseph “had such a limited knowledge of history at that time that he did not even know that Jerusalem was surrounded by walls.”60 Years later, in 1877, Emma repeated the story to Nels Madsen and Parley P. Pratt Jr.: “He had not read the Bible enough to know that there were walls around Jerusalem.”61

Joseph’s not knowing of the walls around Jerusalem is often repeated as evidence of his ignorance of the Bible. However, he described several times how he “searched the scriptures” as a youth.62 He remembered how, after reading James 1:5, he retired to a grove of trees to pray vocally in 1820. Accounts depicting Joseph Smith as ignorant of the Bible are undoubtedly in error. However, it is also clear his familiarity was limited, and few verses, if any, had been committed to memory by 1829.

Composition, editing, vocabulary, and language

Unfortunately, Joseph Smith wrote very little before dictating the Book of Mormon; if he if he had written even moderately, virtually none of his handwritten communications survived. This reality makes evaluating his composition, editing, and language skills by reviewing his 1820s literary works impossible.

Nonetheless, multiple eyewitnesses left relevant historical observations. In an 1842 account, Orson Hyde observed: “He could read tolerably well, but he wrote very poorly, and had but little knowledge of rhetoric.”63 David Whitmer described Joseph Smith as “quite illiterate, knew nothing of grammar or composition.”64 He was “little versed in Biblical lore, was ofttimes compelled to spell the words out, not knowing the correct pronunciation.”65 In 1884, Martin Harris recalled: “I was Joseph Smith’s scribe, and wrote for him a great deal; for he was such a poor writer, and could not even draw up a note of hand as his education was so limited.”66 John H. Gilbert recalled the Book of Mormon manuscript “was not punctuated at all,” declaring: “They [Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery] did not know anything about punctuation.”67

In an 1875 account, Joseph’s brother, William, specifically addressed Joseph’s writing abilities in the 1820s:

It is to be remembered that Joseph Smith was only 17 years of age [in 1823] when he first first began his profesional career in the Minestrey. That he was illitterate to some extent is admitted but that he was enterly [entirely] unlettered is a mistake. In Sintax, orthography Mathamatics grammar geography with other studies in the Common Schools of his day he was no novis and for writing he wrote a plain intelegable hand.68

William refers to Joseph as “no novis,” regarding syntax (sentence formation), orthography (spelling), mathematics, grammar, and geography. Yet he also states that Joseph was then “illiterate to some extent,” suggesting his progress was limited. Orson Pratt agreed:

His education was limited to a slight acquaintance with two or three of the common branches of learning. He could read without much difficulty, and write a very imperfect hand; and had a very limited understanding of the ground rules of arithmetic. These were his highest and only attainments; while the rest of those branches, so universally taught in the common schools throughout the United States, were entirely unknown to him.69

Memory and recall

Assessing Joseph Smith’s 1829 memory and recall ability is difficult due to a lack of specific evidence. No eyewitness statements describe him possessing extraordinary recall or a photographic or eidetic memory. Likewise, through thousands of pages of their publications, biographers Fawn Brodie, Richard Bushman, George Q. Cannon, G. Homer Durham, Donna Hill, Preston Nibley, Lucy Mack Smith, Edward W. Tullidge, Dan Vogel, and John A. Widtsoe describe many of his personal qualities.70 Yet, none portray him as possessing a phenomenal memory. Equally, none of the transcripts published in Dan Vogel’s five-volume series Early Mormon Documents describe Joseph Smith as having an extraordinary ability to memorize and remember. Neither did Joseph Smith’s brother-in-law, Michael Morse, describe him as capable of producing the Book of Mormon using his memory and other cognitive skills.71

Joseph Smith’s attempt to learn Hebrew in Kirtland, Ohio, in 1836 demonstrated his memory and recall skills seven years after dictating the Book of Mormon. Professors Elvira V. Masoura and Susan E. Gathercole observe: “Research has revealed a close link between language acquisition and the capacity of the verbal component of working memory.”72 After attending the Hebrew classes taught by Joshua Seixas, Joseph learned to translate Hebrew into English satisfactorily but without becoming proficient.73 In contrast, Orson Pratt mastered the language enough to be certified as a teacher.74 Pratt bested him on that occasion, indicating an upward limit to Joseph Smith’s memory capacity. Overall, his youthful memory abilities seemed at least average, but not prodigious.

Research and specialized knowledge

Most available data support the idea that Joseph Smith possessed a limited understanding of the world beyond his immediate surroundings in 1829. He may have read his father’s newspapers, which would have expanded his views. Orsamus Turner remembered: “Once a week he [Joseph Jr.] would stroll into the office of the old Palmyra Register, for his father’s paper.”75 The Palmyra Register was published between 1817 and 1821, indicating that Joseph would have been between eleven and fourteen. William E. McLellin described Joseph Smith’s knowledge of science in 1834:

I was personally and intimately acquainted with Joseph Smith <the man who read off the> the translation of the book, for five years near the beginning of his ministry. He attended my High school during - <the winter> of 1834. He attended my school and learned science all winter. . . . When I took him into my school, he was without scientific knowledge or attainments.76

After hearing Joseph Smith speak in 1844, Josiah Quincy reported that Smith’s “comments, though rambling and disconnected, were delivered with the fluency and fervor of a camp-meeting orator.” And, “he talked as from a strong mind utterly unenlightened by the teachings of history.”77

During the months and years immediately after the 1830 publication of the Book of Mormon, critics sought plausible explanations for the source of its words to counter Joseph Smith’s claims of divine inspiration. However, among their accusations, no acquaintances remembered him writing or hiding a manuscript. None of the local storekeepers described him (or an accomplice) buying ink and paper in quantities not inconsistent with letter-writing or penmanship practice. No recollections from his contemporaries mention him visiting libraries or bookstores to read, borrow, or buy their books. Even ambiguous recollections of 1820–1829 might have been spun into evidence of Joseph’s fabrication of the words. Yet, little or no supportive historical data has been found.78 In addition, other documentable activities likely competed for his time and resources, like farming, clearing land, treasure-seeking expeditions, maple sugar production, schooling, and day-labor employment.79

Creativity, imagination, and world-building skills

Among the skills needed to replicate Joseph Smith’s dictation of the Book of Mormon, AI chatbots repeatedly refer to creativity, imagination, and world-building. In her recollections, Lucy Mack Smith, Joseph’s mother, recounted the family recitals that he delivered around 1823 when he was in his seventeenth year:

During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of travelling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life with them.80

If Joseph’s stories originated in his imagination, this recollection could be evidence of his creativity and an effort to hone rhetorical skills as a youth. That scenario does not fit recollections from Joseph’s younger brother, William, who witnessed those recitals:

Knowing that he [Joseph Smith] was very young, that he had not enjoyed the advantages of a common education; and knowing too, his whole character and disposition, they were convinced that he was totally incapable of arising before his aged parents, his brothers and sisters, and so solemnly giving utterance to anything but the truth.81

William also described how Joseph was incapable of authoring a “historey of a once enlightned people, their rise their progress, their origin, and their final over throw that once in habited this american Continent.”82

Lucy Mack Smith also reported that the details he related in those family gatherings, including references to “the ancient inhabitants of this continent,” originated with the angel Moroni.83 Concerning Lucy’s account, H. Donl Peterson notes: “From Mother Smith’s report we can see that the visions that accompanied Moroni’s instructions were vivid.”84 It is also possible that Lucy’s memory faltered when recalling some details. Jeff Lindsay points out that the Book of Mormon
has no descriptions of people riding animals in over 500 pages that include several major migrations and 100 distinct wars. It provides no notably detailed descriptions of clothing (other than armor) and no detailed descriptions of the structure of later buildings. The most detail we get involves descriptions of fortifications with palisaded walls and ditches.85

Speaking, dictation, and storytelling

The historical record describes Joseph Smith’s involvement in a few oratory activities n the 1820s. In 1893, Daniel Hendrix recalled that Joseph Smith “was a good talker and would have made a fine stump-speaker if he had had the training.”86 According to several sources, Smith attended Methodist meetings but never joined the church. Pomeroy Tucker wrote:

Protracted revival meetings were customary in some of the churches, and Smith frequented those of different denominations, sometimes professing to participate in their devotional exercises. At one time he joined the probationary class of the Methodist church in Palmyra, and made some active demonstrations of engagedness, though his assumed convictions were insufficiently grounded or abiding to carry him along to the saving point of conversion, and he soon withdrew from the class. 87

In 1851, Orsamus Turner recalled that Joseph Smith “was a very passable exhorter” at Methodist camp gatherings.88 Joseph’s informal involvement with the Methodists may have lasted only a few months, from the fall of 1824 to the winter of 1825.89 As a nonmember participant who spoke impromptu during Methodist meetings, he would have received little or no formal rhetorical training compared to that available to exhorters with complete membership.90 Turner also reported:

Joseph had a little ambition; and some very laudable aspirations; the mother’s intellect occasionally shone out in him feebly, especially when he used to help us solve some portentous questions of moral or political ethics, in our juvenile debating club, which we moved down to the old red school house on Durfee street.91

Here, Turner described Smith as a capable debater but attributes the skill to his “mother’s intellect” when it “shone out in him feebly.” Overall, he seemed less impressed with the youthful Joseph: “He was lounging, idle; (not to say vicious,) and possessed of less than ordinary intellect. The author’s own recollections of him are distinct ones.” 92

Richard Bushman observed that Joseph Smith “is not known to have preached a single sermon before organizing the church in 1830.”93 He had no reputation as a preacher. James Gordon Bennett recorded that Joseph Smith’s father was a “grand story teller,” but wrote nothing similar concerning the younger Joseph.94

Other references to Joseph Smith’s oratory skills before and after the Book of Mormon dictation are varied. Jared Carter remembered him in the early 1830s as “not naturally talented for a speaker.”95 An unidentified critic from Henrietta, New York, described him in 1834: “His manner is ungainly, his diction coarse, and his delivery slow and labored. There is nothing in his appearance or language to excite much attention.”96

Peter H. Burnett, who had served as Joseph Smith’s lawyer in Missouri and later governor of California, recalled:

His appearance was not prepossessing, and his conversational powers were but ordinary. You could see at a glance that his education was very limited. He was an awkward but vehement speaker. In conversation he was slow, and used too many words to express his ideas, and would not generally go directly to a point.97

In 1886, Sarah Pratt recalled:

Joseph did not talk much in society, his talk was not very fluent. He used to make a remark now and then, letting the others talk. Whenever he spoke of Church affairs, his talk grew intelligent. He had no great choice of words, and generally expressed his ideas in a very humble, common-place way. . . . Joseph was no orator. He said what he wanted to say in a very blundering sort of way.98

This review of Joseph Smith’s documentable skills should not be interpreted as evidence he was dumb or cognitively challenged. Joseph was intelligent, but this data show that in 1829, he was not proficient in any of the aptitudes AI chatbots predicted would be needed to dictate the Book of Mormon using only an author’s intellect.

AI fail: Inability to document Joseph Smith possessed the fifteen skills

Although the fifteen skills identified by AI appear to be reasonable and valid, historical accounts indicate Joseph Smith did not possess them in 1829. These observations indicate that Artificial Intelligence has failed in this application. However, the reasons for failure are not empirically obvious.

Identifying Two Historically Defensible Lists
of Joseph Smith’s 1829 Skills

Two contradictory but historically defensible lists of Joseph Smith’s 1829 skills emerge from the discussion above.

Joseph Smith dictated the words therefore he possessed the skills

Multiple eyewitness accounts describe how Joseph Smith spoke all 269,320 words of the 1830 Book of Mormon. Employing this fact and the Latin phrase res ipsa loquitur, which means: “The thing speaks for itself,” logical reasoning supports he did it; therefore, he had the skills.

Fawn Brodie employed this approach: “There is no doubt . . . that Joseph had developed a remarkable facility for dictation. The speed was not ‘far beyond his natural ability;’ it was evidence of his ability.”99 Robert M. Bowman Jr. agreed: “As a matter of historical inquiry, the proper question to ask is not how Joseph Smith could have written the Book of Mormon but rather whether the evidence shows that he did so.”100 This approach circumvents the need to dive further into the historical record, substituting deductive argument for documentation. Accordingly, answering “What skills were needed?” simultaneously answers “What skills did Joseph Smith possess in 1829?”

Eyewitness statements declare Joseph Smith did not have the skills

A second list of Joseph Smith’s 1829 skills is derived from eyewitness accounts describing his capabilities at the time of the dictation of the Book of Mormon. As shown above, this approach fails to historically document any of the skills selected by the AI modules to any significant degree. This database of eyewitness statements also acknowledges that no one who knew Joseph personally attributed the words of the Book of Mormon to his abilities or intellect then or anytime thereafter.

Dealing with the two contradictory approaches

Latter-day Saint believers have capitalized on the disconnect between the predicted essential skills and the documentable ones. Hugh B. Brown included these observations in a talk titled “The Profile of a Prophet” in 1955.101 Hugh Nibley expanded on the idea with his 1960s “Book of Mormon Challenge.”102 Other authors have followed this lead in book-length manuscripts.103 However, these discussions included highly devotional content and were easily dismissed by secular scholars examining the origin of the Book of Mormon.

As the dialogue moves forward regarding Joseph Smith’s ability to dictate all 269,320 words, contextualizing it to the skills needed or exhibited, provides essential nuance. If accurate, the fifteen skills identified by the AI chatbots could be helpful. They more precisely define the discrepancies between the skills he should have possessed versus those skills eyewitnesses attributed to him.

Summary

AI chatbots can produce data as a starting point for task-skills inquiries, but experts must validate such results. When AI chatbots are asked specifically about the skills needed to dictate a book like the Book of Mormon, a generalized list of fifteen skills is generated. According to several criteria, that list accurately predicts the composition and oratory skills an author would need. However, the historical record fails to corroborate that Joseph Smith possessed them in 1829, suggesting a need for additional research. As Robert N. Hullinger observes: “Even if one believes that Joseph Smith was at best a scoundrel, one still must account for the Book of Mormon.”104 Possibly, the greatest usefulness of the AI responses is that they provide a new tool to assist investigators in evaluating how Joseph Smith produced all the words.

Appendix A:
College-Level Vocabulary Words Missing from the Bible

The Book of Mormon includes dozens of vocabulary words not found in the Bible but rated at a college-level difficulty by modern standards.105 Table 3 lists sophisticated words used in the Book of Mormon but absent from the KJV Bible and seldom found in other popular books of the day.106 Word difficulty is scaled from 1 (low) to 10 (high). The abbreviation “n/a” signifies no data available.

Table 3. Comparison of occurrences of sophisticated words used in the
Book of Mormon, Bible, and selected 1820s books.

Words found in the Book of Mormon

Difficulty

Book of Mormon

KJV Bible

English Reader

A History of the United States of America

Gospel Sonnets or Spiritual Songs

The Late War

First Book of Napoleon

Arabian Nights Entertainments, vol. 1

arraigned

10

1

0

0

2

0

0

0

0

derangement

10

1

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

ignominious

10

1

0

1

0

0

0

3

2

scantiness

10

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

breastwork

10

3

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

priestcraft

10

4

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

abridgment

10

5

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

cimeter [scimitar]

10

11

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

indolent

9

1

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

insensibility

9

1

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

interposition

9

1

0

0

3

0

0

0

0

typifying

9

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

condescension

9

3

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

stratagem

9

7

0

0

2

0

0

0

2

depravity

8

1

0

1

0

0

0

2

0

discernible

8

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

enumerated

8

1

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

frenzied

8

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

impenetrable

8

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

iniquitous

8

1

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

repugnant

8

1

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

serviceable

8

1

0

0

0

1

0

0

0

abhorrence

8

2

0

2

2

0

0

0

0

nothingness

8

3

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

flaxen

7

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

embassy

5

3

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

probationary

5

4

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

hinderment

n/a

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

overbearance

n/a

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

consignation

n/a

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

unwearyingness

n/a

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

An additional sixty-nine words occur only once in the Book of Mormon and are not found in the KJV Bible (with vocabulary difficulty score in parentheses):107
aggravating (7), appellation (9), apprised (9), astonishing (6), awkwardness (9), baseness (10), beggars (8), beguile (10), bliss (6), brazen (8), captivation (9), censured (8), coarseness (10), confounding (8), consecrating (9), consign (9), deformed (7), disowned (9), dispelled (8), dissenter (10), divulge (7), dormant (6), droop (9), earnestness (6), enact (6), engulf (9), exert  (6), exhausting (7), exult (9), faction (6), frailties (9), garb (7), glimmer (7), havoc (6), incomprehensible (7), indolence (10), inexpressible (10), infancy (6), infirm (8), infused (8), insensibility (9), insurrections (8), intrigues (7), lonesome (8), massacre (6), misunderstand (8), monarchy (6), observance (6), perversion (8), pester (9), plunged (6), precarious (7), recollection (7), redoubled (9), relinquished (7), reluctance (6), reunite (8), scoffing (9), slackened (10), sprouted (8), stupor (9), subsistence (6), trifle (8), triumphant (7), tyrant (7), undaunted (9), unsteadiness (10), victorious (7), and wilfulness (10).

Similarly, the twenty-seven words below are used only once in the Book of Mormon and three times or less in the 783,137-word KJV Bible (vocabulary difficulty in parentheses):

austere (8), avenging (8), babblings (8), banished (8), barbarous (9), barbarous (9), canker (9), conquerors (9), daunted (10), extolled (9), fain (9), foretold (9), garners (7), gnash (10), grudgingly (9), moisture (4), nurture (6), overshadow (9), overspread (10), orphans (6), providence (7), solemnity (9), tarrying (9), thicket (9), weariness (8), zealously (8), and wrestle (7).

Words appearing even once require the same vocabulary training and skill as words used dozens of times. “Both practice and repeated encounters with words seem to be important for the acquisition of vocabulary,” observe Elfrieda H. Hiebert and Michael L. Kamil in their book, Teaching and Learning Vocabulary. 108

Appendix B:
Documentary Evidence and Visions in a Seer Stone

In his book Visions in a Seer Stone, William L. Davis introduces a theory that attributes remarkable sermon-composition skills to Joseph Smith in 1829. It describes those abilities as emanating from his natural intellect but does not entirely discount the possibility of divine assistance.109

Joseph Smith’s alleged 1829 skill of “laying down heads”

William L. Davis asserts that in 1829 Joseph Smith possessed a highly developed skill of “laying down heads,” or the ability to create, memorize, recall, and spontaneously expand (vocally) outlines of the content to be communicated. However, the supportive evidence for this claim is sparse and problematic.

The primary corroborating documentation presented in Visions in a Seer Stone is Joseph’s 1832 History.110 Davis reports: “Smith’s 1832 history begins with an opening paragraph that provides the reader with a sketch outline of the historical events that Smith wished to emphasize in his narrative.”111 Davis further explains:

Smith’s method of using a preliminary outline, or, as more commonly termed, a “skeleton” of “heads” (an outline formed with key summarizing phrases) to organize and arrange his 1832 historical narrative, was a standard technique of composition in the early nineteenth century. The explicit use of the skeletal sketch in the opening of the history, marking each stage in the sequence of the narrative with a summarizing phrase, provides one of several expressions of the method commonly known as “laying down heads.”112

Davis refers to the 1832 History more than forty times in Visions in a Seer Stone as evidence of Joseph Smith’s proficiency in laying down heads.113 Additionally, the 1832 History is portrayed as an example of the technique and a manifestation of Joseph’s “personal method and style of composition.”114

Examining Joseph Smith’s 1832 History

Nine subjects or “headings” can be identified in the 173-word opening paragraph of Joseph Smith’s 1832 History (in bold brackets):

[1] A History of the life of Joseph Smith Jr. [2] an account of his marvilous experience and [3] of all the mighty acts which he doeth in the name of Jesus Ch[r]ist the son of the living God of whom he beareth record and also [4] an account of the rise of the church of Christ in the eve of time according as the Lord brought forth and established by his hand [5] <firstly> he receiving the testamony from on high [6] seccondly the ministering of Angels [7] thirdly the reception of the holy Priesthood by the ministring of—Aangels to adminster the letter of the Law <Gospel—> <—the Law and commandments as they were given unto him—> and in <the> ordinencs, [8] forthly a confirmation and reception of the high Priesthood after the holy order of the son of the living God power and ordinence from on high to preach the Gospel in the administration and [9] demonstration of the spirit the Kees of the Kingdom of God confered upon him and the continuation of the blessings of God to him &c——

However, the nine outlined topics do not correlate well with the subjects covered in the ensuing 1,882-word account (see figure 1).

For the “laid down” headings in the opening skeleton outline to be helpful to the speaker, they must be appropriately sequenced and sufficiently specific to guide the ensuing speech. This does not occur in this example. For example, several headings are not covered: “an account of the rise of the church . . .,” “thirdly . . .,” “fourthly . . .,” and “demonstrations of . . . .” Some of these hanging headings could result from Joseph Smith’s inability to complete the manuscript as he originally intended.

However, a more significant disconnect becomes apparent as multiple topics in the remaining narrative are not predicted in the first paragraph, including his Bible learning and religious struggles, the aftermath of the First Vision and his transgressions, his marriage and move to Harmony, Martin Harris’s journey to New York, or Oliver Cowdery’s arrival. These mini-storylines comprise nearly half the remaining account but are not forecasted in any specific way in the outline headings. The order of presentation also reflects inconsistencies.

Figure 1. Diagram showing that the first paragraph outline (left) contains nine headings that correspond poorly to the headings of topics discussed in the remaining 1,882-word history (right). Items in gray are not addressed.

Handwriting analysis shows that Joseph Smith wrote 1,013 words of the 1832 History and dictated the other 1,043 words to his scribe, Frederick G. Williams, who wrote most of the first paragraph.115 The divergences between the outline paragraph and the ensuing content raise the question of why Joseph didn’t simply follow the written outline by referring back to it. It appears that strictly following the original outline was not his intent.

These observations demonstrate that Joseph Smith’s 1832 History does not corroborate Davis’s assertions that Joseph possessed expertise in laying down heads in 1829. Instead, the opening paragraph and subsequent narration contradict that conclusion, supporting he was either unfamiliar or inexperienced with that preaching style.

Supplementary evidence from late problematic sources

To bolster his theory, Davis also discusses two Nauvoo-era discourses. The importance of the fourteen and fifteen-year gaps between the evidence and the event it seeks to corroborate is minimized (see figure 2). Additional problems stem from the fact that the discourses were not recorded verbatim. Hence, the notes recorded reflect the style of the listener in each instance.

Figure 2. Visions in a Seer Stone seeks to document Joseph Smith’s 1829 skills from a very small sampling, all from years afterward. Multiple additional problems can be identified (see discussion in text).

Visions in a Seer Stone draws detailed conclusions regarding Joseph Smith’s 1829 skills from very small narrative samples. It also assumes that the skills existed retroactively and fails to address the possibility that they may have been learned after 1829.

It could be argued that the notes from listeners to Joseph Smith’s discourses over a decade after dictating the Book of Mormon have minimal direct application to his 1829 abilities. He demonstrably learned new skills in the interim.

Undocumented skills in Visions in a Seer Stone

As noted in this paper, Visions in a Seer Stone also portrays Joseph Smith exhibiting many of the other skills listed by the AI chatbots. However, Davis presents little or no historical documentation to verify Joseph acquired them before 1829. Instead, by assuming the Book of Mormon flowed from Joseph Smith’s intellect, Davis repeatedly uses its content as evidence of Smith’s 1829 skillset. The resulting conclusions are based on circular logic and are less convincing. A second approach assumes that Joseph picked up skills through environmental influences without documenting that he did. Table 4 summarizes the assumed skills.

Table 4. Sources of evidence presented in Visions in a Seer Stone to document Joseph Smith’s assumed 1829 skills. High correlation is ++++.

AI-generated list of skills needed to dictate a book with characteristics of the Book of Mormon

Source of evidence cited in Visions in a Seer Stone

Assumptions based on Book of Mormon text

Assumptions based on environmental influences

Historical accounts of Joseph Smith’s 1829 abilities

Attention to detail

++++

++

+

Bible and theology

++

++++

+

Creativity-imagination

++++

+

-

Discipline-stamina

-

-

-

Editing

+++

+

-

Memory

++++

++++

-

Mental focus

-

+

-

Organizational

++++

++

-

Religious composition

+++

++++

-

Research-specialized knowledge

+++

+++

-

Speaking—dictation

+++

++++

+

Storytelling

+++

++++

+

Time management

-

-

-

Vocabulary-language

++++

++++

-

World-building

-

-

-

Summary

Visions in a Seer Stone is a significant contribution to Book of Mormon studies because it approaches Joseph Smith’s 1829 dictation in terms of the literary skills he would have needed (and ostensibly possessed) to accomplish it. However, the primary evidence presented to support the skill discussed—“laying down heads”—is his 1832 History. It contains multiple disconnects between the headings outlined in the opening paragraph and those discussed in the remaining narrative. At best, it might represent a beginner’s attempt to harness the power of laying down heads, but shows little or no proficiency with the process. Visions in a Seer Stone also quotes observations on discourses delivered more than a decade afterward. But such provide minimal additional persuasiveness.

Lastly, Visions in a Seer Stone portrays Joseph Smith exhibiting at least twelve AI-generated skills during the dictation, even though it does not openly acknowledge that such skills would have been needed. In so doing, it tacitly validates those chatbot responses. Most of these additional abilities are not corroborated historically. Instead, assumptions based on textual observations and environmental influences consistently substitute for documented evidence of Joseph Smith’s 1829 skills.

Brian C. Hales is a retired anesthesiologist who has published extensively on Joseph Smith and plural marriage. His more recent studies involve the origin of the Book of Mormon. He is hopeful his book manuscript, “Authoring the Book of Mormon: Investigating Joseph Smith’s 1829 Skills,” will be published in 2025.

1 . See John W. Welch, ed., “Documenting the Translation Chronology,” in Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations 1820–1844 (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2005), 119–213. See also Larry E. Morris, A Documentary History of the Book of Mormon (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019); Brant A. Gardner, The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2011).

2 . The Joseph Smith Papers: Journals, Volume 1: 1832–1839, ed. Dean C. Jessee, Mark Ashurst-McGee, and Richard L. Jensen (Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2008), 89; Times and Seasons 3, no. 9 (1 March 1842): 707, contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/NCMP1820-1846/id/9801/rec/2; “History, 1838–1856 Vol. A–1 [23 December 1805–30 August 1834],” p. 31, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history
-1838-1856-volume-a-1-23-december-1805-30-august-1834/37.

3 . See Brian C. Hales, “Naturalistic Explanations of the Origin of the Book of Mormon: A Longitudinal Study,” BYU Studies Quarterly 58, no. 3 (2019), scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol58/iss3/5/; Brian C. Hales, “Automatic Writing and the Book of Mormon: An Update,” Dialogue 52, no. 2 (Summer 2019): 1–35, dialoguejournal.com/articles/automatic-writing-and-the-book-of-mormon
-an-update/; Brian C. Hales, “Visions, Mushrooms, Fungi, Cacti, and Toads: Joseph Smith’s Reported Use of Entheogens,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 38 (2020), journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/visions-mushrooms-fungi-cacti-and-toads-joseph-smiths-reported-use-of
-entheogens/.

4 . See William L. Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone: Joseph Smith and the Making of the Book of Mormon (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2020). For counterpoint, see Brian C. Hales, “Joseph Smith as a Book of Mormon Storyteller,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 46 (2021), journal.interpreterfoundation.org/joseph-smith-as-a-book-of-mormon
-storyteller/; Brian C. Hales, “Theories and Assumptions: A Review of William L. Davis’s Visions in a Seer Stone,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 39 (2020), journal.interpreterfoundation.org/theories-and
-assumptions-a-review-of-william-l-daviss-visions-in-a-seer-stone/; Gardner, Gift and Power, 320; “Richard Bushman—Reddit—Ask Me Anything,” MormonThink, 16 December 2013, mormonthink.com/glossary/richard-bushman
-ama.htm; and Robert A. Rees, “Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and the American Renaissance,” Dialogue 35, no. 3 (2002): 102, dialoguejournal.com
/articles/joseph-smith-the-book-of-mormon-and-the-american-renaissance/.

5 . Eran Shalev, “An American Book of Chronicles,” in Americanist Approaches to the The Book of Mormon, ed. Elizabeth Fenton and Jared Hickman (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019), 148.

6 . Richard S. Van Wagoner, Natural Born Seer: Joseph Smith American Prophet 1805–1830 (Salt Lake City: Smith-Pettit Foundation, 2016), 383–84.

7 . Fawn M. Brodie, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith, 2nd ed. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1971), ix, 62.

8 . Dan Vogel, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2004), xix, 120.

9 . The awkward wording scattered throughout the 1830 Book of Mormon may create the illusion that the text is not highly refined. Yet, multiple observations demonstrate that Joseph Smith’s first oral draft met virtually all of the goals of content editing, redrafting, and revising: intertwining 77 storylines with impressive continuity, mentioning 147 geographical locations over 670 times with only two mistakes, referencing 207 individuals 3,780 times, apparently misappropriating one or two names (Benjamin to Mosiah) but maintaining strict character identification accuracy, flawlessly portraying two genealogies extended beyond twenty generations, inserting hundreds of timestamps that comply precisely with textual chronological requirements, and interweaving hundreds of heading outlines, editorial promises, and internal prophecies that are precisely fulfilled later in the narrative.

10 . Microsoft Bree is an app with ten free inquiries and the required paid subscription. URLs for other chatbots on 19 July 2024 include: chatgpt.com; claude.ai/chat; copilot.microsoft.com; gemini.google.com/app; ldsbot.com/; iask.ai; meta.ai; pi.ai/discover; poe.com/Assistant; and perplexity.ai.

11 . See also Nick Sales, “I Asked Chat GPT To Write a Book Like the Book of Mormon,” Faith in Focus (YouTube Channel), youtube.com/watch?v=620
bnHwc7mQ.

12 . On 18 February 2019, Book of Mormon scholar Stanford Carmack wrote: “The 1830 first edition has 6,852 full stops in 269,318 words.” And later: “if we count the first instance of ‘me thought’ as two words (18, 41; the second is spelled as one word) and the second instance of ‘for/asmuch’ as two words (111, 32; no hyphen; the first is spelled as one word), then we get 269,320 words.” Stanford Carmack, comments on Brian C. Hales, “Curiously Unique: Joseph Smith as Author of the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 31 (2019), journal.interpreterfoundation
.org/comments-page/?id=21768.

13 . See Roger Terry, “The Book of Mormon Translation Puzzle,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 23, no. 1 (2014): 182, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms
/vol23/iss1/10/.

14 . See the results from submitting the Book of Mormon to reading difficulty algorithms in Brian C. Hales, “Curiously Unique: Joseph Smith as Author of the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 31 (2019): 153–56, 174–77.

15 . See James T. Duke, The Literary Masterpiece Called The Book of Mormon (Springville, UT: CFI, 2004), 10–15.

16 . See Robert J. Matthews, Who’s Who in the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1967). This number does not include names found in chapters resembling King James Bible content including those mentioned in Isaiah.

17 . The groups identified include: People of Akish, Amlicites (people of), Amalickiahites (people of), Amalekites, Ammonihahites (people of Ammonihah), Amulonites (people of Amulon), Anti-Nephi-Lehies (people of) or Ammonites (people of Ammon), people of Antiparah, people of Antipus, Christians or people of Jesus or people of Christ, people of the church, people of Coriantumr, Gadianton robbers (band of, robbers of), Gentiles, people of Gideon, people of Hagoth, Ishmaelites, people of the House of Israel, Jaredites (people of Jared), Jews, Jacobites, Josephites, King-men, Lamanites, people of (King) Lamoni, people of Lehi, people of Lehi, Lemuelites, people of liberty, people of (King) Limhi, people of Morianton, people of Moroni, people of Moronihah, people of Mosiah, Mulek (descendants), people of Nephihah, Nephites (people of Nephi), people of King Noah, order of the Nehors, people of Shiz, people of Zarahemla, people of Zeniff, people of Zemnarihah, and Zoramites.

18 . See John L. Sorenson, The Geography of Book of Mormon Events: A Source Book (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS], 1990), 217–326; Roger R. Keller, “Land and Lands,” in Book of Mormon Authors: Their Words and Messages (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU], 1996), 103–50, rsc.byu.edu
/book-mormon-authors-their-words-messages/land-lands.

19 . Sorenson, Geography of Book of Mormon Events, 217–326.

20 . Paul Y. Hoskisson, “Book of Mormon Names,” Encyclopedia of Mormonism (New York: Macmillan, 1992), 1:186, contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection
/EoM/id/5545/rec/1. Hoskisson lists 188 names as “unique.” A more conservative tally is 170.

21 . Susan Easton Black documents 101 different titles for Jesus Christ in 400 Questions and Answers about the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2011), 34–38; Earl M. Wunderli tabulates 138 different names in An Imperfect Book: What the Book of Mormon Tells Us About Itself (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2013), 329–33.

22 . See Scripture Central Staff, “Sequential Consistency,” Evidence #239, 20 September 2021, evidencecentral.org/evidence/sequential-consistency.

23 . Flashbacks to the primary storyline in Mosiah and Alma include Zeniff, Noah, Abinadi, and Limhi (Mosiah 9–22), Alma (the elder) and the Waters of Mormon (Mosiah 23–24), Ammon and King Lamoni (Alma 17–20), Aaron and Muloki (Alma 21), and Helaman and his two thousand warriors (Alma 56–58).

24 . See Scripture Central Staff, “Book of Mormon Evidence: Ether’s Genealogy,” Evidence #0096, 19 September 2020, scripturecentral.org/evidence
/book-of-mormon-evidence-ether-s-genealogy.

25 . R. Kent Crookston, Book of Mormon Ecology: What the Text Reveals about the Land and Lives of the Record Keepers (Provo, UT: Village Lane Publishing, 2020), 254.

26 . Duke, Literary Masterpiece, 20–30. Duke’s compilation included four “Biblical prophecies” with verbiage closely resembling chapters from the King James Bible, which have not been included here.

27 . Topics include Abrahamic covenant, adversity, agency, apostasy, atonement of Jesus Christ, baptism, Bible, charity, chastity, Christ’s ministry, condescension of God, conversion, covenant, creation, death, devil-satan, discipleship, eternal life, faith, fasting, foreordination, forgiveness, gathering, gifts of the spirit, God the Father, Godhead, gospel of Jesus Christ, grace, gratitude, happiness, heaven, hell, high priest, Holy Ghost, honesty, hope, humility, Jesus Christ, Israel, judgment, justice, justification, law of Moses, light of Christ, love, mercy, miracles, missionary work, obedience, opposition, ordinances, other sheep, parenting, peace, persecution, personal revelation, plan of salvation, prayer, premortality, priestcraft, priesthood, prophets, purpose of life, repentance, restoration of the gospel, resurrection, revelation, sacrament, sacrifice, salvation, second coming, service, sin, spirit world, spiritual gifts, temptation, ten commandments, trials, Urim and Thummim, warfare, works, and Zion.

28 . See John W. Welch, “Chiasmus in the Book of Mormon,” in Book of Mormon Authorship: New Light on Ancient Origins, ed. Noel B. Reynolds (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1982), 33–52, rsc.byu.edu/book-mormon-authorship
/chiasmus-book-mormon; Donald W. Parry, Poetic Parallels in the Book of Mormon: The Complete Text Reformatted (Provo, UT: Neal A. Maxwell Institute, 2007), scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/61/.

29 . Royal Skousen, “The Language of the Original Text of the Book of Mormon,” BYU Studies Quarterly 57, no. 3 (2018), 104–5, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol57/iss3/5/; Royal Skousen, The History of the Text of the Book of Mormon, Part Four: The Nature of the Original Language (Provo, UT: FARMS and BYU Studies, 2018), 865 et seq., 952–53; Nicholas J. Frederick, The Bible, Mormon Scripture, and the Rhetoric of Allusivity (Madison, WI: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2016), xiii–xviii; and Nicholas Frederick, “Episode 92: Intertextuality in the Book of Mormon with Nick Frederick,” LDS Perspectives Podcast, 22 August 2018, transcript p. 15, ldsperspectives.com
/2018/08/22/intertextuality-book-mormon/, (transcript link on webpage).

30 . See Wilford M. Hess, “Botanical Comparisons in the Allegory of the Olive Tree,” in The Book of Mormon: Jacob through Words of Mormon, To Learn with Joy, ed. Monte S. Nyman and Charles D. Tate Jr. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 1990), 87–102, rsc.byu.edu/book-mormon-jacob
-through-words-mormon-learn-joy/botanical-comparisons-allegory-olive
-tree; John W. Welch, The Legal Cases in the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2008), scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/49/; William J. Hamblin, “The Importance of Warfare in Book of Mormon Studies,” in Warfare in the Book of Mormon, ed. Stephen D. Ricks and William J. Hamblin (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: FARMS, 1990), 495–96, scholars
archive.byu.edu/mi/98/.

31 . My research shows that 4,066 editorial changes have been made between the 1830 and 1981 editions of the Book of Mormon. These affect 4,721 words (1.8% of the total of 269,320 words). Of these, 91.7% (3,727 of 4,066) involve one word, with 46% (1,715 of 3,727) involving spelling alone. Two-word changes involve 5.6% of the total (227 of 4,066), and 1.0% or 40 of 4,066 comprise three-word changes. The last 1.8% of the Book of Mormon emendations (72 of 4,066) involve four to thirteen words. Forty-eight of these are deletions of “it came to pass,” leaving 24 phrases that have been deleted, added, substituted, or moved. None involve a full sentence. See Brian C. Hales, “Authoring the Book of Mormon: Investigating Joseph Smith’s 1829 Skills,” (forthcoming).

32 . The Microsoft Bree app allows ten unpaid responses and then requires a subscription.

33 . Response from LDSBot posed to ldsbot.com/, 9 August 2024.

34 . See PDF available at ldsperspectives.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09
/11-AI-Chatbot-Answers-to-9-Questions-BofM.pdf.

35 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, xi; see also x.

36 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, 16.

37 . Davis mentions “laying down heads” over 100 times in Visions in a Seer Stone, Kindle Edition; word search for “laying down heads.”

38 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, Kindle Edition; word search for “outline.”

39 . See references to these skills in the indexes of book like Lynn Quitman Troyka, Simon & Shuster: Handbook for Writers (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2017); Jean Wyrick, Steps to Writing Well, 13th ed. (Boston: Cengage Learning, 2017); Albert Zuckerman, Writing the Blockbuster Novel, updated ed. (New York: Tom Doherty Associates, 2016); Betty Mattix Dietsch, Reasoning & Writing Well: A Rhetoric, Research Guide, Reader, and Handbook, 5th ed. (Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2009); Randall McCutcheon, James Schaffer, and Joseph R. Wycoff, Speech: Communication Matters, 2nd ed. (Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill, 2001); Amy Einsohn and Marilyn Schwartz, The Copyeditor’s Handbook: A Guide for Book Publishing and Corporate Communications, 4th ed. (Berkely: University of California Press, 2019); Writer’s Choice, Grade 12, Student Edition, 5th ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008); John J. Ruszkiewicz, Christy E. Friend, Daniel E. Seward, Maxine Hairston, The Scott, Foresman Handbook for Writers, 9th ed. (New York: Pearson, 2010); Alfred Rosa and Paul Eschholz, Models for Writers: Short Essays for Composition, 14th ed. (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2020).

40 . One of the nine questions asked of the chatbots was: “Has any highly skilled author ever dictated a refined and complex book of over 200,000 words in under three months?” Seven of the chatbots reported it had never been done. Four claimed it had. However, the authors they identified did not routinely dictate all of their works and their first drafts went through extensive editing before publication. See data (PDF download): ldsperspectives.com/wp-content
/uploads/2024/09/11-AI-Chatbot-Answers-to-9-Questions-BofM.pdf.

41 . See Brian C. Hales, “Authoring the Book of Mormon: Investigating Joseph Smith’s 1829 Skills,” (forthcoming). See also Brian C. Hales, “Joseph Smith’s Education and Intellect as Described in Documentary Sources,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 59 (2023): 1–32, journal
.interpreterfoundation.org/joseph-smiths-education-and-intellect-as
-described-in-documentary-sources/.

42 . See Asa B. Searles in John Dixon, History of Lee County (Chicago: H. H. Hill and Co., 1882), 308, 397; John W. Barber, John Warner, Henry Howe, Historical Collections of the State of New York (1841), 580−81, archive.org/details
/historicalcollec00barbny/page/580/mode/2up; Stephen S. Harding, quoted in Thomas Gregg, The Prophet of Palmyra (New York: John B. Alden, 1890), 36, 39, 54, archive.org/details/GR_1666/mode/2up.

43 . Christopher M. Stafford, quoted in Arthur B. Deming, Naked Truths About Mormonism, also a journal for important newly apprehended truths (April 1888): 1.

44 . Pomeroy Tucker, Origin, Rise, and Progress of Mormonism (New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1867), 14–15, archive.org/details/originriseprogre00tuck
/page/n21/mode/2up.

45 . Orsamus Turner, History of the Pioneer Settlement of Phelps and Gorham’s Purchase, and Morris’ reserve (Rochester, NY: William Alling, 1852), 213−14, archive.org/details/bub_gb_TUX698v8KGkC/page/213/mode/2up.

46 . William H. Kelley, “The Hill Cumorah, and the Book of Mormon,” The Saints’ Herald 28, no. 11 (1 June 1881): 165.

47 . Dan Vogel, comp., ed., Early Mormon Documents, 5 vols. (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996–2003), 3:281–82.

48 . “James Gordon Bennett Account,” in Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 3:284–85. See also pp. 281–82 regarding Bennett’s journal entries.

49 . Kelley, “The Hill Cumorah, and the Book of Mormon,” 167.

50 . “Kelley Notes,” in Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 2:87; spelling and punctuation normalized. Vogel explains on p. 83: “On 6 March 1881 William H. and Edmund L. Kelley visited Palmyra and Manchester, New York, and interviewed Thomas H. Taylor, William and Mary Bryant, Danford Booth, Ezra Pierce, Orin Reed, Orlando Saunders, Abel Chase, John H. Gilbert, and Hiram Jackway. They also interviewed John Stafford in Rochester. Notes of these interviews . . . [are] apparently in the handwriting of William Kelley.” His notes reflect information he received from them.

51 . Gregg, Prophet of Palmyra, 54, archive.org/details/GR_1666/mode/2up.

52 . A. W. Cowles, “The Mormons: Pen and Pencil Sketches Illustrating their Early History,” Moore’s Rural New Yorker (2 January 1869): 13.

53 . Tucker, Origin, Rise, and Progress, 17, archive.org/details/originriseprogre
00tuck/page/n23/mode/2up

54 . Tucker, Origin, Rise, and Progress, 18, archive.org/details/originriseprogre
00tuck/page/n25/mode/2up.

55 . See 1 Nephi 13:28–29; 2 Nephi 29:6.

56 . Masterful Discourses and Writing of Orson Pratt, comp., N. B. Lundwall (Salt Lake City: N.B. Lundwall, 1962), 395, archive.org/details/masterful
discour00prat/page/394/mode/2up.

57 . Lucy Mack Smith, Biographical Sketches of Joseph Smith the Prophet and His Progenitors for Many Generations (Lamoni, IA: Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, 1912), 101, archive.org/details/biographical
sket00smit_0/page/100/mode/2up.

58 . Smith, Biographical Sketches, 92, archive.org/details/biographicalsket00
smit_0/page/100/mode/2up.

59 . Lyndon W. Cook, ed., David Whitmer Interviews: A Restoration Witness (Orem, UT: Grandin Book, 1991), 211.

60 . Edmund C. Briggs, “A Visit to Nauvoo in 1856,” Journal of History 9, no. 4 (October 1916): 454, bhroberts.org/records/0rGxg3-kFtGKj/edmund_c
_briggs_recalls_emma_hale_smith_saying_js_was_ignorant_of_jerusalem
_having_walls.

61 . Nels Madsen, “Visit to Mrs. Emma Smith Bidemon,” transcript pp. 1–2, Church History Catalog, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/0d0d3c56
-50a1-4071-90f0-2bb08b753a7f/0/0.

62 . See “History, circa Summer 1832,” p. 1, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmith
papers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/1.

63 . Orson Hyde, Ein Ruf aus der Wüste, eine Stimme aus dem Schoose der Erde (Frankfurt, DE: Im Selbstverlage des Verfassers, 1842), 13, josephsmith
papers.org/paper-summary/orson-hyde-ein-ruf-aus-der-wste-1842-extract
/2, Google translation.

64 . David Whitmer Interview “The Last Man. Of the Men Who Attested to the Truth of the `Book of Mormon,’ David Whitmer Only Is Left. In the Sunset of Life He Bases His Hopes of Heaven on the Records of the Lost Tribe. And Solemnly Reiterates All that He Has Ever Said Regarding Them,” Chicago Times, 17 October 1881; reprinted in The Saints’ Herald 28, no. 22 (15 November 1881): 347.

65 . David Whitmer, “The Book of Mormon,” Chicago Tribune, 17 December 1885, 3.

66 . Harris was interviewed by Simon Smith on 5 July 1875. He recounted the interview on 30 April 1884 in Simon Smith, letter to editors, The Saints’ Herald 31, no. 21 (24 May 1884): 324, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets
/bbece5be-28e4-48b5-a0d8-a90d1c197ed4/0/3.

67 . Kelley, “The Hill Cumorah, and the Book of Mormon,” 165.

68 . William Smith, “Notes Written on ‘Chamber’s Life of Joseph Smith,’” (1875), 27, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/7ce89849-3bb8-4ca4-9627-3c283
aec0bae/0/32.

69 . Orson Pratt, A Interesting Account of Several Remarkable Visions in relation to the Late Discovery of Ancient American Records (Edinburgh, 1840), 3, at Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/appendix
-orson-pratt-an-interesting-account-of-several-remarkable-visions-1840/3.

70 . See Brodie, No Man Knows My History; Richard Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005); George Q. Cannon, The Life of Joseph Smith, the Prophet (Salt Lake City: Juvenile Instructor Office, 1888), archive.org/details/lifeofjosephsmit01cann/mode/2up; G. Homer Durham, Joseph Smith Prophet—Statesman (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1944); Donna Hill, Joseph Smith: The First Mormon (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1977); Preston Nibley, Joseph Smith the Prophet (Salt Lake City: The Deseret News Press, 1944); Smith, Biographical Sketches of Joseph Smith, archive.org
/details/biographicalsket00smit_0/page/100/mode/2up; Edward W. Tullidge, Life of Joseph the Prophet (New York: Tullidge & Crandall, 1878), archive.org
/details/lifeofjosephprop00byu2tull/page/n9/mode/2up; Dan Vogel, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2004); John A. Widtsoe, Joseph Smith as Scientist: A Contribution to Mormon Philosophy (Salt Lake City: General Board Young Men’s MIA, 1908), archive.org/details
/josephsmithassci00widt/page/n3/mode/2up.

71 . William W. Blair, letter to editors, The Saints’ Herald 26, no. 12 (15 June 1879): 190–91.

72 . Elvira V. Masoura and Susan E. Gathercole, “Phonological Short-term Memory and Foreign Language Learning,” International Journal of Psychology 34, no. 5–6 (1999): 383, researchgate.net/publication/255671234_Phono
logical_Short-term_Memory_and_Foreign_Language_Learning.

73 . “Certificate from Joshua Seixas, 30 March 1836,” in The Joseph Smith Papers: Documents, Volume 5: October 1835–January 1838 (Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2017), 216, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary
/certificate-from-joshua-seixas-30-march-1836/1.

74 . Elden J. Watson, comp., The Orson Pratt Journals (Salt Lake City: Elden Jay Watson, 1975), 75. See also “History of Orson Pratt,” LDS Millennial Star 27 (11 February 1865): 87, contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/MStar/id
/8054.

75 . Turner, History of the Pioneer Settlement, 214; italics added, archive.org
/details/bub_gb_TUX698v8KGkC/page/213/mode/2up.

76 . Mitchell K. Schaefer, ed., Willliam E. McLellin’s Lost Manuscript (Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2012), 175–76.

77 . Josiah Quincy, Figures of the Past: From the Leaves of Old Journals, (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1883), 391, 399, archive.org/details/figuresofpastfro02quin
/page/n3/mode/2up.

78 . See D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, rev. ed. (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 181–93. Quinn mentions availability of “sophisticated” books in Palmyra, but presents no evidence that Joseph visited any bookstores or libraries to borrow, study, or read their books.

79 . See Donald L. Enders, “The Joseph Smith, Sr., Family: Farmers of the Genesee,” in Joseph Smith: The Prophet, The Man, ed. Susan Easton Black and Charles D. Tate Jr. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 1993), 213–25,
rsc.byu.edu/joseph-smith-prophet-man/joseph-smith-sr-family-farmers
-genesee.

80 . Smith, Biographical Sketches, 92, archive.org/details/biographicalsket00
smit_0/page/92/mode/2up.

81 . William Smith on Mormonism (Lamoni, IA: Herald Steam Book and Job Office, 1883), 9–10, archive.org/details/williamsmithonmo00smit.

82 . Smith, “Notes,” 12–13, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/7ce89849
-3bb8-4ca4-9627-3c283aec0bae/0/14.

83 . H. Donl Peterson, “Moroni: Joseph Smith’s Teacher,” in Regional Studies in Latter-day Saint Church History: New York, ed. Larry C. Porter, Milton V. Backman Jr., and Susan Easton Black (Provo, UT: Department of Church History and Doctrine, BYU, 1992), 56.

84 . Peterson adds: “Joseph’s visiting faculty of celestial tutors numbered about sixty, with Moroni spending considerably more time than any other messenger carefully honing his maturing student,” Regional Studies, 68.

85 . Jeff Lindsay, “Joseph the Amusing Teller of Tall Tales: Lucy Mack Smith’s Puzzling Statement in Perspective,” Arise from the Dust, (blog), 26 April 2018, arisefromthedust.com/joseph-amusing-teller-of-tall-tales/.

86 . Daniel Hendrix in “Origin of Mormonism. Joe Smith and His Early Habits. How He Found the Golden Plates. A Contemporary of the Prophet Relates Some Interesting Facts,” San Francisco Chronicle (14 May 1893), 12.

87 . Tucker, Origin, Rise, and Progress, 17–18, archive.org/details/originriseprogre
00tuck/page/n25/mode/2up.

88 . Turner, History of the Pioneer Settlement, 214, archive.org/details/bub
_gb_TUX698v8KGkC/page/213/mode/2up.

89 . Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 5:396.

90 . In contrast, William Davis wrote that Joseph Smith “for a time, trained in extemporaneous and semi-extemporaneous techniques of Methodist exhorters.” See “Performing Revelation: Joseph Smith’s Oral Performance of The Book of Mormon,” alternately titled “Performing Revelation: Joseph Smith and the Creation of The Book of Mormon” (PhD diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 2016), 23, escholarship.org/uc/item/86h814zv. Davis provides no documentation for this claim, and none has been identified in the historical record.

91 . Turner, History of the Pioneer Settlement, 214, archive.org/details/bub_gb
_TUX698v8KGkC/page/213/mode/2up?view=theater.

92 . Turner, History of the Pioneer Settlement, 213; italics added, archive
.org/details/bub_gb_TUX698v8KGkC/page/213/mode/2up?view=theater. Repeating Turner’s report of Joseph Smith’s debating and exhorting skills—without contextualizing his “less than ordinary intellect” as described by Turner—is a tactic sometimes employed by naturalists defending the theory that Joseph Smith possessed the intellectual ability to create the Book of Mormon. See Wunderli, An Imperfect Book, 50–56; Dale Morgan on Early Mormonism: Correspondence & A New History, ed. John Phillip Walker (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1986), 314; Davis, in Visions in a Seer Stone, 3, 33, 36–39, 42, 44, 47, 49, 58, 66, 78, 82, 105, 111, 114, 120; Davis, “Performing Revelation,” v, 105–6, 121–22, 125, 128, 129n291, 132–33, 135, 149–50, 175, 178, 191, etc, escholarship.org/uc/item/86h814zv.

93 . Bushman, Rough Stone Rolling, xx.

94 . Leonard J. Arrington, “James Gordon Bennett’s 1831 Report on ‘The Mormonites,’” BYU Studies 10, no. 3 (July 1970): 355, 357, scholarsarchive.byu
.edu/byusq/vol10/iss3/9/.

95 . “Carter, Jared, 1801–1855,” journal typescript, Church History Catalog, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/994fb2fe-d8b1-4156-a452
-3a8fecacf538/1/12.

96 . M.L.F., “Interview with the Mormon Prophet,” Evangelical Magazine and Gospel Advocate 5, no. 14 (5 April 1834): 107, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org
/assets/d81ebbca-ecd9-47d5-9890-ec8ac165357b/0/2.

97 . Peter H. Burnett, Recollections and Opinions of an Old Pioneer (New York: D. Appleton, 1880), 66, archive.org/details/recollectionsopi00burnrich/page
/n3/mode/2up.

98 . Wilhelm Wyl, Mormon Portraits or the Truth About the Mormon Leaders (Salt Lake City: Tribune Printing, 1886), 26, 27, archive.org/details/joseph
smithproph01wyme.

99 . Brodie, No Man Knows My History, 62.

100 . Robert M. Bowman Jr., “The Sermon at the Temple in the Book of Mormon: A Critical Examination of Its Authenticity through a Comparison with the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew,” (PhD diss., South African Theological Seminary, 2014), 476, archive.org/details/BowmanRFinal
DissertationApril2015_201706/page/n475/mode/2up.

101 . Hugh B. Brown, “The Profile of a Prophet,” Devotional talk, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, 4 October 1955, speeches.byu.edu/talks/hugh-b
-brown/profile-of-a-prophet/.

102 . Hugh Nibley, The Prophetic Book of Mormon, ed. John W. Welch (Provo, UT: FARMS; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1989), 221–22, scholarsarchive
.byu.edu/mi/88/.

103 . See also Randall A. Wright, The Book of Mormon Miracle (Springville, UT: Cedar Fort, 2014), 188–89; Grace Guymon Jones, The Challenge the Book of Mormon Makes to the World (Provo, UT: Rock Canyon Publishing, 2018).

104 . Robert N. Hullinger, Joseph Smith’s Response to Skepticism (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1992), ix.

105 . Level of difficulty is determined by the types of academic examinations that employ those words. Easy words are found in tests administered to elementary school students, while more difficult words are found in college-level exams in the early twenty-first century. “n/a” is “not available,” apparently due to the lack of usage in the examinations used to construct the scale. See “Language Scoring” (website), twinword.com/api/language-scoring.php. This chart assumes these words would have also been difficult in the 1820s.

106 . See Lindley Murray, The English Reader: Or, Pieces in Prose and Poetry, Selected from the Best Writers (1824); Charles A. Goodrich, History of the United States of America (1823), archive.org/details/historyofuniteds00in
good/page/n5/mode/2up; Ralph Erskine, Gospel Sonnets or Spiritual Songs, (1750); Gilbert J. Hunt, The Late War, between the United States and Great Britain, from June 1812 to February 1815, (1816), archive.org/details/latewar
betweenun00inhunt/page/n5/mode/2up; Modeste Gruau, The First Book of Napoleon, the Tyrant of the Earth (1809); and Arabian Nights Entertainments: Consisting of One Thousand and One Stories (1792).

107 . These data were compiled by the author using Microsoft Word and transcripts of the 1611 King James Bible and the 1830 Book of Mormon.

108 . Elfrieda H. Hiebert, and Michael L. Kamil, eds., Teaching and Learning Vocabulary: Bringing Research to Practice (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2005), 9.

109 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, xi; see also x.

110 . See “History, circa Summer 1832.”

111 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, 14.

112 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, 16.

113 . See search results for “1832 history” in Kindle version.

114 . Davis, Visions in a Seer Stone, 89, 14.

115 . See handwriting, “History, circa Summer 1832.”

Finding Nephi’s Ore

Bradley R. Larsen

Abstract: Khor Kharfot and Wadi Sayq are in the region that has become the premiere candidate for Nephi’s Old-World Bountiful. Out of the several matching criteria that has led to this opinion, the one that may be the weakest has been the identification of readily available ore in the area that Nephi could have used to manufacture the tools necessary to build his ship. This investigation, conducted in February 2023, found several distinct examples of iron ores suitable for ”smelting” in the form of float, all pointing to deposits yet to be located. Additionally, I review the investigation of Dr. Revell Phillips, who headed a group from BYU in 2000, that found two locations north of Khor Kharfot apparently containing significant deposits of iron ore. However, one site turned out to be problematic and the other site is too distant for Nephi to have been able to access it. Nonetheless, their efforts are reviewed as a backdrop for this current study. Also presented are findings regarding heretofore unrecognized features of Wadi Sayq and Khor Kharfot and the likely conditions that produced them, going back into the Pleistocene era.

In recent years, Khor Kharfot has been generally accepted as the location that best corresponds to Nephi’s Old World Bountiful. The promise of this site was first identified by Warren Aston after an exhaustive five-year survey and reconnaissance of the south to eastern coasts of the Arabian Peninsula in 1987–1992. In 2022, George Potter published an article promoting Khor Rori, which is located 38 miles (61 km) east of Salalah and about 95 miles (153 km) up the coast from Khor Kharfot, as the most likely Bountiful site (see figure 1).1 However, a more recent publication from Warren Aston provides a detailed comparison between Khor Kharfot and Khor Rori and shows the deficiencies of Khor Rori as a candidate for Nephi’s Bountiful.2

Aston’s description of his investigation and their results is found in his book Lehi and Sariah in Arabia.3 Aston identifies twelve criteria garnered from Nephi’s description of the land of Bountiful that must be met for a site to be considered as Bountiful with any reasonable certainty. After presenting all the possible sites he found along the seacoasts of Dhofar (southwest Oman province) and Mahra (northeast Yemen province), he then demonstrated how Khor Kharfot is, by far, the best candidate. It closely matches eleven of the twelve criteria.

There is one of Aston’s criteria that, up to this point, has not been sufficiently verified or identified—the presence of the ore that Nephi was directed to obtain to make tools to build a ship. Infrequent patches of so-called iron-concretions have been identified in the limestones of the Khor Kharfot region, but these are quite wispy and unsubstantial and wholly inadequate to concentrate into useable ore.4

In 1 Nephi 17:9, Nephi asks the Lord where he should go to find the ore for his tools. The necessity of Nephi’s seeking the Lord’s guidance indicates that the ore was not underfoot, nor was it something Nephi could readily locate. This implies that our present-day efforts need to focus on areas not only within Khor Kharfot, but also in surrounding areas. Could Nephi’s ore have been something other than iron ore, possibly copper-tin (bronze) or copper-zinc (brass) alloys? Though there are exploitable copper deposits and small-scale zinc mining occurrences in the north of Oman,5 tin is never mentioned, with zinc only associated with the ophiolites of northern Oman.6 Additionally, Nephi’s account gives no hint that he had to deal with more than one ore type in either finding the deposits, smelting them, or creating an alloy of the mixture.

During investigations conducted in 2016–2017, a few float samples7 were discovered that give every appearance of being fairly high-grade iron ore, or that contain iron-rich sedimentary cement/content that may have been derived from richer ore deposits. This was confirmed in one of the samples using spectrographic element analysis.8 Consequently, the current study (conducted in February 2023) examined the possibility of ore being readily available in the Khor Kharfot region by searching out examples of high-grade iron ore in either float or in situ samples.9 Samples were to be sought throughout the Khor Kharfot and Wadi Sayq area, and in wadis tributary to Wadi Sayq. Additionally, any samples would be collected with the goal of finding and characterizing the actual ore deposits. These samples, to include those collected on previous expeditions, were then to be analyzed to evaluate their exact mineral composition.

Previous Investigation of Iron Ore in Dhofar Province

When investigators first started thinking about locating Bountiful, they took their cue from Nephi’s description of traveling “nearly eastward” (1 Nephi 17:1) from a place that was called Nahom, where Ishmael was buried (1 Nephi 16:34). Based on the probable but approximate location of Nahom and traveling due east would bring Lehi’s group to the south Arabian Peninsula coast somewhere in northeastern Yemen or southeastern Oman. Initially, the most obvious candidates were in the harbor areas of Salalah or Khor Rori, which currently and anciently were fruitful regions with good, semi-protected access to the sea. This area was the generally accepted location for Nephi’s Bountiful at the time and was the focus of the first expedition mounted to try to locate Nephi’s ore by a group mainly from BYU, headed by Dr. Revell Phillips. He gives an account of this expedition as well as an analysis of probable smelting techniques used by Nephi in an article published in 2000.10

Two areas were targeted by Phillips for his iron-ore search: Wadi Nharat and Mirbat.

Wadi Nharat

As is evident in figure 1, Wadi Nharat debouches into the sea and is a relatively short distance (1.75 miles; 2.8 km) north-northeast of the small fishing village of Rakhyut. It was selected by Phillips because a member of his group, who had been an oil geologist in Oman, remembered a small Paleozoic/Precambrian rock exposure at the mouth of the wadi. This was a type of rock deemed most likely to contain hydrothermal, ore-containing dikes (veins with intruded deposits).

Their investigation of this area allegedly revealed the presence of iron ore contained in carbonatites (igneous carbonates). However, Jason Aase, another member of Phillip’s team, calls them carbonate dikes emplaced by fluidization, and having more affinity to marine limestones.11 This means they would not necessarily have an igneous origin, and are a mixture of calcite (CaCO3) and siderite (FeCO3), with pods of almost pure hematite (Fe2O3) possibly present in areas where the dikes widen. Phillips describes one pod as measuring eight by ten feet, thus potentially providing ample ore for building tools.12 They reportedly collected ten samples from this location and analyzed six of them, which revealed iron content from 3 to 28 weight percentage,13 values that are somewhat less than one would expect from Phillips’s description of them.14

Wadi Nharat is especially pertinent to this study because of its proximity to Khor Kharfot and Wadi Sayq (approximately thirteen kilometers or eight miles north-northeast of Kharfot), making it a possibility for the source of Nephi’s ore. It could have been accessed by small boats/rafts and possibly by camel, though the several steep coastal headlands may have rendered the overland route too difficult to travel, especially if more convenient deposits were available.

However, a rather cautionary caveat regarding the Nharat site comes from Warren Aston, who has visited the location on three separate occasions.15 He has not been able to find the deposits described, nor does any sample from the site show any iron content. Other than Jason Aase’s analyses and the verbal descriptions by Phillips, the deposits at Wadi Nharat have yet to be mapped and adequately analyzed for mineral content.16 The site warrants a more exacting geologic survey of its possible potential.

Mirbat

The second likely location of iron ore was determined by the Phillips group to be east of the town of Mirbat, located 6 miles (10 km) east of the ancient port ruins of Khor Rori. Khor Rori is situated along an almost entirely enclosed lagoon, 38 miles (62 km) east of Salalah and approximately 89 miles (143 km) north-northeast of Wadi Nharat (see figure 1). The group was investigating ancient rocks exposed in erosional windows in the overlying thick deposits of Cretaceous/Tertiary limestones that dominate the Dhofar province. Phillips describes these ancient rocks as a broad expanse of Precambrian igneous/metamorphic “basement complex” deposits, likely to have been intruded by ore-rich dikes.

Again, they found carbonatite dikes rich in siderite/calcite. However, in this case, the siderite component was apt to have weathered into a “gossan-like mass of goethite/limonite ore (Fe2O3.nH2O).”17 They deemed this deposit as the most significant one yet encountered and focused on data garnered from it for further studies.

The study of the Wadi Nharat and Mirbat sites is important, not only because of the iron ore located there, but because the described environments may be similar to those containing iron ore closer to Khor Kharfot. I found strong hints in this study that this is the case.

Samples Found at Wadi Sayq and Khor Kharfot

The primary focus of this study envisioned searching for more iron-related samples or deposits closer to the most likely candidate for Bountiful, namely Khor Kharfot and Wadi Sayq. This would entail a search for iron ore float samples located along the Khor Kharfot inlet and along the length of Wadi Sayq leading into it. The idea was that the actual source deposit of the float samples would be found close to where float samples were no longer apparent, either close to the wadi’s thalweg18 or somewhere up either of its enclosing sides. What was not anticipated was the extremely rugged terrain that would be encountered going up the grade of the wadi. Due to time and manpower constraints, our team fell short of locating the actual deposits. Examples of this rugged terrain are seen in figure 2, showing gigantic, interlocking boulders in an area beyond the junction of Wadi Sayq with Wadi Kharfot. Figure 3 shows the boulder-strewn terrain at the tail-end of Wadi Sayq just before it enters one of the ponds at the west end of Kharfot Lagoon.

The presence of large boulders

The incredible jumble of boulders at the lowest point of the wadi is due to the loss of the Wadi Sayq gradient as it meets the lagoon area. It can be seen on Google Earth to continue almost unabated up to a point in the wadi halfway to where the highway crosses it. Figure 4 shows Wadi Sayq from Kharfot Lagoon up to the highway crossing near the western end of the image. The label “Max Boulders” shows the start of the boulder concentration. Figure 5 shows this abrupt terrain change. Further up the wadi, boulder patches are much more infrequent. They mostly consist of one or two boulders in the ten- to thirty-foot diameter or greater size range. Some of these show a few smaller boulders that have accumulated around them. The large boulders (figure 2) are likely to be located at or close to the area in which they landed after falling from the surrounding cliffs. They are much too large to have been moved very far by the force of water, either in the present or anciently.

A reasonable explanation for the concentrated boulder field in the lower wadi is suggested by strong evidence that the sea level was over 400 feet lower during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM; approximately 20,000 years ago) than where it is now, and only reached its present level about 7,000–8,000 years ago.19 Three situations logically follow from this:

1. The gorge near the present outlet at the lower sea level would have been much deeper.

2. As the sea rose, the deeper gorge would have filled in with sediment to a higher level resulting in a wider lagoon valley than the wadi leading into it.

3. Boulders would not only build up at the lagoon/wadi junction because of the loss of gradient, but would start backing up behind this junction over time.

It should be mentioned that in the present day, water only flows in the wadi during the rainy season driven by the Khareef Monsoon, which is active from June into September. Additionally, devastating cyclones strike the region every four to ten years causing massive flooding and destruction. The last two cyclones occurred in May 2018 and October 2021, which resulted in the semi-permanent sand bar across the Kharfot Lagoon temporarily blowing out, emulating how it might have been anciently.

Ancient climate regimes affecting the Wadi Sayq and Khor Kharfot regions

Linda Pappas Funsch has spent the last eighteen years doing service work for the Omani Ministries. She first visited Oman in the 1970s and echoes the apparently common opinion that, “Oman enjoyed a relative abundance of water in ancient times.” She further notes that the pre-Islamic Persian Sassanid occupiers of Oman called it “Mazoun from the word muzn, suggesting clouds and abundant flowing water.”20 Iftikhar Ahmed Abbasi cites pollen data collected from the Dhofar province which supports a wetter climate there anciently.21

Evidence has also been collected for the existence of perennial paleolakes and paleowater channels in the eastern and western portions of the Rub’ al-Khali or Empty Quarter, impinging the northwest border of Oman, and for smaller ephemeral intradune paleolakes22 in other areas of the Rub’ al-Khali desert. This pluvial regime was present as recently as the mid-Holocene (5,500–7,000 years ago), with the remains of large mammal species being found around the large paleolake Mundafan, in the west of this region (e.g., wild goat and sheep, oryx, gazelle, horse and ass, camel, wild cattle, hippopotami, and birds such as ostrich).23

Additional data that underscores the earlier wetter climate in southern Oman comes from studies of oxygen isotope content in dated stalagmites found in caves.24 The Omani studies indicate that there was a gradual decrease in precipitation from very abundant rainfall amounts 8,000 years ago, to what we see today. The studies also suggest this trend was caused by a southward moving Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) driven by an orbitally induced25 reduction in the summer insolation (solar radiation).

The wetter climate is also confirmed by a study of the sediment configuration and pollen content from both Khor Rori and Khor Al Balid (seaward from Salalah).26 The findings of this study are important because they indicate a perennial water flow into these estuaries prior to the AD 270–420 timeframe that was sufficient to prevent long-shore currents from building sandbars blocking them. The study also concludes this was a regional phenomenon strongly implying the absence of a sandbar blocking Khor Kharfot prior to this time.

A more open lagoon—effectively, an estuary—would facilitate Nephi being able to launch his ship into the open sea. In any case, any monsoonal flooding, during that time or later, would be sufficient to help dislodge massive boulders from the overhanging cliffs and move smaller ones down the wadi.

George Potter maintains that there is no evidence that Khor Kharfot was anciently in the form of a harbor or estuary that could protect a moored ship, or one being built on a ramp, from tidal/storm surges and monsoonal winds.27 He adds that it was further lacking in having anything like a breakwater to afford minimal protection. What he hasn’t considered, however, is that the ancient, more intense fluvial regime could have not only kept the inlet open, but could produce strong enough currents to prevent sediment build-up in the “harbor” by moving it out over the off-shore shelf. This would intensify during monsoonal and cyclone episodes and would tend to counteract concurrent storm surges. The result would be a much deeper harbor than the present lagoon suggests.

Additionally, it must be noted that Wadi Sayq and its ending lagoon valley impinges on the coastline generally at about a twenty-five-degree angle, with the last quarter mile making a sixty-degree angle with the shoreline. This means wave/surge momentum (perpendicular to the shoreline) would be deflected from moving directly up the quarter-mile mouth of the harbor by something close to thirty-three percent and by seventy-three percent from moving directly up the continuation of the harbor. In effect, this configuration would act as a breakwater or jetty in relation to the westernmost parts of the harbor.

An additional wrinkle in this climate scenario, which may have impacted the Lehite sojourn at Khor Kharfot, was the onset of colder temperatures from about 750 to 550 BC with the convergence of the Homeric Solar Minimum.28

As an aside, after the experience of trying to navigate the section of the boulder-strewn wadi we traversed, and taking note of the thick vegetation covering the steep slopes of the wadi, we find it very difficult to believe that Lehi brought his entire caravan along the full length of Wadi Sayq to Bountiful. It is more likely that he would have followed the wadi thalweg, if at all, up to the point where the massive boulder accumulation started in his time, but then would move higher up the sides or on top of the wadi ridge for the rest of the journey, before dropping down into the lagoon. Traversing the boulder terrain is not only slow and cumbersome, but rather dangerous, especially for a large group. The ridgelines defining the wadi still point to the lagoon inlet, which is visible from many vantage points along the ridges. A recent article by Warren Aston explores the possibility that Lehi’s group entered Khor Kharfot from Wadi Kharfot which, though narrower and steeper than Wadi Sayq, may be more passible.29

Major constriction in Wadi Sayq channel

Another aspect of Wadi Sayq worth noting is a significant and unusual constriction of the waterway located about halfway between the start of the boulder fields and the highway crossing of the wadi (figure 6; labeled as Constriction in figure 4). It appears to be a very narrow channel with a possible steep drop-off and is constrained by a cliff on its east side. A closeup of this constriction reveals a very dark rock type in the cliff, the significance of which may indicate it is much harder/denser than the normal limestones of the region. If so, it is not easily eroded and is possibly an expression of the more ancient bedrock in which intrusive dikes containing ore deposits might be found. Any erosional window into the subbasement along the thalweg would be located in the older Cretaceous limestones on its north side. This is because the Tertiary limestones on the south have dropped down along normal faults defining the east-west trace of the Wadi Sayq thalweg to be even with them.30 This warrants further investigation.

Though progress in traveling up the wadi was constrained, we did find float samples of high-grade iron ore in the area we examined. These, added to those found on earlier expeditions, may have been derived or degraded from the original ore source or accompanying igneous injection. Additionally, one example of dike/vein filling outcrop in the form of a large, mostly buried boulder was discovered and photographed (figure 7) and suggested the occurrence of Precambrian/Paleozoic basement rocks noted above.

Sample preparation and analytic technique used

The analytic techniques selected to characterize these samples was three-fold. First, the density of the entire sample (whole rock) was determined for screening purposes and to supplement mineral content data.31 Second, X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) analyses were performed on 10–30 gram portions (splits) of these samples to give a semi-quantitative assessment of their mineral content.32 Third, post-analytic densities of the splits were determined using the weighted averages of mineral components coupled with the density of each component.33

It is noteworthy that the densities determined for the 10–30 gram sample splits were quite close to their whole-rock densities, though generally showing slightly higher values. These higher values are likely due to porosity (voids) present in the large samples that are absent in the ground-up sample splits. Any drastic difference between the whole-rock and split densities would indicate problems with the analytic result.

Sample characterization

Float samples collected from the Khor Kharfot/Wadi Sayq site, coupled with similar samples collected on earlier expeditions, could be visually categorized into three separate groups:

- Those showing obvious and major hematite (Fe203) or goethite/limonite content (Fe2O3.nH2O) or combinations of the two, which constitute viable iron ore. The goethite/limonite dominated samples are likely produced by alteration of the purer iron-oxides by surface conditions, i.e., hydration.

- Samples exhibiting sedimentary characteristics and containing smaller amounts of hematite/goethite/limonite. They are also, by far, the most prevalent iron-containing samples encountered along the terrain investigated but would be of questionable use as iron ores.

- Crystalline samples that don’t fit the normal Cretaceous/Tertiary limestone provenance of the region. Except for possible iron-staining, these samples lack iron content and may be related to the Precambrian/ Paleozoic basement rocks into which the ore-veins were intruded. Included in this group are recrystallized calcite limestones that appear anomalous to the normal limestones of the area.

The entire length of terrain sampled is shown in figure 8, delimited by green vertical lines. The area begins at the beach strand blocking the eastern terminus of Kharfot Lagoon and its ponds, up to where it meets Wadi Sayq (0.8 miles; 1.3 km); the segment of Wadi Sayq from this point to where Wadi Kharfot enters it (0.4 miles; 0.6 km); and from this junction to a point further up the wadi (0.75 miles; 1.2 km). The general locations of samples are shown in yellow (abundant iron oxides) and red (lesser or no iron-oxides).

Sample analysis

What follows is a catalogue of the selected float samples that were found in the Khor Kharfot/Wadi Sayq region to date and were deemed worthy of analysis. This included their mineral compositions and significance. Samples in each category will be described in the order of closest to furthest away from the Khor Kharfot beach. The samples collected that were of most interest and are most pertinent to the purpose of this study are those that show significant amounts of iron-bearing minerals, normally in the form of hematite and goethite. There were seven samples in this category. It should be noted that, except for one of the iron-abundant ore samples, any amorphous or poorly crystalline component of the samples was left undetermined by the semi-quantitative XRD method used. The content of the known components was normalized to 100 percent.

The first two samples from this group were picked up during the 2017 field season from a location near the west end of the Kharfot Lagoon (see “Wadi Sayq (begin)” in figure 8) and are labeled 4a and 4b as shown in figure 9. They appear to be pure hematite, yet their analyses indicate hematite content of only 64.4 and 73.5 weight percentage, with the remaining content consisting of quartz. The lesser amount of hematite in Sample 4a is reflected by its greater abundance of quartz (35.6 %), with sample 4b having only 26.5% quartz.

The next ore-related sample is sample 6, shown in figure 10. This is one of two or three similar samples collected by Scott Gubler of Deseret Laboratories, in the boulder region between the west end of Kharfot Lagoon up to the junction of Wadi Sayq with Wadi Kharfot. Hematite content is 17.2%, with quartz being the remaining content. Visual inspection suggests the hematite content should be greater. Unfortunately, we don’t have a whole-rock density value for this sample to help assess this. The red appearance and high quartz content suggests it could be an iron-rich jasper, where hydrothermal activity was likely involved in its creation, thus making it more likely to be derived from intruded Paleozoic horizons.

Sample 12 (figure 11) was located just upstream beyond the junction of Wadi Sayq and Wadi Kharfot. It contains 30.9% goethite, which is reflected by its higher density of 3.35 gm/cm3; and with most of the remainder of the sample consisting of calcite (68.3%). This fits the profile of samples collected by Phillips at Mirbat, which also contained much goethite or hematite mixed with calcite, the significance of which will be discussed below.

Sample 14 (figure 12) is probably the most striking example of iron ore collected. It has every appearance of being rich ore—both by density (4.8 gm/cm3; density of pure hematite is 5.3 gm/cm3) and mineral content, color, and streak—with both goethite and hematite phases. It was found near the upper end of the sampling terrain. It exhibits almost no erosion, which implies a nearby location for the deposit of origin. Surprisingly, the iron-mineral bearing content registers only 46% goethite and a mere 10.7% hematite, yet allegedly contains 42.6% calcite.

Despite this relatively high iron content, the whole-rock density of the sample indicated there should be even more iron and much less calcite than showed up in the XRD analysis. Consequently, this sample was re-analyzed by Activation Laboratories to determine possible amorphous content that lacks the course crystallinity that would show up in regular XRD analysis. The results indicated an amorphous content of 35.3 weight percentage.

The most likely cause of the underrepresentation of iron in sample 14, to include its abnormal amount of calcite, is a lack of homogeneity in the sample. In other words, the split taken from sample 14 may have been from an area containing lower than average iron oxide content relative to the calcite content. Additionally, missing iron might be present in the amorphous phase in the form of limonite. Visual inspection of sample 14 does show a significant and distinct presence of an orange mineral(s), most likely consisting of a mixture of limonite and goethite, where limonite is amorphous and will not be detected by XRD.

The last of the iron-rich ore samples constitute four large pebbles (figure 13) that were located approximately fifty feet up-wadi from sample 14, and all within about a two-foot square area. Only the darker upper-left (labeled 15a) and lighter lower-right (tan-gray-yellow, labeled 15d) large pebbles were analyzed. The darker large pebble contains 65.4% hematite and 33% goethite for a total of 98.4% iron-oxides; and the lighter large pebble consists of 100% goethite. The densities of these samples are commensurate with the indicated mineral content.

These samples indicate there is high-grade iron ore from which tools could be made in the Khor Kharfot region, which would have been quite accessible to Nephi.

The next group of samples containing smaller amounts of goethite and/or hematite give every appearance of being sedimentary, having medium to large amounts of quartz or calcite. They include sample 1 (figure 14), which is mostly quartz (94.9%), but contains goethite (5.5%) and hematite (1.2%); sample 3 (figure 15), containing quartz (16.1%), hematite (9.9%), and calcite (74%); and sample 11 (figure 16), discovered in the area well beyond the junction of Wadi Sayq and Wadi Kharfot, containing quartz (60%), calcite (34%), and goethite (1%). Sample 11 is also unusual because of its yellowish color and having small amounts of the igneous-derived minerals albite (1.9%) and K-Feldspar (2.1%), as well as kaolinite (1.9%). Samples 2, 8, and 10, shown in figures 17–19, were not analyzed because of their similarity to samples 1 and 3.

Hand lens inspection of fresh surfaces of these samples show rounded quartz grains, of either medium or fine to very-fine sizes, depending on the sample, amid hematite or goethite cement. However, sample 3 (74% calcite) also exhibits what appears to be small sedimentary oolites (rounded calcite grains). The question remains, however, whether or not these float samples were redeposited directly from original Paleozoic iron ore containing deposits before deposition of the Cretaceous/Tertiary limestones, or originated from iron-rich sedimentary horizons within the limestones.

Evidence for the later possibility is the recent finding and sampling of a bed of iron-rich-appearing red-brown rocks by Warren Aston (see IRB, figure 4; and figure 20) at the top of the road cut as it comes out of Wadi Sayq to the north. This bed shows no similarity to the ferruginous hard grounds or iron concretions mentioned by Abbasi.34 The bed is located at the top of the Tertiary rock sequence of this area (base of the Rus Formation). A possible origin for it may have been the introduction of bog iron into a swampy region that came into existence when the sea temporarily receded.

The presence of albite and K-Feldspar in sample 11 may be an indication it was redeposited from eroded Paleozoic outcrops before the Cretaceous/Tertiary limestones were laid down.

The last few samples analyzed (5, 7, 13) contain no noticeable iron and are very similar in composition, showing mostly calcite (94.2–98.4%) and a small amount of quartz (0.4–1.6%). Two of the samples contain 2.2% and 5.4% dolomite. Sample 5 has a dull-gray-to-magenta coloration and a course crystalline fabric consisting of approximately 0.2–0.7 mm crystal sizes. Sample 7 (figure 21) exhibits a brown-red phase (the phase analyzed) filling voids/cracks in a gray dolomite. Sample 13 (figure 22) has a tan to orange colored matrix with multiple small pores or voids. All three samples give the appearance of having undergone significant alteration (diagenesis) that involved calcite recrystallization coupled with elevated heating, a possible indication they originated from the Paleozoic intrusive process already noted.

Extent of Nephi’s Knowledge of Metallurgy

Nephi was commanded by the Lord to build a ship so that the Lehite party could journey over the ocean to the promised land. Confronted with this command and realizing he had no tools to do such a thing, Nephi asks the Lord: “whither shall I go that I may find ore to molten, that I may make tools to construct the ship after the manner which thou hast shown unto me?” (1 Nephi 17:9). He then recounts “that the Lord told me whither I should go to find ore, that I might make tools” (1 Nephi 17:10). Whereupon Nephi builds a skin-based bellows and starts a fire so he can “molten” the ore. In chapter 17, he laconically states, “And it came to pass that I did make tools of the ore which I did molten out of the rock” (1 Nephi 17:16). This is quite scant information about how Nephi arrived at this point.

Revell Phillips notes that the Chinese were melting iron out of ore rock and pouring it into molds as early as 800 BC, probably because they had been experimenting with very high temperatures in working with porcelains.35 This technology was not available in Israel during Nephi’s time, where they would be limited to creating iron in a solid form at a much lower temperature than the melting point of iron (2,192° F or 1,200° C versus 2,795° F or 1,535° C).36 This temperature was reached by burning charcoal with forced air (Nephi’s bellows), producing excess heat and carbon monoxide (CO). Carbon monoxide is the agent that reduces the iron ore to elemental iron in the form of a solid sponge-iron bloom. It would also actually melt the impurities mixed with the ore, but would not have resulted in a pool of molten iron that could then be poured into a cast. The bloom would also have to be hammered into the shapes desired.37

Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defines molten as the “‘participle passive’ of melt. Melted. 1. adjective Made of melted metal; as a molten image,”38 which seems to contradict both Nephi’s use of the word and our understanding of what Nephi would be able to do using his own devices. There are three obvious possibilities for resolving this contradiction:

- Nephi is conflating his use of the term, perhaps due to his actual knowledge of how other metals such as copper and bronze are derived from actual melts.

- The Lord told him how to achieve the high temperatures to melt iron ore.

- He is referring to a portion of the iron smelting process, which does achieve a molten state, namely the slag.

Getting direction from the Lord in how to do this seems unlikely because Nephi gives no hint that this is the case, yet readily mentions direction from the Lord in finding the ore, how to build the ship, and in many other situations.

Several scholars, including Phillips, mention the likelihood that Nephi had already acquired the knowledge of how to work iron and perhaps other metals, either from earlier training or fairly recent observations on how it is done in areas he had visited.39 This is reinforced by Nephi’s statement much later after arriving in the Promised Land that “I did teach my people to build buildings, and to work in all manner of wood, and of iron, and of copper, and of brass, and of steel, and of gold, and of silver, and of precious ores, which were in great abundance” (2 Nephi 5:15).

Phillips writes that the type of iron derived from a bloom is called wrought iron and is very malleable and soft, requiring it to be worked in several ways before it can be made into useful tools and implements. Forging or hammering the bloom to drive out additional impurities offers no further improvement beyond a certain point. The techniques Phillips cites that Nephi probably had knowledge of were:

1. Carburization, which involves heating the wrought iron over a period of time while it is in contact with glowing charcoal, resulting in carbon atoms penetrating the outer layers, which creates a very hard, steel-like surface.

2. Quenching, where the hot steel/iron is plunged into water, thereby, further hardening it, but also making it more brittle.

3. Tempering it to make it less brittle, yet retaining its hardness, accomplished by reheating the metal to moderate temperature (red-hot) followed by slow cooling.40

This means that Nephi’s use of the term molten is most likely his catchall term for working with metal-bearing ores. In the case of iron-smelting, it would likely refer to his awareness of an actual melting phase of the slag that is produced.

Another question that arises regarding Nephi’s probable use of a bloom from the ore to make his tools, is how he was able to hammer the bloom into shape in the first place with no tools yet in his possession. Phillips suggests that it would be logical for Lehi to have included at least a hammer and ax as part of the equipment he assembled for his journey.41 This is even more plausible if Lehi were a caravan merchant, for which Hugh Nibley strongly made the case.42 What better tool to have for driving tent stakes into rough ground, for instance, than a good iron/steel hammer, let alone other tools that might be necessary for certain needs that would arise in a caravan expedition.

There is an additional aspect of the ores surveyed by Phillips near Mirbat, which may be like the ores used by Nephi. This involves the presence of significant amounts of calcite in the so-called carbonatites and hematites. Calcite/limestone is known to act as a flux that entrains and melts impurities contained in iron ores (for example, silicates). It effectively lowers the temperature needed to do so.43 This allows for a lower overall temperature needed to create the iron bloom. Three of the iron ores collected in this study contained significant quantities of calcite.

Summary and Conclusions

The most important result of this study was discovering high-grade iron ore samples in the Khor Kharfot and Wadi Sayq region. These samples strongly imply the presence of the originating deposits in the same area, which would provide an accessible source of iron ore for making the tools Nephi would need to build his ship. Warren Aston compared twelve specific criteria from Nephi’s description of Bountiful with the physical features at Khor Kharfot. The only questionable item was Nephi’s claim to have accessed iron ore to make his tools. The findings of this present study go a long way to satisfy this final link between the scriptural account and the features on the ground at Khor Kharfot. The samples described in the study likely derive from hydrothermal veins/dikes deposited in much older Precambrian/Paleozoic basement deposits and not in the overlying Cretaceous/Tertiary limestone deposits that characterize this region. This would make their originating deposits very much like those described earlier by Revell Phillips and his team during their investigation of iron ore deposits in the broad area of the southern Dhofar province of Oman.

The only difference between Phillips’s iron-rich samples and the float samples collected in this study is the absence of siderite in the float samples. Otherwise, they both contain either hematite or goethite or mixtures of these two iron oxides and many of these contain calcite components, which lowers the temperature needed to smelt the ores into iron.

This investigation also discovered features of Wadi Sayq and Khor Kharfot, coupled with supporting evidence, that would have affected the success and general operation of Lehi’s group in this area. For instance, several lines of evidence indicate the region was much wetter and perhaps cooler during Lehi’s sojourn, possibly allowing the Wadi Sayq water course to be perennial and strong enough to keep the inlet open year-round. This would greatly facilitate launching Nephi’s finished ship. Additionally, the configuration of the Khor outlet indicates it would act as a breakwater providing protection from storm surges and surf, which could otherwise disrupt Nephi’s ship building efforts. Finally, the intense boulder field of Wadi Sayq and the probable reasons for its build-up likely prohibited the group from coming directly into Khor Kharfot via the lower reaches of the wadi.

Phillips and his team determined that Nephi was probably well-versed in the production of metals from their ores, but did not produce an actual iron-melt. Instead, he was working with sponge iron produced at temperatures below the melting point of iron. Furthermore, in the possibility that Lehi was a caravan trader, Nephi undoubtedly had access to a minimal array of tools that he could have used to work the sponge iron into appropriate tools for shipbuilding.

Further research is needed to locate the source of the iron-rich float samples described in this study. A promising target might be the extreme constriction about halfway up Wadi Sayq, indicative of a probable erosional window into a Paleozoic/Precambrian ore-containing subbasement rock exposure.

[Author’s Note: I am indebted to Dr. Hauck for giving the green light to this present investigative effort, and also to Jon Groneman, who provided much needed help in navigating the terrain being investigated and carrying out many of the samples collected. I also want to acknowledge and thank Scott and Mark Gubler, principals of Deseret Laboratories, for the use of their facilities, as well as Warren Aston for his useful suggestions and efforts to further the objectives of this study.]

Bradley R. Larsen is a geologist with BS (BYU) and MS (University of Utah) degrees in geology. He has worked at the US Geological Survey, Office of Marine Geology, where he participated in many scientific projects; in the oil and gas industries with emphasis on computer geology, core analysis, and mapping; and mining, primarily for gold, specializing in mineralogy and sample analysis (petrography, microscopy, XRD/XRF). He is the author and co-author of twenty-two public-domain publications and numerous in-house scientific reports. Bradley has been providing geologic consulting for the Khor Kharfot project since 2016, including conducting ground-penetrating radar surveys in the area and the discovery of a possible archaeoastronomy site at the location.

1 . George D. Potter, “Khor Rori: A Maritime Resources-Based Candidate for Nephi’s Harbor,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 51 (2022): 253–94, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/khor-rori-a
-maritime-resources-based-candidate-for-nephis-harbor/.

2 . Warren P. Aston, “Nephi’s ‘Bountiful’: Contrasting Both Candidates,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 55 (2023): 219–68,
journal.interpreterfoundation.org/nephis-bountiful-contrasting-both
-candidates/. This study is also available in Warren Aston, Godfrey J. Ellis, and Neal Rappleye, Into Arabia: Anchoring Nephi’s Account in the Real World (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2024), 221–68.

3 . Warren P. Aston, Lehi and Sariah in Arabia: The Old World Setting of the Book of Mormon (Bloomington, IN: Xlibris, 2015), 227n22, scripturecentral.org/archive
/books/book/lehi-and-sariah-arabia-old-world-setting-book-mormon.

4 . Iftikhar Ahmed Abbasi, “Geological Assessment of the Khor Kharfot Sediments, Western Dhofar Region, Sultanate of Oman,” SQU Journal for Science 21, no. 1 (2016): 20, figure 5c.

5 . “Minerals Concessions Map: Exploration to Mining Blocks, Sultanate of Oman,” Ministry of Energy and Minerals (website), 2024, mem.gov.om/Our-Business
/Minerals/Minerals-Concessions-Map. This shows many copper mines, but only one zinc mining concession (Blk-2, Target 23), all of which are in northern Oman.

6 . “Oman—Country Commercial Guide; Mining and Minerals,” International Trade Administration, (website), 2024, trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/oman
-mining-and-minerals. The article associates zinc with ophiolites, which are in northern Oman.

7 . Float samples are those that have been eroded from original in situ deposits, thereby being easily available on the surface.

8 . The testing was performed by Deseret Laboratory (St. George, UT) in 2018.

9 . The study was funded under the auspices of the Khor Kharfot Foundation, originally founded by Warren Aston and two other couples in 2014. The Foundation focuses on supporting a broad range of research in the area, with Dr. Richard Hauck (PhD Archaeology), now the principal investigator for archaeological studies. Permits to do this research come from the Sultanate of Oman Ministry of Heritage and Tourism.

10 . Wm. Revell Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9, no. 2 (2000): 36-41, 82, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms
/vol9/iss2/6/.

11 . Jason G. Aase, “Geology of a Carbonate Rich Diatreme-like Structure, Marbat Area, Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman: A Reconnaissance Study” (master’s thesis, Brigham Young University, 2004), 17–19.

12 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 38.

13 . Aase, “Geology,” 76, 79, Appendix A.

14 . Pure hematite contains approximately 70 weight-percentage iron. This site could still be the site of Nephi’s ore, but it needs closer and more exact characterization. The more impurities an ore has, the more difficult it is to smelt and extract the necessary iron.

15 . Warren Aston, personal communication with the author during October 2024. Mr. Aston collected several samples from the site and had them analyzed by Iftikhar Ahmed Abbasi of Sultan Qaboos University. No iron was present in any of these samples.

16 . Aase was a member of the Revell Phillips group in Oman. His masters thesis does not deal with ore-deposits per se, but is a study of two “carbonate diatremes,” located in the Mirbat area and northern Oman. His thesis contains whole-rock elemental analyses of six samples collected from the Wadi Nharat area closest to Khor Kharfot.

17 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 38.

18 . A thalweg is a technical term denoting the bottom channel of the wadi.

19 . “How does present glacier extent and sea level compare to the extent of glaciers and global sea level during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM)?,” U.S. Geological Survey (website), usgs.gov/faqs/how-does-present-glacier
-extent-and-sea-level-compare-extent-glaciers-and-global-sea-level. See also, Kevin Fleming et al., “Refining the eustatic sea-level curve since the Last Glacial Maximum using far- and intermediate-field sites,” Earth and Planetary Science Letters 163 (1998): 327–42, sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs
/pii/S0012821X98001988.

20 . Linda Pappas Funsch, Oman Reborn—Balancing Tradition and Modernization (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015), 19.

21 . Abbasi, “Geological Assessment of the Khor Kharfot Sediments,” 23.

22 . Small lakes between sand dunes intermittently appearing and disappearing.

23 . R. Crassard et al., “Middle Palaeolithic and Neolithic Occupations around Mundafan Palaeolake, Saudi Arabia: Implications for Climate Change and Human Dispersals,” PLoS ONE 8(7): e69665 (2013), doi.org/10.1371/journal
.pone.0069665. See also, Max Engel et al., “Lakes or Wetlands? A Comment on ‘The Middle Holocene Climatic Records from Arabia: Reassessing Lacustrine Environments, Shift of ITCZ in Arabian Sea, and Impacts of the Southwest Indian and African Monsoons’ by Enzel et al.,” Global and Planetary Change 148 (2017): 258–67, doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2016.11.001.

24 . Oxygen isotope (δ18O) determination is a method widely used to study regional precipitation trends from the past. See Dominik Fleitmann et al., “Holocene Forcing of the Indian Monsoon Recorded in a Stalagmite from Southern Oman,” Science 300 (13 June 2003): 1737–39. See also Dominik Fleitmann et al., “Holocene ITCZ and Indian Monsoon Dynamics Recorded in Stalagmites from Oman and Yemen (Socotra),” Quaternary Science Reviews 26 (2007): 170–88.

25 . Likely caused by Milankovitch Cycles; cyclical perturbations in the Earth’s rotational or orbital movements.

26 . Carina Hoorn and Mauro Cremaschi, “Late Holocene Palaeoenvironmental History of Khawr Rawri and Khawr Al Balid (Dhofar, Sultanate of Oman),” Elsevier Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 213, no. 1–2 (2004): 1–36, sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0031018204001865.

27 . Potter, “Khor Rori,” 260.

28 . Cella Martin-Puertas et al., “Regional Atmospheric Circulation Shifts Induced by a Grand Solar Minimum,” Nature Geoscience 5 (2012): 397.

29 . Warren P. Aston, “Accessing Nephi’s Bountiful: A New Proposal for Reaching Irreantum,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 62 (2024): 429–38, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/accessing-nephis-bountiful-a-new-proposal-for-reaching-irreantum. Also in Aston, Ellis, and Rappleye, Into Arabia, 212–19.

30 . Abbasi, “Geological Assessment of the Khor Kharfot Sediments,” 17.

31 . Deseret Laboratories was used to evaluate whole-rock sample densities and to extract the 10–30 gram splits needed for XRD analysis (i.e., similar densities and other similar characteristics imply sample redundancy).

32 . Barbara L. Dutrow, Christine M. Clark, “X-ray Powder Diffraction (XRD),” Science Education Resource Center, Carlton College, 17 May 2017, serc
.carleton.edu/research_education/geochemsheets/techniques/XRD.html. The XRD technique basically operates by sending a collimated x-ray beam into a powdered crystalline sample where the beam is then diffracted or bent at angles characteristic of the crystal lattice within the mineral encountered. The resulting peaks from this process are then graphed and used to calculate a semi-quantitative estimate of the amount of each mineral in the sample. The XRD analyses and minimal sample preparation (pulverizing) were performed at the Activation Laboratories, Ltd., located in Ontario, Canada, using the Rietveld XRD method.

33 . The split density was calculated using a weighted average of mineral component weight percentages and mineral component densities. I.e., Split Density = (w1x1 + w2x2 + w3 x3 + w4 x4)/(w1 + w2 + w3 + w4), where w = component weight percentage expressed as a fraction, and x = density of component. This reduces to (w1x1 + w2x2 + w3x3 + w4x4), because weight percentages have been normalized to 100 percent. Mineral component densities (gm/cm3) used are: albite = 2.62; calcite = 2.71; dolomite = 2.84; goethite = 3.3; hematite = 5.3; K-Feldspar = 2.56; kaolinite = 2.6; and quartz = 2.62.

34 . Abbasi, “Geological Assessment of the Khor Kharfot Sediments,” 20, figures 5a, 5b.

35 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 39.

36 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 39, 41.

37 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 41.

38 . Webster’s American Dictionary of the American Language (1828), s.v. “molten,” webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/molten.

39 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 40–41; John A. Tvedtnes, The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Springville, UT: Cornerstone, 1999), 94–97, scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book/most-correct-book-insights-book-mormon-scholar; Warren P. Aston, “Across Arabia with Lehi and Sariah: ‘Truth Shall Spring Out of the Earth,’” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15, no. 2 (2006): 20, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol15/iss2/4/; Jeffrey R. Chadwick, “Lehi’s House at Jerusalem and the Land of His Inheritance,” in Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem, ed. John W. Welch, David Rolph Seely, and Jo Ann H. Seely (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS], 2004), 113–17, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/39/; and Aston, Lehi and Sariah in Arabia. These sources all make the point and seem to base that speculation on (1) his initial interruption in the narrative in order to admire the “exceedingly fine” metalwork of Laban’s sword (1 Nephi 4:9), (2) his interest in the “fine brass” of the Liahona (1 Nephi 16:10), (3) his ownership of “my bow, which was made of fine steel” (1 Nephi 16:18), and (4) his ability to fabricate ultrathin metal plates to engrave his long record (1 Nephi 19:1). He was clearly a connoisseur of fine metalwork.

40 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 41.

41 . Phillips, “Metals of the Book of Mormon,” 40.

42 . Hugh Nibley, Lehi in the Desert; The World of the Jaredites; There Were Jaredites (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: FARMS, 1988), 36, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/50/.

43 . Su Tiansen, Xie Bing, Xu Kuangdi, “Flux for Metallurgy,” ECPH Encyclopedia of Mining and Metallurgy, 15 September 2023, 1–2, doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-0740-1_1336-1.

Figure 1. Southeast coast of Oman, Dhofar province.

Figure 2. Team member Jon Groneman, standing next to several large interlocking boulders in Wadi Sayq’s thalweg.

Figure 3. Boulder field at the lowest point of Wadi Sayq with a pond at the west end of Kharfot Lagoon visible in background.

Figure 4. Overview of Wadi Sayq, extending from Khor Kharfot lagoon to the highway crossing shown at left of image. This investigation was limited to the wadi to the east of the highway, though the wadi also extends several miles west of this point.

Figure 5. Point in Wadi Sayq where terrain starts to be dominated by boulders.

Figure 6. Unusual Wadi Sayq channel constriction.

Figure 7. Possible Precambrian/Paleozoic boulder showing vein dikes.

Figure 8. Study area and general sample locations (yellow and red numbers).

Figure 9. Sample 4; abundant hematite.

Figure 10. Sample 6; significant hematite.

Figure 11. Sample 12; significant goethite.

Figure 12. Sample 14; abundant goethite and hematite representing about two-thirds of the original sample collected.

Figure 13. Sample 15a (upper left); 98% hematite and goethite. Sample 15d (lower right); pure goethite.

Figure 14. Sample 1; approximately 7% goethite/hematite.

Figure 16. Sample 11; 1% goethite in quartz/calcite.

Figure 15. Sample 3; approximately 10% hematite, 74% calcite.

Figure 17. Sample 2; sedimentary and iron rich.

Figure 18. Sample 8; sedimentary and iron rich.

Figure 19. Sample 10; sedimentary and iron rich.

Figure 20. Iron-rich red bed at location IRB in figure 4.

Figure 21. Sample 7; two-phased; similar to sample 5 in content.

Figure 22. Sample 13; recrystalized calcite, iron stained. No dolomite.

Ring in the Christ that Is to Be:
Fulfilling the Pattern of His Life

Don Bradley

Abstract: The story of Christ, and of Christmas, is the story of Christ “the Lord God Omnipotent” incarnating in “a tabernacle of clay” (Mosiah 3:5). Christ took upon himself flesh so that he might also take upon himself burdens that he did not naturally have to bear—our burdens—in order to relieve us of those burdens. Christ, according to the scriptures, voluntarily “takes upon him” our pains, our sicknesses, death, our infirmities, and our sins (Alma 7:7–13). Unlike Christ, ordinary human beings do not “take upon them death” and bodily infirmity, but are, like king Benjamin, “subject to” them (Mosiah 2:11). In voluntarily taking upon himself our burdens, Christ brought redemption to us, and provided a pattern for us to live by. When we choose to bear burdens that we do not by nature or by necessity have to bear, we emulate him. Paul referred to following this pattern as living by “the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2), and, as Alma’s teachings at the Waters of Mormon indicate, we covenant at baptism that we will live this pattern with one another—to “bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light” (Mosiah 18:8–10). In so doing, we live as part of the body of Christ, measurably living out and incarnating our heavenly King in this world.

As the year draws toward its close, after reaching its darkest days, we celebrate the coming into the world of the Light by which it was made. The birth of that Light is most profoundly described in the one New Testament Christmas story that we never read at or associate with Christmas—the Christmas story in the Gospel of John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. . . .

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. . . .

And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. (John 1:1–5, 14, 16)

John poetically describes the shining of the eternal Light into the darkness, the coming into the world of its Creator, God the Son (the “Word”) taking on human flesh.

It is in John’s account of the Christmas event, and in the anticipations of that sacred event in the Book of Mormon, even more than in the familiar Christmas stories narrated by Matthew and Luke, that the significance of Christ’s birth is made clearest—and that the pattern he set for us to live by is revealed most plainly. In the symbolic and theological narratives of Christmas given by John and the Book of Mormon prophets we learn of a God who came down to our level to lift us up to his, and who took upon himself our burdens and modeled how we should take upon us the burdens of others.

Unlike John, Book of Mormon prophets spoke of the Christmas event, often referred to in Christian history as the Incarnation, in anticipation—before it occurred.

The prophet Abinadi’s message a century and a half before the first Christmas was that in Christ “God should come down among the children of men, and take upon him flesh and blood, and go forth upon the face of the earth” (Mosiah 7:27).

Similarly, a century and a quarter before that first Christmas, King Benjamin learned of the Messiah’s coming birth via an angelic annunciation of “glad tidings of great joy” similar to Gabriel’s later Annunciation to Mary in Luke’s gospel:

I am come to declare unto you the glad tidings of great joy. . . . For behold, the time cometh, and is not far distant, that with power, the Lord Omnipotent who reigneth, who was, and is from all eternity to all eternity, shall come down from heaven among the children of men, and shall dwell in a tabernacle of clay. . . . And lo, he shall suffer temptations, and pain of body, hunger, thirst, and fatigue, even more than man can suffer, except it be unto death; for behold, blood cometh from every pore, so great shall be his anguish for the wickedness and the abominations of his people. And he shall be called Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Father of heaven and earth, the Creator of all things from the beginning; and his mother shall be called Mary. (Mosiah 3:3, 5, 7–8)

Benjamin’s Nephite hearers observed a kind of anticipatory Christmas based on these glad tidings.

The angel’s annunciation to Benjamin anticipated not only Christ’s birth—his coming “down from heaven among the children of men” to “dwell in a tabernacle of clay”—but also his atoning death, his sharing in our griefs so intensely that he suffers them even more than we can, taking on him the pains of the people he has created, and also “the wickedness and the abominations of his people.”

Incarnation thus leads to Atonement: “the Lord God Omnipotent” takes upon him human flesh so that he might take upon him human sin and suffering.

The Book of Mormon’s language of “taking upon”—that Christ would “take upon him flesh and blood” in order to take upon him our burdens—is used perhaps most strikingly and illuminatingly by Alma, in a sermon to the people of Gideon.

Evoking the messianic prophecies of Abinadi and Benjamin, and the pending arrival of the first Christmas, Alma promises:

the time is not far distant that the Redeemer liveth and cometh among his people. . . . And behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem which is the land of our forefathers, she being a virgin, a precious and chosen vessel, who shall be overshadowed and conceive by the power of the Holy Ghost, and bring forth a son, yea, even the Son of God. And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy . . . the Son of God suffereth according to the flesh that he might take upon him the sins of his people, that he might blot out their transgressions according to the power of his deliverance. (Alma 7:7, 10–13)

Alma repeats the language of Christ “taking upon him” our burdens several times, to refer to several kinds of burdens of our human condition:

- our pains
- our sicknesses
- death
- our infirmities
- our sins

Most curious is that Christ is said to “take upon him death.” When any one of us dies, will others say, “He took upon him death?” or “She took upon her death?” When ordinary mortals die, we do not “take upon us death”; rather we, like King Benjamin, are “subject to” death and the bodily infirmities that lead to it (Mosiah 2:11).

The divine Christ, who took on flesh for us, was not “subject to” death, but submitted himself to death (2 Nephi 9:5), and thereby “took death upon him” for our sake.

The story of Christ, and of Christmas, is of “the Lord God Omnipotent” taking on himself burdens he did not naturally have to bear—our burdens—in order to relieve us of those burdens.

In doing so, he saved us and gave us a pattern for living our own lives. Christ’s example, and his word, encourage us to bear one another’s burdens, even literally, as when he admonished his disciples to bear the burden of a Roman soldier an additional mile beyond the single mile compelled by Roman law (Matthew 5:41). Rather than merely bear a burden they had to bear by law, he encouraged them to take the initiative to bear another’s burden voluntarily, as he himself does with our burdens.

The Apostle Paul exhorted the early Christians, whom he described as becoming through baptism a single communal body—the body of Christ—to follow the Savior’s example in taking the burdens of others (1 Corinthians 12:13–27). He taught the Philippian saints to emulate Christ, who in his divine premortal glory did not grasp to hold onto his divine prerogatives but emptied himself of them to descend to our level, become like us, and take on our lowly condition:

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. (Philippians 2:5–9)

To the Galatians, Paul went so far as to refer to living by this pattern—emptying or lowering ourselves to shoulder the burdens of others—as fulfilling the very “law of Christ”: “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2).

Christ’s central example of bearing for us the burdens he did not by nature have to bear, and that we by nature ultimately cannot adequately bear, explains the covenant Alma1 called upon his people to make at the waters of Mormon, a covenant to bear one another’s burdens as Christ had borne theirs:

Behold, here are the waters of Mormon . . . and now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light; Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort. . . . Now I say unto you, if this be the desire of your hearts, what have you against being baptized in the name of the Lord, as a witness before him that ye have entered into a covenant with him . . . ? (Mosiah 18:8–10)

The covenant we are invited to make is to emulate the divine Christ in his Incarnation and Atonement by, like him, shouldering burdens for others that we would not otherwise bear. Our own burdens we have to bear; the burdens of others we can choose to voluntarily take upon ourselves. In so doing, we emulate our Lord, who suffered the pains of sin and death, not because he had to, but voluntarily for our sake.

In living after this pattern, following his teachings and example of bearing one another’s burdens, we give flesh to his word and participate in a new birth, not a birth of the baby Jesus, but of the communal “body of Christ.”

Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s, beautiful poem, “Ring Out, Wild Bells,” particularly known to Latter-day Saints in the form of a hymn,1 expresses a longing for Christ in the new year that begins a week after Christmas. Tennyson wrote anticipating the Savior’s Second Coming, which we await in his due time, and also anticipating the growth and maturation of the communal body of Christ, in which we can now participate:

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land;
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Don Bradley is an author and historian specializing in the beginnings of the Restoration. He completed a Bachelor’s in History at BYU and a Master’s in History at Utah State University, where he wrote his thesis on “American Proto-Zionism and the ‘Book of Lehi’: Recontextualizing the Rise of Mormonism.” Don has performed an internship with the Joseph Smith Papers Project working with the earliest Joseph Smith sources. He was the primary researcher for Brian C. Hales’s Joseph Smith’s Polygamy series. He has published on the First Vision, the translation of the Book of Mormon, plural marriage before Nauvoo, Joseph Smith’s “grand fundamental principles of Mormonism,” and the Kinderhook plates. His chapter, with Mark Ashurst-McGee, “‘President Smith has Translated a Portion’: Joseph Smith and the Mistranslation of the Kinderhook Plates,” won the Mormon History Association’s 2021 “Best Article Award.” His first book is The Lost 116 Pages: Reconstructing the Book of Mormon’s Lost Stories (Greg Kofford Books, 2019). He has further books in progress on Oliver Cowdery as a revelator and translator, and on the origin of Nauvoo polygamy.

1. 1 . “Ring Out, Wild Bells,” Hymns, no. 215.

The “Allegory” of Ruth as a Prophecy
of Latter-day Gathering

Jan Francisco

Abstract: In the historical context of the late fifth century BC, the book of Ruth was a powerful story of hope and redemption for the eventual gathering and restoration of Israel’s covenants. Connecting their golden period of unity under King David to this idyllic tale with a beautiful happy ending may be more than a family story. It could also be read allegorically to prophesy the promised gathering of Israel by the Gentiles in the Latter-days. The key to understanding the symbolic layer of this story lies in deciphering the Hebrew meanings of the characters’ names, with Naomi representing the Israelites, and Ruth the Gentiles. Doing so unlocks the messages in the story of the Gentiles gathering Israel, the marriage relationship of Christ and the Church, and the promise of a Millennial Messiah. Exploring the connection of the book of Ruth, Pentecost, and harvest themes adds more significance to this allegory.

The book of Ruth is both a love story and a family story, and while it can be read with that lens, there are many other lenses that can give depth and inspiration to the story. Seeing it as a simple folktale, a commentary on social justice issues, an example of Mosaic legalities, or as a polemic against xenophobia are interpretations that others have espoused to explain the book of Ruth.1 The lens and interpretation in this article is one of allegory, with the characters in the story representing the Israelites, Gentiles, and the Lord in their respective roles in the latter-day gathering of Israel. When read this way, the story joins the prophecies of Isaiah, Nehemiah, Ezra, and other Old Testament prophets who anticipated the future gathering and restoration of Israel. The Hebrew meanings behind the names give more substance to this lens, though “allegory” is just one of many ways that the story can be interpreted.

An allegory is a literary device wherein each part of the story represents a different element in the actual world. For example, a lost coin represents a precious wayward soul, the one searching for it is the Lord (or a fellow Christian), and the celebration after it is found represents the joy in heaven over reclaimed souls. An allegory is different than a parable or a type, though all three have allegorical elements.2 A parable is more generally a “wise saying” or a fictional short story.3 The Dictionary of the Bible asserts that there are no sustained allegories in the Bible, though many of Jesus Christ’s teachings in the New Testament have allegorical elements, such as the lost coin, the sower of the seeds, and searching out one sheep when leaving the ninety-nine. This paper uses the term “allegory” in quotes because the term most closely represents the intention of the author in uncovering a hidden layer of meaning beneath the story, though it is not recognized as a proper allegory in the traditional sense as the story exists in its own right and has various interpretations beyond what this article proposes.

The Story

Naomi, wife of Elimelech and mother of Chilion and Mahlon, together with her family moved to Moab in consequence of a famine in their home region of Bethlehem. While they were in Moab, her sons married two Moabites. Chilion married Orpah and Mahlon married Ruth. Tragically, Elimelech and his two sons died in Moab, which left Naomi and the two Moabitesses widowed and without means of support. Knowing that their chances of survival in Moab without a family network were slim, Naomi determined to return to Israel and encouraged the two young women to remain in Moab, where they had connections and possible prospects for remarriage. Orpah agreed to stay in Moab after some urging on Naomi’s part. Ruth declared that she would follow Naomi to her home in Israel.

When Naomi and Ruth arrived in Bethlehem, they learned of a near kinsman of Naomi’s late husband, Elimelech, a man named Boaz who owned many large fields. Naomi encouraged Ruth to go and glean in his fields. Boaz took note of Ruth as a hard-working individual and gave her special privileges that allowed her more comfort as she worked. It also permitted her to take an abundance of grain home. Naomi, noticing his positive attention and his position as one of their redeeming kin, encouraged Ruth to stay in those fields and work with his workers.

After the barley and the wheat were gathered, Naomi schemed a risky proposition: she sent Ruth to the threshing floor late one evening when she knew Boaz would be there. She instructed her to lie down at his feet and do whatever he asked her to do. Fortunately, he didn’t ask her to do anything compromising, and she asked him to redeem her and Naomi as a goʾel, or redeeming kinsman. Boaz agreed, but first had to clear it with a nearer kinsman, who had the first right of redemption. When that kinsman declined his superior right, knowing that it would compromise his family dynamics to add another wife and potential child to the mix, Boaz proceeded to take Ruth as his bride. Their son, Obed, was the father of Jesse, who was the father of David, who would become king over all Israel.

Historical Context of the Book

Some scholars place the penning of the book of Ruth either during the Babylonian exile or the post-exilic period (586–550 BC).4 Both of those time periods were full of upheaval, uncertainty, and fear. Robert Alter attributes the timing as a polemic against Ezra and Nehemiah’s xenophobic rhetoric, which also places the timeframe as post-Babylonian exile.5 He points to the style, which includes some “late Biblical usage—as, for example, the verbs used for taking a wife (Ruth 1:7), for wait or hope (Ruth 1:13), and for removing a sandal (Ruth 4:7).”6 There is also a little aside in Ruth 4:7: “Now this was the manner in former time in Israel, concerning redeeming and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour: and this was a testimony in Israel,” narrating to the audience how it was done “in former time.” The narration shows a distance between the occurrence and the writing of the story.

The Dictionary of the Bible affirms,

In the [Hebrew] canon the book is placed in the third part among the Writings . . . which suggests a later date of its acceptance and probably of its composition. The LXX and Vg (and Eng Bibles) place it after [Judges]. . . . Most modern critics place the book after the exile. This judgment rests principally upon a large number of Aramaisms in such a small book and on its general style and tenor.7

The Oxford Companion to the Bible differs in its assessment: “Linguistic criteria and judgments about its place in the development of thought, invoked in the past as pointers to a late date, have lost their cogency. A date anywhere in the time of the Judean monarchy is plausible.”8

Many scholars and critics agree that the book is a work of carefully crafted fiction, a vessel for the genealogical information at the end.

The question turns rather on whether the genealogical information is a genuine ancient tradition, and whether the story is composed on the datum that one of David’s ancestors was a Moabite. . . . One may therefore take the genealogical data as a reliable piece of historical information while regarding the story as a whole as a free invention.9

If the story was circulating after 537 BC when Cyrus decreed that the Jews could return home (post-exile), the Assyrians had already conquered and assimilated Israel, the Northern Kingdom, 200 years previously in 721 BC. The Babylonians had already conquered Judah, the Southern Kingdom, in progressive stages from taking their elites captive (like Daniel and his three friends; Daniel 1:1–6), installing a puppet king (Zedekiah; 2 Kings 24:17–18), to full invasion and destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC (2 Kings 25:1–2). Having this story circulating during a period of immense upheaval and destruction makes it plausible that there is an additional prophetic or allegorical layer under the surface of the happy story. The timing of its origin is part of its story; it bears further examination of why the story unfolds as it does, why the characters behave as they do, and what lies deeper beneath the surface.

Symbolism of the Names

The symbolism of the story can be unraveled by investigating the meaning of the names of the characters in Hebrew. The names’ obvious double meanings to a Hebrew audience further confirms the idea that the story is a carefully crafted work with layers of meaning.

Naomi, the protagonist of the story, means “pleasant one.”10 Her name is also translated as “my delight.” Even though the title is The Book of Ruth, it is Naomi around whom all the actions revolve; her survival is intertwined with the survival of Ruth. She represents the “pleasant people” of the Lord: the Israelites. As an allegory, her actions in the story are the actions of the Israelites. Being the “pleasant one” or the “delight” of the Lord is further solidified by her relationship with her husband, Elimelech, which means “God is King.”11 Naomi could have been the delight or pleasant one of an infinite number of things, but in tandem with her husband, she is the delight of God. God’s covenant people, the house of Israel, are his delight and his pleasant ones.

Naomi and Elimelech begin the story at a disadvantage, prefigured by their hometown. They are referred to as “Ephrathites of Beth-lehem-judah” in Ruth 1:2 and again in 4:11. They belong to the very place where Rachel, beloved wife of Jacob, tragically died in giving birth to Benjamin. “And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Beth-lehem” (Genesis 35:19). The pillar on her grave was set there, a reminder of the tragically shortened life of Jacob’s delight. An allegorical connection with the “delight” of the Lord, the House of Israel, beginning its story at the place of Rachel’s death, portends anguish and tribulation.

To compound their misfortune, a famine forced their move to Moab. The famine could be symbolically viewed as an indication that they had broken their covenants through wickedness and disobedience. Deuteronomy 28 enumerates Israel’s covenants with God, both the blessings for obedience and the curses for disobedience. Famine was the first curse pronounced for disobedience: “Therefore shalt thou serve thine enemies which the Lord shall send against thee, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things” (Deuteronomy 28:48).

Their broken covenants were manifest in the cause for their move and their location. The trip to Moab would have been a route-reversal of the Israelite’s journey into the Promised Land back over the Jordan River into the wilderness. This was an “inverted exodus” where the couple goes out full and Naomi comes home empty, unlike Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, or the Israelites on their exodus journeys leaving with flocks, cattle, and wealth.12 Israel’s apostasy could be represented in the couple’s move. Perhaps the writer was making a statement about the Israelites’ worship of a false god, or a corruption of their understanding of the true God, in having Elimelech leave the promised land with his wife. God the King, the Divine Father, was not apostate, but their understanding of him had been corrupted. He does not appear in the rest of the story, only to illustrate that the couple had left the promised land and were living among the Moabites when he died, leaving her stranded in a foreign nation. Her connection with him was severed.

Elimelech and Naomi were not alone in the gentile land of Moab; they moved with their two sons. The names of their offspring represented the condition of the Israelites, now bereft of their protective covenant—Mahlon, meaning “sick”13 and Chilion, meaning “annihilation” or “decrease.”14 They only appear in the story for four verses, to present their weak and ill-fated names and to announce that not only were they sick and failing, but that they also married Moabite gentile women, outside of the covenant people. Allegorically, the consequences of Israel leaving their covenants with the Lord were manifest in both destruction and sickness: the offspring of their idolatrous choices.

The wives of these two sons were named Orpah and Ruth (Ruth 1:4). Orpah means “hard necked” or “obstinate.”15 The “back of the neck” figuratively symbolized either a fleeing foe or apostasy. Jewish tradition explains that this name was to symbolize that Orpah turned her back on her mother-in-law.16 She was also painted as a promiscuous harlot when she returned to Moab in later Jewish writings (circa 700–950 AD).

Once she had taken her leave of her mother-in-law, her subsequent actions are deemed extremely negative. She is said to have lain, that very night, with one hundred men, and even with a dog. The Philistine Goliath, who fought the young David during the battle in the valley of Elah, was born of this promiscuous activity (Ruth Rabbah). Orpah’s wanton behavior is said to be characteristic of her and one of the exegeses of her name describes such conduct: “Orpah—because everyone ground her like bruised corn [harifot].”17

Ruth’s name represents, symbolically, the opposite of Orpah’s betrayal. Ruth means a “friend,” “female companion,” or “neighbor woman.”18 Her role in the story is that of an intermediary savior, the outside caregiver who would restore Naomi to her former position and respect. She represents the Gentiles in the latter-days who are instrumental in restoring Israel to their covenants. Ruth would not leave Naomi; her famous expression of loyalty has been quoted for centuries:

Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God, my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me. (Ruth 1:16–17)

In sum, Ruth stays and Orpah goes. Ruth is symbolically the friend who will redeem the family line through her great sacrifice and commitment; Orpah turns against her family. Ruth is the progenitor of David; Orpah bears Goliath. The Gentiles are symbolically and symmetrically cast in the story as playing two opposing roles in the future of the Israelites’ gathering and restoration. Here is a summary of the story to this point, using the symbolic names from Hebrew:

The Pleasant One (Naomi) and God the King (Elimelech) were married, but they forsook their covenants and left their promised land. They bore children of Sickness (Mahlon) and Destruction (Chilion). When God the King died, the Pleasant One was left for ten years with Sickness and Destruction. When her sons died, everyone else abandoned her and the Pleasant One was left destitute, without support, and far from home. She had two connections with Gentiles: Nape of the Neck (Orpah), who turned her back on her, and the Friend (Ruth), who was devoted to her and her God.

Naomi could be symbolically seen as the original prodigal. At the depths of her desperation, she looks back to her home and hears that there is some food there. She returns in meek poverty, announcing that she is no more Naomi (Pleasant One), but Mara (bitterness) (Ruth 1:20). The inverted exodus is clearly stated by Naomi: “I went out full, and the Lord hath brought me home again empty” (Ruth 1:21). She was too old to bear another child and secure future support for herself or a new husband for Ruth, so she was forced to rely on the mercy of distant relatives who might take pity on her. Being a childless widow in the ancient world was a precarious position. Casting the two characters in the story as childless widows was a well-executed literary trope to describe desperation and hopelessness.

Israel had no pension plans, no social security, no assisted living. The responsibility to care for the elderly fell upon their families. It was first the responsibility of children to provide for the aged and the widow; this is one reason why the loss of children was such a staggering blow. . . . If a married man died without children, his brothers were responsible to care for his wife. Part of this care was for one brother to marry and impregnate the new widow; therewith the firstborn child bore the dead brother’s name and served as his heir.19

The manner of caring for widows through marrying a near kinsman (like a brother, uncle, or nephew) who would then father a child to carry on the deceased husband’s name is called the Levirate. It was a law for the Israelites to observe to protect the vulnerable from neglect (Deuteronomy 25:5–10). Thus, when Ruth followed Naomi out of gentile Moab, she, too, left all means of providing for herself. Ruth had no other brother-in-law to marry and conceive a child to provide for her older years. She was also a Moabitess, an outsider from a neighboring oppressor. The story is narrated from the beginning as occurring in “the days when the judges ruled” (Ruth 1:1). The Moabites in Judges 3, with the grotesquely fat King Eglon, had been oppressing Israel for eighteen years (Judges 3:14). After Ehud, an Israelite, assassinated the Moabite king and slipped away into the night, the Israelite army went into Moab and slew 10,000 Moabite “men of valor” (Judges 3:29). Ruth was not only a foreigner and a widow, but perceived as an enemy to the Israelites. She had no one but Naomi, and neither of them had much to support themselves. They had to wholly rely upon the attention of the Lord.

The Pleasant Ones are not forsaken by their Friends. The rest of the world may “turn their back” on Israel, but one group will stay with them. The Israelites God will be their God. The Gentiles will follow and preserve the Israelites.

Marriage to the Redeemer

The role of the Gentiles in bringing Israel back to its covenant with God is embodied by the relationship between Ruth and Boaz (Elimelech’s relative). The name Boaz has a meaning of both “strength” and “swiftness,” depending on the lexicon used. Thus, his name has been interpreted as “in him is strength, swiftness, quickness.”20 He is introduced as a “kinsman of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz” (Ruth 2:1). Boaz is the rescuer, the redeemer, the bridegroom, the savior. As the Son of God (family of God the King), Jesus Christ is the Redeemer, Bridegroom, and Savior—he is the allegorical manifestation of the character of Boaz.

The relationship between God and his people is often described as a marriage. When they left their covenants, the Lord described the Israelites as an unfaithful wife, a harlot. (See, for example, Isaiah 1:21, Jeremiah 2:20, Ezekiel 16:15, and Hosea 4:15.) They lost their privilege to be the Lord’s covenant bearers, and the Gentiles picked up the relationship. Though Naomi was never an unfaithful wife or a harlot, she had been forsaken and left destitute. Ruth, a Gentile, entered into a redeeming relationship with Boaz and together the two saved them all. This is a common theme of many symbols and stories: God is the bridegroom, and his Church is the bride, whether that church is Israelite or Gentile.

Often in the scriptures the covenant which God made with Israel is referred to as a marriage covenant. The same conditions which are at the core of the bond of marriage are also at the core of the bond between Jehovah and Israel: honesty, love, and fidelity. The covenant of marriage and God’s covenant with his chosen people are, in fact, very similar. Hosea’s message concerning Jehovah and his people is expressed in that kind of language.21

In Hosea 2 we read,

And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies. I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the Lord. . . . And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God. (Hosea 2:19–20, 23)

The temple endowment ceremony has elements of a wedding between the participants and the Lord. The clothing, veils, tokens, and altar are the symbols of a covenant of marriage. Members participate in those ordinances and gain power in their covenantal relationship with the Lord, just as though he was now their legal husband, protector, and redeemer, authorized to access his hesed. President Russell M. Nelson has emphasized the power of temple worship in strengthening our relationship with the Lord.

Once we make a covenant with God, we leave neutral ground forever. God will not abandon His relationship with those who have forged such a bond with Him. In fact, all those who have made a covenant with God have access to a special kind of love and mercy. In the Hebrew language, that covenantal love is called hesed. . . . A celestial marriage is such a covenant relationship. A husband and wife make a covenant with God and with each other to be loyal and faithful to each other. Hesed is a special kind of love and mercy that God feels for and extends to those who have made a covenant with Him. And we reciprocate with hesed for Him.22

Temple ordinances allow worshippers to enter covenants to bind themselves to the Lord, declaring that they are willing to give everything the Lord needs to build up his kingdom. In return, the Lord promises to care for and protect them, as a husband. This kind of commitment is also illustrated in the story of Ruth, with a similar reward.

Orpah and the potential redeemer in 4:3–6 are ready to give some help; the drama lies with the greater risk and commitment required of Ruth and Boaz to bring good out of bad, a theme expressed in the key concept hesed, “kindness,” in 1:8; 2:20; and 3:10.23

Because Ruth and Boaz were willing to give it all, each through their own sacrifice, they embody the loving-kindness, mercy, and commitment in hesed, the word for covenantal love.24

The story of Boaz and Ruth was woven through with ancient temple symbolism. The very name Boaz would have immediate temple connotations. The left brazen pillar of the Temple at Jerusalem was named Boaz (1 Kings 7:21). The pillar not only held up the entrance to the temple, but symbolically held up the firmament of heaven. The name Boaz, the temple, and the creation were all intertwined. Another temple image was the location of their midnight meeting on the threshing floor. Threshing floors were centers of agricultural communities. People gathered there for work, legal agreements, celebrations, and rituals. They believed that Jehovah blessed their threshing floors or cursed them, depending upon their righteousness.25 David purchased a threshing floor on Mount Moriah (the temple mount), which then became the base for the temple of Solomon (2 Samuel 24:15–25) and, later, the temples of Zerubabbel and Herod.26 The threshing floor of David was at the foundation of them all. Ruth and Boaz made their arrangement in a place that echoed both legal and spiritual covenants, prefiguring the covenants in holy temples between the Gentiles and the Lord in the latter days.

Additionally, the use of the word wing in their relationship has symbolic meaning: “The Lord recompense thy work, and a full reward be given thee of the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust” (Ruth 2:12). Again, when Ruth bravely surprises Boaz on the threshing floor, she answers, “I am Ruth thine handmaid: spread therefore thy skirt over thine handmaid; for thou art a near kinsman” (Ruth 3:9). The Hebrew word for skirt is also translated as wing.27 These allusions to wings, along with the symmetrical descriptions of Boaz and Ruth as worthy, recall a pair of matched winged figures—the cherubim on top of the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, facing one another, arms lifted to God.28 Their marriage was imbued with celestial, eternal imagery.

Wing imagery was also a powerful representation of Christ’s grace and atonement. He alluded to gathering his people under his wings in symbolic language representing his unmatched ability to provide safety, comfort, and salvation. (See Psalms 17:8; 36:7; 57:1; 61:4; 63:7; and 91:4, as well as 3 Nephi 10:5–6.) Matthew Bowen explored the relationship between the imagery of wings (or the divine embrace) and the Savior’s protective love. Within the book of Ruth, he noted the symbolic repetition of the image of wings.

Boaz commends Ruth’s faithfulness to Naomi, mother of her deceased husband, and to Naomi’s God in language that echoes the foregoing passages in the Psalms: “The Lord recompense thy work, and a full reward be given thee of the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings [kĕnāpâw] thou art come to trust [to take refuge]” (Ruth 2:12). Boaz’s language foreshadows Ruth’s request to Boaz that he fulfill the role of kinsman-redeemer (gōʾēl).29

Boaz’s role was that of redeemer, or goʾel, as well as husband. The role was an essential part of ancient Israelite culture; it was the only way that mercy could intervene without robbing justice. In the allegorical interpretation of Ruth, the Law of Justice may be the nearer kinsman that Boaz, the redeemer, had to negotiate with who had the first right of redemption. Christ’s atonement paid the demands of justice so that mercy could have her full power (Alma 42:15).

In Israel, the family had another responsibility in looking after its members who had come under hardship. Israel and her ancient Near Eastern neighbors required that all possible means be taken in order to meet a debt. If an individual had difficulty in paying his debt, family land and even family members, including the debtor, were required to be sold as an attempt to meet the obligation. No allowances were made in justice, which demanded debt repayment. Yet the law of Moses also provided a way for mercy to be extended through family members. The closest family member had a right and an obligation to redeem, or buy back, family land or family members who had been sold. “After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him: either his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or any that is nigh of kin unto him of his family may redeem him; or if he be able, he may redeem himself” (Leviticus 25:48–49). The man who bought his family land or kinsman back was known as the redeemer, or in Hebrew, the gōʾel. This was not free deliverance; this was deliverance at a price, and the gō’el paid that price. He met the debt owed by his relative which that kinsman could not pay on his own.30

The Strong One who is Swift to Save (Boaz) paid the price justice demanded and covenanted with the Friend (Ruth). Together they brought the Pleasant One (Naomi) back into the safety of her promised blessings.

The end of the book of Ruth provides a shining ray of hope, possibly the reason the whole story was written: “There is a son born to Naomi. . . . [H]e is the father of Jesse, the father of David” (Ruth 4:17). For the exiled Jews reading this story, the connection to David would have been auspicious. He was the hero underdog who, with five rocks, saved Israel from Orpah’s giant—he represented their best days: freedom, independence, unity, righteousness, and wealth. This was the poet-king-priest whom God had selected to lead them. And, importantly, he was the symbol of the promised Messiah. Jesus Christ’s lineage through the Davidic line was a token of his legitimacy. During the post-exilic period everything was in upheaval and separation. Babylon had already invaded, destroyed, and taken prisoners; the Assyrians had already disbursed the ten tribes, assimilating them by breaking them up into small groups or individuals in far-flung points throughout the vast empire. It seemed that all hope of an independent, united nation was merely a dream. Then the book of Ruth came with hope of a Messiah and redemption. Interestingly, it is Naomi, not Ruth, who is listed as the parent of Obed. When the Messiah comes again, he will be fully Israelite, not Gentile in his lineage. Jesus Christ was born into the tribe of Judah, and continues to bear that lineage, no matter the help the Gentiles offered in the ongoing restoration.

In the context of the story as an allegory, understood by the Hebrew audience more clearly because of the meanings behind the Hebrew names, the inclusion of David at the end also points to a reunified, powerful Israel, and a new reign of the Messiah. Only the Messiah, from the line of David, could expand the reach of the kingdom.

After the Redemption of the Gentiles and the Israelites, there will come a Savior fit to rule the earth as David ruled. And there will be peace, righteousness, and prosperity forever.

The Role of the Gentiles

Once Ruth and Boaz were married, Naomi was brought back to her original station. This message encapsulates the allegory. Gentiles will seek a relationship with the Lord (a little presumptuously, as they were not the covenant people—like Ruth on the threshing floor) empowering them to help the Israelites also be restored to their original station. “The typological redemption of Ruth follows this pattern: Naomi, the Jewish widow, is bereft; the Gentile daughter Ruth joins her; Naomi gets a redeemer when Boaz attaches himself to Ruth. The pattern is not ‘salvation, then incorporation of Gentiles’ but ‘incorporation of Gentiles, then salvation.’”31

Gentile is a difficult word to define because it is situationally determined. Paul Y. Hoskisson explains,

The word Gentile has several meanings that can be traced back etymologically to one original concept, the idea of a people or tribe. The English word Gentile comes from a Latin word that means “tribe, clan, family, people, etc.” This means that Gentiles, in general terms, simply implies a segregation between various people; it gives the idea of them and us.32

Nephi used the word Gentile more than any other writer in the Book of Mormon with over eighty occurrences in his record. He was contemporary with the Babylonian exile in which the book of Ruth may have emerged. His story mirrors hers in certain ways as well—his family left Jerusalem, fleeing tribulation of a different sort. They were persecuted for their belief in Christ and inspired to leave and populate a new land of promise. Other faithful families were also commanded to leave to protect themselves and preserve Israelite heritage in yet unknown parts of the world.33 The literal scattering of Israel illustrates that many who left the land of Israel were not apostate but were being obedient to the commandments of the Lord. In the book of Ruth, their move out of Jerusalem symbolically showed the distance that the House of Israel had created from their blessings and the safety of their covenants. Nephi’s familiarity with the role of the Gentiles in the restoration of the House of Israel shows that this prophecy was part of the religious conversation in Jerusalem at the time of their exodus.

One hundred and fifty years previous to Nephi, Isaiah had written:

Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people: and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord: for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me. (Isaiah 49:22–23)

Nephi included many of Isaiah’s writings in 1 Nephi 20–21, 2 Nephi 7–8, and 2 Nephi 12–27. All of these inclusions are intended to give hope to his posterity that they will be gathered again; they are not cast off forever. “It is a light thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the ends of the earth” (1 Nephi 21:6). The role of the Gentiles in gathering Israel is a favorite theme of Nephi.

And blessed are the Gentiles, they of whom the prophet has written; for behold, if it so be that they shall repent and fight not against Zion, and do not unite themselves to that great and abominable church, they shall be saved; for the Lord God will fulfil his covenants which he has made unto his children; and for this cause the prophet has written these things. (2 Nephi 6:12)

Nephi shows that there is a divide in the loyalties of the Gentiles. Those who will repent and join Zion will be saved—those are the friends, like Naomi. Those that unite with the great and abominable church will not—those turn their backs, like Orpah. The invitation was to all the Gentiles, but not all will accept it.

The deeper message within the story may be that, eventually, all the Israelites will return to their covenants and be reunited. A prolific number of prophecies regarding Israel’s eventual gathering and restoration abounded during the scattering. The earlier prophesies of Hosea, Amos, Micah, and Isaiah all point to a latter-day gathering with the help of the Gentiles.34 These prophets predated the scattering of the Northern Kingdom, teaching from 826–721 BC, right when Assyria invaded. They used agrarian themes of planting and harvest to describe Israel’s return in the latter-days, as well as references to King David’s reign, just like the book of Ruth.

The later prophets (620–540 BC), Jeremiah, Ezekial, and Zechariah, in the turmoil of conquest, prophesied of future restoration. Jeremiah saw a vision of future gathering: “Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord; for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion” (Jeremiah 3:14). He also prophesied of hunters and fishers, who would search out missing individual Israelites from “every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks” (Jeremiah 16:16). After many words of condemnation for backsliding Israel, Ezekiel also prophesied that hope would come in the future:

Thus saith the Lord God: I will even gather you from the people, and assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel. And they shall come thither. . . . And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you: and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and will give them an heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 11:17–19)

Zechariah prophesied of the Gentiles joining Israel:

And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto thee. And the Lord shall inherit Judah his portion in the holy land, and shall choose Jerusalem again. (Zechariah 2:11–12)

In the context of this prophetic tradition and message—that the Gentiles will assist the Israelites in returning to their covenants, their promised land, and the Lord—the book of Ruth could be seen as the illustrative version of their prophecies.

The restoration of the Gospel through Joseph Smith and subsequent Latter-day prophets is the fulfillment of these prophecies. The expansive missionary effort, steadily increasing for nearly 200 years has swept every continent and penetrated every clime, as Joseph Smith prophesied.35 The “gentile nations,” in the geo-political sense, of the United States with a large demographic of northern Europeans, began the work to gather Israel back to their covenants in the 1830s. As the work has rolled forward, Israelites (both by birth and by adoption) from all over the world are being brought back to their relationship with God through covenantal ordinances. They, too, have joined the missionary force in gathering other Israelites, and the work of God compounds exponentially.

The first shall be last and the last shall be first applies to the order of distribution of gospel truth. The Jews had it first and will be last in the latter days; the Gentiles had it last and were first in the latter-day restoration. The book of Ruth illustrates this principle with the story of a gentile woman nurturing, sacrificing, and loving a Jewish woman, supporting her in her destitution, and bringing her back to a place of security and comfort.

Pentecost

The book of Ruth is the traditional reading of the Pentecostal festival.36 Pentecost is one of the three main feast days of Israel, and each are associated with a different harvest. Passover ends with the Festival of First Fruits—the barley harvest. Pentecost occurs fifty days later and celebrates the gathering of the wheat. The fruit harvest occurs in the fall around the Festival of Tabernacles, or the feast of in-gathering.37

Observing these three feasts are commandments of the Lord, written in Exodus 23. They each have layers of significance and a relevance for the story of Ruth. The Passover serves as a reminder of the exodus from slavery in Egypt but also carries the symbolism of Christ’s atoning sacrifice, with a sacrificial lamb, protective blood, and the destroyer “passing over” the Israelites. This feast is connected to the barley harvest. The last day of the seven-day feast is called the First Fruits.

Barley is the first grain harvested, and when it is ripe, its heads bow down, evoking an image of humility and obedience. It is the easiest to harvest. The grains and chaff can be separated without much physical persuasion, just the wind. Given the proximity to the symbolic atonement of Passover (within the same week), it could be argued that the barley harvest represents the faithful righteous of Israel, first and easily gathered. Christ is labeled “the firstfruits” by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:20–23. John prophecies that the 144,000 who join the Lamb on Mount Zion are “redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb” (Revelation 14:4). Others have called the barley harvest “the overcomers.” The faithful, obedient, righteous saints who follow easily and humbly are gathered in first.38

The Pentecost is tethered to first fruits by fifty days. It commemorates the gathering of the wheat. Wheat, unlike barley, stands up straight and erect, its chaff is more stubborn and uses more physical persuasion to separate the grain—called threshing. The ancient method of separating the chaff and wheat was using a threshing board, inlaid with chips of flint or stone, and called tribulum in Latin (from whence tribulation is derived). The wheat harvest could symbolize the gathering of the more stubborn, stiff, and disobedient, who require the persuasion of tribulation to see their way back to God. This could also be a symbol of the gentile nations shedding their false beliefs and idols so they could be gathered, in contrast to the humble barley-Israelites.39

The final festival commanded by the Lord, the feast of Tabernacles, coincides with the harvest of the fruit, especially the grapes, but also olives, pomegranates, and figs. This occurs six months later, in the fall. The grapes were crushed by feet in a winepress, creating deep red liquid, reminiscent of blood. The symbolism here is of the wicked being judged. The wicked are harvested, just as the righteous are, but they will be burned as tares. John prophesies of the punishment of the wicked as grapes being harvested and thrown into the winepress.

And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs. (Revelation 14:19–20)

Harvesting was a cyclical microcosm of the lifespan of the earth—the gathering of souls in phases, bringing them safely into the storehouse of heaven. The parables of the vineyard, the sower of seeds, the wheat and the tares, the olive tree allegory in Jacob 5, the end of days revelation by John—all of these use the metaphor of harvesting to symbolize gathering, judgment, and eternal life of different degrees of glory.

The harvests in Boaz’s fields were central to the plot of the story, and the timing of the harvests also coincided with the message of the allegory. Ruth and Naomi arrived at the beginning of the barley harvest, they were still unredeemed by their goʾel at that point in the story, but he sent them home with loads of grain, symbolizing the gathering of the Israelites before the time of the Gentiles. Ruth worked in his fields through the barley and wheat harvests and came to the threshing floor during the winnowing of the barley. Thus, she approached Boaz between the time of the wheat harvest and the thrashing of the wheat, the same time that Pentecost is celebrated. As a formal, literary allegory, it is imperfect, with not every element matching up, but there is some significance to the plot of harvesting, the fact that Ruth (Gentile) brings in an abundance of barley (Israel), and the timing of the meeting on the threshing floor.

After Christ’s resurrection, when he visited his apostles, he explained their commission to go to all the nations, teaching repentance and the remission of sins. The sign that they were to begin this world-wide gathering was when the Holy Ghost came upon them (Acts 1:2–8, Luke 24:46–49). This sign occurred on the feast of Pentecost, when the Spirit filled the house where they were gathered and gave the Christians the ability to speak in the languages of the Gentiles (Acts 2:1–18). That day 3,000 souls were baptized from many nations, though they were all Jewish, attending the feast of the Pentecost. Perhaps Peter thought that it was sufficient that they were baptizing Jews from all nations to fulfill their commission to go to all the world.

Several weeks later, the commission to go to the Gentiles was reaffirmed with Peter’s vision of the unclean animals. He was commanded to “rise, Peter; kill and eat” (Acts 10:13). The vision may have been a gentle rebuke and reminder that he was to take the gospel to all nations, not just the Jews of all nations, which the Lord had instructed him previously should commence with the reception of the Holy Spirit. “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common” (Acts 10:15). The past tense phrase indicates that God had already cleansed or approved of them. When Cornelius showed up at the door moments later, Peter understood the meaning behind the vision—he was to gather the Gentiles into the gospel net too.

Thus, the times of the Gentiles commenced with Peter and continued through the apostasy and into the restoration.40 The sign was given to begin on the day of Pentecost, as they were gathered in a private home, likely reading the book of Ruth and eating their wheat bread offering, when the Holy Spirit rushed through the house like tongues of fire (Acts 2:2). The harvest of the wheat had begun, and the book of Ruth anticipated the event each year for centuries.

Conclusion

In the context of the post-exilic scattering, the allegory embedded within the story of Ruth was a powerful explanation of their current condition (sickness and destruction) with a shining ray of hope (Gentiles will help to reunite them with their goʾel). The names of the characters in the story tell a deeper, more meaningful story of a people who needed help to come back to their promised land, pledge loyalty and fidelity, and ultimately find safety in their Lord’s wings. The fact that it is tied to the harvest of the wheat, read at the Pentecost, strengthens this allegorical lens of the role of the Gentiles in gathering Israel. The story of Ruth is a microcosm of Israel’s journey and destiny.

The Pleasant One and God the King leave the safety of their covenants, resulting in sickness, destruction, failing and annihilation. Then all means of support vanish—her husband and sons perish while she is far from home. There are two groups of Gentiles who she relies on: One who Turns Her Back and leaves, and another who is a Friend and Neighbor. The Friend and Neighbor follows the Pleasant one with loyalty—she will go with her anywhere, worship her God, be a part of her people. The Friend works hard to support the Pleasant One, gathering in the humble stalks of barley and bringing home an abundance, sanctioned by the owner of the field.

He who is Swift to Save notices the Friend and offers her more than her share of the harvest, protects her, and opens his fields and home to her. She stays in his fields and doesn’t go anywhere else. During the winnowing of the barley, the Friend boldly goes to the threshing floor, the place where covenants were made, the place reminiscent of the temple in Jerusalem, and requests that He who is Swift to Save will redeem both her and the Pleasant One. He promises that he will if he can. He has to make arrangements with one who has closer claim on them than he does. He negotiates with the nearer kinsman, who declines to help, and offers mercy and salvation to the two women. The Friend and He who is Swift to Save are married and have a child. Through their lineage, David will be born, he whose right it is to rule. Through this, the Pleasant One’s future is assured and her safety and protection are restored. The Messiah, through David’s line, will come because of this union and reinstate peace, prosperity, and unity to the Pleasant One and to the Friend.

Jan Gillespie Francisco graduated from Utah State University with a BA in History and Secondary Education. She lives in Lander, Wyoming, with her husband, Ben, and their six children. She loves learning about the scriptures and ancient cultures. She maintains a blog at indefenseofwomen.wordpress.com relating to her experiences as a woman in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

1 . To read about the social justice lens, see Gaye Strathearn and Angela Cothran, “Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz: Borders, Relationships, Law, and Hesed,” Covenant of Compassion: Caring for the Marginalized and Disadvantaged in the Old Testament, ed. Avram R. Shannon et al. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU]; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021), 163–65, rsc.byu.edu/covenant-compassion/naomi-ruth-boaz. For a deeper look into the Mosaic legalities, see Brad Embry, “Legalities in the Book of Ruth: A Renewed Look,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 41, no. 1 (2016), doi.org/10.1177/0309089216628519. For the folktale lens, Jack M. Sasson, Ruth: A New Translation with a Philological Commentary and a Formalist-Folklorist Interpretation, 2nd ed. (Sheffield, UK: JSOT, 1989), archive.org
/details/ruthcommentary0000niel/page/6/mode/2up. This book is a compilation around the idea that if Ruth was written in the post-exilic period, during the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, the teachings of those two prophets were not inclusive for foreigners. Ezra 4:1–3; 9:1–4; Nehemiah 13:1–3 are examples of the disdain for foreigners, and the story of Ruth could be seen as an answer to that position.

2 . John L. McKenzie, S.J., Dictionary of the Bible (Milwaukee, WI: Bruce Publishing, 1965), s.v. “Allegory.”

3 . McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible, s.v. “Parable.”

4 . Encyclopedia Britannica, s.v. “Book of Ruth,” britannica.com/topic/Book-of-Ruth.

5 . Robert Alter, Strong as Death is Love: The Song of Songs, Ruth, Esther, Jonah and Daniel (New York: W. W. Norton, 2015), 57.

6 . Alter, Strong as Death is Love, 57.

7 . McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible, s.v. “Ruth.”

8 . The Oxford Companion to the Bible, ed. Bruce M. Metzger and Michael D. Coogan (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 663.

9 . McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible, s.v. “Ruth.”

10 . From the Hebrew word נעם (naam) meaning “to be pleasant.” Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden, NDL: Brill, 2001), s.v. “נעם.”

11 . A combination of the Hebrew words אל (el, or God) and מלך (melech, or king). Koehler and Baumgartner, Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, s.v. “אל” and “מלך.”

12 . Peter J. Leithart, “When Gentile Meets Jew: A Christian Reading of Ruth & the Hebrew Scriptures,” Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity 22 (May 2009): 21–22.

13 . From the Hebrew word חלה (chalah) meaning “to fall sick, be ill.” Koehler and Baumgartner, Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, s.v. “חלה”.

14 . From the Hebrew word כליון (kilayon) meaning “annihilation, decrease.” Koehler and Baumgartner, Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, s.v. “כליון.”

15 . Koehler and Baumgartner, Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, s.v. “ערפה.”

16 . “Ruth Rabbah 2:9,” Sefaria, sefaria.org/Ruth_Rabbah.2.9?lang=bi. Ruth Rabbah is an old text, but not as old as the book of Ruth. It was written in ca. 700–950 AD, it is an explanation of each verse in the book of Ruth, It is part of the Midrash Rabbot, which also includes the books of Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and the Book of Esther.

17 . Tamar Meir, “Orpah: Midrash and Aggadah,” The Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women, Jewish Women’s Archive (website), jwa.org
/encyclopedia/article/orpah-midrash-and-aggadah.

18 . James Strong, Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2007), s.v. “H7327, H7468 [Ruth],-,” 1573, 1575.

19 . Kerry Muhlestein, “Ruth, Redemption, Covenant, and Christ,” in The Gospel of Jesus Christ in the Old Testament, ed. D. Kelly Ogden, Jared W. Ludlow and Kerry Muhlestein (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 2009), 189–90, rsc.byu.edu/gospel-jesus-christ-old-testament/ruth-redemption-covenant-christ.

20 . Ruth 2:1 note a, in the Latter-day Saint edition of the King James Version of the Bible; see also Strong’s Concordance, s.v. “H1162 [Boaz],” 1478; Koehler and Baumgartner, Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, s.v. “עז.”

21 . Kent P. Jackson, “The Marriage of Hosea and Jehovah’s Covenant with Israel,” in Isaiah and the Prophets: Inspired Voices from the Old Testament, ed. Monte S. Nyman and Charles D. Tate Jr. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU, 1984), 57–74, rsc.byu.edu/isaiah-prophets/marriage-hosea-jehovahs-covenant-israel.

22 . Russell M. Nelson, “The Everlasting Covenant,” Liahona, October 2022, 5–6, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona/2022/10/04-the-everlasting
-covenant.

23 . Oxford Companion to the Bible, 663.

24 . See Nelson, “Everlasting Covenant.”

25 . Jaime L. Waters, “Threshing Floors in Ancient Israel,” review of “Threshing Floors in Ancient Israel: Their Ritual and Symbolic Significance,” by John D. Currid, Bible History Daily, Biblical Archaeology Society, 8 April 2016, biblicalarchaeology.org/reviews/threshing-floors-in-ancient-israel/.

26 . David Rolph Seely, “The Temple of Herod,” in New Testament History, Culture, and Society: A Background to the Texts of the New Testament, ed. Lincoln H. Blumell (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2019), 53–70, rsc.byu.edu/new-testament-history-culture-society/temple-herod.

27 . Strong’s Concordance, s.v. “H3671 [skirt],” 1516.

28 . Jeffrey M. Bradshaw, “KnoWhy OTL20A—How Does the Book of Ruth Provide a Model for Marriage?,” Interpreter Foundation, 21 May 2018, interpreterfoundation.org/knowhy-otl20a-how-does-the-book-of-ruth-provide-a-model-for-marriage/.

29 . Matthew L. Bowen, “‘Encircled About Eternally In the Arms of His Love’: The Divine Embrace As a Thematic Symbol of Jesus Christ and His Atonement in the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 59 (2023): 117, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/encircled-about-eternally-in-the-arms-of-his-love-the-divine-embrace-as-a-thematic
-symbol-of-jesus-christ-and-his-atonement-in-the-book-of-mormon/.

30 . Muhlestein, “Ruth, Redemption, Covenant, and Christ,” 191–92.

31 . Leithart, “When Gentile Meets Jew,” 23.

32 . Hoskisson, s.v. “Gentile(s),” Doctrine and Covenants Reference Companion, ed. Dennis L. Largey (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2012), quoted in John Hilton III et al., “Gentiles in the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 33 (2019): 269–70, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/gentiles-in-the-book-of-mormon/.

33 . For example, the Mulekites, and the ancestors of many native people, have similar Hebrew origins to the Nephites, in both North and South America and on the islands. Jesus even told the Nephites that “other sheep” needed him to visit them, and there are stories from Russia to the Ojibwa that Christ visited them after his resurrection.

34 . Chapter 25, “Prophecies of a Latter-Day Gathering (Jeremiah 23; 30–31; 33; 46–51; Obadiah),” in Old Testament Student Manual, Kings–Malachi (Salt Lake City: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1981), 253, archive.org/details/oldtestament1kin00chur/page/252/mode/2up. Hosea prophesied, “Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter-days” (Hosea 3:5). In the context of the book of Ruth, his inclusion of “David their King” as part of the latter-day restoration is significant. Amos uses the imagery of sifting the house of Israel, “like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth” (Amos 9:9). He also employed a planting metaphor to describe their return to their blessings: “And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God” (Amos 9:15). These agrarian themes are also central to the book of Ruth. Micah compares Israel to a flock of sheep that will be gathered (Micah 2:12) and as sheaves gathered into the floor (Micah 4:12). Isaiah’s prophecies are very clear regarding the partnership between the Gentiles and Israel, which will be addressed later in the body of this article.

35 . “Church History,” 1 March 1842, p. 709, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/church-history-1-march-1842/4.

36 . Oxford Companion to the Bible, 662. McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible, s.v. “Ruth.” Commanded to be observed in Exodus 23:14–16.

37 . Bible Dictionary, s.v. “Feasts,” in the Latter-day Saint edition of the King James Version of the Bible, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bd/feasts.

38 . Iain Gordon, “Revelation Chapter 14: The Harvest of the Earth,” Bible Study Series, Jesus Plus Nothing (website), jesusplusnothing.com/series/post/bible-study-revelation-14-harvest-earth.

39 . Gordon, “Revelation Chapter 14.”

40 . Joseph Fielding Smith, Church History and Modern Revelation, 1:196, quoted in Doctrine and Covenants Student Manual (Salt Lake City: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1981), 94, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-student-manual/section-45-looking-forth-for-the-great-day-of-the-lord.

Looking Again at the Anthon Transcript(s)

John S. Thompson

Abstract: The official account of Martin Harris’s visit to Charles Anthon, canonized in the Pearl of Great Price, suggests that Anthon may have been shown more than one transcript by Harris. The differing responses of Anthon to each of these transcripts may shed light on the kinds of characters he was shown and provide additional perspectives that can help clarify a little more what is happening in the historical sources.

[Editor’s Note: This article is an updated version of a paper first presented at the 2024 FAIR Virtual Conference. Those interested in the original presentation can find it at fairlatterdaysaints
.org/conference/virt_2024-history/thompson_looking-again-at
-the-anton-transcripts.]

Some inconsistencies exist in the written historical sources concerning the number and nature of the transcripts Martin Harris presented to Professor Charles Anthon at Columbia College in 1828. Did Harris have with him only a single piece of paper, or did he have two or more? Was there only one copied set of characters? Was a translation included? What exactly was the nature of the characters and translations? Some sources seem to indicate that Harris showed Anthon one document on which was written only a single collection of characters; this has been the standard assumption among historians and lay-members alike.1 However, the official account of Harris’s visit with Anthon, as recorded and published in the History of the Church2 and in the Pearl of Great Price (Joseph Smith—History 1:63–65), and other sources suggest that Harris may have shown Anthon at least two transcripts, as B. H. Roberts had noted.3 While the number of actual documents presented is unclear in most sources, Martin Harris’s report does explicitly state that he presented Anthon two different sets of characters—one set that was translated and another set that was not yet translated. This report, which also includes two differing responses from Anthon regarding these two sets of characters, provides some additional possibilities to consider with respect to Anthon’s abilities and the kinds of characters that may have been on the document(s) copied from the plates.4

Some Background

Joseph Smith’s history projects do not explicitly mention the number of documents Harris carried with him. His 1832 History indicates only that “some of the characters” were copied from the plates for Martin Harris to take with him to the East. No reference to the number of documents created is present.5

Joseph Smith’s 1838 History states: “Immediately after my [Joseph Smith’s] arrival there [in Pennsylvania] I commenced copying the characters of all the plates. I copyed [sic] a considerable number of them and by means of the Urim and Thummin I translated some of them.”6 As in the 1832 account, nothing in this version indicates the number of documents made, only that a “considerable number” of characters were copied somewhere and that “some” of these characters were translated. That is as far as these sentences allow one to go when recreating history. It cannot even be determined where the translation itself was written. Was it right next to any of the characters? Was it on a separate document? It is not clearly stated. Note that this text originally stated Joseph Smith copied characters of “all” the plates, but then all is crossed out, presumably because it goes too far. However, the initial reading, even with its correction, certainly gives the impression that characters were copied from more than one plate.

The 1838 History goes on to say that “Mr Martin Harris came to our place, got the characters which I had drawn off of the plates and started with them to the City of New York.”7 Again, the text does not actually specify the number of documents. It only says he “got the characters” without any reference to their physical context. Orson Pratt’s 1840 history is likewise vague.8

Recent scholarship has demonstrated that Joseph Smith likely created more than one copy of characters from the plates while he possessed them—some having different formats or appearances than the others.9 Joseph Knight Sr. stated that Joseph and Emma Smith “Drew of the Caricters exactly like the ancient,” suggesting they took care to render facsimile copies of the characters just as they appeared on the plates.10

The 1838 History provides (Joseph Smith’s recollection of?) Martin Harris’s first-hand report wherein Harris explicitly states that he presented two sets of characters to Anthon and received two different responses:

I went to the City of New York and presented the Characters which had been translated [C1], with the translation thereof [T], to Professor <Charles> Anthony a gentleman celebrated for his literary attainments. Professor Anthony stated that the translation was correct, more so than any he had before seen translated from the Egyptian [R1]. I then shewed him those which were not yet translated [C2], and he said that they were Egyptian, Chaldeak, Assyriac, and Arabac, and he said that they were true characters [R2].11

Based on these sources, it is possible that Harris could have presented Anthon with any of four options:

1. A singular document (D) with two sets of characters and a translation of one of the sets (D=C1+T+C2)

2. Two documents with a set of characters on each and a translation on one of them (D1=C1+T; D2=C2)

3. Two documents with one containing the two sets of characters and the other the translation (D1=C1+C2; D2=T)

4. Three documents with a set of characters on each of two documents and a translation on the third, (D1=C1; D2=T of C1; D3=C2)

Any of the documents could have writing on the front or back, or both. Harris’s report that he “presented” the first set of characters [C1] “with the translation thereof” [T] and received Anthon’s reaction to them [R1] but then later “showed” him a second set of characters [C2] and received a second reaction [R2] is more consistent with option 2 or 4, but 2 is the most likely since the first character set was presented “with the translation thereof.”

Anthon’s Responses to the Two Sets of Characters

When Anthon was presented with the first set of characters and their translation, he, according to Harris, simply identified the characters as “Egyptian.” Although Martin Harris or Anthon could have been using this term generically for any ancient script (like the phrase “it is all Greek to me”), the possibility that Anthon actually identified this transcript as having recognizably Egyptian characters should not be ruled out, since one of his main purposes for inspecting the characters was to identify their origin. In his academic position, Anthon had been exposed to various forms of Egyptian writing, notwithstanding his ability-level to translate such.

When Anthon was presented with the second set of characters (those that were not translated), Anthon seems less certain which language the characters represented, stating that some looked Egyptian while others looked “Chaldeak, Assyriac, and Arabac.” Even Anthon’s own accounts of Harris’s visit seem to verify the ancient authenticity of many of the characters because he speculated that they must have been copied from a book of “various alphabets,” albeit in a nonsensical manner.12

At face value, the above can be viewed as evidence that two different scripts were shown to Anthon—a script Anthon simply identified as Egyptian and another script containing characters of a less certain origin. Joseph Knight Sr.’s report seems to corroborate the idea of two different scripts for he stated that Harris “found men that could translate some of the Carictors . . . But there were some Carictors they could not well understand.”13

The possibility of an Egyptian script that Anthon could readily identify and another script that he could not readily identify would be in harmony with claims within the Book of Mormon itself. Mormon and Moroni, who lived c. 400 AD, created an abridgment of the main Nephite records using a language that had been “altered” over their thousand-year history which they called “reformed Egyptian.” It was reformed so much that “none other people knoweth our language” (Mormon 9:32, 34), suggesting that even an ancient Egyptian would not have understood their language in spite of the name given.14 Mormon, however, noted that as he was creating his abridgment of the main Nephite history, he “searched among the records” and “found” the set of plates that contained the “small account” written by Nephi, Jacob, and others down to King Benjamin. He felt they were important to include and indicates that he would simply “put them” with the remainder of his abridgment (Words of Mormon 1:3–6).15 Since Nephi and Jacob lived around a thousand years before Mormon and Moroni, the language and characters on this small record would not have been the altered “reformed Egyptian” that Mormon and Moroni used. Rather, Nephi tells his readers plainly that he wrote using “the language of the Egyptians” (1 Nephi 1:2), a language that his father Lehi knew how to read and had taught to his children (Mosiah 1:4). It is known from archaeology that there was a scribal tradition using Egyptian hieratic in Israel during Nephi’s day.16 This Palestinian Hieratic is currently the most plausible candidate for an Egyptian script Nephi would have used to make his own record.

So, if this additional “small account” that Mormon put with the remainder of his abridgment had been written in the Egyptian language of Lehi and Nephi’s day, and all the other writings were written in the “reformed Egyptian” of Mormon and Moroni’s day, then it would be reasonable to postulate that two different-looking scripts would have been found on the bundle of plates that Joseph Smith received. This could explain the different reactions of Charles Anthon to the two character sets presented to him by Martin Harris—the one when he declared the characters to be Egyptian, and the other that he could not definitively identify but said that they had some features of Egyptian and other ancient languages.17

Anthon himself would later claim the characters were “any thing else but ‘Egyptian Hieroglyphics.’”18 However, it has been noted that Anthon likely did tell Harris at some point that many of the characters looked like Egyptian characters, because after their meeting it began to be circulated among the Latter-day Saints that Anthon told Harris some of the characters appeared to be “short-hand Egyptian.”19 This distinctive term was something the scholars, including Champollion himself, were using in their publications to describe hieratic script and was unlikely a term that Harris would have known unless Anthon actually said it to him.20 This detail is significant in light of the fact that hieratic was the known Egyptian script used in the Jerusalem of Nephi’s day as noted earlier.

The Translation

According to Harris’s report in the 1838 History, Anthon also indicated that the translation “from the Egyptian” characters in the first transcript was “correct.” Although translating any Egyptian characters was still in its infancy, Anthon was familiar with Champollion’s earliest work and mentioned it in his 1825 reworking of A Classical Dictionary. He also had a personal copy of Champollion’s 1824 Précis du système hiéroglyphique des anciens Égyptiens.21 In the least, Anthon likely understood from Champollion’s work that Egyptian was a phonemic language, having characters representing sounds, not just logograms or symbolic writing, but the means to translate full sentences was not yet published. Consequently, for Anthon to have made any substantive and affirming remarks concerning a “translation” could only have been for something simple, like alphabetic equivalences, rather than the translation of words or sentences. While it is uncertain how deep Anthon’s understanding of various Egyptian scripts and their values was, there is evidence in the sources that Joseph Smith may have attempted to create and send something like an alphabet with Harris.22 Consequently, Anthon’s comment to Harris that the translation “from the Egyptian” was “correct” may have been a simple acknowledgement of rudimentary ideas, such as characters having alphabetic features and nothing more.23

Joseph Smith’s initial interaction with the Egyptian characters on the papyri brought to him by Michael Chandler from which the Book of Abraham was translated may have some bearing on this moment. Oliver Cowdery published a letter he had written concerning the initial meetings between the Prophet and Chandler saying:

While Mr. Chandler was in Philadelphia, he used every exertion to find some one who could give him the translation of his papyrus, but could not, satisfactorily, though from some few men of the first eminence, he obtained in a small degree, the translation of a few characters. Here he was referred to bro. Smith. . . .

Mr. Chandler was told that his writings could be deciphered, and very politely gave me [Cowdery] a privilege of copying some four or five different sentences or separate pieces, stating, at the same time, that unless he found some one who could give him a translation soon, he would carry them to London.

I am a little in advance of my narration; The morning Mr. Chandler first presented his papyrus to bro.—Smith, he was shown, by the latter, a number of characters like those upon the writings of Mr. C. which were previously copied from the plates, containing the history of the Nephites, or book of Mormon.

Being solicited by Mr. Chandler to give an opinion concerning his antiquities, or translation of some of the characters, bro. S. gave him the interpretation of some few for his satisfaction. For your gratification I will here annex a certificate which I hold, from under the hand of Mr. Chandler, unsolicited, however, by any person in this place, which will show how far he believed bro. Smith able to unfold from these long obscured rolls the wonders contained therein:

“Kirtland, July 6th, 1835.”

“This is to make known to all who may be desirous, concerning the knowledge of Mr. Joseph Smith, jr. in deciphering the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic characters, in my possession, which I have, in many eminent cities, shown to the most learned: And, from the information that I could even learn, or meet with, I find that of Mr. Joseph Smith, jr. to correspond in the most minute matters.”24

An important thing to note in this source is that, according to Chandler, none of the eminent men in Philadelphia could translate the papyri’s words or sentences. He even speaks about going to London to find someone who could. These men could only provide rudimentary remarks concerning “a few characters.” Consequently, Chandler’s comparison of the eminent men’s most basic assessment with Joseph Smith’s interpretation of “some few,” suggests the Prophet must have only provided undeveloped ideas about a few characters as well but not words or sentences. Thus, the certificate can be accurate but not to the degree some may suppose.

In a similar manner, the Anthon episode does not appear to deal with any translation of words or sentences. As noted above, Anthon was not able to do so, but he likely had a simple understanding of a few Egyptian characters. Since the 1838 History reports that Joseph Smith only sent with Harris a translation of “some” characters, any assumption that he translated words or sentences at this point goes beyond the text. The Prophet’s elementary effort appears to have corresponded in some way with Anthon’s limited understanding, and so Anthon, like Chandler, gave a certificate affirming such.

Considering the above, it is reasonable to conclude that Joseph Smith only provided rudimentary interpretations of a few characters on both the Egyptian papyri and on the Gold Plates the first time he engaged with them. According to the reports, the Prophet’s basic efforts were somehow in accordance with the very limited understanding of Chandler’s eminent men in Philadelphia and Harris’s eminent man in New York, Charles Anthon. Neither the Prophet nor the eminent men appear to be translating or affirming the translation of words or sentences at this point. That effort would come later.

One other important detail from Chandler’s visit should be noted. Cowdery reports that Joseph Smith pulled out a transcript of “a number of characters” from the Book of Mormon plates to show Chandler. Apparently, the characters of the plates “were like those” upon the papyri that Chandler brought. This overlooked detail becomes important when it is understood that the papyri that Chandler brought were written in hieratic.25 This provides additional evidence that the Book of Mormon plates may have contained hieratic characters—characters that Anthon identified as “short-hand Egyptian,” a term used for hieratic characters in the scholarly literature of the day. That Anthon affirmed the first transcript as Egyptian and its translation of a few characters correct but then struggled to identify, and thus translate, the characters on the second transcript again matches Joseph Knight Sr.’s report noted above that Harris “found men that could translate some of the Carictors . . . But there were some Carictors they could not well understand.”26

If the 1838 History is accurate and two scripts were shown, then Anthon’s reports in his letters of a single transcript about which he could not make any sense may be conflating everything into a single collection of characters. In other words, Anthon’s inability to discern the origin of the “reformed Egyptian” characters he was shown, coupled with his declared bias against anything involving angelic visitations,27 may have swayed him to later deny that any of the characters had authentic Egyptian connection. Since the characters he viewed in the second set were unrecognizable to him, being a reformed Egyptian “that none other people knoweth,” this would cast doubt on all the characters he saw, even if some did appear to be legitimately like “short-hand Egyptian” as he apparently said to Martin Harris. Many hieratic characters, especially if written in isolation, like in columns as Anthon claimed he saw, can appear to be simple squiggles and flourishes of the pen. It would not be difficult for Anthon to settle into that conclusion for everything he was presented by Harris.

Conclusions

Considering all the above, the most likely scenario in which the details given in the official 1838 History are plausible would be as follows:

1. Martin Harris obtained at least two documents from Joseph Smith, both containing copies of characters from the plates. Some kind of minimal effort of “translation,” like an alphabet, was added to the first set of characters.

2. The first set of characters were likely written in an Egyptian script from Nephi’s day that Anthon readily identified as “Egyptian” and related them to “short-hand Egyptian,” a term being used for hieratic Egyptian in scholarly publications of the day. Indeed, hieratic is attested in the archaeological record of Jerusalem and surrounding areas of Nephi’s day, and it is the script on the Chandler papyri that Cowdery said was like the ones on the Book of Mormon plates.

3. For Anthon’s comment on the correctness of the translation to have any integrity, it could only be addressing rudimentary ideas relative to individual characters, rather than the translation of specific words or sentences. Anthon appears to have had some exposure to Champollion’s early work on Egyptian characters, but it was too early for Anthon to have understood any translation in the fullest sense. It is not necessary to conclude that Anthon was full of hubris, pretending to know whether the translation was correct or not, nor is it necessary to conclude that Joseph did any translation of words or sentences—just as he did not appear to translate words or sentences in his initial interaction with the Egyptian papyri.

4. The second set of characters was a copy of “reformed Egyptian” characters from the hand of Mormon or Moroni that appeared on the greater percentage of the plates. Since “reformed Egyptian” is an altered script and language, Anthon could not readily identify its origins and speculates on several possibilities.

5. When Anthon learned that the characters are from someone claiming miraculous religious experience (and since he could not discern the origin of several of the characters), he concluded that some of the characters must have been copied from available books on alphabets in nonsensical ways. Any resemblances to Egyptian scripts that he may have noticed before were reduced to random “flourishes” of the pen. He, thus, concluded that none of it was Egyptian.

As scholars have pointed out, Harris’s experience with Anthon and others satisfied him enough as to the authenticity of the characters on the plates that he answered the call in Doctrine and Covenants 19:26–27 to freely give a significant portion of his substance to pay for the publication of the Book of Mormon.

In consequence of the above, the Caractors document that has circulated in historical sources cannot be ruled out as a document shown to Anthon solely on the basis that Anthon’s own description of what he saw does not appear to match it. If there were more than one document as Harris seems to claim, then Anthon’s recollection may be referring to one of the other documents. Having said this, since the Caractors document is not hieratic and Anthon’s description seems to rest on characters he could not identify on a document that does not match the formatting of the Caractors document, it is still more likely this document was a copy of characters created for some other purpose other than Harris’s visit.

John S. Thompson obtained his BA and MA in Ancient Near Eastern Studies (Hebrew Bible) from BYU and UC Berkeley respectively and completed a PhD in Egyptology at the University of Pennsylvania, with a dissertation emphasis on ancient priesthood. He was an employee of the Seminaries & Institutes of Religion for 28 years, most recently as a Coordinator and the Institute Director in the Cambridge, Massachusetts, area. John is now very happy to research and write full time for Scripture Central, a nonprofit organization that focuses on ancient and modern historical-cultural contexts of the Bible, Book of Mormon, and other Latter-day Saint scripture. He is married to Stacey Keller from Orem, Utah, and they have nine children and six grandchildren.

1 . For example, Charles Anthon himself mentions in a letter to E. D. Howe that Martin Harris requested that he “decypher, if possible, a paper [singular], which the farmer would hand me” and that the paper had “crooked characters disposed in columns . . . , and the whole ended in a rude delineation of a circle.” Letter published in Eber D. Howe, Mormonism Unvailed (Painesville, OH: Telegraph Press, 1834), 270–72.

2 . “History, 1838–1856, volume A–1 [23 December 1805–30 August 1834],” p. 9, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1838-1856-volume-a-1-23-december-1805-30-august-1834/11.

3 . B. H. Roberts indicated that Harris submitted “two papers containing different transcripts, to Professors Anthon and Mitchell [sic], of New York, one that was translated and one not translated.” B. H. Roberts, A Comprehensive History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (1930; reprint, Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 1965), 1:100. Richard Bennett noted that “Roberts does not identify the source of his information” and seems to suggest a few unlikely possibilities but overlooks Harris’s statement in the History of the Church itself. Richard E. Bennett, “‘Read This I Pray Thee’: Martin Harris and the Three Wise Men of the East,” Journal of Mormon History 36, no. 1 (Winter 2010): 180n4. A thirdhand source in 1831 suggested “Harris with several manuscripts in his pocket, went to the city of New York, and called upon one of the Professors of Columbia College for the purpose of shewing them to him.” James Gordon Bennett, “Mormon Religion—Clerical Ambition—Western New York—The Mormonites Gone to Ohio,” Morning Courier and Enquirer, 1 September 1831, reprinted in Leonard J. Arrington, “James Gordon Bennett’s 1831 Report on ‘The Mormonites,’” BYU Studies 10, no. 3 (1970): 362. The accuracy of Harris’s account has been called into question by some scholars given that it appears to be a later recollection of Joseph Smith’s written into the History at a time when Martin Harris would not have been present to verify its claims. Moreover, it contains additional (but not contradictory) items that are absent from Joseph Smith’s earlier 1832 History. See Susan Easton Black and Larry C. Porter, Martin Harris: Uncompromising Witness of the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2018), 94; Stanley B. Kimball, “The Anthon Transcript: People, Primary Sources, and Problems,” BYU Studies 10, no. 3 (1970): 338, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol10/iss3/8/. For example, none of the earliest sources mention a translation sent with the characters; however, it still remains to be seen what details, if any, in the 1838 History are absolutely inaccurate.

4 . A brief mention of this idea first appeared in John S. Thompson, “Lehi and Egypt,” in Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem, ed. John W. Welch, David Rolph Seely, and Jo Ann H. Seely (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS], 2004), 275n38.

5 . “History, circa Summer 1832,” p. 5, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/5. Joseph Smith’s 1832 and 1838 histories and Anthon’s three letters should be given the greatest weight, for they are in the best position to know what was copied from the plates, how many documents were made, whether any were translated, what was said, etc. Joseph Smith’s histories appear to be the most internally consistent whereas Anthon’s letters do not always agree among themselves as to what happened.

6 . “History, 1838–1856, volume A-1,” p. 9.

7 . “History, 1838–1856, volume A-1,” p. 9.

8 . “In the mean time, a few of the original characters were accurately transcribed and translated by Mr Smith, which, with the translation, were taken by a gentleman by the name of Martin Harris, to the city of New York, where they were presented to a learned gentleman by the name of [Charles] Anthon, who professed to be extensively acquainted with many languages, both ancient and modern. He examined them; but was unable to decipher them correctly; but he presumed, that if the original records could be brought, he could assist in translating them.” “Appendix: Orson Pratt, A[n] Interesting Account of Several Remarkable Visions, 1840,” p. 14, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/appendix-orson-pratt-an-interesting-account-of-several-remarkable-visions-1840/14.

9 . Michael Hubbard MacKay, Gerrit J. Dirkmaat, and Robin Scott Jensen, “The ‘Caractors’ Document: New Light on an Early Transcription of the Book of Mormon Characters,” Mormon Historical Studies 14, no. 1 (Spring 2014): 131–52; Michael Hubbard MacKay and Gerrit J. Dirkmaat, From Darkness Unto Light: Joseph Smith’s Translation and Publication of the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: BYU Religious Studies Center and Deseret Book, 2015), 25–38; Michael Hubbard MacKay, “‘Git Them Translated’: Translating the Characters on the Gold Plates,” in Approaching Antiquity: Joseph Smith and the Ancient World, ed. Lincoln H. Blumell, Matthew J. Grey, and Andrew H. Hedges (Provo, UT: BYU Religious Studies Center and Deseret Book, 2015); Don Bradley, The Lost 116 Pages: Reconstructing the Book of Mormon’s Missing Stories (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2019), 20–26.

10 . Joseph Knight, Sr., “Reminiscences,” no date, Church History Library, MS 3470, p. 3, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/37b7b91c-4148-45d6-8f32-df4acf06fe99/0/3. See also Orson Pratt’s description that the characters “were accurately transcribed” in footnote 7 above.

11 . “History, 1838–1856, volume A-1,” p. 9.

12 . “[The] characters . . . had evidently been prepared by some person who had before him at the time a book containing various alphabets. Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and flourishes, Roman letters inverted or placed sideways . . .” Letter published in Howe, Mormonism Unvailed, 271.

13 . Knight, “Reminiscences,” p. 3, emphasis added.

14 . Moroni indicates that their reason for using a form of Egyptian (and likely the reason Nephi used Egyptian and why the Brass Plates were written in Egyptian as indicated in Mosiah 1:3–4) is because the plates were not “sufficiently large” (Mormon 9:33). But Egyptian characters are not a space saver because its singular characters are smaller than singular Hebrew characters (you can write either as small as possible). They are a space saver because a single character can represent multiple consonantal sounds in a single word, allowing fewer characters to be used when spelling something. In contrast, Hebrew was strictly alphabetic, meaning each character represents only one sound in a word.

15 . That Mormon appears prompted in order to have purposely “searched” for the small account could suggest that the small account was mentioned somewhere in the main records he was abridging. My thanks to Stacey Thompson for this insight.

16 . On this, see John S. Thompson, “Lehi and Egypt,” in Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem, ed. John W. Welch, David Rolph Seely, Jo Ann H. Seely (Provo, UT: FARMS; Brigham Young University, 2004), 266–67.

17 . Don Bradley concludes that Joseph Smith may have sent with Harris a facsimile copy of the last leaf of the plates, which may have contained not only the text currently published as the title page of the Book of Mormon (since Joseph Smith indicated that is from where the Title Page came) but possibly an ancient alphabet and a circular seal as well. (Bradley, Lost 116 Pages, 20–26.) While the idea of an alphabet’s being inscribed on the last plate is unlikely, given the nature of Egyptian languages and of the Book of Mormon’s stated purpose for using one, the idea that Martin Harris may have shown Anthon a facsimile copy of the last leaf is intriguing. If the Egyptian small plates of Nephi were added at the end of Mormon and Moroni’s record and thus translated last as most scholars conclude, then the title page, created using the Nephite’s reformed Egyptian, would have been right next to the small plates written in the Egyptian of Nephi’s day, thus providing contiguous access to both styles of characters. Scholars have argued persuasively for the “Mosiah First” theory of translation, which suggests that Joseph resumed translation in Mosiah after losing the 116 pages, and then translated Nephi’s small plates last. However, translation order need not strictly dictate the physical configuration of the plates due to the inspired nature of the translation, and could accommodate the small plates’ being first, last, or inserted in the middle. See John W. Welch, “The Miraculous Timing of the Translation of the Book of Mormon,” in Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations, 1820–1844, ed. John W. Welch (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2017), 115–17; John W. Welch, “Timing the Translation of the Book of Mormon: ‘Days [and Hours] Never to Be Forgotten,’” BYU Studies Quarterly 57, no. 4 (2018): 10–50, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol57/iss4/3/; Brant A. Gardner, Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007), 2:513–14, 3:76–78; Alan Goff, “Positivism and the Priority of Ideology in Mosiah-First Theories of Book of Mormon Production,” Review of Books on the Book of Mormon 16, no. 1 (2004): 11–36; John W. Welch and Tim Rathbone, “How Long Did it Take to Translate the Book of Mormon?” in Reexploring the Book of Mormon: The F.A.R.M.S. Updates, ed. John W. Welch (Provo, UT: FARMS; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1992), 1–8; Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1984), 99, 223n67; Hyrum L. Andrus, God, Man, and the Universe (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1968), 90.

18 . See Anthon’s 1834 letter in Howe, Mormonism Unvailed, 272.

19 . For example, William Phelps stated in his 1831 letter to E. D. Howe that “at New York, they were shown to Dr. Mitchell, and he referred to them to professor Anthon who translated and declared them to be the ancient short-hand Egyptian.” Printed in Howe, Mormonism Unvailed, 273.

20 . See FARMS Staff, Martin Harris’s Visit with Charles Anthon: Collected Documents on the Anthon Transcript and “Shorthand Egyptian” (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1990), 4–5, archive.bookofmormoncentral.org/content/martin-harriss-visit-charles-anthon-collected-documents-anthon-transcript-and-shorthand and also Robert F. Smith, Gordon C. Thomasson, and John W. Welch, “What Did Charles Anthon Really Say?” in Reexploring the Book of Mormon.

21 . Kimball, “Anthon Transcript,” 337.

22 . The original draft of Lucy Mack Smith’s history of this event indicates that Joseph “was instructed to take off a fac simile of the alphabet Egyptian charecters <composing the alphabet> <which were called reformed egyptian> Alphabetically and send them to all the learned men that he could find and ask them for the translation of the same” and “it was agreed that Martin Harris should follow him as soon as he <Joseph> should have sufficient time to transcribe the Egyptian alphabet which Mr. Harris was to take to the east.” “Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1844–1845,” p. 3, bk. 6 and p. 7, bk. 6, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1844-1845/71. Lucy Smith’s initial use of “alphabet” in the phrase “characters composing the alphabet which were called reformed Egyptian” seems more like a term she uses to reference the style of characters generally (i.e., the reformed Egyptian style of characters = the Egyptian “alphabet” of the golden plates) rather than some sort of abecedary. However, her text also indicates (more clearly when the insertions are temporarily ignored) that Joseph Smith copied these characters “alphabetically.” This suggests his focus may have been on copying single characters. Joseph Smith Sr. is also reported to have mentioned an alphabet in connection with Joseph Smith’s work with the plates. See Fayette Lapham’s late (1870) recollection of his interview with Joseph Smith Sr., published in Historical Magazine 7 (May 1870): 305–9 and republished in Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996), 1:462–63.

23 . Stanley Kimball speculated that Anthon may have only verified that the “transcription” appeared correct. See Kimball, “Anthon Transcript,” 336.

24 . Oliver Cowdery letter to William Fry published in Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate 2, no. 3 (December 1835): 234–35, emphasis added.

25 . To see the hieratic characters of the extant papyri and facsimile copies see: “Egyptian Papyri,” Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts, Revelations and Translations, The Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/the-papers/revelations-and-translations/jsppr6/jsppr6-SUB01; “Notebooks of Copied Egyptian Characters,” Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts, Revelations and Translations, The Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/the-papers/revelations-and-translations/jsppr6/jsppr6-SUB02; and “Copies of Egyptian Characters,” Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts, Revelations and Translations, The Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/the-papers/revelations-and-translations/jsppr6/jsppr6-SUB03.

26 . Knight, “Reminiscences,” p. 3, emphasis added.

27 . Harris indicates that Anthon declared “there was no such thing now as ministring [sic] of angels.” “History, 1838–1856, volume A-1.”

“Our Hands Have Handled”: Ensuring the Reassuring Doctrine of the Resurrection in the Lucan and Johannine Writings

Matthew L. Bowen

Abstract: The Lucan and Johannine writings emphasize the literalness and physicality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This emphasis does not represent an emerging Christology from an earlier, inchoate conception of Jesus and the meaning of his life. Rather, it reflects an effort to defend the doctrine of the resurrection—of Christ and humanity—against the increasing cultural and intellectual pressures of middle Platonism. Nephi’s vision of the tree of life, which included seeing a “great and abominable church” and its formation among “the nations of the Gentiles” (1 Nephi 13:4–9) matches well with late first- and second-century apostate movements that “made war” with the saints and “overcame” many of them (Revelation 13:7). A conspicuous feature of some movements at that time is the denial of the literal, physically resurrected Jesus Christ and the resurrection of all humanity from the dead. The widespread distortion of Christ’s resurrection and opposition to the concept of bodily resurrection continues to the present.

When Luke opens his treatise on “the Acts of the Apostles” and their ministry, he does so with a declaration of a resurrected Jesus, attested by “many infallible proofs” (en pollois tekmēriois, “in many sure signs”)1 given to his disciples throughout a forty-day post-resurrection ministry (Acts 1:3, see Acts 1:1–12). Luke, traditionally the author of the third gospel and the Acts of the Apostles (its sequel), appears to have been “a second- or third- generation Christian.”2 Although its date of composition is uncertain, Luke’s gospel was widely distributed in an increasingly gentile church at a time when most of the original eleven and other apostolic witnesses (including Paul) were increasingly unavailable to bear firsthand testimony of his resurrection (75–95 CE).3 Although all four gospel writers present Jesus’s resurrection as a physical, concrete reality,4 Luke and John, usually considered to have been written after Matthew and Mark, go to even greater lengths than those gospels to show how the resurrected Christ interacted with his disciples within the mortal realm—namely, they show Jesus doing what a resurrected being can do (e.g., eat, drink, appear where doors are shut, vanish, etc.).

In addition to Luke-Acts and the Gospel of John, other writings widely regarded as having been written later—e.g., the Johannine epistles—also emphasize the physicality of the mortal and resurrected Christ. I propose that one common and major purpose in the careful emphasis on the physicality of Jesus’s resurrection and a bodily resurrected Christ as found in these writings was to defend the doctrine of the resurrection against increasing incursion from culturally and intellectually ascendant middle Platonism. This emphasis on the physicality of the resurrected Christ and the resurrection did not, as commentators sometimes suggest, represent a developing Christology that emerged out of an early inchoate or abstract sense of who or what the resurrected Jesus was. On the contrary, Peter, John, Paul, and Luke fought to save the doctrines of an incarnate and resurrected Jesus from those within the church who were already making a “shipwreck” of them (cf. 1 Timothy 1:19; 2 Timothy 2:17; 2 John 1:7–10).

I will further attempt to make the case that Nephi’s vision of “the great and abominable church” and its formation among “the nations of the Gentiles” (1 Nephi 13:4–9) matches well with the apostate movement that “made war” with the saints and “overcame” many of them (Revelation 13:7). A key tenet of that church, “abominable above all other churches,” then and now, is the denial of the literal, physically resurrected Jesus Christ and resurrection of the dead—the best of good news.5 Moderns, clergy or otherwise, who downplay the reality of the bodily resurrected Christ because of its perceived incompatibility with post-Enlightenment paradigms fall into the same error as many late first-century CE church members who embraced Middle Platonic Greek thought vis-à-vis the core doctrine of Jesus Christ’s resurrection

Contemporary Philosophical Encroachment on the Church and the Doctrine of the Resurrected Christ

Arguably, Luke’s use of the word asphaleian in the phrase “That thou mightest know the certainty [asphaleian] of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed” (Luke 1:4) in the introduction to his gospel constitutes the key to understanding why he so carefully depicts the physicality of Jesus’s resurrection. In fact, asphaleia—“safety, security”; “certainty, truth”6 or “surety”7—nicely sums up the authorial intent of the Gospel of Luke and its sequel the Acts of the Apostles: “safety,” “certainty,” or “surety” for Theophilus or any “lover of God.” Taken together, Luke’s two treatises manifest a deep and specific interest in the apostolic witness of Jesus’s life, ministry, and resurrection. Since, beyond the thoroughly Jewish confines of Judea and Galilee and their vicinity, those defining events occurred within a wider Greco-Roman world in which middle Platonism gained increasing intellectual ascendancy, the firsthand apostolic witness became increasingly important. Middle Platonism maintained the view that matter was “the third and lowest principle” upon which “God confers order.”8 Thus, the physical body remained, for those who embraced Middle Platonism, the relic of an imperfect world into which the immortal soul had fallen.

Paul affirmed that he and the other apostles “preach[ed] Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:23). By implication, they also preached Christ resurrected (see 1 Corinthians 15:12). Any convert—Jewish, Greek, or anyone else in the Mediterranean world—faced an inevitable cultural and intellectual test: reconciling a belief in an embodied, resurrected Jesus in a world which believed that the body and matter were undesirable, even evil. This was the very challenge that Paul faced at Corinth: “Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?” (1 Corinthians 15:12).

As a rule, New Testament writings exhibit a desire not only to affirm the traditions surrounding Jesus of Nazareth, but to defend them against incursion. Even very early Pauline letters, like 2 Thessalonians insist that its recipients “stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle” (2 Thessalonians 2:15). Paul specifically warns the Colossian saints against the incursion of Greek philosophy: “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy [tēs philosophias] and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ” (Colossians 2:8).

While scholars have long debated the precise identity and religious target of Paul’s warning, Paul conceivably intended this warning against the more general incursion of Greek philosophy into church doctrine and belief. No doctrine would be at greater risk from contemporary Platonic thought than Jesus’s resurrection and the resurrection of the body. Nevertheless, philosophy made tremendous incursions into the beliefs and teachings of many early church members. Regarding Colossians 2:8, Daniel W. Graham and James L. Siebach note, “three centuries later, philosophy had entered into Christianity so completely that one could not be considered a Christian without espousing a philosophical position.”9

In preparing Timothy as a church leader, Paul had also admonished him, “O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science [gnōseōs, “knowledge”] falsely so called” (1 Timothy 6:20). The KJV translators’ unfortunate use of “science” (following the Vulgate’s use of Latin scientiae) has obscured for modern readers exactly what Paul was warning against: the so-called knowledge or gnosis. The basic meaning of the Greek term gnosis is, of course, “knowledge,” but this term had broader connotations within Platonism and streams of thought that derived from it, including Gnosticism. James L. Crenshaw writes: “Under gnostic influence, some early Christians claimed special knowledge, prompting a response from Paul that labeled such views false and declaring the cross as God’s secret wisdom.”10 Paul makes this point in 1 Corinthians 2:4–16 (note the abundant repetition of wisdom [sophia] and know [ginōskō, oida] in these verses), which may shed additional light on the problem he was attempting to redress in teaching about the physicality of Christ’s resurrection and of the resurrection in general in 1 Corinthians 15. It was certainly a philosophical problem (middle Platonism) and perhaps a proto-gnostic one.

“I Saw Among the Nations of the Gentiles, the Formation of a Great Church”: Apostasy and the Loss of Belief in a Physical Resurrection

As the second half of the first century CE wore on, the church became increasingly susceptible to apostasy. John W. Welch suggests that disunity and interpersonal conflict among the apostles and disciples bred disunity among church members, thus catalyzing apostasy.11 This idea finds support in latter-day revelation: “My disciples, in days of old, sought occasion against one another and forgave not one another in their hearts; and for this evil they were afflicted and sorely chastened” (D&C 64:8).12 Jesus’s prophetic parable of the wheat and the tares would have been particularly meaningful to church members in the latter-end of the first century, struggling to maintain their community boundaries and identity.

Written sometime between 53 and 57 CE, 1 Corinthians is rife with evidence of division within the church at Corinth (see 1 Corinthians 1:10–17; 3:3–15; 11:17–18).13 Paul correlates this division with the difficulty that the doctrine of Christ presented for both Jews and Greeks (see 1 Corinthians 1:24). Chapter 15 of that same letter articulates some of the most important doctrine on the resurrection anywhere in scripture. Paul cites witness after witness—Cephas (Simon Peter), more than “five hundred brethren at once,” James the Lord’s brother, and himself—in support of the reality of the resurrected Christ. Paul reveals exactly what occasions his citation of these witnesses and everything else that he teaches on the resurrection in this chapter in verse 12: “How say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?” (1 Corinthians 15:12). As noted above, already in Corinth some church members were teaching that bodily resurrection was not real or was allegorical. Paul recognized the challenge that this presented to his apostolic authority and witness (“we are found false witnesses of God,” 1 Corinthians 15:15). This very problem would only grow worse within the nascent church over the course of the ensuing decades.

The textual evidence of the New Testament itself also strongly suggests that the closing decades of the first century saw a war for the soul of the nascent church. Near the beginning of John’s Apocalypse, the Lord both praises and castigates seven of the churches of Asia Minor. The Lord praises the Ephesian saints because “thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans [tōn Nikolaitōn], which I also hate” (Revelation 2:6). The Nicolaitans are widely thought to have represented (or become) a gnostic libertine sect.

Regarding the Nicolaitans, Adela Yarbro Collins notes, “the name may be allegorical, meaning ‘conqueror(s)’ of the people.”14 John’s inference seems to be that Nicolaitans with their immoral and heretical doctrines and practices were “conquering” or “overcoming” the heretofore faithful saints. Whatever the case, the manifest concern here (and later) is that each church member “conquer” or “overcome” (nikaō) rather than be overcome (e.g., the refrain “to him that overcometh [tō nikōnti],” Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 26). Conversely, the Lord castigates the saints of Pergamos because they had “them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate” (Revelation 2:15). Thus, Revelation 2:6–7, 15, with its evident wordplay on Nikolaitēs and participial forms of nikaō marks an appropriate launching point for John’s nikaō-Leitmotif throughout the Apocalypse.15

Revelation 2:14 records that the Lord also upbraided the saints of Pergamos for having those who “h[e]ld the doctrine of Balaam” which is explained as teaching other saints “to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication.” If “fornication” (porneia) here is understood to be literal, rather than as a metaphor for idolatry, we have two distinct violations of the moral requirements for church members established by the Jerusalem Council (see especially Acts 15:20, 29). In any case we appear to be dealing here with libertines and perhaps a gnostic libertinism that gave rise to the beliefs and practices of later groups like the Carpocratians of the second century CE, a libertine gnostic group that originated in Alexandria.16

The epistle of 2 Peter also recognizes and addresses libertine apostasy as a real and present threat to the saints. 2 Peter 2:1–2 foretells apostasy that denies Jesus Christ: “But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.” The same chapter goes on to describe these apostates as “them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise government [authority, kyriotētos kataphronountas]. Presumptuous are they, self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities [glorious things]” (2 Peter 2:10). 2 Peter 2:12–19 goes on to describe the sexual licentiousness of these apostates and, like John, connects their behavior with the Old Testament prophet Balaam (see especially Numbers 22–24).

Jude uses very similar language to describe apostasy and licentious libertinism (2 Peter and Jude are in one way or another intertextually related, though the direction of textual dependency is debatable). Jude 1:4 mentions “certain men [who have] crept in unawares . . . ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness [aselgeian], and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.” He describes these apostates as “giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, [who] are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion [kyriotēta de athetousin, NRSV, “reject authority”], and speak evil of dignities [glorious things]” (Jude 1:7–8). He further states: “But, beloved, remember ye the words which were spoken before of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; How that they told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts. These be they who separate themselves [apodiorizontēs, who cause divisions], sensual [psychikoi, natural men and women], having not the Spirit” (Jude 1:17–19). Note how Jude specifically emphasizes both apostolic authority and the apostolic witness over against this group of licentious apostates.

The third Johannine letter mentions a local church leader Diotrephes who has rejected John’s (or “the elder’s”) authority: “I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth us not. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words: and not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them that would, and casteth them out of the church” (3 John 1:9–10). Assuming John’s authorship of the letter, Diotrephes’ rejection of John and other visiting brethren (“us”), would constitute a rejection of John’s apostolic authority. And Diotrephes’ apostasy goes further: “prating against [John and “the brethren”] with malicious words”—i.e., what we might call “speaking evil of the Lord’s anointed.”

Thus, Revelation, 2 Peter, Jude, and 3 John all paint a pretty bleak picture of the state of the church and many of its members in terms of moral praxis and the rejection by many church members of existing ecclesiastical authority, including apostolic authority (such as it remained), in the closing years of the first century CE. Nephi saw in vision that the “multitudes of the earth,” including the “house of Israel” and “nations, kindreds, tongues, and people” would “fight against the twelve apostles of the Lamb” (1 Nephi 11:34–36). The vision equated this scenario with the great and spacious building of his father Lehi’s dream (1 Nephi 8). Later, Nephi receives a more detailed vision of the meaning of this building and its relationship to the rejection of apostolic authority (see 1 Nephi 13:4–9). Among other things, Nephi learns that this “great and abominable church” destroyed the saints of God in a manner not unlike what John describes in Revelation 2:20 and that its members pursued wealth (cf. the Balaam motif)17 and engaged in licentious behavior. For such individuals, the doctrine of a bodily resurrection, followed by a divine judgment according works done in the body, would hold little appeal.

Regarding the identity of this “great and abominable church,” Stephen E. Robinson asks, “Can we, then, identify the historical agency that acted as the great and abominable church in earliest Christianity? Such an agent would have had its origins in the second half of the first century and would have done much of its work by the middle of the second century.”18 Libertine Gnostic Christianity, as later manifest in second-century movements such as the Carpocratians, meets this criterion, but it also meets the additional criterion of “harlots” being one of the major “desires” of the “great and abominable church.” The “seduction” of Christ’s servants to such desires (Revelation 2:20) would surely fulfill Nephi’s vision of a church that “slayeth the saints of God, yea, and tortureth them and bindeth them down, and yoketh them with a yoke of iron, and bringeth them down into captivity” (1 Nephi 13:5). Destroying the saints’ faith in the reality of Jesus Christ’s literal resurrection and their own would constitute the ultimate example of spiritual murder, torture, binding, yoking, and captivity.

Regarding the impact that Gnosticism had within the second-century Christian church, Hugh Nibley observes:

The oldest definition of the Gnosis specifies that it was the knowledge imparted secretly by the Lord to the Apostles after the Resurrection. The Gnostics claimed to have that very knowledge, and their tremendous initial success shows how hungry the Christian world was for it—the “main church,” in fact, had to invent a counter-Gnosis of its own to meet the threat and ended up with a compromise that has left a Gnostic stamp on Christian thinking ever since. The Gnostics did not invent the 40-day situation, as has been claimed, for they were the last people in the world to imagine a return of the Savior in the flesh, and any tinkering would have been readily exposed in a quarreling and hyper-critical society; but they did exploit it because it was there and they had to: at a time when everything else was being questioned, it is one of the few things that is never challenged.19

Nibley believed that the post-Apostolic efforts of the early Christian church to blunt the impact of Gnosticism with a “counter-Gnosis of its own” had a permanent effect on broader Christianity, even up to the present. It should be noted that there is still great value in the cornucopia of so-called Gnostic documents, not only in terms of understanding what types of teachings circulated within that milieu, but also in identifying which among the earliest teachings of the Jesus movement and nascent church were being corrupted. The writings of Luke, John, and other authoritative writers helped believers during this period and later “know the certainty of those things, wherein [they had] been instructed” (Luke 1:4).

“Handle Me and See”: The Evidence of Luke 24

Luke 24, more than any other single chapter in Luke’s writings, provides the crux of the asphaleia or “certainty”—the “surety”—that he promised at the beginning of the Gospel of Luke (Luke 1:4). The annunciation of the resurrection begins with “two men” in “shining garments” (Luke 24:4), who ask Jesus’s female disciples, “Why seek ye the living among the dead?” and then declare, “He is not here, but is risen” (Luke 24:5–6). What exactly that means, however, Luke soon illustrates with the story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus. The climax of that account comes with the moment of recognition when Jesus, still unrecognized by them, physically breaks bread with them: “And it came to pass, as he sat at meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave [epedidou] to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him [epegnōsan auton]; and he vanished out of their sight” (Luke 24:30–31). Jesus performs four distinct, concrete actions involving the bread in front of Cleopas and his companion. These actions engaged their physical senses: they saw Jesus, heard his voice, touched the bread as he gave it to them, then presumably smelled and tasted it.

Luke furnishes even stronger and more concrete evidence for the resurrected Christ in the verses that follow:

And they [Cleopas and his companion] rose up the same hour, and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven gathered together, and them that were with them, Saying, The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon. And they told what things were done in the way, and how he was known of them in breaking of bread. And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet [idete tas cheiras mou kai tous podas mou], that it is I myself [egō eimi autos]: handle me [psēlaphēsate me], and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones [sarka kai ostea ouk echei], as ye see me have [kathōs eme theōreite exonta]. And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet [edeiken authois tas cheiras kai tous podas]. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat [echete ti brōsimon enthade; or do you have any food here]? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish [hoi de epedōkan auto ixthyos optou meros] [and of an honeycomb]. And he took it, and did eat before them [kai labōn enōpion autōn ephagen]. (Luke 24:33–43)

Luke’s text belabors the point that the resurrected Jesus is tangible, physical, and real. Regarding these verses Fitzmyer writes, “That the members of this household are incredulous or mistake him for a ghost is at first understandable. But their rapt silence in the episode is striking; Christ is the only one who speaks. He tries to dispel their doubts ‘with many proofs.’”20 Luke’s mention of their abject fear that they were seeing a spirit was relevant to contemporary controversy over the reality of Jesus’s resurrection. Metaphorical resurrection to a blissful state of “disembodiment” becomes a hermeneutical impossibility with Luke’s account. Jesus invites them not just to “behold [his] hands and [his] feet,” but to “handle” him. The Greek verb psēlaphaō means “to touch by feeling and handling,” thus “touch, handle.”21 The essential point of Luke’s text is that Jesus cannot be a mere spirit being.

The disciples’ initial trouble believing parallels the ongoing trouble believing among many of the saints of the late first century. Here Luke depicts Jesus presenting yet another infallible proof of the resurrection. Jesus insists on eating in their presence. The concreteness of Jesus’s request and subsequent meal—“a piece of a broiled fish [and of an honeycomb]”22—ensures that nobody can walk away from this episode and coherently argue against the reality of the resurrected Jesus. Fitzmyer further notes, “Though the motif of the meal is there [i.e., later in Acts 1:4 and 10:41] and helps fill out the parallelism of the Emmaus incident, one cannot help but realize that the scene is intended also to stress the identity and physical reality of the risen Christ who has appeared to his disciples.”23

Luke seals the evidence that his account has thus far presented with Jesus’s statement “Ye are witnesses of these things” (Luke 24:48). Indeed, Jesus’s subsequent promise to endow or invest his disciples with power from on high “will be the basis of the boldness with which Peter and the others will speak (Acts 2:29; 4:13, 29, 31; 28:3).”24 In other words, Jesus endows them with power to bear witness of his concrete, tangible, physical resurrection from the dead as the ultimate reality.

“With Great Power Gave the Apostles Witness
of the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus”:
Acts 1–5 and the Apostolic Witness

Luke’s emphasis on the apostolic witness of the resurrected Jesus forms a fitting bridge between the unforgettable and unmistakable events of Luke 24 and the launching of the ministry of the apostles as witnesses of Jesus’s resurrection. The “sure signs” of Jesus’s resurrection in Luke 24 are answered by “many infallible proofs” or “sure signs” through which Jesus “showed himself alive” during his forty-day ministry (Acts 1:3). Regarding Acts 1:3, Fitzmyer states: “This is yet another way in which he [Luke] emphasizes the reality of the experience of the apostles to whom the risen Christ has appeared.”25

Luke takes pains in Acts 1 to describe the selection of a new member of the twelve to replace Judas Iscariot in part, at least, to help his audience understand just what kind of “witness” the apostleship implied: “Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection” (Acts 1:21–22). Many saints at the time of Luke’s authorship of his gospel had lost their sense of these requirements for an apostolic witness of Jesus’s resurrection.

Fitzmyer surmises that “The Twelve are reconstituted so that they can confront Israel assembled in Jerusalem on the first great feast day following Passover, the feast of Assembly or (in Greek) Pentecost. What Peter and the other eleven will proclaim at that important assembly is the first instance of testimony given by the apostles to the Twelve Tribes of God’s people: despite the death of God’s anointed one, God still addresses the message of salvation first to the children of Abraham, to the Twelve Tribes of Israel.”26

The apostles assert this witness powerfully before their fellow Israelites: “This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses” (Acts 2:32; see all of Acts 2:30–32); “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly [asphalōs oun ginōsketō pas oikos Israēl], that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36). Fitzmyer calls Acts 2:32–33, 36 “the major affirmation and climax of the whole speech” since “it portrays Peter testifying about the risen Christ to ‘the whole house of Israel,’ represented by the Jews assembled in Jerusalem from every nation, and calling Israel to repentance and conversion.”27 The power of Peter and the Apostles’ witness is evident in the conversion of three thousand fellow Jews who “continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers” (Acts 2:42), to which Luke poignantly adds: “And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles.”

The Apostles’ witness continues in the temple, and later before the Sanhedrin, the governing body of Judaism, including Caiaphas, the very high priest who passed sentence on Jesus: “And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all” (Acts 4:33); “Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with his right hand to be Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins. And we are his witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him” (Acts 5:29–32). Luke does not include this as merely some fond reminiscence of the days of the Apostles. Luke’s readership needs to know how committed the Apostles were to their witness of Jesus’s bodily resurrection: “And to [Gamaliel] they agreed: and when they had called the apostles, and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. And they departed from the presence of the council [Sanhedrin], rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ” (Acts 5:40–42). Jesus’s resurrection was no rhetorical ploy.

“Even to Us, Who Did Eat and Drink with Him After
He Rose from the Dead”: Witnesses Who Dined
with the Resurrected Christ

Peter’s apostolic witness also serves as an important part of Luke’s account of the transition from what had been a wholly Jewish church in its first generation to one that would include Gentiles, including Greek Gentiles who had been steeped in philosophy and Platonism. Luke records Peter again testifying to the Roman gentile God-fearer Cornelius and his household in unmistakable terms, even returning to the concrete images of the Apostles eating and drinking with a resurrected, embodied Christ who was eating and drinking with them:

And we are witnesses of all things which he did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree: Him God raised up the third day, and shewed him openly; Not to all the people, but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, who did eat and drink with him after he rose from the dead. And he commanded us to preach unto the people, and to testify that it is he which was ordained of God to be the Judge of quick and dead. To him give all the prophets witness, that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins. While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word. (Acts 10:39–44)

Here again, Luke’s account reiterates that Jesus ate and drank with the disciples after his resurrection, recalling Luke 24 and Acts 1:4. In other words, he emphasizes that the resurrected Lord ate the same food as those who witnessed him, including Peter. The testimony of these details would have been particularly important for future non-Jewish converts. Indeed, during the time of Luke’s writing of Luke-Acts, the polity of the church increasingly included Greek gentiles, whose cultural, religious, and intellectual backgrounds would make them susceptible to misunderstanding the resurrection of Jesus Christ and its meaning.

For similar reasons, Luke emphasizes that Paul attempted to bear his bold witness of Jesus’s resurrection in Athens, the heart of Platonism on earth, as it were: “Because [God] hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance [pistin, a token or pledge] unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked: and others said, We will hear thee again of this matter” (Acts 17:31–32). Luke’s inclusion of Paul’s use of pistis, “a token,” fits well with the asphaleia/assurance theme begun in Luke 1:4 and the “infallible proofs” or “sure signs” that Jesus himself mentions in Acts 1:3.

Regarding this passage, N. T. Wright observes, Jesus’s “resurrection from the dead is the start of the single event still known as ‘the resurrection of the dead’ or ‘out from among the dead’. It reinforces belief in that future hope, so that announcing Jesus can be presented as loyalty to Judaism’s cherished expectation.”28 He further asks, “Why did they [the early apostolic witnesses] come to hold that kind of hope in that kind of way? Acts, like Paul and the synoptic gospels, answers: because of what happened to Jesus.”29

Nevertheless, even among those who professed to believe in Jesus as Messiah, Paul knew and Luke records that “grievous wolves [would] enter in among you [the church members], not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them” (Acts 20:29–30). Among those “perverse things” would be the claim that “there is no resurrection of the dead” (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:12) in spite of what all the Apostles had testified. Paul’s recorded prophecy matched the apostasy and schismatic conditions within the Church in the closing decades of the first century. I submit that Luke’s inclusion of this prophecy helps shed light on the urgency of Luke’s gospel portrait of the resurrected Jesus.

“Hold Me Not”: John’s Account of Jesus’s
Appearance to Mary

One of the oft-most cited lines from the intercessory prayer as recorded by John is Jesus’s statement: “And this is life eternal, that they might know [ginōskōsin] thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3). At a minimum, John’s enlistment of the verb ginōskōsin and its cognates, here and elsewhere, in the context of the late first century would push back against the incipient Gnostic notion of the knowledge of God, so-called gnosis (“knowledge”).

The final chapters of John show just what truly “knowing” God and Jesus Christ look like as the disciples meet the resurrected Jesus, and thus the nature of an embodied God and resurrected humans. Wright notes that “‘Resurrection’ is never, for John, simply a metaphor for present spiritual life, though its wider levels of meaning certainly include that.”30 This is no “Platonized expectation of immortality” but “firmly within the bounds of Jewish resurrection theology, and within the early Christian parameters of the redefinition of that theology around Jesus himself.”31 It is the virtual antithesis of the Gnostic redefinition of “resurrection.”

John presents Mary Magdalene as the first disciple to “know” or “recognize” the resurrected Jesus:

[S]he turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not [ouk oida] that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not [mē mou haptou]; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God. Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that he had spoken these things unto her. (John 20:14–18)

The KJV rendering of Greek mē mou haptou as “touch me not” obscures what is happening here. C.K. Barrett notes that “the present imperative with me [mē] in a prohibition signifies the breaking of an action already in progress, or sometimes the attempt to perform an action.”32 JST John 20:17 renders it “hold me not”—i.e., “don’t hold onto me,” perhaps a gesture similar to that of female disciples holding Jesus by the feet (in worship) in Matthew 28:9–10.33 Here N.T. Wright points out that “If, as is often suggested, the proper interpretation of this is ‘do not cling on to me’, the story may be making the point that this was not simply the appearance of a phantom, a bodiless spirit, such as Odysseus attempted to cling on to but could not.”34 In other words, the language of the narrative suggests that Mary touched, physically held onto, or clung onto Jesus. She now knows Jesus as the resurrected Christ. The narrative thus begins its strong emphasis on the physicality of the resurrected Christ and the resurrection. Wright adds, “The same point is made in Luke, John, and Acts by the stories of Jesus eating with the disciples.”35

“He Showed unto Them His Hands and His Side”:
True Tokens, Sure Signs

John builds on the previous recognition scene with his subsequent inclusion of the Savior’s appearance to the disciples behind “shut” doors: “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord” (John 20:19–20). The disciples’ misconception that he was a disembodied spirit (cf. Luke) explains Jesus’s next actions: showing them his hands and his side. The clear implication is that they handled both, but John proleptically reserves his most precise language for the forthcoming Thomas episode. John’s mention that “the doors were shut” additionally serves the function of showing that the resurrected Jesus was able to do something similar to what Joseph Smith reports the resurrected Moroni doing: appearing into a room through some kind of “conduit” (see Joseph Smith—History 1:30, 43).

“Reach Hither Thy Finger, and Behold My Hands”

Going even further than the previous episodes, the Gospel of John includes the so-called “doubting Thomas” episode precisely to dispel doubt about the reality and physicality of Jesus’s resurrected body. This description’s concreteness will admit no Platonic separation of the physical and spiritual realms or any Gnostic allegorizing:

But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe. And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. (John 20:24–29)

For traditional, non-Platonized Jews, the only conceivable resurrection worthy of the name would have been a physical one. But, as for Martha who told Jesus “I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day” (John 11:24), a resurrection of the physical body remained only an eschatological reality in the minds of most Jews. Thus, Wright comments, “Thomas comes to the question with one particular epistemology uppermost in mind: he wants to touch as well as to see. Indeed, he insists that the data must be caught within his proposed epistemological net or he will not acknowledge it as real data at all.”36

Again, the doors are “shut,” suggesting something of a duplication of the feat of Jesus’s previous appearance. Notwithstanding the shut doors, Jesus “came.” The Lord then invites Thomas to receive what can best be described as a “knowledge”—what Peter calls an epignosis—of his bodily resurrection by every conceivable “token” or “proof” (cf. the Lucan Paul’s use of pistin) or “infallible proofs” (Acts 1). Where Mary’s recognition is marked by the exclamation, “Rabboni” or “[My] Master,” Thomas’s recognition is marked by the ultimate declaration, “My Lord and my God.” John here wishes us to remember Thomas’s question on the night of his suffering in Gethsemane “how can we know the way?” and Jesus’s response “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by me. If ye had known [egnōkeite] me, ye should have known [ēdeite] my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him [ginōskete], and have seen him” (John 14:5–7). Thomas now “knows” God the Father and Jesus Christ in the manner Jesus prescribed in the intercessory prayer (John 17:3). What the Father is, Jesus now is. Thomas now possessed gnosis better than any Platonist or gnostic could ever claim.

The “real target” of this passage, Wright notes, is “any future reader who might respond by saying, ‘It was all very well for Thomas; you can’t expect me to imitate that kind of faith unless I have the same evidence.’”37 Thus the Thomas episode offers the concrete apostolic witness upon which saving faith can be built: “blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.” This constitutes the very purpose of the Johannine gospel: “these [signs] are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name” (John 20:31).

“Come and Dine”: Witnessing the Resurrection
Again Through a Sacred Meal

The foregoing in John’s gospel would seemingly constitute sufficient evidence of a resurrected Christ with a resurrected physical body. However, like Luke, John wishes to demonstrate that the resurrected Christ was not only seen, heard, touched, and held by the disciples, but also that he ate with them: “Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine. And none of the disciples durst ask him, Who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus then cometh, and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise. This is now the third time that Jesus shewed himself to his disciples, after that he was risen from the dead” (John 21:12–14). John adds this episode as a kind of third witness of the resurrected, embodied Christ, which may hint at a Christological interpretation of the Law of Witnesses (Deuteronomy 17:6; 19:15): “at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established” or “shall the Word [dābār] rise up/resurrect [yāqûm]” (Deuteronomy 19:15).

“That Which . . . Our Hands Have Handled”:
The Importance of the Johannine Witness

The authorial intent of the epistle of 1 John differs little from that of the Gospel of John: “These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God” (1 John 5:13). The epistle concludes: “And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him [ginōskōmen] that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life” (1 John 5:20).

These statements of intent provide a context within which to view the letter’s opening statement, which possesses lexical affinities with the prologue of John’s gospel. This opening declaration recalls the scenes in John 20 and Luke 24 in which Jesus is held and handled:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled [epsēlaphēsan], of [regarding] the Word of life; (for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ (1 John 1:1–3).

First of all, the “we” is often interpreted here as having reference to a Johannine community of believers, but John may also have reference to a wider “community” or “fellowship” (koinōnia) of the apostles and their converts.38 Secondly, the expression “Word of life” is deliberately ambiguous, referring both to Jesus Christ and the message of salvation of which Jesus is the center and focus.

In describing physically touching the Lord, John uses the same verb that Luke used in Luke 24:39, psēlaphaō, “to touch by feeling and handling.”39 Pheme Perkins writes that “1 John stresses the physical character of the revelation that the community has received.”40 This may indicate that this “community” had an experience with the resurrected Jesus much along the order of what the Lamanites and Nephites experienced in 3 Nephi 11 and 17:

And it came to pass that the Lord spake unto them saying: Arise and come forth unto me, that ye may thrust your hands into my side, and also that ye may feel the prints of the nails in my hands and in my feet, that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole earth, and have been slain for the sins of the world. And it came to pass that the multitude went forth, and thrust their hands into his side, and did feel the prints of the nails in his hands and in his feet; and this they did do, going forth one by one until they had all gone forth, and did see with their eyes and did feel with their hands, and did know of a surety and did bear record, that it was he, of whom it was written by the prophets, that should come. And when they had all gone forth and had witnessed for themselves, they did cry out with one accord, saying: Hosanna! Blessed be the name of the Most High God! And they did fall down at the feet of Jesus, and did worship him. And it came to pass that he spake unto Nephi (for Nephi was among the multitude) and he commanded him that he should come forth. And Nephi arose and went forth, and bowed himself before the Lord and did kiss his feet. (3 Nephi 11:13–19)

And it came to pass that when he had thus spoken, all the multitude, with one accord, did go forth with their sick and their afflicted, and their lame, and with their blind, and with their dumb, and with all them that were afflicted in any manner; and he did heal them every one as they were brought forth unto him. And they did all, both they who had been healed and they who were whole, bow down at his feet, and did worship him; and as many as could come for the multitude did kiss his feet, insomuch that they did bathe his feet with their tears. (3 Nephi 17:9–10).

And when he had said these words, he wept, and the multitude bare record of it, and he took their little children, one by one, and blessed them, and prayed unto the Father for them. And when he had done this he wept again; and he spake unto the multitude, and said unto them: Behold your little ones. (3 Nephi 17:21–23).

The New Testament attests the early saints having such experiences. For example, Paul records that Jesus “was seen of above five hundred brethren at once” (1 Corinthians 15:6). The experience of John’s “community” may have been similar.

The testimony of 1 John is not only that the resurrected Word can be seen (he uses two verbs of seeing) but “handled” (cf. especially Luke 24:39). As Wright notes, “There is evidence enough to lure sceptics forward even if they have lessons to learn about how we know things as well as about what there is to be known. And the faith which, in its most mature form, might be happy to go forwards without either touch or sight, is after all a belief and trust not simply in otherworldly realities, but (for John of all people!) in the Word made flesh, which can be heard, seen and handled.”41 John also recognizes that this has enormously important implications for those who embrace the doctrine of Christ and Jesus’s atonement and resurrection. Just as “the Word was made [became] flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14), John knows that “we” (the apostles and the community of saints who believe in their witness) become like the resurrected Word in “our” resurrection: “when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

The initial emphasis in 1 John on a physically resurrected Christ that could not only be heard, seen, looked upon, and “handled” with hands, sets up its later condemnation of gnostic docetists in the church—namely, those who believed or professed that Jesus only “seemed” (dokeō) to have been born in the flesh, lived in the world, suffered, died, and resurrected: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world” (1 John 4:1–3).

At the writing of the first letter, a gnostic or proto-gnostic (docetic) apostasy was already widespread. At the writing of the second letter, it was even more so: “For many deceivers are entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist” (2 John 1:7). The second letter goes even farther in outlining a policy for dealing with this kind of heresy: “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed” (2 John 1:9–10). The individuals whom these letters warned congregations against were apostate evangelists or traveling missionaries who would speak in church meetings, still then in “house”-churches.

Conclusion

Apostolic writers (e.g., Peter, John, Paul) and their immediate successors, such as Luke, understood that the literal, physical resurrection of Jesus Christ constitutes the basic fact upon which the gospel message stands or falls. Middle Platonism’s intellectual pervasiveness in the first-century CE Roman world made acceptance of Jesus’s resurrection difficult for many. Emerging from Platonism and widespread religious syncretism, “proto-Gnostic” forces (within the church) presented a concomitant challenge to apostolic authority and the apostolic witness of Jesus’s resurrection. They catalyzed the “formation” of the “great and abominable church” (1 Nephi 13:3–9, 26–29, 32). All of this helps explain the tendency of “late” first-century writers (e.g., John, Luke) to assert the reality of Jesus’s resurrection in increasingly concrete terms (see, e.g., John 20:19–29; 1 John 1:1; Luke 24:36–43; Acts 1:3–11, 15–26). As Latter-day Saints, living in a post-Enlightenment world, similarly influenced by Greek philosophy, we must take care not to be seduced away from the resurrected Christ and the apostolic witness of that doctrine.

[Author’s Note: This article is based on a paper originally presented at the Forty-Seventh Annual Sidney B. Sperry Symposium at Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, on 26 October 2018. I would like to thank Suzy Bowen, Jeff Lindsay, Godfrey Ellis, Allen Wyatt, Tanya Spackman, Victor Worth, and Alan Sikes.]

Matthew L. Bowen was raised in Orem, Utah, and graduated from Brigham Young University. He holds a PhD in Biblical Studies from the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, and is currently an associate professor in religious education at Brigham Young University—Hawaii. He is also the author of Name as Key-Word: Collected Essays on Onomastic Wordplay and the Temple in Mormon Scripture (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2018) and Ancient Names in the Book of Mormon: Toward a Deeper Understanding of a Witness of Christ (Orem, UT: Interpreter Foundation; Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2023). With Aaron P. Schade, he is the coauthor of The Book of Moses: From the Ancient of Days to the Latter Days (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2021). He and his wife (the former Suzanne Blattberg) are the parents of three children: Zachariah, Nathan, and Adele.

1 . See discussion in Andrew Skinner, Third Nephi: The Fifth Gospel (Springville, UT: Cedar Fort, 2012), 112.

2 . Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Luke I-IX: A New Introduction with Translation and Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 1970), 35.

3 . See, e.g., John T. Carroll, “Luke, Gospel of,” in The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, ed. Katharine Doob Sakenfeld et al. (Nashville: Abingdon, 2008), 3:720–22.

4 . E.g., Matthew 28:9: “And they came and held him by the feet, and worshipped him.”

5 . 1 Nephi 13:5, 26. In v. 26: the angel tells Nephi: “They have taken away from the gospel of the Lamb many parts which are plain and most precious; and also many covenants of the Lord have they taken away.” The doctrine of a literal, resurrected Jesus and a literal, general resurrection is the most plain and precious truth of the gospel and the one upon which the whole plan of salvation hinges, and without which the Savior’s Atonement would not be complete.

6 . Walter Bauer et al., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, rev. and ed. by Fredrick William Danker, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 147. Hereafter cited as BDAG.

7 . Cf. 3 Nephi 11:15: “And it came to pass that the multitude went forth, and thrust their hands into his side, and did feel the prints of the nails in his hands and in his feet; and this they did do, going forth one by one until they had all gone forth, and did see with their eyes and did feel with their hands, and did know of a surety and did bear record, that it was he, of whom it was written by the prophets, that should come.”

8 . John Turner, “Plato, Platonism,” in The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, 4:547.

9 . Daniel W. Graham and James L. Siebach, “The Introduction of Philosophy into Early Christianity,” in Early Christians in Disarray: Contemporary LDS Perspectives on the Christian Apostasy. ed. Noel B. Reynolds (Provo, UT: Foundation for Apologetic Research and Mormon Studies [FARMS]; Brigham Young University Press, 2005), 205.

10 . James L. Crenshaw, “Knowledge,” in The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, 3:545.

11 . John W. Welch, “Modern Revelation: A Guide to Research about the Apostasy,” in Early Christians in Disarray, 102.

12 . Welch, “Modern Revelation,” 102.

13 . The same situation, though probably to a lesser degree, existed at Rome at an earlier date. Paul wrote them thus: “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them” (Romans 16:17).

14 . Adela Yarbro Collins, “The Apocalypse (Revelation)” in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990), 1002. Hereafter cited as NJBC.

15 . The verb nikaō (“overcome,” “conquer,” “prevail,” “be victorious”) occurs seventeen times in Revelation: Revelation 2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21 (2 x); 5:5; 6:2 (2 x); 11:7; 12:11; 13:7; 15:2; 17:14; 21:7. John emphasizes overcoming versus being overcome.

16 . “The Carpocratians have been called libertine Gnostics because they contended that the attainment of transcendent freedom depended on having every possible experience, sinful or otherwise. Such an array of experiences normally required more than one lifetime, so the Carpocratians espoused the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, perhaps inspired by Indian or Pythagorean beliefs.” Britannica, s.v. “Carpocratian,” britannica.com/topic/Carpocratians.

17 . See 2 Peter 2:15; Jude 1:11; Revelation 2:14, citing Numbers 22–23.

18 . Stephen E. Robinson, “Warring against the Saints of God,” Ensign, January 1988, 38–39, www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1988/01/warring-against-the-saints-of-god.

19 . Hugh W. Nibley, Mormonism and Early Christianity (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: FARMS, 1987), 15. Originally published as: Hugh Nibley, “Evangelium Quadraginta Dierum,” Vigiliae Christianae 20, no. 1 (March 1966): 1–24, jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1581972. Reprinted as Nibley, “The Forty-day Mission of Christ—The Forgotten Heritage,” in When the Lights Went Out: Three Studies on the Ancient Apostasy (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1970; Provo, UT: FARMS, 2001), 33–54, 49–90.

20 . Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Luke X-XIV: A New Translation with Notes and Commentary (New York, Doubleday, 1985), 1574.

21 . BDAG, 1097.

22 . Some ancient textual witnesses lack the words kai apo melissiou kēriou “and from a honeycomb.”

23 . Fitzmyer, Luke X-XIV, 1574–75.

24 . Fitzmyer, Luke X-XIV, 1582.

25 . Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Acts of the Apostles: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 1998), 200.

26 . Fitzmyer, Acts, 221.

27 . Fitzmyer, Acts, 250.

28 . N.T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003), 456.

29 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 456.

30 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 447.

31 . Wright (Resurrection of the Son of God, 447) also correctly notes that “This, too, is Paul’s picture of the future. It is a rich, many-sided set of promises, which cannot be flattened out into a spiritualized ‘realized eschatology’, or a Platonized expectation of immortality.”

32 . C.K. Barrett, The Gospel According to St. John, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1978), 565.

33 . Pheme Perkins, “The Gospel According to John,” NJBC, 983.

34 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 691.

35 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 691.

36 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 715.

37 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 678.

38 . I.e., the “us” of John 1:14, etc.

39 . BDAG, 1097.

40 . Pheme Perkins, “The Johannine Epistles,” NJBC, 898.

41 . Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 715–16.

Small Hinges, Great Doorways:
How Some Descendants of an
Enslaved Youth Unexpectedly
Became Prominent Utah Citizens

Jeffrey M. Bradshaw

Abstract: A vivid illustration of how “the doorways of history turn on small hinges” is found in the Howell family tradition about Wilford Woodruff’s short stay at the home of slaveholders in the South, where it appears he may have taught a 14-year-old enslaved boy named Jackson Howell. Decades later, Jackson’s son Paul C. Howell would migrate to Utah and become a prominent citizen of Salt Lake City. Later, Paul’s son, Abner, would serve a unique mission and would continue to speak and serve in the Church. Several Church leaders played a key role in the story of the Howell family throughout the years when priesthood and temple restrictions remained in place.

President Thomas S. Monson once said that “the doorways of history turn on small hinges, and so do people’s lives.”1 The history of the Howell family’s enslavement and later rise to prominence illustrates that principle. Though many important elements of the Howells’ story are widely known, some family traditions have heretofore lacked corroboration in the historical record. Some of these traditions—including the possibility that Wilford Woodruff lit the spark that led to Jackson Howell’s embrace of the restored Church of Jesus Christ in the 1830s and the arrival of some of his children and grandchildren in Utah in 1887—have seemed to contradict known facts about the dates, places, and people involved. Moreover, details about an intriguing cross-country “mission” taken by Jackson’s grandson, Abner, are also murky.

In this article, my purpose is not to provide a detailed history of the Howell family because much of their story has already been published by previous biographers.2 Rather, my hope is to present some new details about their lives that have been uncovered by recent research and the availability of additional historical records. Besides relating new details that have emerged about the Howells, I will attempt to unravel some previous uncertainties surrounding three questions:

- Did Wilford Woodruff preach to an enslaved member of the Howell family in 1835?

- When did members of the Howell family emigrate to Utah?

- Why did Abner and Martha Howell travel across the United States in 1951?

The answers to these questions provide a fascinating story. Before addressing these questions, though, let’s turn for background to a brief account of the progenitors of the Utah branch of the Howell family.

Figure 1. Upper: Paul and Levi (Howell siblings) and Byrdie (Paul’s daughter).3 Lower: Record of John McLawchlin (McLaughlin) in 1820 US census for Ouachita, Louisiana.4 McLaughlin was the owner of a Louisiana plantation where early members of the Howell family may have been enslaved.

Byrdie Lee Howell Langon’s Account of the
Family of Jackson and Eliza Jane Hogan Howell

Byrdie Lee Howell Langon (1885–1979), a sister of Abner Howell (1878–1966), authored a fifty-eight-page typed family history in 1969. It was published privately a few months after a celebration in her honor

Figure 2. Left: James Later holds a megaphone for Byrdie Howell Langon at a twenty-fifth annual Salt Lake Picnic in Hollywood Park, 27 July 1969. At the event, Byrdie was honored with two citations, one from the Los Angeles Councilman from her home district and another from the Bethel A.M. E. church;5 Right: Excerpt from letter of Byrdie to Kate B. Carter about her family history: “I am a stranger to you, but as you are not a stranger to my late Bro. Abner L. Howell thought I’d write you knowing you are interested in the pioneers and particular the Negroes and early settlers since the Civil Rights bill, so many states have been trying to give to history some thin[g] about the Negro also about the ones in their states.”6
by friends and relatives from near and far who attended the twenty-fifth anniversary of an annual picnic at Hollywood Park. In her history, Howell gives the most complete family account known of the early life of her grandparents Jackson Howell (ca. 1814/1821–1899) and Eliza Jane Hogan Howell (1829–1909). Since, apart from civil records, this is the only written narrative we have of their lives, it is difficult to understand and verify personal details. However, I have inserted bracketed text and notes within Byrdie’s account, below, to document what has been found in civil records:

During slavery time in Mansfield, Louisiana a Mr. McClelland [or, possibly, “McLaughlin”7] had a plantation. He was the father of two daughters and one son by his slave maid. The McClelland’s had gone to Scotland8 and beside his family he had taken his pretty housemaid with him. While in Scotland she had a son by him,9 which was common during slavery and they named him Jack.10 McClelland was very fond of the boy and educated him along with his two girls. He told the boy that when he reached age 21, he was going to give him his freedom papers, but Jack had a mind of his own and by having some education knew that slavery was wrong as many white people knew and told him he did not want any paper because he was free.

Living next to the McClelland’s was a family by the name of Howell, who was also fond of Jack. He and Mr. Howell had many talks about slavery. He set all of his slaves free, but most of them stayed with Mr. Howell. There was one girl named Mary Eliza [rather, Eliza Jane11] who Jack was very fond of and so Jack married her, but he was so angry with his own father for still selling slaves, that when he married Mary Liza he took her name of Howell. She was a very pretty Madagascar girl and Mr. Howell was very glad of the union and gave Jack and Mary Liza a large piece of land where they raised a family of seven or eight boys and one girl. The girl’s name was Celie. The boys were Levi, John, Elias, Nathan, Robert and Paul. Most of them grew to manhood.12 The girl Celie had one son, Dick who also grew to manhood.

Most of them stayed in Mansfield, but when Paul was a young man he said when he got enough money he was going west. Many people both black and white were going west to the gold rush. His father, Jack Howell, was a carpenter and even made coffins along with his farm work. . . .

After Mary and Paul’s marriage, Paul had told Mary that they would go West as they would perhaps have a better opportunity. . . .

[They eventually got to] Colorado and then [went] on to Salt Lake City. At that time there was quite a few Negro families. Some came over as early as the Mormons, but with every wagon load there would always be some Negroes. Paul came ahead of his family. When he left Colorado, his brother Levi remained as he was working; so Paul decided to go on and see how much work was in Salt Lake as the West was new and so much building was going on. Of course, they had to cut down their own timber in order to build their home. I heard my father [Paul] say many times that anyone with a saw and a hammer could get work.13

According to Byrdie, two of Jackson and Eliza Jane’s children eventually came to Utah—Levi Martin Howell (1852–1936) and Paul Cephas Howell (1855–1915). They remained with their families in Salt Lake City the rest of their lives.

Did Wilford Woodruff Preach to an Enslaved
Member of the Howell Family in 1835?

Paul’s children—Abner and Byrdie—took great interest in recording Howell family history. In addition to the forty-page history recorded by Byrdie about her family and early Black settlers in Utah,14 we are fortunate to have firsthand written and audio versions of Abner’s remembrances.15

Abner, along with his wife and children, were eventually baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.16 He told many otherwise unknown stories describing the interactions of Church members and leaders with the Howell family. Notably, according to Abner, the first contact his family had with the Church members was during a mission of Wilford Woodruff to the southern states.

On 29 October 1960, George Boyd, Bill Hartman, and James Allen interviewed Abner Howell, then 81–82 years old, as part of the James Moyle Oral History Program.17 However, because the collection containing the interview was never finalized, the recording has not been available to researchers until recently. In the recording, Abner claimed that Wilford Woodruff preached the gospel to his father, Paul Howell, during a visit to a plantation in Little Rock, Arkansas:

Abner Howell: [M]y father . . . said Woodruff came to his master’s house and he had stayed there two, three days and then he baptized the master. And he was baptized too.

Interviewer: That was in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Abner Howell: Yeah. . . . My father was . . . his master’s boy. He had to get his master’s boot jack, help his master dress, and get him his cane and his umbrella and stay with him wherever he went. And it appears that the master went to bed early that particular night. And my father said he had to sit up before his master went to bed . . . and help him go to bed. . . . Wilford Woodruff was there that night to stay all night. And after . . . his master had gone to bed, Wilford Woodruff told him, he said, “Someday you’ll be free and someday you’ll be a man and you’ll go to Utah, Salt Lake City.” . . .

Interviewer: How old is Wilford Woodruff now? About 15?

Abner Howell: No, he’s more than that. He’s more. No, I don’t remember the year.

Interviewer: He was only 15 years old when he started to go down to Little Rock, Arkansas.

Abner Howell: Yeah. Oh, I think he was older than that.18 . . . But he told him he would go to Salt Lake. He was set free, and he grew up to manhood and married, and I was the first child born, see. And then . . .

Interviewer: Your father wasn’t a member yet?

Abner Howell: No.19 Then he started for Salt Lake.

Interviewer: What brought him here? Yeah. What brought him? Why did he come to Salt Lake?

Abner Howell: Because president would’ve told him he’d grow up and come to Salt Lake.

Interviewer: So that’s why he made up his mind to come.

In a secondhand report of the same incident as related by Howell three years later, we read:

His father, _______ Howell, was baptized by Wilford Woodruff in Louisiana20 after the master was baptized. (Slaves could only be baptized after the slave masters were.) His father saved every available penny until he had enough to go to S. L. City. In Dodge City on their way to S. L. C. Batt [sic] Masterson asked Abner where he was going. He said, “To S. L. C.” Masterson said, “Don’t you know the Mormons out there have horns? Don’t let them hook you.”21

There is nothing impossible in the idea that Woodruff met with an enslaved member of the Howell family during his mission to the South except for one glaring problem—Woodruff visited Arkansas for the first and only time as a young missionary in March 1835, twenty years before Abner’s father was born. Margaret Blair Young, who recognized the incongruity of these timeframes, charitably concluded that although Abner’s account must have been fictitious, it innocently “illustrates . . . Abner’s way of weaving his own story into the larger Mormon narrative, especially through mentioning church authorities.”22

Despite the appealing simplicity of Young’s hypothesis, I wondered whether there was some other explanation for the account. Eventually, another possibility occurred to me: Could Woodruff have encountered Abner’s grandfather rather than his father?

Figure 3. Wilford Woodruff Journal for 12–21 March 1835.23

I looked more carefully at Wilford Woodruff’s journal for clues. As I read the details of his missionary journey to Arkansas, I was impressed with rough correspondences between Woodruff’s description of a visit to a Mr. “James P. Kelleam Monroe Co” and Abner Howell’s account. The relevant entries in Woodruff’s journal read as follows:

Figure 4. Wilford Woodruff Journal for 22–27 March 1835.24

18 March 1835 (Wednesday): Left Mr Cribbins crossed Wite River at Cash ferry from thence to Mr James P Kelleam Monroe Co. Distance 18 Miles

19 March 1835 (Thursday) to 21 March 1835 (Saturday): Spent the Day[s] in labouring for Mr Kelleam

22 March 1835 (Sunday): On the Lords Day preached to an attentive congregation at the house of Mr Kellean [sic]

23 March 1835 (Monday): Left Mr Kelleam25

Let’s examine the correspondences between Woodruff’s journal and Howell family accounts one by one. Given that Woodruff’s journal is the only source for his visit, our only recourse is to assess the plausibility that Howell’s story refers to the same event by relying on a series of coincidences and general consistencies rather than to search for some single overwhelmingly strong piece of evidence.26

Name of the slaveholder

Given that the two sources for the slaveholder’s name are independent, Woodruff’s phonetically spelled name of “Kelleam” is remarkably close to “McClelland,” the name given by Byrdie Langon. Significantly, unlike Byrdie’s late recollection, Woodruff’s journal records the name and events at the time they happened. Unfortunately, I have not yet been able to locate primary records in the timeframes and geographical locations of interest for variants of the name “McClelland” that would confirm Langon and Woodruff’s remarkably congruent remembrances.27 Plus, we have no evidence of a plausible variant of “McLaughlin” in the county at that time. Is it possible that the James P. Kelleam of Woodruff’s Arkansas diary and the well-attested John McLaughlin of Mansfield, Louisiana, are two different individuals—that is, potentially successive slaveholders of Jackson? Records are so fragmentary that we will probably never know.

Identity of the enslaved youth

In Abner Howell’s most complete account of the supposed meeting of his father with Wilford Woodruff, the setting is prior to emancipation when his father was still a slave.28 However, in his confusion, he may have later come to believe that his father, Paul, must have met Wilford Woodruff before Paul “left Little Rock” about 1884, as his family made their way to Fort Smith, Arkansas.29 Notably, Abner did not claim to have met Woodruff himself until he got to Salt Lake City.30 If Abner believed that his father met Woodruff in Little Rock in 1884, it might explain why Abner also said that Woodruff “was here [in Salt Lake City] three years before” his own family arrived in 1887.31 Remember also Abner’s contradiction when he said in the same interview both that Woodruff had baptized the enslaved boy and his slaveholder as a missionary, and also that his father “wasn’t a member” when, as a married man, he left for Salt Lake City in the mid-1880s. All this seems to indicate that although Abner believed that Woodruff had visited his father in the South, he couldn’t quite put all the facts together about when that happened. The difficulty may have been because the story about Woodruff he heard from his father actually concerned his grandfather.

Place

Woodruff describes the March 1835 residence of Mr. “Kelleam” as “Monroe Co.” Arkansas, east of Little Rock where Abner remembered the meeting with Woodruff taking place. In a later summary, Woodruff describes the trials of this arduous part of his missionary journey but, regrettably, without mentioning his stay with Mr. “Kelleam”:

We . . . continued our journey down the river to Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas, which then consisted of only a few cabins.

After visiting the place, we crossed the river and tied up our canoe, which had carried us safely one hundred and fifty miles.

We then took the old military road, leading from Little Rock to Memphis, Tennessee. This road lay through swamps, and was covered with mud and water most of the way, for one hundred and seventy miles. We walked forty miles in a day through mud and water knee deep.

On the 24th of March, after traveling some ten miles through mud, I was taken lame with a sharp pain in my knee. I sat down on a log.

My companion, who was anxious to get to his home in Kirtland, left me sitting in an alligator swamp. I did not see him again for two years. I knelt down in the mud and prayed, and the Lord healed me, and I went on my way rejoicing.

On the 27th of March, I arrived at Memphis, weary and hungry.32

The “old military road, leading from Little Rock to Memphis” mentioned by Woodruff “approximated the route of current Highway 40.”33 The rigors and tensions of this part of the journey may explain in part the elliptical nature of Woodruff’s entries for these dates.

Date

The 1835 date given in Woodruff’s journal is a reasonable fit with Abner’s remembrances for the ages of the story’s principals. In 1835, Woodruff would have not been fifteen years old, as Abner’s interviewer claimed, but rather, as Abner insisted, “more than that.” While Woodruff turned twenty-eight on 1 March 1835, Abner’s grandfather would have been about fourteen years old, unmarried, and of an age appropriate to the role as the slaveholder’s “boy” that Abner seems to have mistakenly attributed to his father instead of his grandfather.

Abner said that Woodruff “stayed there two, three days.” Woodruff recorded that he arrived at the “Kelleam” home Wednesday night and left Monday morning.

Favorable reception of Woodruff’s preaching

Abner said that Woodruff “baptized the master” and that the enslaved boy “was baptized too.” Woodruff did not specifically mention a baptismal service, but the journal entry for his last full day at the “Kelleam” home stated that “On the Lords day [he] preached to an attentive congregation at the house of Mr Kelleam.” Although Woodruff felt his reception was favorable, he provides no evidence of baptisms that day. Since Woodruff usually was careful to keep track of baptisms, this makes the idea that any in the household received this ordinance at that time less likely.

Woodruff’s encouragement to gather with the Saints

According to Abner, Woodruff said, “Someday you’ll be free and someday you’ll be a man and you’ll go to Utah, Salt Lake City.” Abner’s recollection of this statement by Woodruff would have been reasonable if it had been spoken to Abner’s father sometime after 1847. However, if we suppose that a statement like this was made by Woodruff in 1835, the obvious problem is the fact that Salt Lake City was not founded until 1847.

A solution is suggested when we step back from the specific words recounted by Abner and focus, instead, on their gist, namely the idea that Woodruff wanted Jackson Howell, once he gained his freedom, to gather with the Saints. With respect to this statement, an anonymous reviewer of an earlier version of this paper observed that embellished free speech that is spoken with such certainty that it sounds like direct speech would not be unusual in spoken narration of the sort used by Abner—including for recollections regarding associations with prophets by those who revere them.

It is well known that Woodruff often preached about the gathering during his mission. Indeed, citing examples from Woodruff’s mission to the South, Fred E. Woods observed that Woodruff “maintained his focus on the gathering of modern-day Israel through the duration of his varied missions from 1834” to 1850,34 consistent with the Lord’s instructions for the missionaries to “bring to pass the gathering of mine elect . . . in unto one place upon the face of the land” (Doctrine and Covenants 29:7–8). Thus, it appears that when Abner seems to have mistakenly conflated the experience of his grandfather with that of his father, the specific place where he would have been gathered seems also to have been shifted with it—from Kirtland to Salt Lake City. If this conjecture is correct, it would have been natural for Abner to remember that the reason his father came to Salt Lake City specifically—and not just to the West generally—was “because president [Woodruff] . . . told him he’d grow up and come to Salt Lake.” This was, after all, the place then appointed for the gathering of the Saints. Without such specific encouragement, Abner’s father would have had less reason to choose Utah over other favorable places to settle.

Evaluation

At present, the evidence and arguments above are the best that can be mustered for the family tradition that Wilford Woodruff visited Jackson Howell in 1835. However, continued research sometimes yields serendipitous surprises of the sort that may confirm (or disconfirm) such tentative conclusions.

Deciphering the historical record relating to Abner Howell’s recollection is a good demonstration of Don Bradley’s principle that “establishing the chronology of events is the first step in doing history.”35 The application of this principle will also be demonstrated as we puzzle through the answer to the next question.

When Did Members of the Howell Family Emigrate to Utah?

In Byrdie’s history, she writes that her father, Paul, arrived in Salt Lake City a year or so prior to his wife and children, sending for them in 1890 after he had earned a little money.36 Later family biographers have accepted the date of 1890 for the arrival of Paul’s family.37 Abner, however, remembers the arrival as three years earlier—early enough to witness the funeral of John Taylor on 29 July 1887:

Figure 5. Left: President John Taylor shortly before his death, ca. 1887.38 Right: Interior of Salt Lake Tabernacle decorated with garlands, ca. 1890.39

We arrived in Salt Lake City in 1887. At that time, President Taylor was president, and that’s the year he died. And I can remember going to his funeral. . . . He was in the tabernacle, and you go in the north door and walk past President Taylor’s coffin.40

Abner’s account is consistent with the public viewing described in the historic record.41 President Woodruff was being sought for arrest at the time of the funeral, and a request for exemption to enable him to attend failed.42

We are provided with an additional data point by Byrdie’s account of her westward journey where she relates that she was born three weeks before her family left Kansas.43 In a FamilySearch record, her birthdate is given as 27 June 1887, but without any supporting documentation.44 Such a date would make 1890 rather than 1887 the arrival year in Salt Lake City, making it impossible that Abner would have witnessed the viewing of John Taylor.

That said, there is good evidence for a birth year for Byrdie prior to 1887. The earliest available census record (1900) gives Byrdie’s birthdate as June 1885.45 Significantly, the 1885 date is consistent with Abner’s remembrance of having “walked across the plains in Kansas” when he was “seven years old.”46 In light of this possibility, Abner’s recollection of seeing President Taylor’s coffin in the Salt Lake Tabernacle in 1887 is not unrealistic. The fact that Abner accurately remembered and recounted details of Taylor’s viewing so long after the event occurred also lends credence to other memories of his early life.

Max H. Parkin reports Abner as having provided a second recollection of being in the Tabernacle, as a young man on 2 April 1899 when the famous evangelist Dwight L. Moody47 gave a speech to the assembled crowd of an estimated 6,000 people:

The evangelists, Moody and Sankey, were loaned the Tabernacle (S. L.) for a preaching service by Pres. W. Woodruff. Abner passed the coin plate: only time in history, according to Bro. Howell.48

There are two problems with the recollection. First, President Woodruff passed away seven months before the meeting (2 September 1898), so the authorization to preach in the Tabernacle would have come from the succeeding president, Lorenzo Snow. Second, we have no evidence besides Howell’s recollection that Ira David Sankey, a famous gospel singer, was at the 1899 meeting.49

Paul and Abner Rise to Relative Prominence

Although little is now known about later events in the lives of most of the Howell family, Paul and his son Abner improbably rose to relative prominence in Salt Lake City in the early years of the twentieth century. While Paul became Salt Lake City’s first Black police detective, Abner received recognition as a talented football player in high school and college. As described below, Abner’s eventual conversion to the Church and tenacious faithfulness was recognized by Church leaders. Their love and friendship for Abner set the stage for an unusual 1951 mission he took with his wife.

Figure 6. Left: Paul C. Howell in Police uniform.50 Right: Paul C. Howell house at 138 East 800 South, Salt Lake City, 2020.51 Paul was living in this house when he passed away in 1915.

Paul Howell becomes Salt Lake City’s first Black police detective

According to Rachel Quist, Abner and Byrdie’s father, Paul Howell “served on-and-off the Salt Lake City Police Department between 1892 and 1911, attaining the rank of Detective in 1908.”52

The Deseret News reported that Paul was appointed to the police force to replace R. Bruce Johnson:

LOST HIS OFFICIAL HEAD.

City Detective Bruce Johnson Relieved of His Star, Last Night . . .

REMOVALS AND APPOINTMENTS

Mayor Baskin sent in the following:

To the President and City Council:

Gentlemen:—I hereby appoint . . . P. C. Howell as patrolman on the city police in place of R. B. Johnson, removed; and submit the appointments for confirmation. Adopted.

Johnson’s successor is a darkey of mastodon proportions.53

Johnson was removed from the police force in an apparent move by the new Mayor Baskin to “clean house.”54 With regard to the shocking description of Howell, Rachel Quist comments that “segregation and racism were rampant in [Salt Lake City] and although Howell was well respected and believed to be a man of principle, he was also demeaned for his skin color and tall frame.”55 Paul retired in 1911 and on 11 February 1915 died of Bright’s Disease (a kidney condition).56

Abner becomes a talented high school and college football star

As Abner grew, he attended public school in Salt Lake City. During high school he was an avid and formidable football player.

Wendell J. Ashton, in relating the history of the Deseret News, wrote about the attention football games garnered in Salt Lake City and included an account of an important game in which Abner starred:

Football games seemed to receive more notice than any other local athletic event when the News was kicking off with its daily sports coverage. There were almost two entire columns describing the 34–0 victory of Salt Lake High over East Denver’s footballer’s [sic] on Thanksgiving Day in 1900. The game was attended by five thousand fans, including

Figure 7. Abner Howell (9) with victorious 1900 Salt Lake High School team.57

Utah’s Governor Heber M. Wells, arriving in a beautifully rubber-tired vehicle. Those were the days when perspiring huskies discarded gear as they played, fists flew frequently, and a colored fullback named Abe Howell “was everything from the band-wagon to the steam calliope” for Salt Lake High.

At the century’s turn, the sports writer handled players as roughly with his words as they did each other with their hands. A little exaggeration was alright too, if it made good reading. The News account of the Salt Lake-Denver game started off: “Salt Lake High school, 34; East Denver High school, G-O-O-S-E E-G-G.”58

After high school, Abner scrimped and saved money for two years and eventually enrolled in the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Like some of his high school classmates, he intended to study law.59 While there, he continued his interest in football and played on the freshman football team under Coach Fielding Yost.60 Abner is listed as a second-year student in the “Department of Law” at Ann Arbor from 1903–1904.61

However, Abner never completed his studies. He no doubt faced strong racism in Michigan during that era,62 and it is reasonable to suppose that this factor may have played a part in his decision.63 Biographer Young concludes that “money was scarce,”64 especially after his marriage to Nina Stevenson on 30 August 1904,65 and his father’s health had begun to decline.66 Young adds, “There is, of course, no documentation of the pain Howell must have felt as he packed up his possessions and his pregnant wife, and abandoned his dreams of becoming a lawyer. He returned with Nina to Utah, where he adopted his father’s former profession—that of a bricklayer.”67

Figure 8. Abner Howell (rear left) with University of Michigan freshman football squad, 1902.68

Abner’s conversion and baptism

Despite his friendly encounters with Church leaders as a youth, Abner was not baptized until later in life.69 He relates his conversion as follows:

Before I was in my teens I wondered many times why I was a different color to the other boys. Little by little I was told that I was cursed and could not go to heaven when I died, but was doomed to go to hell with the devil and burn forever.

One day, when the boys were telling me these things, I was so touched that I began to cry. While in this frame of mind, Bro. John Henry Smith [of the Twelve] came along and wanted to know what was wrong and why I was crying. So I told him. He comforted me with a few kind words and took me to his house, a block away. He got the Book of Mormon and turned to the 26th chapter of 2nd Nephi, and last verse. He then said, “Read this,” which I did [“the Lord . . . denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God”]. When I was through reading, a great load was lifted from my heart and mind, and my eyes were opened, and I read more and more. I thought how great that was! The words “all are alike unto God.”

I could not find anything in the Bible that pleased me so much as what I had just read in the Book of Mormon. I never discussed my thoughts with anyone. I just dreamed day after day to myself. I did not tell my mother about this as she did not want to join the Church. The people who owned her in slavery time were Methodist and she always said that was good enough for her. With this background I grew up joining no church but with all Latter-day Saint ideas, ways and thoughts.

I did not go to church much until I was married and my first child was old enough to be baptized. My wife and I were baptized and then was when I became active in the Church and have been ever since.70

In an oral history interview, Mary Lucile Bankhead spoke with admiration of Abner’s faith in the face of the discrimination he experienced when his family attended Church in the Holladay area of Salt Lake City. She said that during Sunday meetings his family had to “sit out in the vestibule” because “he couldn’t go in the congregation. . . . It didn’t seem to [faze] him at all. It seemed that he went on through it. I don’t know what he said or what he did. But I know he never went away from the Church. He was a staunch member.”71

Why Did Abner and Martha Howell Travel
Across the United States in 1951?

With the understanding of Abner’s early history and conversion to the Church just described, we are now ready to consider what can be known about the purpose of the long cross-country trip that he and his wife Martha took in 1951. As background for how that trip came to be, it’s important to understand the many strong friendships that Abner had formed with Church leaders from the time of his family’s arrival in Utah in 1887 until the middle of the next century.

Church leaders and the Howell family

From historical and family records, there is no doubt that Church leaders were aware of the Howell family and took interest in them over the years, starting with Wilford Woodruff. Abner remembered with gratitude that Woodruff helped his father transition from day labor on construction projects72 to a better job as a policeman:

And he [Paul] came to Salt Lake and he worked. And in 188873 . . . President Woodruff who knew him—he remembered him, see, when he came here—got him on the police force and he was on the police force for twenty years. And I can remember President Woodruff coming to the house after we got here. . . .

But anyway he [Wilford Woodruff] told him he wanted him [Paul] to stand on the front gate of that temple over there [the Salt Lake Temple] when it was being dedicated [in 1893]. And he was six foot four, my father was, in stocking feet. And President Woodruff had him on that front gate, he says, “You’re tall, you can see over everybody.” And I never forgot that.74

Besides the kindness shown by President Woodruff in finding better employment for his father, Abner was impressed that the prophet never lost the common touch:

President Woodruff was such a wonderful man [in] that he was liked more by the poor than he was by the rich because any place he saw you his hand was out for you. If you had rags. It didn’t make any difference for him.75

I can remember President Woodruff being an entirely different president to any we have ever had, because he was just a common man. I’ve seen him come to my mother’s house, come in the back door and say, “Mary, have you had, got any good hot biscuits?” One more thing about President Woodruff. I have seen him hauling fertilizer from Salt Lake City out to his farm. And the apostles got after him and said he’d have to quit hauling manure because he had to do his duty as president of the church and quit farming. And . . . he’d have on just common clothes.76

The friendship of Elder John Henry Smith, an apostle, and his son, Elder Nicholas Groesbeck Smith—a teammate on the high school football team and later an Assistant to the Twelve—had a lasting impact on Howell. After the Smiths died, others continued to extend friendship. For example, Abner recounted the following experience at the 1945 funeral of his former classmate:77

And when we were down there looking at Nick in the coffin, Winslow and I, Harold B. Lee [then an apostle] came up and he knew how much Nick thought of me and how much I thought of Nick. And he says to me, “Ab,” he says, “there’s one thing I want to do. I want to take Nick’s place in your heart. Remember that. I want to be just as Nick has been all his life.” . . . That’s what he’s been doing, look after me.

Figure 9. Left to right: Elder John Henry Smith,78 Elder Nicholas Groesbeck Smith,79 President Heber J. Grant,80 Elder Harold B. Lee.81

Apart from Monroe Fleming,82 perhaps no other Black Latter-day Saint in the first half of the twentieth century enjoyed more friendships with Church leaders than did Abner. He was also well-acquainted with apostle and later Church President Heber J. Grant:83

I knew President Grant since I was a boy, and always liked him because he used to let me in the baseball games when he used to play 2nd base on the team. Then in 1902 he took 50 missionaries to organize the Japanese Mission. I was the porter on the car that took them to Portland, Oregon. When he left me there he told me about living a good straight life and then our paths did not cross anymore until 1936 when he was President of the Church, and had started the church welfare plan and I began to work for the Church. I helped build all the buildings in the welfare center. I did other work for the Church; I tore down the last of the old tithing office. It was while working there that he gave me this letter that I will copy [see figure 10].

Unraveling the purpose of the Howells’ unique “mission”

Because of Abner’s friendship with various Church leaders, it was no surprise that his name came to mind in 1951 when the need came up for someone to fill a unique “mission.” Although the fact of the mission is not in doubt, its precise purpose has been less clear.

Margaret Blair Young reported that church leaders were considering the idea that “separate congregations be set up for the Negro Saints”84 and hoped that Abner and Martha’s trip could provide them with useful information. Young based her conclusions on a 2002 interview of Boyd Burbidge, who had made an audio recording of Abner relating some of his experiences in 1958.85 The Burbidge source and Young’s summary have been cited since by other biographers.86 Unfortunately, the audio recording was lost for many years, and the whereabouts of Young’s notes are still unknown. Happily, Young recently found the long-lost recording and since it is not available elsewhere, she has given permission for the full transcript to be included in the appendix to this article.

Independently, historian Matthew L. Harris has researched this question. Citing the letter from Bishop LeGrand Richards87 in figure 11, Harris wrote that Richards “asked Abner Howell . . . to travel to the South with his wife to gauge the feasibility of establishing a segregated congregation for Black members.”88 However, the letter by Richards cited by Harris does not mention anything about a proposal for establishing a segregated congregation.

In short, Young’s account is based on her recollection of interview notes whose location is currently unknown. The 1958 audio recording, transcribed in the appendix, does not say anything relevant to the notion of establishing segregated congregations. And the Richards letter given to Abner Howell does not provide support for this motive. Unfortunately, evidence cannot be sought from the Church leaders’ journals and meeting minutes, as they are currently closed to research.

Figure 10. Letter, 18 October 1938, from President Heber J. Grant to Abner Howell thanking him for his work on the old tithing office.89

Going further, Abner’s firsthand accounts always describe their trip in purely personal terms. In one early account, Abner simply described his personal motivation for the trip being that he “wanted to see some of the East and South.”90 Elsewhere, he stated that he had originally

Figure 11. Letter of introduction, 20 June 1951, by Presiding Bishop LeGrand Richards on behalf of the Howells.91
planned the trip because he had “a lot of relations down there and . . . visited some of them on this trip.”92 In addition, Elder LeGrand Richards of the Quorum of the Twelve wrote a letter of introduction on behalf of the Howells (figure 11) that alluded to the reason for their travel being that they “are now enjoying what they have looked forward to for a long time; namely a trip to the Southern and Eastern parts of the United States.”

Fortunately, a new firsthand source recently made available at the Church History Library provides additional hints from Abner himself about the nature of their visit to the Southern and Eastern United States. In a previously unpublished transcript of a fireside in the Pasadena California Stake (probably held between 1955 and 1958), Abner personally confirmed that his trip was originally conceived by Church leaders as a “short mission”:

Have you seen any noticeable change in the attitude of the Church towards Negroes? Well, four years ago, President [Stephen L] Richards, . . . a good friend of mine . . . called me into his office and he said, . . . “It’s about time that the Church did a little more on what we’re doing for the Negro race.”

He says, “You have been here longer than anyone. . . . I want to know if you will go on a short mission and see if you can’t get some of them to come back into Church who left the Church. And some who would have been baptized in the Church because their parents were.” I said, “I’ll certainly go.”

He says, “I’ll give you Brother Claude Petersen.” (Brother Claude Petersen is [Elder] Mark Petersen’s brother). And so we went for six weeks, and we got twenty to come back into the Church. But they didn’t stay long. But we got them to come back in. He also made this statement to me. He says, “If we can get them to come back in, . . . if they don’t want to mingle with us, we’ll build them a church of their own, like we have done the Spanish people here.”

A lot of people don’t know that. They’re . . . trying hard. But it’s just almost impossible. You know, this thing. The Church is not yet bringing the Gospel to the Negro. But there’s this thing about it. When you go down south on a mission, and one of them wants to join the Church, there’s no way to keep him out. You must baptize him. And that’s a must to every missionary.93

Thus, while Abner and Martha’s primary objective was to encourage Black members of the Church who had “left the Church” to return to activity, he indicates that the Church leaders were also “trying hard” by whatever means to help them—including the possibility of establishing separate Church units, as they had done with some Spanish-speaking congregations, if it might make returning easier.

Note that Howell’s explanation does not mention a desire by Church leaders to accommodate white members who might want to exclude Black Saints from their meetings, but instead emphasizes Church leaders’ focus on ascertaining the wishes of Black members. In Abner’s words, new units would be created for Black Saints only “if they don’t want to mingle with us . . . like we have done [with] Spanish people.” This understanding was recognized in an email exchange with Matthew L. Harris:

The Brethren were not interested in establishing a segregated unit for the same reasons that Southerners were. Rather, the brethren were interested in reactivating Black Latter-day Saints, and the way to do that was through a separate unit where they could worship with folks who shared the same burdens in life. It’s the same reason the brethren created the Genesis Group some two decades later, and the same reason the Church allows today the “Polynesian Branch” or “Hispanic Branch” or whatever. Church attendance, they’ve learned, is greater when folks from a shared language and culture worship together.94

Figure 12. Left to right: Elder Stephen L Richards,95 Elder LeGrand Richards,96 Elder Mark E. Petersen,97 Elder Spencer W. Kimball.98

As Abner and Martha Howell planned their travel, apostles LeGrand Richards, Mark E. Petersen, and Spencer W. Kimball each visited with him separately. Elder LeGrand Richards’s letter of introduction had announced that the couple had been “invited to call upon our people, the missionaries, and Saints wherever convenient.” Abner Howell records being warmly received as he spoke to members and missionaries in Boston, Cincinnati, Atlanta, and Shreveport.99 One of his longer accounts of their trip is as follows:

We left as soon as we got the letter [from Bishop Richards], for Boston, as Brother Dilworth Young100 was there at that time and he has been such a good friend to me all his life. At the mission there as we arrived, were missionaries, and there was a homesick girl, who, after hugging my wife and finding that we were from Utah, she was made a happy, well girl. I was happier than her to think a few words could make such a change in anyone.

Figure 13. Left: Martha Ann Stevens Howell and her husband, Abner.101 Right: Church members Len and Mary Hope with some other Hope family members in Cincinnati, Ohio, probably in 1942 or 1943.102 Len is in the middle of the front row, Mary is at the far left in the second row. In February 1952, soon after the visit of the Howells, the Hopes moved to Salt Lake City. Len passed away a short time after their move.103

Our next stop was Cincinnati, as this was a special stop to see a colored Brother and his family [Len and Mary Hope]. Bro. Mark E. Petersen gave me the address, as he had baptized two members when he was on his mission and thought a lot of the family.

On arriving in Cincinnati, we had a sadder outlook. We found that society had creeped into religion. Most of the members lived across the river on the Kentucky side and some of them did not want the Negro family to come to church. They could only come to church once a month, on fast Sunday. Cincinnati was at that time only a branch. I went Sunday with the colored brother whose name by the way was Len Hope. His family had been receiving missionaries for many years. Bro. Petersen said he had many a meal in the Len Hope home. I went in the gospel doctrine class and as I had already had the lesson they were on, I was able to answer many questions. When Sunday School was out I gave my letter to the bishop to read, and after reading he said “How long will you be here?” and I said “two days.” He said, “Would you like to say a few words at Sacrament tonight?” I said, “Sure I would.” Then it was that he told me of the feeling of some of the members of the Church about the Negro family. He told me to be easy on the “haters.” I said, “I will be so nice they will like me.” He said they all sat on the right side, the leader had long bushy hair.

When Brother Spencer W. Kimball heard that I was going down South he called me into his office to talk to me. He said, “I want to tell you something. You have been raised in Utah and you don’t know those people. You won’t get treated there like you do here. Be very careful, what you say, and where you go. They will always be right and you will be wrong, but say nothing, you will then get along.”

That afternoon I asked the Lord to lead me in the right way that night. The bishop had said about ten minutes. Somehow that last verse in the 26th chapter of 2nd Nephi said “Read me.” I talked a short while on brotherhood. Then I took the Book of Mormon and started to read, but my time was up—I looked at the bishop. He said, “Go on.” I finished the entire evening by looking at the bishop several times and each time getting the go-ahead sign. As I had expected, those people came to shake my hand and greeted me as a good Latter-day Saint. One man said, “I did not know there were such things in the Book of Mormon.” That Negro family was permitted to come and were made welcome by all the members of the church.

I went to Atlanta next and had a wonderful time. There were 15 missionaries there, and they all read the letter I had from Bishop Richards. I did not have time to stay long in Atlanta, as I wanted to get to Shreveport where the new mission was being set up. We stayed overnight there. There were no missionaries there.

We had an experience that is worth mentioning. I was on the train between Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi when a lady and her grown daughter got on the train. She began to look at me and my wife. I don’t know what she thought, but she finally said, “Are you a preacher?” I said, “No lady—I am a Mormon.” She said, “What is a Mormon?” I told her about the Prophet Joseph. When she got off the train in Meridian, I gave her the only tract I had. It was baptism. The birth of water and spirit by Orson F. Whitney. I did not get her name, but two years later on the [Salt Lake] Temple grounds she tapped me on the back and said, “I know you.” She told me about the time on the train, then said, “I’m here for my first conference.”104

Characteristically, Abner did not dwell on whatever disappointments and challenges their mission must have encountered.105 Instead, he rejoiced whenever his efforts at preaching, testifying, encouragement, fellowship, and increased understanding were welcomed. His faith and optimism taught him to persist until he found a way to warm up people’s hearts. Once he was asked how well he thought he would be accepted if he walked into a ward he had never visited before. His answer:

I have been in churches, Mormon churches, from coast to coast, from ward to ward. And I have never gone into one yet that I didn’t receive a welcome.106

Continuing Witness

After Abner returned from his “mission” to encourage Black members of the Church outside of Utah, he continued to bear witness of the Gospel—by word and example. For example, at an advanced age, he spent the better part of four years serving the Church in southern California. He recounts working during the open house of the newly constructed Los Angeles Temple:107

My wife Martha died in May 1954, and as I wanted to go to California, I went to visit my sister, who had been living there some 35 years. I placed my recommend108 in the Arlington Ward from where I acted as a guide to the dedication [open house] of the Los Angeles Temple.109

Figure 14. Abner Howell served as a guide to visitors at the Los Angeles Temple open house in 1955–1966.110

Figure 15. Harris Weberg (1898–1979): Scenes from the Los Angeles Temple Creation Room, 1955.111

Abner had a singular experience in the Creation Room of the Los Angeles Temple, just prior to the dedicatory services. Significantly, he tied this experience to his recollection of how God touched his father (grandfather?) through President Woodruff. In the way he constructs his account, it is easy to sense that Abner saw his own extensive missionary opportunities with a special gratitude, since they allowed him to fulfill the promise he remembered having been given to his forebear by President Woodruff that “someday [he’d] be able to do a wonderful work”:

On the day of the dedication for the members of the church, . . . I was in the Creation Room one full hour before things started. And surprising, the feeling that you have in a place like that, in God’s holy house.

I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t stay awake, I didn’t know what was happening. But after the proceedings started, I came wide awake, and realized that God put his finger on my father, the slave boy, so that President Woodruff could say to him, “Someday you’ll be free, and you’ll go to Salt Lake City, and there you’ll be able to do a wonderful work.”

My father died without doing very much. Although he was faithful. I had no brothers [in the Church], so if there’s anything to be done, I had to do it.

And that’s what I’ve tried to do all my life—to let my light shine so that men could see it.

Figure 16. Abner received this card as a dues-paying (honorary) member of the High Priests Quorum when he visited California in 1956–1958.112

Abner’s firm testimony as a faithful Black convert who, because of racial restrictions at that time, could not hold the priesthood thrilled hundreds of Saints in firesides and Institute classes. He related:

I spoke to many firesides and seminaries and University of S. Cal Institute. Pres. Paul Dunn said I could please his classes better than he could, sometimes, as they liked to see me come. I spoke to several of Brother Tingey’s classes. I talked to a class of Brother William Hartman in Long Beach, that had no standing room, all wanting to know why I was a Mormon.113

Mary Lucile Bankhead observed, “He died before the Church recognized the Blacks in the priesthood. Which I wish he had lived—he could have been in. . . . Because he was really a staunch member of the Church even so with that.”114

Abner stayed in Los Angeles until sometime after 24 October 1958, when a brief history and testimony was recorded by Boyd Burbidge (transcript in Appendix). Abner says on the Burbidge recording that after the temple dedication, he was “getting lonesome because I couldn’t go to work,” and, at Elder Mark E. Petersen’s suggestion, spent the remainder of his time in California repairing furniture for Deseret Industries. Abner commented, “There isn’t very much wages. But there’s pleasure in knowing that you’re trying to keep up a plan organized by the Church which has been felt all over the world. In no place in the United States has a more successful plan been instituted.”

Conclusion

The small hinges that may have begun to turn on behalf of the Howells in the South nearly two hundred years ago opened great doors for some members of their family. Although we may never be able to corroborate with certainty the family tradition that the impetus for their migration to the West came through a visit by Wilford Woodruff to their progenitor, Jackson Howell, in 1835, somehow the seeds that motivated his son Paul’s eventual journey to Utah seem to have been planted well in good soil and later reaped with great blessings to their family and those who have known them. Jackson’s children became well-respected citizens, and his grandson Abner became the first known Black member called to serve a short-term mission to encourage and strengthen fellow Black members of the Church. Abner’s testimony, born from the spark lit long ago in the South and burning brightly in the lives of his family for generations, still thrills us today.

If, in the challenging circumstances of his life, Abner ever had doubts about the gospel he wholeheartedly embraced and lived with great vigor, no extant record of his life gives any indication of it. His expressions are more focused on doing than on contemplation.115 Certainly, he seemed to draw strength from the love and tangible support he received from Church friends and leaders over his lifetime. But there was an unquenchable fire in his soul that cannot be explained as the result of a mere social conversion. Over the course of his life, his testimony was affirmed by spiritual conviction that was bone-deep. According to Max H. Parkin, “One time while Bro. Howell was invited to talk in Los Angeles he was asked . . . ‘Why do you stay with that Church?’ ‘Because it is the true Church’ was his answer.”116

Figure 17. Left: Abner Howell, undated.117 Right: Levi and Betty Howell’s daughter, Beulah, and her husband, Perry, with their first grandchild in Salt Lake City, ca. 1944.118

Appendix: Transcript of Abner Howell Recording
by Boyd Burbidge on 24 October 1958

The transcription below has been made from the only known copy of a cassette tape in the possession of Margaret Blair Young and Bruce Young,119 and is included here with their kind permission. It includes details about Abner and Martha’s 1951 trip to the southern and eastern states but, unfortunately, does not add to our understanding of the purpose of the trip. It also contains new details about Abner’s personal experiences in Los Angeles at the dedication of the temple, his later work at Deseret Industries there, and a brief testimony. At the time the recording was made, Abner was about eighty years old.

[Boyd Burbidge]

The information that we’re getting on this tape is to be received from Brother Abner Howells, taken on October 24th in Los Angeles, California, in the home of his daughter.

We’re gathered here just rather informally to ask him a few questions and talk to him for a moment and ask him to bear his testimony to the truthfulness of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So that this might be used in the future to help and to strengthen the testimonies of those who are not yet members of the Church, or that who are members of the Church, and need help in understanding more of the Gospel, and also in receiving more information as to the power of the priesthood of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

[Abner Howell]

I have here a letter given me by Bishop LeGrand Richards in 1951. It is:

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:

This will introduce you to Brother and Sister Abner L. Howell (colored), who are good members of our church, being members of the Evergreen Ward here in Salt Lake City.

Brother and Sister Howell have been faithful through the years and are now enjoying what they have looked forward to for a long time; namely, a trip through the Southern and Eastern parts of the United States. We have invited them to call upon our people, the missionaries and saints, wherever convenient.

Any courtesies extended to them will be very much appreciated.

Sincerely yours,

LeGrand Richards.

I want to tell you I went through the Southern States Mission—my wife and I. We had a wonderful time, with huge [unintelligible] while we were there. We had a wonderful time.

In Atlanta, where the mission is, we had quite a hard time getting permission because of, uh, [unintelligible] not being able to ride in the only taxi cabs we were able to afford.120 We eventually got the taxi cab and got to the mission home in Atlanta. We presented our letters there. Those people surely enjoyed seeing someone of our race away down south, members of the Church.

We, uh, came from there, went to Shreveport, Louisiana, where they organized the mission there—and that was just in the process of opera—of organization at that time. And we came to Independence, Missouri. And we were at the mission there. And then we went from there to Nauvoo, over to Carthage. We saw the Carthage Jail. We saw that spot on the floor where the Prophet and his brother, was killed.

That strengthened my testimony and it made me more faithful to the Church. I want to say, without hesitation, from all this time I have learned to know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is true. I’ve also learned to know that the Prophet Joseph Smith was called of God. And that what he has done, the restoration of the true Church, and the gospel of Jesus Christ [unintelligible], it has helped me from boyhood till now.

And I believe with all my heart, with sincerity and humility, that the Prophet Joseph Smith was truly a prophet of God. And this is my testimony as to the faithfulness of the Prophet. And all the members of the Church at the present time, I believe that all our presidents have been called of God. And that the things they have said and done have been under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

This is my testimony, that I bear in the name of Jesus Christ, humbly, Amen.

[Boyd Burbidge]

You might say, one or two—a little bit about what you’re doing down at the Deseret Industries, so that I can bind this all together and correlate it for you. Just what your, what your work is there at Deseret Industries and what—

[Abner Howell]

I, I came down to California for the dedication of the temple. And I was guide out there at the temple during the dedication, and I want to say this to you.

On the day of the dedication for the members of the Church, when the public was excluded, I was in the Creation Room one full hour before things started. And surprising, the feeling that you have in a place like that, in God’s holy house.

I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t stay awake, I didn’t know what was happening. But after the proceedings started, I came wide awake, and realized that God put his finger on my father, the slave boy, so that President Woodruff could say to him, “Someday you’ll be free, and you’ll go to Salt Lake City, and there you’ll be able to do a wonderful work.”

My father died without doing very much. Although he was faithful. I had no brothers [in the Church], so if there’s anything to be done, I had to do it.

And that’s what I’ve tried to do all my life—to let my light shine so that men could see it.

After the dedication of the temple, I stayed around a while. Then I saw Brother Mark [E.] Petersen, who said, “Why don’t you go to work at the Deseret Industries?” I said I was getting lonesome because I couldn’t go to work. I went down there. I went to work. And I’ve worked ever since at the Deseret Industries.

I spend my time repairing furniture. Figuring out what’s good and what’s bad. There isn’t very much wages. But there’s pleasure in knowing that you’re trying to keep up a plan organized by the Church which has been felt all over the world. In no place in the United States has a more successful plan been instituted.

That’s at this time, that’s about all I can say.

Jeffrey M. Bradshaw (PhD, Cognitive Science, University of Washington) is a Senior Research Scientist at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) in Pensacola, Florida (www.ihmc.us/groups/jbradshaw). His professional writings have explored a wide range of topics in human and machine intelligence (www.jeffreymbradshaw.net). Jeff has been the recipient of several awards and patents and has been an adviser for initiatives in science, defense, space, industry, and academia worldwide. Jeff has written detailed commentaries on the Book of Moses and Genesis and on temple themes in the scriptures. For Church-related publications, see www.TempleThemes.net. Jeff was a missionary in France and Belgium from 1975 to 1977, and his family has returned twice to live in France. He and his wife Kathleen are the parents of four children and sixteen grandchildren. They served two missions in the DR Congo and currently live in Nampa, Idaho. As a church service missionary for the Church History Department, Jeff is writing histories of the temples in the DR Congo and the Republic of the Congo. For The Interpreter Foundation he is working to document the history of the Church in Africa on film (NotByBreadAloneFilm.com).

Notes

1. Thomas S. Monson, “‘Finishers Wanted,’” Ensign, July 1972, 68–70, churchof
jesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1972/07/finishers-wanted. The original statement of this concept (“Great doors turn upon small hinges”) was probably the sermon “Naaman, the Syrian” by John McNeill in Sermons of the Rev. John McNeill, vol. 1 (New York: Fleming H. Revell, 1890), 339, books.google.com/books
/about/Sermons.html?id=lBgTAAAAYAAJ. Compare Dieter F. Uchtdorf, “The Influence of Righteous Women,” Liahona, September 2009, 3–7; Gordon B. Hinckley, “Caesar, Circus, or Christ?,” in BYU Speeches of the Year (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University [BYU], 1965), 1–8; Sterling W. Sill, “Good Judgment,” in The Wealth of Wisdom (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1977), 85–88, archive
.org/details/wealthofwisdom00sill.

2. For readable accounts of Abner Howell and his family, see Byrdie Lee Howell Langon, Utah and the Early Black Settlers (self-pub., 1969), available at Utah State History Library, PAM 20898, MSS A 2002; Abner L. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” in The Story of the Negro Pioneer, ed. Kate B. Carter (Salt Lake City: Daughters of Utah Pioneers, 1965), 55–60; Margaret Blair Young, “From Slavery to Freedom: Martha Ann Jane Stevens Perkins Howell,” in Women of Faith in the Latter-days, ed. Brittany Chapman Nash and Richard E. Turley Jr., vol. 4, 1871–1900 (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2017), 97–107. See also Margaret Blair Young, “The Black Woman Who Served an Unprecedented Church Mission to Help Reduce Segregation, Prejudice in the Church,” LDS Living, 19 February 2019, ldsliving.com/the-black-woman-who-served-an
-unprecedented-church-mission-to-help-reduce-segregation-prejudice
-in-the-church/s/90299; Abner Leonard Howell, “One Seeking to Know and Learn: Abner Leonard Howell, 1878–1966,” in My Lord, He Calls Me: Stories of Faith by Black American Latter-day Saints, ed. Alice Faulkner Burch (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2022), 24–28; Tonya S. Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard,” Century of Black Mormons, University of Utah J. Willard Marriott Library Digital Exhibitions, exhibits.lib.utah.edu/s/century-of-black-mormons/page/howell
-abner-leonard; Rachel Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell: First SLC Black Detective,” Rachel’s SLC History (blog), 11 February 2020, slchistory.org/2020/02/paul
-cephas-howell-first-slc-black.html. More recently, see the brief account of Abner and Martha Howell’s mission in Matthew L. Harris, Second-Class Saints: Black Mormons and the Struggle for Racial Equality (New York: Oxford University Press, 2024), 81–82.

3. See Langon, Early Black Settlers, photos following p. 4 and p. 28, and frontispiece.

4. 1820 U.S. Census, Union parish, Louisiana, M33, image group 005156915,
image 108, digital image s.v. “John McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ-GYB3-2QB?view=index.

5. Langon, Early Black Settlers, Addendum.

6. Byrdie Lee Howell Langon to Kate B. Carter, letter, 7 June 1968, Pioneer Memorial Museum.

7. For genealogical information on John McLaughlin (1804–ca. 1861–1870) compiled by Stephen Howell, see “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, John McLaughlin (LV4R-LYH), familysearch.org/tree/person/details/LV4R-LYH. Comments on the discussion page for McLaughlin’s record mention the name “McGlocklin” and Byrdie Lee Howell gives the name as “McClelland.” Regarding “McGlocklin,” while not being a plausible spelling of the name “McLaughlin,” it is certainly a very plausible reflection of the pronunciation of the name “McLaughlin” by someone who may have never seen it written. (See “McLaughlin (surname),” Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org/wiki
/McLaughlin_(surname)). While Byrdie’s version, “McClelland,” is implausible as a pronunciation of “McLaughlin,” it is not entirely out of range for a childhood memory of an Irish name recorded in writing more than a century later. Extant 1820 census records also struggle with the spelling, giving the name “John McLaughlin” as John “McLawchlin” and “Mclauchlin.” See 1820 U.S. Census, Union parish, Louisiana, M33, image group 005156915, image 108, digital image s.v. “John McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org
/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ-GYB3-2QB?view=index. There are at least as many variants of McClelland, including McClellan, McCellan, McLellen, and others even closer to Woodruff’s “Kelleam”—e.g., McKillion, Killion, Killean.

Though it is unlikely that we will ever be able to connect “John McLaughlin” to the Howell family definitively, I include below a relatively complete account of what inconclusive evidence I have been able to find that may bear on his identity so that later researchers can be aware of what has already been investigated. Specifically, Stephen Howell’s research has uncovered McLaughlin’s ship arrival records (see note 9) and US census records from 1840 onward (see below) that are generally consistent with Byrdie’s account. My own research has failed to find any plausibly similar names, such as McClelland, corresponding to these details and timeframes, adding weight to Stephen Howell’s research—but perhaps also suggesting alternatives such as that Jackson may have been enslaved by a James P. Kelleam/McClelland in Monroe County, Arkansas, before he was enslaved by John McLaughlin in Mansfiled, Louisiana. Consistent with the general geography of the Louisiana site of Byrdie’s recollection, there is a John McLaughlin in 1840 (Caddo and Natchitoches, Louisiana), 1850 (DeSoto, Louisiana) and 1860 (DeSoto, Louisiana) census records. See 1840 U.S. Census, Caddo parish, Louisiana, M704, image group 005154540, image 98, digital image s.v. “Jno McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9YY1-58K?view=index; and 1840 U.S. Census, Natchitoches parish, Louisiana, M704, image group 005154540, image 291, digital image s.v. “Jno McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9YY1-G1Q?view=index. 1850 U.S. Census, DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M432, image group 004193965, image 35, digital image s.v. “John McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org
/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HT-D55Q-SPN?view=index; 1860 U.S. Census, DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M653, image group 005169992, image 453, digital image s.v. “John McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ
-GBSD-1KL?view=index; and in a slave schedule for DeSoto parish, Louisiana in 1850, see 1850 U.S. Census (Slave Schedules), DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M432, image group 004198716_005_M9C8-ZW8, image 16, digital image s.v. “Jno McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HY
-D1J3-4BP?view=index. The estimate for his death date is based on his appearance in the 1860 US Census, entry for John Mc Laughlin and Rebecca Mc Laughlin, but not in the 1870 census.

8. The name McLaughlin is of Irish origin but also exists in Scotland; see “McLaughlin (surname),” Wikipedia. In the relevant census record, McLaughlin stated that he was born in Ireland. See 1850 U.S. Census, DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M432, image group 004193965, image 35, digital image s.v. “John McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org
/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HT-D55Q-SPN?view=index.

9. Stephen Howell has located a “McLaughlin” and a “John McLaughlin,” probably two different individuals, as listed on ship record returning to the USA from Ireland in 1830 and 1831. See United States Index to Passenger Arrivals, Atlantic and Gulf Ports, 1820–1874, M334, image group 004883726, image 4434, digital image s.v. “McLaughlin,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:
/61903/3:1:33SQ-G5J1-98L6?view=index; and United States Index to Passenger Arrivals, Atlantic and Gulf Ports, 1820–1874, M334, image group 004883726, image 5178, digital image s.v. “McLaughlin, John,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-95J1-9H2Y?view=index. However, Jackson Howell’s birthdate is estimated as 1821 in the 1870 census and 1814 in the 1870 US Census, so either Jackson spent several years in Ireland before coming to America, or we can rule out the 1830 and 1831 ship records as being relevant to the individual described in Byrdie’s account. For Jackson’s birthdate, see 1870 U.S. Census, DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M593, image group 004269412_002_M9CF-L51, image 235, digital image s.v. “Kinee, Jack” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HY-DTP3-9L6?view=index.

10. In genealogical records he is listed as “Jackson H.” (Howell?), “Jackson M.” (McLaughlin?) and “Jack Kinee.” See “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, Jackson H. Howell (L415-X3P), familysearch.org/tree/person/details/L415
-X3P. The “Jack Kinee” seems to be a mistaken transcription of “Jack Howell” from the 1870 Louisiana census—a hastily written “H” in cursive taken to be a “K,” a scribbled middle part, and a miniature “ll” at the end understood as “ee.” See 1870 U.S. Census, DeSoto parish, Louisiana, M593, image group 004269412_002_M9CF-L51, image 235, digital image s.v. “Kinee, Jack” FamilySearch, familysearch.org
/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HY-DTP3-9L6?view=index.

11. There is probably some confusion of the name “Mary Eliza” with the name of Mary Eliza Sharp, the wife of Paul C. Howell. FamilySearch records currently assert that Eliza Jane Hogan Howell was the daughter of Stepney/Sephny/Stephen Hogan (b. 1790) and Tempy/Temby/Temperance (b. 1790) and was later adopted by Mr. Howell (b. 1810) and Mrs. Howell (b. 1810). See “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, Stephen Hogan (LVC1-QXG), familysearch.org/tree
/person/details/LVC1-QXG; and “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, Mr. Howell (LVJV-6XN), familysearch.org/tree/person/details/LVJV-6XN.

12. Nathan and Robert were not listed with the immediate family in the 1870 and 1880 censuses, so it is presumed that they died as children.

13. Langon, Early Black Settlers, 4–5. For genealogical information about Jackson, Eliza, their parents, and their children, see “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, Jackson H. Howell (L415-X3P), familysearch.org/tree/person
/details/L415-X3P.

14. Langon, Early Black Settlers.

15. Abner Howell, testimony, AV 1802, audio recording, Pasadena California Stake Audiotape Collection, 1954–1958, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/341d9588-7cd8-44ae-a50c-1f62f4f3
d0b6/0/0; Abner Leonard Howell, oral history interview by George Boyd, Bill Hartman, and James Allen, 29 October 1960, AV 227, item 1, audio recording, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets
/e29a6e96-84db-4791-bd78-17894854fe31/0/0; Howell, “Abner’s Story;” and Abner Leonard Howell, interview by Boyd Burbidge, 24 October 1958, copy of a cassette tape given to Darius Aidan Gray, Margaret Blair Young, and Bruce Young. Apparently, Abner Howell intended to write a larger history, but never did so. In a letter to Kate B. Carter (see figure 2), Byrdie Lee Howell Langon wrote, “My Bro and I thought some years ago of writing a book . . . but keep putting it off” (Langon to Carter, 1968).

16. Tonya S. Reiter wrote that the Howells lived in the Salt Lake LDS 23rd ward, and that their eldest son, Jay, and eldest daughter, Abbie, were baptized in 1915. Abner, Nina, and their ten-year-old daughter Lucille Mary were baptized six years later on 26 February 1921 and confirmed on 6 March 1921 in the Holladay First Ward. Less than two weeks earlier, on 17 February 1921, their youngest son, Paul Cecil, died of kidney failure. Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard.”

17. Howell, oral history interview.

18. Howell was correct. Wilford Woodruff was born on 1 March 1807 and would have just turned 28 when he visited Monroe County, Arkansas, in the second half of March 1835.

19. Note that Abner’s confirmation that his father “wasn’t a member yet” contradicts his previous statement that his father “was baptized . . . in Little Rock.” This and other contradictions will be discussed later.

20. This contradicts the premise of his interview three years earlier that Woodruff preached at a plantation in Arkansas, not Louisiana. This and other contradictions will be discussed later.

21. Max H. Parkin, notes on Abner Howell’s talk at Olympus Seminary, 17 April 1963, ACCN 1539, box 61, folder 3, Max H. Parkin Papers, 1820–1995, Special Collections, University of Utah J. Willard Marriott Library, Salt Lake City.

22. Margaret Blair Young, “Abner Leonard Howell: Honorary High Priest,” Paperzz
.com, paperzz.com/doc/8830890/abner-leonard-howell. Tonya Reiter similarly concluded that “no evidence has been found to corroborate that story.” Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard.”

23. “Journal (December 29, 1833–January 3, 1838),” p. 47, The Wilford Woodruff Papers.

24. “Journal (December 29, 1833–January 3, 1838),” p. 48, The Wilford Woodruff Papers.

25. “Journal (December 29, 1833–January 3, 1838),” pp. 47–48, The Wilford Woodruff Papers, wilfordwoodruffpapers.org/documents/b048a7c5-6b6b
-438a-bce7-262d5ba297d8.

26. Paraphrasing Henry G. Tomkins, as cited in Hugh W. Nibley, Lehi in the Desert, The World of the Jaredites, There Were Jaredites, 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1988), 4.

27. Though we currently possess no contemporary records in relevant places that include variants of the name “McClelland,” Stephen Howell has located genealogical records for a John McLaughlin (1804–ca. 1861–1870) that lead him to identify this individual as Jackson’s slaveholder. While Howell’s conclusions have some support in the records he has found, the name “McLaughlin” is harder to justify than “McClelland” as a plausible spelling of the slaveholder’s name in light of Langon and Woodruff’s recollections. However, if Howell’s findings are taken as conclusive, one might argue that Woodruff’s spelling of the name as “Kelleam” might have been influenced by his acquaintance with a prominent early Church member who bore a similar Gaelic name, William E. McLellin. See notes 7 and 9.

28. Howell, testimony.

29. Howell, oral history interview.

30. “That’s where I met President Woodruff.” Howell, testimony.

31. Howell, oral history interview.

32. Wilford Woodruff, Leaves from My Journal, 4th ed. (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1909), 17–18, archive.org/details/leavesfrommyjour04wood/page/n4
/mode/1up. For a more detailed description of the events of 12–27 March 1835, see “Journal (December 29, 1833–January 3, 1838),” pp. 47–48.

33. Thomas G. Alexander, Things in Heaven and Earth: The Life and Times of Wilford Woodruff, a Mormon Prophet (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1991), 35, archive.org/details/thingsinheavenea0000alex. See also “Memphis to Little Rock Road,” CALS Encyclopedia of Arkansas, Central Arkansas Library System, encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/memphis-to-little-rock-road
-7503/.

34. Fred E. Woods, “Wilford Woodruff and the Gathering of Modern-day Israel, 1834–50,” in Banner of the Gospel: Wilford Woodruff, ed. Alexander L. Baugh and Susan Easton Black (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, BYU; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2010), 65, rsc.byu.edu/banner-gospel-wilford-woodruff
/wilford-woodruff-gathering-modern-day-israel-1834-50.

35. Don Bradley, conversation with author, 30 August 2023.

36. Langon, Early Black Settlers, 5.

37. See Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 55; Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard;” Young, “Abner Leonard Howell;” Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.”

38. John Taylor, circa 1887, photograph, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/record/01bfbe96-1232-4403-b796
-e0ec408b3a17/0. Thanks to Stephen O. Smoot and Brian R. Passantino.

39. Charles R. Savage, Interior of Mormon Tabernacle, 250 Feet Long [ceiling decorated with garlands], circa 1890, photograph, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets
/7291ea92-51bc-498a-97d4-d24c6c6273e7/0/0.

40. Howell, testimony.

41. See, e.g., Brigham H. Roberts, The Life of John Taylor: Third President of the Church (Salt Lake City: George Q. Cannon and Sons, 1982), 437–39, archive
.org/details/TheLifeOfJohnTaylor.Taylor; and Francis M. Gibbons, John Taylor: Mormon Philosopher, Prophet of God (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1985), 272.

42. Gibbons, John Taylor, 271.

43. Langon, Early Black Settlers, 4.

44. “Family Tree,” database, FamilySearch, Byrdie Lee Howell (L859-8DH), familysearch.org/tree/person/details/L859-8DH. An estimate of her birth year is given in the 1920 census as 1888. See 1920 U.S. Census, Mesa county, Colorado, T625, image group 004964350, image 218, digital image s.v. “Langdon, Bertie L,” FamilySearch, familysearch.org/ark:/61903
/3:1:33SQ-GRX7-JPT?view=index.

45. 1900 U.S. Census, Salt Lake county, Utah, T623, image group 004115259_001
_M9KG-HPF, image 482, digital image s.v. “Howell, Birtie,” FamilySearch,
familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HT-DZ2Q-64V?view=index.

46. Howell, oral history interview.

47. Kyle Beshears, “’Sowing and Reaping’: Dwight L. Moody’s 1899 Mormon Tabernacle Sermon,” Kyle Beshears (blog), 4 January 2024, static1
.squarespace.com/static/5f91fc6b08a5626206a4a5c9/t/6596ad73455b52052da3f739/1704373620181/Sowing+and+Reaping+Moody+Sermon+1899
.pdf. Beshears provides a convenient amalgamation of various contemporary newspaper sources for the event which are listed in his posting (see, e.g., Salt Lake Herald, 3 April 1899, p. 5, loc.gov/resource/sn85058130/1899-04-03
/ed-1/?sp=5&r=0.524,-0.137,0.533,0.708,0; “Moody in Tabernacle,” Salt Lake Tribune, 3 April 1899, p. 8, newspapers.lib.utah.edu/details?id=12821272; “Moody at the Tabernacle,” Deseret Evening News, 3 April 1899, p. 4,
chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045555/1899-04-03/ed-1/seq-4/. Moody had previously preached in the Tabernacle in 1871 (see, for example, Deseret Evening News, 5 June 1871, p. 3, newspapers.lib.utah.edu/pdfjs-4.0
.379/web/viewer.html?file=/udn_files/9c/70/9c7030ef2edb02a0d018f50a42b555790ed0ecbe.pdf.

48. Parkin, notes, spelling corrected.

49. Sankey reports accompanying Moody to Salt Lake City at an earlier time during the period when John Taylor was leading the Church, but does not appear to have left a record of any subsequent visits. See Ira David Sankey, My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1928), 86–87, archive.org/details/mylifestoryofgos00irad.

50. Photo from Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.” With permission of Rachel Quist.

51. Photo from Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.” With permission of Rachel Quist.

52. Quist reports that Howell’s great-grandson Jake Green Jr. also served on the
Salt Lake City police force beginning in 1968. Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.”

53. “Lost His Official Head. City Detective Bruce Johnson Relieved of His Star, Last Night,” Deseret Evening News, 22 June 1892, p. 5, newspapers.lib.utah.edu
/details?id=1633944.

54. For additional context of Johnson’s firing and Howell’s hiring, see Rachel Quist, “SLC’s First Black Police Officer: R. Bruce Johnson,” Rachel’s SLC History (blog), 11 February 2020, slchistory.org/2020/02/slcs-first-black-police
-officer-r-bruce.html.

55. Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.”

56. Quist, “Paul Cephas Howell.”

57. “Home Boys Victorious—East Denver Defeated by Salt Lake High School before Great Throng of People—Story of the Game,” Salt Lake Tribune, 30 November 1900, pp. 5, 7, newspapers.lib.utah.edu/details?id=13427183. Also see Howell, testimony.

58. Wendell J. Ashton, Voice in the West: Biography of a Pioneer Newspaper (New York: Duell, Sloan & Pierce, 1950), 235. See also “Home Boys Victorious,” Salt Lake Tribune. According to Matthew L. Harris, “When the team decided to eat in the kitchen area with Howell, the restaurant owner relented and let Howell eat in the dining area.” Harris, Second-Class Saints, 354n80. Harris provides no source for this anecdote.

59. Langon, Early Black Settlers, 26.

60. Some historians err in placing Howell on the famous Michigan “point-a-minute” varsity team. He is only documented to have played on the freshman team (see figure 8). For information on Coach Yost, see Wikipedia, s.v. “Fielding H. Yost,” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fielding_H._Yost.

61. Calendar of the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor, 1904), 351.

62. Though we have no indication from the historic record that racism in University of Michigan football was a factor in Abner’s decision to leave the school, it seems important that readers be aware of the challenges that some Black athletes at the school are said to have been experiencing around that time. Students of the history of Michigan football report that coach Yost had a reputation for racism during his time at the school. See, for example, John Behee, Hail to the Victors! Black Athletes at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor, MI: Ulrich’s Books, 1974), 7, 19, 33, quod.lib.umich.edu/g/genpub/AEN3524.0001.001/1. One author writes that in 1932—obviously long after Abner had left Michigan—Yost had a “change of heart from his racist past.” John U. Bacon, “Column: The Other Side of Fielding Yost,” Ann Arbor Chronicle, 16 March 2012,
annarborchronicle.com/2012/03/16/column-the-other-side-of-fielding-yost
/index.html. Examination of Yost’s views about Black football players culminated in 2021 when, “after a year-long review of Yost,” “an eight-person panel of university historians . . . made the ‘unanimous’ preliminary recommendation” that his name be removed from its ice-hockey arena. Aaron McMann, “Michigan Considers Removal of Fielding H. Yost’s Name from Hockey Arena,” MLive, 26 May 2021, mlive.com
/wolverines/2021/05/michigan-considers-removal-of-fielding-h-yosts
-name-from-hockey-arena.html. Abner, of course, was on the freshman football team, and as far as we know his selection and management as a player had nothing directly to do with Yost. That said, it seems reasonable to suppose that Abner knew about Yost’s reputation and would likely have considered whether Yost’s views would impact the prospects of his eventually joining the varsity team.

63. It is, perhaps, notable that another Black student—Lloyd Gaines, enrolled at a Missouri law school—disappeared and was possibly murdered a generation later. See Chad Garrison, “The Mystery of Lloyd Gaines,” Riverfront Times, 4 April 2007, riverfronttimes.com/news/the-mystery-of-lloyd-gaines-2479115.

64. Young, “Abner Leonard Howell.”

65. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 55.

66. Young, “Abner Leonard Howell.”

67. Young, “Abner Leonard Howell.”

68. Rentschler’s Studio, 1902 UM Freshman Football Team, photograph, University of Michigan Library Digital Collections, quod.lib.umich.edu/b/bhl/x-bl009531
/BL009531.

69. Abner was baptized on 26 February 1921. Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard.”

70. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 57–58. Compare the account given in Howell, testimony.

71. Mary Lucille Bankhead, interview by Leslie G. Kelen, 14 January 1983, MS 0453, box 1, folder 4, transcript, p. 9, “Interviews with African Americans in Utah,” University of Utah Oral History Institute, University of Utah Libraries, Salt Lake City, collections.lib.utah.edu/details?id=893605.

72. Langon, Early Black Settlers, 5.

73. As mentioned earlier, Quist also concluded that his service lasted about twenty years, but started in 1892 rather than 1888.

74. Howell, oral history interview. Contra Abner’s statement concerning Paul’s height, Byrdie wrote that their father was “six feet two inches.” Langon, Early Black Settlers, caption on photo following p. 4.

75. Howell, oral history interview.

76. Howell, testimony.

77. Howell, oral history interview.

78. Charles Roscoe Savage, John Henry Smith, between circa 1898 and circa 1901, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:John_Henry
_Smith.jpg.

79. The Relief Society of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Nicholas G. Smith, 1946, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:
Nicholas_G._Smith.jpg.

80. Associated Students of Brigham Young University, Heber J. Grant, 1932, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Heber_J_Grant.jpg.

81. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Harold B. Lee, 11 July 1944, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Harold_B
_Lee_1944.JPG.

82. “Obituaries: Monroe Fleming,” United Press International, 4 August 1982, upi
.com/Archives/1982/08/04/Obituaries/2148397281600/. Also see Edward L. Kimball, Lengthen Your Stride: The Presidency of Spencer W. Kimball (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2005), 210, google.com/books/edition/Lengthen
_Your_Stride/TKHtAAAAMAAJ?hl=en.

83. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 58.

84. Margaret Blair Young and Darius Aidan Gray, Standing on the Promises, vol. 3, The Last Mile of the Way (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2003), 269.

85. Young, “Abner Leonard Howell”; Young and Gray, Last Mile, 271n; Young, “From Slavery to Freedom,” 322n20.

86. E.g., Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard;” Howell, “One Seeking,” 26, editor’s note.

87. LeGrand Richards was said in 1983 by an unidentified Black woman to be well-loved among the Black Latter-day Saint community, as attested by Abner Howell:

LeGrand Richards was the backbone of the Black-Mormon. . . . I mean he’s the one who kept everything in perspective. . . . He came [to the Hill-Haven nursing home] and he stood at the door and he could hardly walk. He was all in pain with arthritis. And he had a cane. He wouldn’t let them put him in a wheelchair. . . . And we were talking and I was telling how I used to use him, you know. And he said, “How?” And I would tell him, that, you know, if I had trouble down in the neighborhood with the Mormons, I’d just tell, “You wait until I call LeGrand Richards.” Never even knew who LeGrand Richards was. But I knew Abe Howell always said he would help Blacks. So I got myself out of a lot of trouble—or into it, I don’t know. And he started laughing. And he said, “Well, if it did you some good great! But,” he said, “You know, I get blamed for more things that I don’t do.”

Unidentified woman present during Frances Leggroan Fleming, interview, 7 March 1983, MS 0453, box 7, folder 6, “Interviews with African Americans in Utah, 1982–1988,” University of Utah Oral History Institute, J. Willard Marriott Library, Salt Lake City.

88. Harris, Second-Class Saints, 81.

89. Heber J. Grant to Abner Howell, letter, 18 October 1938, Papers and Materials from Margaret Blair Young, BYU Special Collections, reproduced with permission of Margaret Blair Young.

90. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 58.

91. LeGrand Richards, letter of introduction, 20 June 1951, Papers and Materials from Margaret Blair Young, BYU Special Collections, reproduced with permission of Margaret Blair Young.

92. Howell, testimony.

93. Howell, testimony.

94. Matthew L. Harris, email message to author, 27 August 2024.

95. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Stephen L. Richards, July 1959, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Stephen_L
_Richards3.jpg.

96. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, LeGrand Richards, 11 September 1934, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:
LeGrand_Richards_1934.JPG.

97. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mark E. Petersen, 22 August 1944, photograph, Wikimedia Commons, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mark_E.
_Petersen.JPG.

98. Portrait in Pinstripe Suit, circa 1943–1950, photograph, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/dfc887c2
-1728-474e-bc70-0e3b204b9011/0/0.

99. The couple also visited Church sites in Independence, Missouri, and Nauvoo/Carthage, Illinois. See the account of these visits in Howell, interview by Burbidge.

100. S. Dilworth Young was then president of the New England Mission. He would later go on to decades of service in the First Council of the Seventy.

101. Margaret Blair Young, “Abner Leonard Howell (1877–1966),” BlackPast (website), blackpast.org/african-american-history/howell-abner-leonard-1877-1966/. Used by permission.

102. ”Len and Mary Hope: Black Converts in the American South,” Liahona, February 2022, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona/2022/02/united
-states-and-canada-section/len-and-mary-hope-black-converts-in-the
-american-south.

103. Scott Hales, “Recorded in heaven: The Testimonies of Len and Mary Hope,” BYU Studies Quarterly 62, no. 1 (2023): 61, byustudies.byu.edu/article
/recorded-in-heaven/.

104. Howell, Abner’s Story, 59–60, spelling corrected and style modernized.

105. Evaluating the success of the mission primarily in terms of the challenging prospect of “helping establish a Black congregation,” Harris concludes that the Howells “returned to Utah without success.” Harris, Second-Class Saints, 82.

106. Howell, testimony.

107. The temple open house took place from 19 December 1955 to 18 February 1956 and the dedication occurred on 11–14 March 1956. See “Los Angeles California Temple,” Temples of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Rick Satterfield, churchofjesuschristtemples.org/los-angeles-california-temple/.

108. Since Abner was not eligible at the time, because of his race, to hold a temple recommend, his mention of a “recommend” no doubt refers to a document from Church leaders in Utah certifying his status as a baptized member in good standing (see Doctrine and Covenants 20:84). The need for such documents at the time, regardless of race, may seem foreign to members today when membership records can be moved from unit to unit in a matter of seconds.

109. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 60.

110. Los Angeles Intermountain News, 29 June 1956, MS_8648_r0009_f0002, p. 226, Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org
/assets/5a1be8b6-3799-4084-876a-772eb8daaf63/0/0.

111. “Los Angeles Temple Murals,” The Improvement Era, November 1955, 825, ia600902.us.archive.org/35/items/improvementera5811unse/improvement
era5811unse.pdf.

112. Long Beach Stake High Priests Quorum, membership card, 1958, XX(7049807.1), Papers and Materials from Margaret Blair Young, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, BYU, Provo, UT, lib.byu.edu/search/byu/record
/cat.7049807.item.7049807-1001?holding=pjer2udfjxhzyz76. Currently in process of cataloging. Reproduced with permission of Margaret Blair Young.

113. Howell, “Abner’s Story,” 60.

114. Bankhead, interview, 9, style modernized. According to a recollection by a “dear friend,” Ruffin Bridgeforth Jr., Abner said, “Until we get the priesthood, we can never become sons of perdition.” Bridgeforth commented, “People laugh at that, and it is true. To whom much is given, much is expected. All of this period, our people are not held responsible—no responsibility.” Bridgeforth also said that Abner “was a great man—one of the greatest members I have ever known.” Benjamin D. Lee, ed., Ruffin Bridgeforth (self-pub., 2017), p. 49, MS 31721, available upon request from the Church History Library, Salt Lake City, catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets/8cfeadd4-ad4a-45c5-aa98-074674
aa4bcf/0/0. See also Howell, testimony: “In order to get in the celestial kingdom, you can get in the highest degree in the celestial kingdom without the priesthood. But the priesthood can keep you out of a lot of places. Because if you have the priesthood and you desecrate that priesthood, your curse is worse than the person who has the priesthood.”

115. As one example, Matthew Harris cites this account of a talk by Abner to students at the Olympus High School Latter-day Saint seminary in Salt Lake City, as reported by Max Parkin: “In Los Angeles he was asked how he felt about the fact that the negroes couldn’t hold the priesthood. He answered, “I’m too busy getting into the Celestial Kingdom that I’m not worried about the priesthood.” (Parkin, notes, 2, as reported in Harris, Second-Class Saints, 181.) Thanks to Matthew Harris for pointing me to this statement and its source.

116. Parkin, notes, 3.

117. From Reiter, “Howell, Abner Leonard.”

118. Langon, Early Black Settlers, photo following p. 34.

119. Howell, interview by Burbidge. Margaret Blair Young wrote that Boyd Burbidge gave the tape to her and Darius Aidan Gray in connection with a 2002 interview (Margaret Blair Young, email message to author, 11 August 2024). According to the obituaries of Boyd Marcroft Burbidge (1930–2017) and his wife Carol (1933–2011), the couple were married in the Los Angeles Temple on 23 August 1956 and spent fifty-five years together in marriage. See “Boyd Marcroft Burbidge,” Deseret News, 14–15 March 2017, findagrave.com/memorial
/177327638/boyd-marcroft-burbidge; “Carol Burbidge,” Deseret News, 22 September 2011, legacy.com/us/obituaries/deseretnews/name/carol
-burbidge-obituary?id=26304270.

120. In Howell, testimony, Abner gives details on this sad situation in Atlanta, as well as recounting other challenges faced by himself and other Black members of the Church due to racial prejudice:

Now we went, I’ll tell you, in Atlanta, where the mission is, we had trouble, because our face was dark. In the first place, you know, down there they separate. The people have never gotten over the fact that we were slaves.

And I had to wait two days before I could get a, a taxicab driver. Because I couldn’t ride in a taxi cab driver driven by a white man, and neither can a white man ride in a taxi cab driver driven by a colored man. And of course, the colored taxi cab drivers never go on that side of town because they don’t have anyone to take over there.

But after waiting two days, I found one that had been born there and he knew where the mission home was, and he took me there. And I had to have him stay one hour and a half to take me back because if I . . . had called for a taxi cab, and they came and saw that we were colored we couldn’t ever gotten out of that part of the town.

“Upon Thy Belly Shalt Thou Go”: The Garden of Eden Serpent Symbology Based on the Concept of Seraphim

Noel Hudson

Abstract: The concept of the serpentine seraphim from biblical iconography is discussed in the context of biblical serpent symbology. The association of the seraphim with Ancient Near Eastern kings, deities, and temples is noted. The concept of the seraphim as members of the Council of God is explored, and the possibility of the seraph as a symbol of Christ is discussed. These concepts are applied to the story of the snake in the Garden of Eden, and the additional explanatory power of the seraph symbol in connection with the snake is explored. Specific serpentine attributes are discussed in the context of the seed motif. The article concludes with a brief discussion of the application of this topic to the modern reader.

There are several instances within the scriptures in which developing an understanding of the use of snake symbology can lead to new insights into the meaning of certain passages. However, in many cases it may be difficult to understand the snake imagery, since the imagery is not used in a consistently negative or positive context; rather, serpent imagery is used both as a symbol of Christ and as a symbol of Satan. As an example of the difficulty of the interpretation of serpent symbology, consider Numbers 21. While traveling in the desert after leaving Egypt, many of the children of Israel were bitten by venomous snakes. In response, Moses created a serpent of brass and raised it on a pole, asking only that the Israelites look at the image. One biblical commentator has noted that the serpent was a pagan symbol used extensively in cultic worship by cultures throughout the Mediterranean, suggesting that

Although the serpent was associated in the Ancient Near East with the restoration of life, the most prominent element in the tradition of Moses and the bronze serpent seems to be that of sympathetic magic—the belief that the fate of an object or person can be governed by the manipulation of its exact image. Thereby a representation of a noxious creature could best drive off that creature.1

Was Moses actually employing pagan imagery when he crafted his bronze serpent? Many Christians seem to struggle to understand how a related scripture that comments on this story of Moses (John 3:14–15) can suggest that the bronze serpent is meant to be an image of Christ when the apparently pagan roots of the symbol would suggest otherwise.2 Nevertheless, “The story of the Israelites getting bitten in the wilderness by ‘fiery serpents’ and then being miraculously healed by the ‘serpent of brass’ (Numbers 21:4–9) is one of the most frequently told stories in scripture—with many of the retellings occurring in the Book of Mormon.”3 What is it about the symbolism in this story that made it so compelling to the ancient authors of scripture? Other related, but somewhat puzzling, serpentine appearances in the Bible include one in which Isaiah described certain angelic beings as six-winged flying snakes (Isaiah 6:2) and another about the serpent in the Garden of Eden who tempts Eve (Genesis 3).

This present article proposes a unique theory that results in a unified view of the usage of serpent symbolism in these scriptural passages. The proposed theory consists of the following: The seraphim are a group of heavenly beings with Christ at their head. The fiery flying serpent is the symbol of the seraphim in general, and of Jesus Christ in particular, as the leader of the seraphim. Lucifer had also been one of the seraphim and could therefore at one time also have been symbolized by a fiery flying serpent. The cursing of the serpent in the Garden of Eden is symbolic of the loss of glory, power, and responsibility suffered by Lucifer when he was cast out of heaven and became Perdition, so that his new symbol is now the serpent, rather than the seraph.

This article first discusses the usage and origin of the term seraphim and the associated fiery flying serpents. The association of seraphim with temple and royal imagery is explored. The article then makes the case for viewing Christ as the leader of the seraphim. The aptness of the serpent as the replacement of a seraph as the new symbol of Perdition is discussed, and the application of this view for the modern reader is addressed in the conclusion section.

Serpents and Seraphim

A unifying attribute of two of the scriptural stories to be explored is the usage of the term seraphim by Neal Rappleye. He notes that

In the biblical text, “fiery serpents” is always a translation of śrp, Anglicized as seraph (pl. seraphim), which, as a verb, typically refers to “burning.” Sometimes it is paired with the word nḥš, “snake, serpent,” other times śrp itself (without nḥš) refers to a venomous serpent.4

The use of the word seraph as described by Rappleye is seen in the book of Numbers:

And the people spake against God, and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? for there is no bread, neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light bread. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died. (Numbers 21:5–6)

After God sent the seraphim among the host of Israel to punish them for their murmuring, he also prepared a way for them to be saved:

And the Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived. (Numbers 21:8–9)

While in the book of Numbers the translation of the Hebrew term is merely fiery serpents, the Book of Mormon refers to them as “fiery flying serpents” (1 Nephi 17:41). One view of the reason that the serpents are referred to in this manner is suggested by Elder Glen O. Jenson:

What kind of a serpent was it? The Hebrew word for fiery means “burning,” a probable reference to the burning pain of the bite. What does it mean for a serpent to fly? Possible explanations include the lightning speed with which a snake can strike and the propensity for some snakes to actually leap through the air at their victims. One snake that fits this general description and lives in the areas inhabited by the Israelites thousands of years ago is the saw-scale viper. Its venom causes death by internal bleeding over several days.5

Some scholars have concluded that the brazen serpent lifted up by Moses likely had wings,6 an observation that may strengthen the Christological symbolism of the serpent raised on the pole. This symbology adds significantly to the “flying” being merely a metaphorical description of their strike. The reason behind this assertion will be explained in detail below.

Fiery seraphim serpents show up again in multiple passages in Isaiah. In one such instance, the inhabitants of Palestine are warned not to rejoice when the king of Assyria, who had oppressed Israel, dies. Isaiah writes, “Because the rod of him that smote thee is broken: for out of the serpent’s root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent” (Isaiah 14:29). Another instance mentions the term in order to provide additional information about the very location where Israel likely encountered serpents as they wandered in the Negev:7 “From whence come the young and old lion, the viper and fiery flying serpent” (Isaiah 30:6).

An article addressing flying fiery serpents notes that

The Hebrew expression translated “fiery flying serpents” (śrp mʿpp) in these Isaiah passages uses the same word that Numbers and Deuteronomy use to refer to “fiery serpents”: seraph (plural seraphim). This is also the word used in Isaiah 6 to describe the fiery, winged beings protecting the throne of God (Isaiah 6:2, 6). Thus, many scholars believe that the seraphim of Isaiah’s vision were winged, serpent-like creatures.8

The word seraphim, as used in Isaiah 6, might seem out of place, since Isaiah’s heavenly vision does not contain any elements that would suggest a serpentine theme. Isaiah opens his account of the vision saying,

In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. (Isaiah 6:1–2)

John Ronning offers the following insight about the usage of the word seraphim here:

The meaning of venomous snake seems so out of place in Isaiah 6. . . . Some deny that it is related to the meaning of snake, instead relating it to the light associated with burning; these are shining beings. Others affirm the sense of venomous serpents and relate the picture of Isaiah 6 to the figure of the rearing cobra (uraeus), sometimes appearing with wings, symbol of royalty for the Pharaoh and the gods.9

To summarize the takeaway message from this section: the seraphim are fiery winged serpents as found in Isaiah’s vision as well as in the story of Israel’s wanderings in the desert found in the book of Numbers. The seraphim are seen variously as divine messengers, executors of divine wrath, and symbols of salvation.

Seraphim in the temple

John Gee notes the same association of the seraphim with temple imagery mentioned by Ronning. He notes the appearance of seraphim in the temple in Isaiah’s vision and gives instances of seraphim in archaeological finds in Israel from the same time period as Solomon’s temple.10

Karen Joines, one of the scholars who associates serpentine seraphim imagery with ancient temples, notes that, “the Israelite cult at Jerusalem was not unique in its utilization of a bronze serpent.” In addition, “the phenomenon of the cultic bronze serpent was limited neither to Palestine nor to the second millennium B.C.”11 Joines further suggests, “the Seraphim are probably winged serpents drawn from Egyptian royal and sacral symbolism.” This conclusion is based on several pieces of evidence, including the close association of the serpent with the person of the pharaoh and the mythological function of the uraeus to protect the pharaoh and sacred objects by breathing out fire on his enemies. Joines notes that uraei with human hands and faces are portrayed serving the pharaoh in the underworld.12

The association of seraphim with divine sovereignty and temple sites might help to explain why the term is also used for heavenly messengers. This association was not limited only to pagan temples; Rappleye explains that many artifacts containing winged serpents have been found in Israel and notes that “visually, the winged serpents depicted on artifacts from Israel and Judah are clearly inspired by Egyptian iconography.”13 What is more, Rappleye suggests that the seraphim may have been closely associated with biblical temple symbolism in Israel (as opposed to pagan symbolism from earlier temple sites in Israel that pre-date the Exodus).

Many scholars believe that the angelic seraphim of Isaiah’s vision were most likely winged serpent-like beings who acted as guardians of the heavenly throne. . . . As with the royal seals, the scenes depicted on these bronze bowls show a pair of winged serpents guarding a sacred or royal symbol, which could be an indication that in Isaiah’s day, there were actually two bronze seraphim in the temple, one on each side of the ark of the covenant, paralleling the cherubim.14

So the seraphim have an association with temples in both the pagan era and in biblical Israel. The seraphim came to be used as symbols of both royal and divine authority.

Seraphim and the Council of God

Scriptures such as Abraham 3 and 4 acknowledge the participation of a council of gods that was involved in the creation of the world. Additionally, Joseph Smith taught that a proper translation of the first line of Genesis would render it “the head of the Gods called the Gods together.”15 David Bokovoy suggests that the seraphim seen by Isaiah, as well as hosts of angels seen by Lehi and others, participated in this council:

Though the Book of Mormon refers to members of the heavenly host by the English word angels and Isaiah describes the beings in his vision as seraphim, from an Old Testament perspective, both these terms can apply to members of the assembly serving in the council that surrounded God.16

Doctrine and Covenants 38:1 provides support for the view that seraphim are members of the heavenly host:

Thus saith the Lord your God, even Jesus Christ, the Great I Am, Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the same which looked upon the wide expanse of eternity, and all the seraphic hosts of heaven, before the world was made.

Bokovoy says of this passage:

The term seraph appears as a designation for the members of God’s premortal assembly “before the world was made” in Doctrine and Covenants 38:1. This would suggest that seraph in LDS theology appears as a literary allusion to the sons of God. The fact that Isaiah describes the members of the assembly/host as “fiery beings” provides an important literary link with the Book of Mormon, which, as noted, specifically places emphasis upon the inherent luster of the heavenly host Lehi witnessed surrounding God’s throne . . . it also echoes an insight shared by the Prophet Joseph Smith concerning the status of those who dwell in God’s presence. On one occasion, the Prophet taught that those who abide with the Lord “are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.”17

The Heavenly Council is an important part of Latter-day Saint doctrine concerning the pre-mortal existence.18 Abraham says that in that Council, “the Lord said: Whom shall I send? And one answered like unto the Son of Man: Here am I, send me” (Abraham 3:27). Isaiah’s vision appears to echo the aspect of this Grand Heavenly Council in which volunteers are called for and specific missions are assigned to participants. He tells us that the Lord asked, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” and Isaiah answered, “Here am I; send me” (Isaiah 6:8). Lehi seems to have had a similar experience (1 Nephi 1:8–18), as did Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:4–8).

Abraham saw that among the Council of God were many noble and great ones and that Christ was their leader (Abraham 3:23–24). There appears to be a hierarchy among heavenly beings, as Abraham noted, but it is not clear where beings such as cherubim and seraphim fall within that hierarchy.19 Val Larsen and Newell Wright say, “The Sôd Elohim, council of gods, is obviously hierarchical” and that “One and the Twelve who descend from heaven [in Lehi’s vision] are divine members of the Sôd Elohim.” Larsen and Wright add that Lehi, Nephi1, and other prophets are enrolled members of the Sôd Elohim. They also say “that the core members of the Sôd Elohim work together ‘to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.’”20

Who else might be considered members of the Heavenly Council and exactly how the Council and the angelic beings known as seraphim overlap is unclear. However, based on the evidenced reviewed here, it seems that the Divine Council consists of a core set of members, many “noble and great ones,” such as Michael, the Archangel. The prophets Lehi, Nephi1, Isaiah, and Jeremiah were also members of the Council, and the members may be referred to as seraphim.

Christ as Seraph

As it touches upon the identity of the seraphim, the parallel prophetic callings of Isaiah and Jeremiah contain illuminating passages. At the beginning of his theophany, Isaiah felt inadequate “because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips” (Isaiah 6:5). Isaiah’s concern was resolved by one of the seraphim who flew to him “having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged” (Isaiah 6:6–7). This visionary experience of Isaiah with the seraphim appears to be a symbolic foreshadowing of the Atonement, with the purging coal serving as a representation of the purging effect of what is often referred to as the baptism of fire, which is the reception of the Holy Ghost.

Jeremiah had a similar concern to Isaiah’s and received a similar solution: “Then the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth” (Jeremiah 1:9). Of these parallel accounts, Bokovoy says,

Though the literal identity of this fiery angelic being is ambiguous in the text, one possible LDS reading would interpret the seraph who cleanses Isaiah as an allusion to Christ. Additional support for this interpretation appears in Jeremiah’s comparable story of prophetic commission, where it is the Lord Yahweh himself who assumes the role of Isaiah’s seraph. . . . Moreover, interpreting the fiery being who interacts personally with Isaiah as a reference to Christ works well with the fact that the seraph that cleanses Isaiah, helping the Israelite prophet to become worthy to stand in God’s presence, may function as a symbolic allusion to the seraph in Numbers 21:8 that heals the children of Israel.21

The relationship between the seraph-serpent lifted up by Moses and the seraph of Isaiah’s vision may not be immediately obvious. The link between these two seraphim is the shared symbolism of Christ. The seraph in Isaiah’s vision purifies Isaiah’s sin with fire while the seraphim in Numbers 21 purify wicked Israel with their burning bites, and the brass serpent purifies Israel from their affliction. Scriptural support for the association of the seraph serpent with Christ is in both the New Testament and the Book of Mormon:

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:14–15)

Yea, did he not bear record that the Son of God should come? And as he lifted up the brazen serpent in the wilderness, even so shall he be lifted up who should come. And as many as should look upon that serpent should live, even so as many as should look upon the Son of God with faith, having a contrite spirit, might live, even unto that life which is eternal. (Helaman 8:14–15)

Rappleye identifies several parallels between the mission of Christ and the usage of the bronze serpent that confirm the identification of the serpent as a type or symbol of Christ. These include the ability to heal; an association with life, immortality, and resurrection; the functions of purification and atonement; associations with kingship; their role as dispensers of divine justice; and their identity as members of the heavenly host or as sons of God. For each of these parallels, Rappleye has extensive commentary explaining the parallels. For example, in regard to healing he explains that:

Nephi understood that the brazen serpent represented the “power . . . [to] heal the nations” (2 Nephi 25:20) and Alma, likewise, emphasized the healing function of the serpent (Alma 33:21–22). Just before telling the story of Moses raising the brazen serpent, Nephi explained that Jesus Christ would “rise from the dead with healing in his wings” (2 Nephi 25:13).22

He goes on to note many different ways that healing power was associated with the seraph serpent and points out similar healing powers associated with Christ. He then points out that the connection between the seraph symbol and Jesus Christ served as point of distinction between the righteous and the wicked.

The seraph-serpent is a legitimate symbol of the Lord and his emissaries, and thus rejecting it, as some had in Nephi’s day, was tantamount to rejecting the Lord; those who did so would perish from the bite of the seraph-serpent—a symbolic point, to be sure, but one made all the more real given that such could indeed be the fate of anyone in Lehi’s party during their time in the wilderness.23

It is apparent from the evidence examined here that Christ is represented in some scriptures by a fiery flying serpent. The seraph-serpent can both punish and heal Israel.

The seraph and the snake

The foregoing sections provide support for the following ideas that are critical for the concept discussed in this section:

- The seraph raised on the pole was a winged serpent that represents Christ.

- The seraphim were incorporated into the iconography of the Hebrew temple.

- The seraphim can be understood as members of the Council of God.

- Christ can be seen as the foremost of the seraphim.

With the foregoing concepts in mind, we are now able to examine the possible relationship between the seraphim and the serpent in Eden. Ronning sees certain traits of the seraphim in Isaiah that are shared with this other famous serpentine figure:

The Seraphim of Isaiah 6:2 are members of God’s court appearing in the temple (v.1), who call to one another, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts” (v. 3), and one of them flies to Isaiah and announces to him the atonement for his sins, as he touches a coal from the altar to his lips (vv. 6–7). Comparison of these creatures to the serpent of Genesis 3 yields rather detailed points of contact that are most suggestive. In both passages, the serpents speak, and by their speech show knowledge of both human and divine affairs, as would be expected from those who are privy to the divine council.24

Ronning compares the seraphim and the serpent of Eden on various additional points, and then concludes:

The picture of the flying serpents of Isaiah 6 therefore implies that the serpent of Genesis 3 is an evil, cursed version of the majestic members of the divine council seen by Isaiah, who perhaps is shown what the evil serpent in the Garden once was.

For Christians who lack the knowledge of additional Restoration scripture, Ronning’s interpretation might seem like something of a stretch. However, Latter-day Saint doctrine has long held that Lucifer was an “angel who fell from before the presence of the Eternal God, and became the devil” (2 Nephi 9:8). Modern scripture notes that

An angel of God who was in authority in the presence of God, who rebelled against the Only Begotten Son whom the Father loved and who was in the bosom of the Father, was thrust down from the presence of God and the Son, And was called Perdition, for the heavens wept over him—he was Lucifer, a son of the morning. (Doctrine and Covenants 76:25–26)

These passages of scripture demonstrate that Lucifer was an angel of authority. He was almost certainly one of the seraphim in the Council of God. There are several points for which the symbolism of identifying Satan, the serpent in Eden, as a fallen seraph is very appealing. To begin with, this view of things provides new insight into what may have been meant by the curse on the serpent found in Genesis 3:14:

And the Lord God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.

The dominant view, of course, is that the serpent was not previously a flying seraph but was instead a snake with legs. For example, Solomon Caesar Malan’s “The Book of Adam and Eve,” a pseudopigraphical work of ancient Jewish stories, contains the detail of the serpent losing his legs as part of the curse.25 However, M. D. Johnson’s translation of the “Life of Adam and Eve,” another pseudepigraphical work, contains the detail that Satan transformed himself into an angel to deceive Eve, as well as the interesting variation of the Genesis curse, “You shall crawl on your belly and you shall be deprived of your hands as well as your feet. There shall be left for you neither ear nor wing nor one limb.”26 This version seems to support the notion that the serpent was in fact a seraph, for the seraphim in Isaiah were possessed of hands, feet, and wings.

A possible explanation for the ancient viewpoint of a snake that lost only its legs, as contrasted with a seraph that lost its wings (or its hands, feet, and wings), is the difference between seeing the serpent as an actual literal snake, or seeing the serpent as a symbol. If the serpent in Eden is a literal snake, then the curse removing his legs makes sense in the context given. However, if the serpent is a symbol and not an actual snake, the curse to go on his belly must also be symbolic. Certainly, both the account in Moses and the modern temple ceremony argue for the view that the serpent is symbolic, and therefore the curse should be understood in symbolic terms.

It seems likely that Lucifer had been a seraphic member of the Divine Council, so metaphorically he would have been one of the winged serpents: a being of light and power. If the wings of the seraphim can be understood in the same way as the wings of the beasts in the book of Revelation, then the insight provided to Joseph Smith about the significance of those wings can be understood in terms of Doctrine and Covenants 77:4: “Their eyes are a representation of light and knowledge, that is, they are full of knowledge; and their wings are a representation of power, to move, to act, etc.”

The transformation from seraph to serpent could be understood symbolically as the loss of abilities and powers that Lucifer and his followers suffered when they were cast down. This loss of abilities may be explained metaphorically in Genesis by the snake being forced to crawl on its belly. The books of Jude and Revelation, as well as Abraham, all contain commentary on the event in which Lucifer and his followers are cast out and lose their glory and power in different metaphorical terms.27 For example, the Apostle John writes:

There was a war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. (Revelation 12:7–9)

The same transition from powerful angelic being of light to a much weaker being of darkness is represented metonymically when Lucifer’s name was changed to Perdition. This name change is such that Lucifer, whose name means the “Shining One,”28 came to be called “Loss” (the meaning of Perdition is loss).29 This was a fitting description for one who had lost glory, power, and much of the ability to act that he once possessed. Once he fell from his previous position, “he became Satan, yea, even the devil, the father of all lies, to deceive and to blind men, and to lead them captive at his will, even as many as would not hearken unto my voice” (Moses 4:4). In his new role the being who was once known as Lucifer is no longer a shining bringer of light, but he has instead received the title of Satan, which means the Adversary, the one working to block men from returning to the presence of God.30

What is more, Nephi1 says that Satan is “that being who beguiled our first parents, who transformeth himself nigh unto an angel of light” (2 Nephi 9:9). It is consistent with the character of Satan that he would attempt to portray himself to Adam and Eve as the being he had previously been, an angel of light. Julie Smith notes an interesting variation of this same concept in one view of the Garden of Eden story that attempts to explain why Eve may have been inclined to trust the serpent: “Another variation of this theme is that Eve thought she was speaking to Jesus Christ, who is sometimes symbolized by a serpent, as in Helaman 8:14–15.”31 Andrew Skinner suggests a very similar theory. He writes, “Satan came to Eve clothed, as it were, in the garb of the Messiah, using the signs, symbols, and even the language of the Messiah, promising things that only the Messiah could rightfully promise.”32

In discussing how the symbol of the serpent could have been a symbol of both Christ and Satan, Skinner speculates that
other signs, symbols, and tokens were also instituted in premortality to represent deity, but the one that Satan absolutely could not imitate was the dove. However, as the preeminent counterfeiter and deceiver, Satan could and does usurp these other signs and symbols properly reserved for God in order to try to legitimize his false identity as a god. This is why Satan chose to use the sign of the serpent as the best means of deceiving Eve as well as her posterity from that moment on.33

Perhaps Satan portrayed himself to Eve as not just a serpent, but as a fiery flying serpent (a seraph). Skinner goes on to say, “By usurping and manipulating the symbol of the serpent, he tried to validate his false identity and his lies, insisting that following his ways would elevate our first parents to the status of the very God represented by the true image of the serpent.”34 If we modify Skinner’s statement to replace serpent with seraph, the counterfeit seems to fit even better with Satan’s strategy of transforming himself nigh to an angel of light.

The second part of the curse on the serpent, “dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life,” may also have metaphorical meaning beyond the obvious observation that snakes slither through the dust. This pronouncement could be understood in terms of a Babylonian belief about the afterlife that originated with the Sumerians. In Isaiah 14, the prophet likens Satan to the king of the Babylonians who, after he dies, is jeered at by the other dead kings who say,

Art thou also become weak as we? art thou become like unto us? . . . How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground . . . thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit. (Isaiah 14:10–12)

In addition to confirming the view described above of Satan and his followers having lost much of their power on the occasion of their fall from heaven, this passage, understood in conjunction with the curse on the serpent, suggests a metaphorical understanding for the curse. In the view of the ancient Hebrews, disembodied souls would go down to Sheol, a place of darkness, a pit full of worms down in the dust.35 This was similar to the Babylonian view in which “there the spirits of the dead (gidim) dwelt in complete darkness with nothing to eat but dust and no water to drink.”36 The ancient story of the “Descent of Ishtar” notes that in the underworld, “dust is their sustenance and clay their food. They see no light but dwell in darkness.”37 Christopher Hays notes that

This text, a later Semitic rendition of the Sumerian “Descent of Inanna,” is first attested in the Late Bronze Age. Certain of its details (dust, darkness, and a shortage of good food and drink) are already familiar from Sumerian underworld texts. . . . [T]his description seems to have been accorded great esteem in Akkadian canonical literature. . . . [I]n short, the pericope above seems to have become an increasingly popular description of the world of the dead in Akkadian literature.38

Hays associates Isaiah 29:4 (“from low in the dust your words shall come; your voice shall come from the ground like the voice of a ghost, and your speech shall chirp (תצפצף) out of the dust”) with the Mesopotamian view of the underworld, and suggests that the biblical authors shared many of their concepts of the underworld, including the views of sheol as a dusty pit, with the Mesopotamians.39 Lewis Paton also suggests that the Hebrew concept of Sheol was influenced by the Mesopotamians and states that “Sheol is conceived as a place of dust” and that “‘dust’ is a synonym of Sheol.”40

Assuming that the concept of Sheol was indeed influenced by the Babylonians, and that dust and eating dust are representative of Sheol, the curse on the serpent could be meant to indicate that Satan’s fate is to remain as a disembodied soul forever, a state that metaphorically consists of eating dust, with no water to drink. Satan may therefore be understood as a fallen seraph. He has lost much of his former glory and power, and is doomed to remain as a disembodied spirit forever. Perhaps it is due in part to this loss of power and abilities that he has come to rely so heavily on deception to achieve his aims among mortal men. It may also help to explain why Satan and his followers seem so eager to possess mortal bodies, as seen in the New Testament, such as in Mark 5:12.

Serpents and Snares

With the association between the devil and the serpent established so early on in the scriptural record, one might expect that the sage words of the prophets would be littered with references to serpentine attacks as a metaphor for the enactment of devilish designs. Indeed, in several cases those who are portrayed as acting in a devilish fashion are described as “lying in wait,” just as a serpent might lie in wait for its prey. This imagery is first applied in the story of Cain. Genesis 4:7 in the King James translation of the Bible has God warning Cain that “sin lieth at the door.” The Hebrew version of the phrase seems to have more of an association with serpentine behavior than is apparent from how it has been rendered in English. Umberto Cassuto in his commentary on this passage makes particular note of the Hebrew term used and says that “it symbolizes the evil impulse; the analogy is that of an animal lying in wait for its prey.”

The narratives in Genesis 3 and 4 establish a motif used in numerous other scripture stories in which the antagonist of the story is depicted acting in serpentine fashion. Ronning,41 Hamilton,42 Verrett,43 and others44 have noted how actions such as lying in wait, betraying one’s close kin in an attempt to gain wealth or power, and being trampled or having one’s head crushed are all part of the established motif that indicates an antagonist is acting in a manner consistent with the “seed of the serpent” depicted in Genesis. Abimelech is an excellent example of a biblical antagonist who acts in a serpentine fashion as he murders dozens of his close kin in order to obtain the throne (Judges 9:4–5), lies in wait to murder another set of relatives (Judges 9:34), and has his head crushed as a punishment from God for his wicked behavior (Judges 9:51–57). I have explored this pattern in detail elsewhere.45 For the purposes of this article, suffice it to say that the establishment of a serpentine counterfeit acting to destroy the righteous followers of God and usurp the dominion first granted to the righteous seed of Adam and Eve by God in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 1:28) is a well-established pattern.

From serpents lying in wait to the seed of the serpent setting snares

At some point, the animal cunning of the predatory serpent lying in wait to capture and kill its prey as a metaphor appears to have undergone a transition into the lying in wait of a human predator who sets lures and snares to entrap the unwary. In some cases, the serpent metaphor and the snare metaphor are both present in a given scriptural narrative. One example of this is in Psalm 140, where David utilizes the framework of the seed motif to clearly identify his enemies as seed of the serpent. He says of them, “They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent; adders’ poison is under their lips” (v. 3), and “The proud have hid a snare for me, and cords; they have spread a net by the wayside; they have set gins for me” (v. 5). There is a logical relationship between the two metaphors, as both can be conceived of relying on treachery and cunning to kill their intended victims. Both metaphors are also combined in Jeremiah 5:28, which says, “For among my people are found wicked men: they lay wait, as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men.” This serpentine behavior of lying in wait, and the treacherous behavior of laying traps and snares, are both identified with the actions of the wicked seed of the serpent, who are the servants of the devil. Several Book of Mormon authors have leveraged the biblical motif of the seed of the serpent, and within this motif they also make use of the same set of imagery in characterizing the seed of the serpent. For example, Alma2 tells Zeezrom,

Thou seest that we know that thy plan was a very subtle plan, as to the subtlety of the devil, for to lie and to deceive this people. . . . And behold I say unto you all that this was a snare of the adversary, which he has laid to catch this people, that he might bring you into subjection unto him. (Alma 12:4–6)

Alma1, Alma2, Amulek, Nephi1, and Nephi2 all utilize the snare metaphor, perhaps based in part on the usage found in Isaiah and Jeremiah (for example, Isaiah 29:21). Isaiah’s prophecy in chapter 29 and adjacent chapters is structured in a way that mirrors the contrast between the seed of the woman (the righteous servants of God) and the seed of the serpent mentioned above, with the wicked seed of the serpent saying,

We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves. (Isaiah 28:15)

This description of the wicked by Isaiah is similar to statements made by the wicked judges who confront Nephi2 (Helaman 7–9) and who believe themselves protected from the action of justice, since they have their secret combination to protect them from the consequences of their actions (Helaman 7:5). Indeed, it is worth noting that the very thing that Isaiah warns about in his prophecy comes to pass in the story of Nephi2. Isaiah prophesies,

All that watch for iniquity are cut off: That make a man an offender for a word, and lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate, and turn aside the just for a thing of nought. (Isaiah 29:20–21)

The phrase he “that reproveth in the gate” refers to a judge or prophet of the people of Israel. A biblical commentary on verse 21 notes, “‘The gate’ was the place where judgment was given and public assemblies held. If anyone boldly stood up and reproved the oppressors ‘in the gate,’ they instantly set to work to lay a trap for him and bring him to ruin.” 46 A related comment on Amos 5:10 (“They hate him that rebuketh in the gate, and they abhor him that speaketh uprightly”) notes, “The gate of Eastern cities was the place of public resort (Proverbs 1:21), either for business (Deuteronomy 25:7), or the administration of justice (2 Samuel 15:2), or for gossip. So ‘he that rebuketh in the gate’ may be a judge, or a chief, or a prophet (Jeremiah 17:19; Jeremiah 19:2).”47

Nephi2 has been all three types of “reprovers in the gate” mentioned above—judge, chief, and prophet. In Helaman 7 he has just returned home from an unsuccessful mission and he laments the wickedness of the people in a very public and vocal prayer. His prayer is heard by passers-by who were “near unto the garden gate by which led the highway” (Helaman 7:10). As Nephi2 expounds the sins of the people, wicked judges who are also near the gate attempt to make him an offender for a word. Nephi2 calls upon the words of Isaiah and Jeremiah, among others, as witnesses of the truth of his words (Helaman 8:20). He even goes so far as to give the people a prophetic sign that his words are true. However, the wicked judges “caused that Nephi should be taken and bound and brought before the multitude, and they began to question him in divers ways that they might cross him, that they might accuse him to death” (Helaman 9:19). Their motives in doing so closely mirror Isaiah’s prophecy of those who “turn aside the just for a thing of nought.” Helaman 7:5 explains that the wicked judges were
condemning the righteous because of their righteousness; letting the guilty and the wicked go unpunished because of their money; and moreover to be held in office at the head of government, to rule and do according to their wills, that they might get gain and glory of the world.

The things of nought the judges were pursuing as they attacked the reprover in the gate were the glory, riches, and vain things of the world (Helaman 7:21). The wicked judges, who are clearly portrayed as seed of the serpent,48 try the very same approach that Zeezrom had used against Amulek, cited above (Alma 12:4–6), as they try to lay a snare using money as the bait (Helaman 9:20). However, just like Amulek, Nephi2 is able to perceive and avoid their trap. As he reproves the wicked judges in the gate for corrupting both the laws and the hearts of the people, Nephi2 calls upon the symbology of the brazen serpent as proof that God gives men the power to prophesy. He skillfully weaves the themes of the coming of the son of God with his warning of the destruction of the wicked who reject the word of God. The story of the brazen serpent is the perfect choice because it exemplifies both the destruction of the faithless wicked and the salvation of those who look to the son of God with faith. He says,

Behold, ye not only deny my words, but ye also deny all the words which have been spoken by our fathers, and also the words which were spoken by this man, Moses, who had such great power given unto him, yea, the words which he hath spoken concerning the coming of the Messiah. Yea, did he not bear record that the Son of God should come? And as he lifted up the brazen serpent in the wilderness, even so shall he be lifted up who should come. (Helaman 8:13–14)

The story of Nephi2 exemplifies Isaiah’s prophecy in a way that combines the duality of the seraph symbol (as both destroyer and redeemer), as well as the metaphor of the snares laid by the wicked. Isaiah’s other usages of the symbolism of snares also complement the story of the bronze serpent in which the seraphim are both the instrument of destruction as well as the instrument of salvation of the people. This dual role is explained by the refusal of the wicked to look to the Lord for relief. Since they refuse his aid, they suffer the consequence for their sins. Thus, Isaiah prophesies that for Israel, the Lord of Hosts
shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And many among them shall stumble, and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and be taken. (Isaiah 8:14–15)

Although the snare described here is associated with the Lord, it seems that he is a snare to Israel due not to malice on his part, but to their refusal to allow him to save them. One Bible commentator notes, “By rejecting the counsel of God; by despising his protection, and by resisting his laws, they would be unexpectedly involved in difficulties, as birds which are caught in a snare.”49 The usage of the snare imagery in Isaiah and throughout the scriptures seems to be as a metaphor primarily to describe the secret machinations of the wicked with which they attempt to entrap the righteous. In several cases, the wicked are shown as being caught up in poetic justice in which they fall victim to their own machinations. Such is the case in several iterations of the seed of the serpent motif,50 including the story of Nephi2 reproving at the gate. In this story, Seantum and Seezoram are both members of the secret band of Gadianton (Helaman 8:28) and therefore ought to be protected from justice by their secret combination. However, they are not protected from the naked ambition of one another, and so it is that Seantum murders Seezoram in order to obtain the judgment seat, and is in turn betrayed by the blood of his brother on his cloak. This is but one of many examples of the operation of poetic justice to punish the wicked.

Earlier we saw that Joines believes the usage of the brazen seraph is an instance of sympathetic magic, but I suggest that it is rather an instance of poetic justice instead. The concept of poetic justice is not seen only in instances of the seed motif such as the one just mentioned, but it is mentioned throughout the scriptures. David, for example, in mentioning the snares of the wicked, pleads with the Lord: “Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me, and the gins of the workers of iniquity. Let the wicked fall into their own nets, whilst that I withal escape” (Psalms 141:9–10). David likewise portrays divine poetic justice in Psalm 7:15–16 wherein the wicked “made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made. His mischief shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down upon his own pate.”

Isaiah likewise uses the imagery of both pits and snares in describing the divine justice that causes the wicked to catch themselves up in their own machinations. In Isaiah 24: 16 he laments the treachery of the people and issues a warning:

Fear, and the pit, and the snare, are upon thee, O inhabitant of the earth. And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the fear shall fall into the pit; and he that cometh up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare. (Isaiah 24:17–18)

We may conclude that the snares and pits set by the wicked to capture the righteous represent the same metaphorical concept as the serpent lying in ambush. A common theme found in the seed motif, including the instances examined here that include the operation of the seraph on a pole, is the operation of divine justice that results in the wicked being caught up in their own traps.

Slicing snares asunder

The righteous, in contrast to the wicked seed of the serpent who set snares and lie in wait, are shown in the scriptures as using their faith and the word of God to either avoid or destroy the snares of the wicked. Mormon, for example, suggests wielding the word of God like a sword to slice the snares of the wicked asunder:

Whosoever will may lay hold upon the word of God, which is quick and powerful, which shall divide asunder all the cunning and the snares and the wiles of the devil, and lead the man of Christ in a strait and narrow course across that everlasting gulf of misery which is prepared to engulf the wicked. (Helaman 3:29)

It makes sense that since the snares of the devil are metaphorical, they must be sliced asunder with a metaphorical sword, and the sharpest metaphorical sword available to do the job is the word of God. Indeed, in the estimation of Alma2, the word of God is more powerful than a literal sword. As Alma 31:5 puts it, “The preaching of the word had . . . more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else.” This is why in every case in which a Book of Mormon prophet invokes the story of the brazen serpent, he also comments on the importance of faith in the word of God, which allows the man of God to perceive the traps and snares of the serpent and to slice them asunder. Nephi1, the first author in the Book of Mormon, links the ability to perceive error to the sort of faith that allowed the Israelites to look to the brazen serpent and be saved. This faith in Christ leads to salvation, and since faith in Christ is developed by hearing the word of God, Nephi1 meticulously recorded the word of God that he had received in order to lead future generations to salvation.

I have spoken plainly that ye cannot err. And as the Lord God liveth that brought Israel up out of the land of Egypt, and gave unto Moses power that he should heal the nations after they had been bitten by the poisonous serpents, if they would cast their eyes unto the serpent which he did raise up before them, and also gave him power that he should smite the rock and the water should come forth; yea, behold I say unto you, that as these things are true, and as the Lord God liveth, there is none other name given under heaven save it be this Jesus Christ, of which I have spoken, whereby man can be saved. Wherefore, for this cause hath the Lord God promised unto me that these things which I write shall be kept and preserved, and handed down unto my seed, from generation to generation. (2 Nephi 25:20–21)

The story of the seraph on the pole in the Book of Mormon, then, is a story of the duality of divine justice: to punish the wicked who refuse to exercise even a particle of faith and to save the righteous who muster the faith to look and live. As Skinner explains, “The agent of both harm and healing, death and life, is, in this instance, the serpent.”51 The duality of divine justice is also shown in the story of the serpent as depicted in the modern temple ceremony. Adam and Eve express their willingness to repent, and they are granted forgiveness of their sins and a return to divine favor. The serpent, however, is cursed by God because he acts to try and frustrate the plan of God. This duality is exemplified in the book of Isaiah with the imagery of the Holy One as both a refuge and as a snare. That duality is also expressed in the motif of the seed of the serpent. This motif, used to represent the differential outcomes for the just and the wicked, makes use of imagery of the snare, the seraph, and the crushing of the head of the seed of the serpent. In discussing the head-crushing imagery of Genesis 3:15, Skinner notes emphatically, “We may even add at this point that the woman’s seed would be able to crush the evil serpent’s head by the power given to them from the true serpent, the Messiah!”52

The seraph and Quetzalcoatl

Our discussion of flying serpents would not be complete without mentioning the iconography of Quetzalcoatl. The symbol of the feathered serpent is common throughout ancient Mesoamerica across cultures as diverse as the Olmec, Toltec, Maya, and Aztec.53 Diane Wirth notes that while some of the associations of Quetzalcoatl with Christ are rather questionable and are based on a common interest between converted indigenous peoples and Spanish Catholic missionaries to find Christian symbols in Mayan mythology, there are some aspects of the Quetzalcoatl story that
may be derived, in part, from Mesoamericans’ remembrance of Christ’s visit to the Americas. Those parts that fit the native traditions are these: a deity playing a role in the creation, “raising the sky”; a deity associated with the bread of life (a correspondence to maize); a deity assisting the dead; a deity shedding blood to save mankind; a deity dying on a tree (the Maize God’s head hung in a tree); a deity resurrecting and being responsible for the rebirth of the deceased; and a personage of light who is associated with the sun.54

The fact that feathered serpent iconography is found across cultures in the lands that may have been inhabited by the Jaredites and the descendants of Lehi may indicate a shared symbology that predates both cultures. That the seraphim of Moses features in the teachings of Book of Mormon authors multiple times suggests that the symbol was a powerful one in Nephite thought. The Quetzalcoatl story may provide evidence that this symbol continued to hold special significance for the people long after the civilizations of the Nephites and Jaredites had crumbled to dust.

Summary and Conclusions

There has been much discussion, from the times of the earliest biblical commentators until now, about the Garden of Eden story and the place that the serpent plays in the story. The trees of life and knowledge, the humans created from the dust of the earth, and the perfidious serpent who sought to beguile the innocent Eve all combined to create a story that, despite its apparent simplicity, contained enough depth of meaning that it has been the source of both confusion and insight for millennia. Likewise, the story of the flying fiery serpents and Moses lifting up the seraph on a pole has occasioned much puzzled speculation in its own right.

The view of Christ-as-seraph and Satan as fallen seraph propounded in this paper provides an interpretive key for the story of the serpent in the garden. This view fits quite well with the additional information the scriptures of the Restoration have made available. The comment of Nephi1 about Satan who “transformeth himself nigh unto an angel of light” is but one example among many of inspired commentary that throws additional light on the original story. Combining this comment with the concept of the seraphim angels and Satan’s penchant for imitation leads to a conclusion that is interesting and satisfying in light of the possibility that the serpent of Eden was meant as an imitation of the divine seraph.

The relationship noted here between the seed of the serpent and those who set metaphorical snares lends credence to the notion of a metaphorical evolution that connects the serpentine behavior of lying in ambush with the human behavior of laying traps. The colocation of both of these metaphors in a couple of biblical accounts reinforces the idea that both are meant to signify the action of the seed of the serpent.

The potency of the word of God in enabling one to discern between convincing counterfeits and the true representations of divine action is made clear in the accounts examined above. Illustrating the various ways in which the adversary acts and how to discern his behavior seems to be a major reason behind framing stories in terms of the seed of the serpent motif. From the moment he was called as a prophet, Moses found himself thrust into situations in which he was required to exercise his faith in the Only Begotten to distinguish demonic duplicity from distinct divinity:

Blessed be the name of my God, for his Spirit hath not altogether withdrawn from me, or else where is thy glory, for it is darkness unto me? And I can judge between thee and God; for God said unto me: Worship God, for him only shalt thou serve. Get thee hence, Satan; deceive me not; for God said unto me: Thou art after the similitude of mine Only Begotten. (Moses 1:15–16)

The devil’s attempts at deception continued throughout the prophetic stewardship of Moses, with his imitations coming one after another in Egypt, including in the guise of miraculous serpents (Exodus 7:12). By the time that he raised up the seraph in the desert, Moses was quite well-versed in distinguishing ersatz copies from the real thing, and his action in raising the brazen serpent is deserving of all of the scriptural commentary and employment of parallel symbolism that it has received. The fact that the symbol may have persisted in Mesoamerica despite centuries of apostasy and mingling with the philosophies of men is a testament to the strength of the original symbol and its associated motif.

The average human in the fast-paced modern world likely has little experience with even common serpents, let alone fiery flying serpents. However, like Eve, the possibility exists that when we least expect it, our normal daily routine may be disrupted by the sudden appearance of a beguiling serpent pursuing a course of action that, if left unchecked, could lead to death, curses, or exile. In fact, in the book of Ether, Moroni frames the story of Akish in the classic seed of the serpent motif,55 and then interrupts the flow of the narrative to warn:

Wherefore, O ye Gentiles, it is wisdom in God that these things should be shown unto you, that thereby ye may repent of your sins, and suffer not that these murderous combinations shall get above you, which are built up to get power and gain—and the work, yea, even the work of destruction come upon you, yea, even the sword of the justice of the Eternal God shall fall upon you, to your overthrow and destruction if ye shall suffer these things to be. (Ether 8:23)

This warning suggests that no matter how distant the symbolism of serpents and seraphim in ancient Hebrew literature may seem from everyday life, there are subtle serpents slithering among us even now, and their actions may directly impact our lives in ways we might not anticipate and for which we may not be fully prepared.

[Author’s Note: I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and editorial staff of Interpreter for their excellent suggestions and recommended changes. This article is much better than it otherwise would have been because of their influence. Godfrey Ellis, my executive editor, was particularly helpful in providing guidance, wording changes, and encouragement.]

Noel Hudson was born in Idaho Falls, Idaho, and raised in Provo, Utah. He earned a BS in Zoology from BYU, an MS in Engineering Technology from BYU, and an MBA in marketing from BYU. While working as an Electrical Engineer for a company that manufactures communications equipment, he published eight books of historical and science fiction and has written articles on the Book of Mormon. He and his wife, Luciana, are the parents of three children.

1 . Karen Randolph Joines, “The Bronze Serpent in the Israelite Cult,” Journal of Biblical Literature 87, no. 3 (1968): 251, doi.org/10.2307/3263536.

2 . Michael S. Heiser, “Why Would Jesus Compare Himself to a Snake?,” Word by Word (blog), Logos, 5 June 2018, 34, www.logos.com/grow/the-healing
-serpent/. Heiser asks, “Why didn’t God heal the people directly? Was the bronze serpent an idol, and thus a violation of the second commandment? Wouldn’t the Israelites have recoiled at the association of healing with a serpent?”

3 . Neal Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass: A Contextual Study of the Brazen Serpent Tradition in the Book of Mormon,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 50 (2022): 217, journal.interpreterfoundation.org
/serpents-of-fire-and-brass-a-contextual-study-of-the-brazen-serpent
-tradition-in-the-book-of-mormon/.

4 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 219.

5 . Glen O. Jenson, “Look and Live,” Ensign, March 2002, churchofjesuschrist
.org/study/ensign/2002/03/look-and-live.

6 . Scripture Central Staff, “Book of Mormon Evidence: Flying Fiery Serpents,” Evidence 149, 19 July 2022, evidencecentral.org/recency/evidence/flying
-fiery-serpents.

7 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 219.

8 . Scripture Central, “Flying Fiery Serpents.”

9 . John L. Ronning, “The Curse on the Serpent (Genesis 3:15) in Biblical Theology and Hermeneutics” (PhD diss., Westminster Theological Seminary, 1997), 133.

10 . John Gee, “Cherubim and Seraphim: Iconography in the First Jerusalem Temple,” Paper presented at the 2020 Temple on Mount Zion Conference, Provo, UT, November 2020.

11 . Joines, “Bronze Serpent,” 245–46.

12 . Karen Randolph Joines, “Winged Serpents in Isaiah’s Inaugural Vision,” Journal of Biblical Literature 86, no. 4 (December 1967): 410–12, doi.org
/10.2307/3262795.

13 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 220.

14 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 220.

15 . “History, 1838–1856, volume F-1 [1 May 1844–8 August 1844,” p. 102, Joseph Smith Papers, josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1838-1856
-volume-f-1-1-may-1844-8-august-1844/108#source-note.

16 . David E. Bokovoy, “On Christ and Covenants: An LDS Reading of Isaiah’s Prophetic Call,” Studies in the Bible and Antiquity 3, no. 3 (2011): 42, scholars
archive.byu.edu/sba/vol3/iss1/3.

17 . Bokovoy, “Christ and Covenants,” 41.

18 . “Council in Heaven,” Topics and Questions, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed 26 December 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org
/study/manual/gospel-topics/council-in-heaven.

19 . Scripture Central Staff, “Why Did Isaiah Refer to the Heavenly Hosts as ‘Seraphim’?,” KnoWhy 645, 12 February 2024, scripturecentral.org/knowhy
/why-did-isaiah-refer-to-the-heavenly-hosts-as-seraphim.

20 . Val Larsen and Newell D. Wright, “Theosis in the Book of Mormon: The Work and Glory of the Father, Mother and Son, and Holy Ghost,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 56 (2023): 283, 290, 293, 296, 304, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/theosis-in-the-book-of-mormon
-the-work-and-glory-of-the-father-mother-and-son-and-holy-ghost/.

21 . Bokovoy, “Christ and Covenants,” 45.

22 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 233.

23 . Rappleye, “Serpents of Fire and Brass,” 247.

24 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent,” 133–34.

25 . Solomon Caesar Malan, The Book of Adam and Eve, Also Called the Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan, (London and Edinburgh: Williams and Norgate, 1882), 216.

26 . M. D. Johnson, “Life of Adam and Eve,” in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, ed. James H. Charlesworth (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1983), 2:277–79, 283–84.

27 . Gaye Strathearn, “The Overlooked Epistle of Jude,” in Shedding Light on the New Testament: Acts–Revelation, ed. Ray L. Huntington, Frank F. Judd Jr., and David M. Whitchurch (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2009), 227–46, rsc.byu.edu/shedding-light-new-testament
/overlooked-epistle-jude.

28 . “Lucifer,” Guide to the Scriptures, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accessed 26 December 2024, churchofjesuschrist.org/study
/scriptures/gs/lucifer.

29 . Merriam-Webster, s.v. “Perdition,” accessed 26 December 2024, merriam
-webster.com/dictionary/perdition.

30 . Sarah Fisher, “Satan: ADVERSARY Is Not a Name,” Hebrew Word Lessons (blog), 16 June 2019, hebrewwordlessons.com/2019/06/16/satan-adversary
-is-not-a-name/.

31 . Julie M. Smith, “Paradoxes in Paradise,” in Adam S. Miller, ed., Fleeing the Garden: Reading Genesis 2–3 (Provo, UT: Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, 2017), 16n52.

32 . Andrew C. Skinner, “Savior, Satan, and Serpent: The Duality of a Symbol in the Scriptures,” in The Disciple as Scholar: Essays on Scripture and the Ancient World in Honor of Richard Lloyd Anderson, ed. Stephen D. Ricks, Donald W. Parry, and Andrew H. Hedges (Provo, UT: Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 2000), 370.

33 . Skinner, “Savior, Satan, and Serpent,” 370.

34 . Skinner, “Savior, Satan, and Serpent,” 370.

35 . Sarah Fisher, “Sheol: the GRAVE? Gehenna? Hades? HELL?” Hebrew Word Lessons (blog), 27 October 2019, hebrewwordlessons.com/2019/10/27
/sheol-the-grave-gehenna-hades-hell/.

36 . Ira Spar, “Mesopotamian Deities,” Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, April 2009, metmuseum.org/toah/hd/deit/hd
_deit.htm.

37 . Christopher B. Hays, “Chirps from the Dust: The Affliction of Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4:30 in Its Ancient Near Eastern Context,” Journal of Biblical Literature 126, no. 2 (2007): 310.

38 . Hays, “Chirps from the Dust,” 310.

39 . Hays, “Chirps from the Dust,” 316, 324.

40 . Lewis Bayles Paton, “The Hebrew Idea of the Future Life, III: Babylonian Influence in the Doctrine of Sheol,” The Biblical World 35, no. 3 (March 1910): 164, jstor.org/stable/3141464.

41 . Ronning, “Curse on the Serpent.”

42 . James Hamilton, “The Skull Crushing Seed of the Woman: Inner-Biblical Interpretation of Genesis 3:15,” The Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 10, no. 2 (Summer 2006): 30–54.

43 . Brian A. Verrett, The Serpent in Samuel: A Messianic Motif (Eugene, OR: Resource Publications, 2020).

44 . Gordon J. Wenham, Word Biblical Commentary, vol. 1, Genesis 1–15 (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1987), 80.

45 . Noel Hudson, “The Seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman in the Standard Works,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 63 (2025), 1–50, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-seed-of
-the-serpent-and-the-seed-of-the-woman-in-the-standard-works/.

46 . “Isaiah 29,” Pulpit Commentary, Bible Hub, accessed 26 December 2024, biblehub.com/commentaries/pulpit/isaiah/29.htm.

47 . “Amos 5,” Pulpit Commentary, Bible Hub, accessed 26 December 2024, biblehub.com/commentaries/pulpit/amos/5.htm.

48 . Noel Hudson, “The Chains of Hell, the Bands of Death and the Seed Motif,” forthcoming.

49 . Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834), sacred-texts.com/bib/cmt/barnes
/isa008.htm.

50 . Hudson, “Seed of the Serpent.”

51 . Skinner, “Savior, Satan, and Serpent,” 366.

52 . Skinner, “Savior, Satan, and Serpent,” 369.

53 . Diane E. Wirth, “Quetzalcoatl, the Maya Maize God, and Jesus Christ,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 11, no. 1 (July 2002): 7–13, scholarsarchive
.byu.edu/jbms/vol11/iss1/3.

54 . Wirth, “Quetzalcoatl,” 15.

55 . Hudson, “The Chains of Hell.”

Perspectives on the Soteriological Problem of Evil: Nuancing the “Universalist” Theologies of Henri de Lubac and Joseph Smith

Timothy Gervais

Abstract: Since the discovery of the new world by Christian European explorers during the age of discovery, the increasingly global community of the modern age has confronted Christian theologians with difficult soteriological questions. These questions have caused many Christian adherents to abandon conceptions of a uniquely Christian salvation in favor of theological positions of religious pluralism. Other Christian theologians have confronted these issues through creative inclusivist theological constructs that expand the offer of salvation to those who may not have professed Christianity in their mortal life. These inclusivist theologies are uniquely suited to address modern concerns about the salvation of non-believers in a largely un-Christian world, while still maintaining the exclusive Christian claim that salvation comes only through Christ. The inclusivist theologies of Catholic theologian Henri de Lubac and Joseph Smith are investigated and nuanced to display how they maintain a uniquely Christian view of salvation, while expanding traditional conceptions of who will receive access to salvific grace.

The question of the fate of those who have died not hearing of Christ appears to be rising to a climatic pinnacle in the global village of the modern epoch. As has been observed by Jonathan Wong:

Much has been said about the rise of the global village, and the vast movements of people across oceans and continents have led to an increasing diversity in the populations of our cities around the world. This has led to a greater awareness of the multiplicity of cultures, practices, and faith traditions in what was once the cradle of Christendom in the West. . . . A particularly vexing issue is the whole matter of the Christian understanding of salvation, especially in light of the many people who remain outside this faith tradition. The main way in which this question is phrased is, “How can the traditional Christian understanding of salvation as being available only to some (whether it be through membership in the church, or through an explicit profession of faith) be reconciled with the vast numbers of people who are of non-Christian religions?” In simpler terms, the question is, “Who can be saved?”1

The study of who can be saved is known as “soteriology,” and since the age of discovery there has been a veritable explosion of Christian theological proposals on the subject. The modern Christian world through adoption and promulgation has, by and large, acknowledged universalist or inclusivist soteriological models as the most suitable formulations for the contemporary individual.2

Loosely defined, Christian universalist theologies are those that maintain a doctrine of universal reconciliation, or that most, if not all, of humankind will ultimately be reconciled to God regardless of professed faith. Unfortunately, un-nuanced universalist theologies often stray deeply into the realm of soteriological pluralism. Soteriological pluralism has been defined by one writer as the view that

All religions are essentially the same, with similar ends, and are equally valid. . . . In essence, pluralism posits that because diverse religious claims now stand side by side in the marketplace, it would be ignorant and insensitive to elevate one faith tradition over another. Therefore the only way forward is to put everyone on the same level and to equalize all truth claims.3

This trend is worrisome for many, as pluralist theologies have often led to a rejection or marginalization of conventional formulations about a host of theological subjects, including moral or ritual stipulations found in traditional Christian dogma (such as the requirement of baptism for salvation; see John 3:5). While one might debate the exegetical soundness of universalist theologies, which often override the predominantly exclusive tone of the New Testament, there can be no question that the love of God upon which such theologies are based is deeply scriptural. Indeed, both critics and proponents of universalism often accuse each other of misreading or ignoring large sections of the biblical text. As such, theological formulations are often determined not by the content of the text itself, but instead by the a priori theological, political, or philosophical considerations brought to bear on such texts.

Christian inclusivist theologies, while similar to their universalist counterparts, posit the possibility of salvation for Christians and non-Christians alike, but maintain that this salvation is mediated by Christ alone. Inclusivist theologies also often maintain that although one belief system is “true” (Christianity), there are latent truths found in most faiths, and that an individual’s salvation may in some way depend upon their response to the truths they have been given within their own tradition. Consequently, some of the most popular or influential theologies among the religiously committed Christians are universal in their offer of salvation but acknowledge that not all individuals will take advantage of that offer. These are the inclusivist theologies mentioned above, ones which hold in careful balance both exclusive and universal scriptural passages.

Depending on the theological leanings of those who oppose them, these inclusivist theologies are frequently criticized as being either too broad or too limiting in their offer of salvation. This is possibly why there is some ambiguity in the terms universalist and inclusivist. Rarely are carefully formulated theologies so easily categorized when dealing with the immensely complex subject of the salvation of souls. Ultimately it is only the extreme ends of the doctrinal spectrum that are easily defined. Most theologies fall somewhere in the middle, in a more or less inclusivist vein.

The goal of this work is to present the soteriology of two influential theologians of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: Joseph Smith and Henri de Lubac. Both exhibit highly refined versions of inclusivism but have often been labeled universalist, or even pluralist, by their critics. Despite these critiques, both have been tremendously influential in shaping the modern theological landscape. Their theologies exhibit striking similarities in their view of the universality of Christ’s Atonement, their belief that all mankind will be given equal access to salvific grace, and their insistence that salvation comes uniquely through Christ’s established church. Careful examination also exposes significant differences in their approach to the soteriological question.

Historical Background

Criticisms of the Christian view of salvation being mediated solely through Christ were raised as early as the fourth century AD by the philosopher Porphyry:

If Christ . . . declares himself to be the Way of salvation, the Grace and the Truth, and affirms that in Him alone, and only to souls believing in Him, is the way of return to God, what has become of men who lived in the many centuries before Christ came? . . . What, then, has become of such an innumerable multitude of souls, who were in no wise blameworthy, seeing that He in whom alone saving faith can be exercised had not yet favoured men with His advent?4

This critique has continued to confront Christians through the modern age, and has come to be known as “the soteriological problem of evil.” Robert Millet phrases this question succinctly:

The soteriological problem of evil might be stated simply as follows: If in fact Christ is the only name by which salvation comes . . . and if, as we have seen, the majority of the human race will go to their graves without ever having heard of Christ in this life, how can God be considered just or merciful? 5

Despite nearly seventeen centuries of theological reflections on the subject, Porphyry’s question, or questions similar to it, remain “far and away . . . the most-asked apologetic question on U.S. college campuses.”6

Regardless of modern discomfort with the doctrine, there can be no question that the fundamental message of traditional Christianity is one of exclusive salvation by and through the central figure of Jesus Christ:

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me (John 14:6). Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it (Matthew 7:13:14). For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (John 3:16–18; see also Romans 1:16; Acts 4:12; Romans 10:9–15; 1 Timothy 2:5; Hebrews 9:27; 1 John 5:11–12)

It would not be an overstatement to suggest that the soteriological problem of evil is one of the most critical theological questions faced by modern Christians, who contend “with the reality that their fundamental conviction of salvation being mediated uniquely and exclusively through Jesus Christ is widely perceived as being parochial, intolerant, or even unconscionable.”7

Porphyry’s argument does not seem to have been given the same weight anciently as it is given today. Augustine’s response to the critique was a reversal of Porphyry’s argument upon veneration of the Roman pantheon, and largely took for granted that a majority of mankind would be unable to attain salvation:

To these statements we answer by requiring those who make them to tell us, in the first place, whether the sacred rites, which we know to have been introduced into the worship of their gods at times which can be ascertained, were or were not profitable to men. If they say that these were of no service for the salvation of men, they unite with us in putting them down, and confess that they were useless. . . . If, on the other hand, they defend these rites, and maintain that they were wise and profitable institutions, what, I ask, has become of those who died before these were instituted? for they were defrauded of the saving and profitable efficacy which these possessed. If, however, it be said that they could be cleansed from guilt equally well in another way, why did not the same way continue in force for their posterity? What use was there for instituting novelties in worship.8

Augustine’s thought was tremendously influential in the subsequent centuries, and his views that hell is punitive and eternal appear to have been widely adopted by the western Christian mainstream.9 The lack of concern towards the un-evangelized shown by Augustine and other subsequent Christian theologians can in some ways be attributed to the unprecedented growth the movement experienced during its first three hundred years. By the year 300 AD, there were probably as many as six million Christians in the Roman empire, roughly ten percent of the total population.10 The astronomical evangelical success the movement experienced in its early years generally stymied overly creative doctrinal responses to the soteriological problem, as the missionary impulse of the young movement was widely viewed as a sufficient response to the issue of a largely un-Christian world. The subsequent Edict of Milan in 313 AD (which outlawed hostilities toward Christians within the Roman Empire) and the Edict of Thessalonica in 380 AD (which ordered all Roman citizens to profess Christianity) increased the already dizzying growth of the Christian movement.11

The swift evangelical progress made by Christianity after these edicts resulted in something of a “theological stagnation” during the subsequent centuries on the subject of the salvation of unbelievers. This is not to say that theologians did not consider and propose solutions to the issue during this time. However, the scope of their proposals often failed to address the truly daunting number of individuals who would never hear the message of Christ. Concepts of deathbed revelation for particularly “virtuous pagans” provided solutions to the issue but on a much smaller scale than the formulations of the great universalist or inclusivist theologians that would come in later centuries. Such propositions, although providing a means by which select individuals might escape the circumstances which had consigned them to endless punishment, still took at face value the belief that a vast majority of mankind would ultimately not be saved.

By the early fifteenth century, Western European Christians had a comfortable view of the progress of salvific knowledge throughout the world: Europe was predominantly Christian, the Jews had long since rejected Christ and would ultimately be corrected in the eschaton, and Islamic peoples were openly hostile towards Christianity. These conditions lent themselves to a widespread belief that the gospel had largely been promulgated to all the peoples of the earth in fulfilment of Christ’s prophecy found in Mathew 24:14. The Papal Encyclical Superna caelestis is strongly indicative of this mindset. Issued on 14 April 1482, by Pope Sixtus IV to Canonize St. Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, it evidences a “fortress mentality” and effectively states that the primary mission of the church is to maintain its current status against all potential intrusions:

Wherefore We require and warn each and every person constituted in dignity, in so far as Our present letters, being solemnly published, to exhort them by all the clergy and people of their cities, dioceses and parishes, that God Himself, from whom all good things proceed, be beseeched humbly, that . . . He might guard the Church Militant, the Apostolic Faith and all the faithful of Christ from the incursions of the pagans and other infidels and heretics and always protect and defend Her from all dangers.12

It was not until European encounters with the Americas began in the late fifteenth century that Christianity was confronted with circumstances that made it difficult to maintain a simplistic view of Christian exclusivity.13 Discovery of a significant portion of the world’s population who had not heard of Christ challenged many common theological beliefs, and resulted in a renewed emphasis on missionary efforts to the un-evangelized. Contrast the encyclical Inter Caetera issued only eleven years after Superna caelestis, one year after Columbus’s successful voyage:

Among other works well pleasing to the Divine Majesty and cherished of our heart, this assuredly ranks highest, that in our times especially the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself.14

The discovery of vast groups of non-Christian peoples necessitated both an increase of evangelism as well as a fresh theological consideration of the salvation of the unbeliever. New theological proposals began early in the sixteenth century with Luis de Molina’s proposition of the “middle-knowledge” of God (scientia media).15 Molina asserted that God has knowledge of counter-factual conditions and how individuals would respond if those conditions were true.16 Middle-knowledge thus could theoretically be used to defend two very opposite soteriological positions: 1) God has a perfect knowledge of how an individual would respond if they were given a chance to hear the gospel; consequently, God would be able to justly save or damn them regardless of whether they had actually heard the gospel in mortality; and 2) because God had prior knowledge of how individuals would respond upon hearing of Christ, he created a world in which only those who would accept the gospel would hear the message. The first position could be used to support either a highly inclusivist theology, or a theology of elected exclusivism. The second obviously supports a highly exclusive theological formulation. While not inherently an inclusivist position, Molina’s formulations began a reassessment of the soteriological issue, and could easily be used to support a more generous view of God’s grace.

Theological formulations since Molina have increasingly trended in a universalist or inclusivist direction, seeing their most rapid expansion in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. As noted by Baukham, “since 1800 . . . universal salvation, either as hope or as dogma, is now so widely accepted that many theologians assume it virtually without argument.”17 The most enduring of these inclusivist theologies creatively offer a hopeful view of the possibility of salvation for unbelievers, while not drifting into the realm of soteriological pluralism and moral relativism by diminishing the role of Christian faith and practice in salvation. Outright universalism has been repeatedly rejected by the Christian mainstream.18 This is precisely because of the tendency of universalist theologies to diminish the necessity of Christian faith.

While Joseph Smith has often been mislabeled a “universalist” by his critics, his theology resides firmly in the “inclusivist” camp and can be viewed as a reconciliation of universalist and exclusivist principles. Interestingly, one of the most influential Catholic Theologians of the twentieth century, Henri de Lubac, has also been accused of universalism. De Lubac’s theology, while more abstract than the restored gospel, bears many similarities to Smith’s salvific vision. A careful investigation of both de Lubac and Smith shows that while maintaining the possibility of salvation for all, both present a theology that is far more nuanced than the oversimplified, pejorative universalist label implies.

The Theology of Henri de Lubac

The problem of the “salvation of unbelievers” has confronted the Christian conscience in tragic guise as a consequence of successive discoveries in geography, history, and pre-history which, while they immeasurably increase the sum of human achievement, seem to diminish in proportion the achievement of Christ. . . . Without closing our eyes to the miserable state of many who are “in the shadow of death,” we consider, nevertheless, with St. Irenaeus, that the Son from the very beginning and in every part of the world, gives a more or less obscure revelation of the Father to every creature, and that he can be the “Salvation of those who are born outside the Way.” We believe, with St. Cyprian, St. Hilary and St. Ambrose, that the divine Sun of Justice shines on all and for all. We teach, with St. John Chrysostom, that grace is diffused everywhere and that there is no soul that cannot feel its attraction. With Origen, St. Jerome and St. Cyril of Alexandria we refuse to assert that any man is born without Christ. And, lastly, we willingly allow, with St. Augustine, the strictest of the Fathers, that divine mercy was always at work among all peoples, and that even the pagans have had their “hidden saints” and their prophets.19

Kevin Hughes argued that in order to properly contextualize the theological thought of Henri de Lubac, one must be cognizant of de Lubac’s life experiences, his background, and particularly his involvement with the two World Wars.20

Henri de Lubac was born on 20 February 1896 to a devout Catholic family in northern France. Evidence of theological interest for de Lubac began as early as the age of 17, when he was inducted as a novitiate in the Society of Jesus. One year later, with the outbreak of World War I, de Lubac was drafted into the French army and sent to fight in “some of the most devastating and destructive battles of the war.”21 Entering the war only one year into his formal religious training deeply affected the theological development of the young de Lubac. Consequently, de Lubac’s later theological contemplations seem to be “an attempt to re-envision the very project of theology itself, to confront the crisis of loss and fragmentation that the First World War provoked with the practical wisdom of the Catholic tradition, a wisdom that does not shrink from the war’s fragmentation of meaning, but meets it with the paradox and mystery of faith in the crucified Christ.”22 De Lubac believed the Christian life was “a meaningful and relevant response to life after the war” because of its ability to reestablish a lost unity between all mankind.23 Commentators have thus classified de Lubac’s theology as “social” or “communal,” in that it emphasizes the role of Christian community in the salvation of souls. De Lubac’s “social” or “communal” theology has been summed up well by Patrick Cruitt:

Humanity’s unity has its origin in nature, for human beings are one on the basis of their creation in the Imago Dei. Since God is one, humanity is also one. Therefore, a human being’s individual religious vocation is not simply a mystic ascent toward unity in God but also a call to community. This community comes into existence not through human striving but in response to the divine calling toward salvation in Christ. According to this understanding of humanity’s vocation, sin is both a “breach with God” and “at the same time a disruption of human unity.” Through Original Sin, separation entered into the created order, and through Christ and the Church original unity is restored.24

If World War I was foundational for the development of de Lubac’s theology of the spiritual unity of mankind, World War II was equally formative in his belief that the world faced issues that were spiritual at their core, issues that could only be solved by a turn to Christianity:

[The battle with Fascism] is no longer a problem of the historical, metaphysical, political, or social order. It is a spiritual problem. It is the total human problem. Today, the fight against Christianity . . . is aimed directly at the heart. The Christian concept of life, Christian spirituality, the inner attitude which, above any particular act or any external gesture, defines the Christian: this is what is at issue.25

The horrors of World War II only served to strengthen de Lubac’s theological vision: Thus, what “de Lubac believed before the war already to be important to the renewal of Christian faith from within became a critical resource for the Christian stand against Nazism, and, after the war, for the Christian approach to the world in general.”26 As de Lubac confronted the realities of Nazi Jewish extermination, his social theology of a unified human race was tested in a far more concrete manner than ever before. De Lubac was faced with the idea that because Jews were not a part of the Christian faith, they went from the fires of Hitler’s death camps directly to the fires of hell. It is in this context that de Lubac formulated his vision of a reunification of the human race, a unity that began first and foremost with a reconciliation of Jew and Gentile through Christ:

Such, in any case, in the earthly order, is that tragic enmity, symbolic of so many others, between Jew and Gentile. Christ came to bring them to unity and peace. . . . Raised up on the Cross, his arms stretched out, he is to gather together the disunited portions of creation, “breaking down the middle wall of partition” between them. 27

De Lubac maintained his social theology and urged Christian support of the Jewish people by showing a direct and indispensable relationship between Christianity and Israel. “More specifically, de Lubac argued for a vigorous defense of the unity of the Scriptures against those who claimed to distinguish between a ‘Semite Old Testament’ and an ‘Aryan New Testament.’”28 To de Lubac “the conjunction of the two testaments was woven [as] a single vesture for the Word; together they formed one body, and to rend this body by rejecting the Jewish books was no less a sacrilege than to rend the body of the Church by schism.”29 He later opined, “No Christian must let himself go so far as to think that a movement of withdrawal with respect to the Old Testament would leave his faith intact.”30

De Lubac’s insistence on a deep spiritual connection existing between Jews and Christians was, in many ways, anticipated by the “covenant theology” revealed to Joseph Smith. Perhaps greater than any other modern theologian, Smith reclaimed in a Christian context the ancient covenants made to the Jewish patriarchs. By reestablishing and rearticulating Christianity’s relationship to Judaism, the gospel as restored through Joseph Smith anticipated and provided a cure for the modern crisis of the holocaust, close to a hundred years before de Lubac’s identification of its root cause.

Nazi appropriation and warping of Christian doctrine in their persecution of the Jews made de Lubac all the more inclined to “spiritually arm” modern Catholics with a proper understanding of the Christian faith.31 During the Nazi occupation of France, at great personal risk, de Lubac began to produce and publish two book series whose focus was the renewal of the Church and recovery of patristic sources. “The first, Sources Chrétiennes, produced editions of patristic texts. . . . The second, Théologie, offered theoretical discussions of traditional Christian scriptural and doctrinal principles.”32 De Lubac’s “zeal to bring Sources Chrétiennes and Théologie to press in the face of Nazi occupation came from [his] . . . conviction that these deep patristic and scriptural resources were all the more vital to a church faced with persecution.”33

De Lubac’s efforts to recover patristic sources ultimately grew into the Catholic theological movement known as Ressourcement, or a “return to the sources.” Ressourcement represented a revitalization of the study of what de Lubac viewed as the basic building blocks of Christianity: the biblical text, the liturgy, and patristic writings. By reincorporating these texts into theological study, de Lubac believed theology would be freed from the bonds of intellectualism and again made accessible and relevant to the modern Catholic laity.34 De Lubac said of the movement: “to the degree that we have let ourselves lose it, we have to rediscover the spirit of Christianity. To do so, we have to steep ourselves in its sources.”35 To de Lubac, these sources were primarily the writings of the early fathers of the Christian movement.36 De Lubac and other theologians involved in the Ressourcement movement believed that these writings had been neglected in the formulation of modern Catholic thought, instead being usurped by medieval works, primarily those of Thomas Aquinas.37 It should come as no surprise, then, that de Lubac’s soteriology mirrored more closely that of the early fathers and was more generous than the post-Augustine and post-Aquinas models favored by the majority of theologians at the time. It is significant that, while the soteriological vision of Joseph Smith is often criticized for its departure from the Augustinian view of a two-part heaven and hell, de Lubac’s reliance on the earliest Christian sources led him to a similar rejection of traditional soteriological formulations. De Lubac, who is known for understanding the “spirit” of earliest Christianity better than any other modern theologian, articulated a theological vision that echoed Joseph Smith’s more closely than traditional Christian conceptions.

The primary focus of de Lubac’s “new theology,” as it was derisively labeled by his critics, was “a sharp critique of the regnant neo-Thomist separation between nature and the supernatural.”38 The prevailing Catholic theology prior to de Lubac relied on a separation between “pure nature” and grace, or human nature and the supernatural. As articulated by David Grumett:

Nature and grace were, according to the reigning NeoThomist consensus, separate and discontinuous, with nature regarded as complete in itself and not dependent on divine action for its preservation. This “pure nature” was, indeed, unable to enjoy any form of relation with God, neither of participated being nor of knowledge, because its end, appetite, and powers were seen as solely natural. 39

In essence, because fallen human nature has no inherent connection to the divine, an eternal separation from God is the natural, and ultimately just, end of humanity without God’s intervention. De Lubac was vehement in his rejection of the notion of pure nature, insisting that every man had a natural desire for God, a grace intrinsic to human nature that urged all men to a pursuit of the beatific vision.40 This conception in many ways mirrors Joseph Smith’s description of the light of Christ, which is “in all things, which giveth life to all things, which is the law by which all things are governed” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:13).

De Lubac’s soteriology is inseparably connected to his construal of the relationship between nature and grace, and rests upon the “organic relation between . . . Christology and anthropology.”41 This relationship is embodied in de Lubac’s conception that salvation through Christ fulfills or completes a natural created dignity (or grace) inherent in all humanity. This dignity is a created “natural unity” of the human race as individuals bear within their soul the same image of God:

Was it not shown to them in Genesis, where it was taught that God made man in his own image? For the divine image does not differ from one individual to another: in all it is the same image. The same mysterious participation in God which causes the soul to exist effects at one and the same time the unity of spirits among themselves. Whence comes the notion . . . of one spiritual family intended to form the one city of God.42

Ultimately, this natural unity is brought to fullness and perfected through the sacrifice of Christ, which binds all mankind together as the “Mystical Body of Christ.”43 The ultimate unification (i.e. salvation) of humankind, according to de Lubac, must be seen as a fundamental desire of the triune God, and is the ultimate purpose of both the Church’s existence as well as Christ’s sacrifice.44 Sin then, is the antithesis of this unity, and is a disruption of either humanity’s unity with God, or the unity of the human race with itself. Although those two are separate classifications of sin, de Lubac is careful to point out that a disruption of unity with God ultimately results in a disruption of the unity of the human race. Likewise, disruption of human unity leads to a disruption of unity with God. Hence, for de Lubac, implicit in an individuals’ endeavor to seek salvation and overcome sin is a much grander necessity to seek the reunification of mankind. To de Lubac, individual “redemption” is “a work of restoration [that] will appear to us by that very fact as the recovery of lost unity—the recovery of supernatural unity of man with God, but equally of the unity of men among themselves.”45 God’s salvific purposes will thus not be complete until “every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess” (Romans 14:11) in total unification: “We must surely affirm” maintains de Lubac, “that the one and only Church will remain incomplete until the last day. We may conclude with Bossuet: ‘Jesus Christ will not be whole until the number of the saints is complete.’”46 In this way, de Lubac believes that a distinctly Christian soteriology must maintain the possibility that all may be saved. In the words of de Lubac: “The human race is one. By our fundamental nature and still more in virtue of our common destiny we are members of the same body. Now the life of the members comes from the life of the body. How, then, can there be salvation for the members if, per impossibile, the body itself were not saved?”47

In conjunction with promoting a significantly broader view of humanity’s access to Christ’s salvific grace than many traditional formulations of his time, de Lubac also sought to expand the scope of that grace. De Lubac envisioned Christ’s sacrifice as one that covers every human blemish, thus reclaiming the whole of human nature.48 De Lubac, then, maintains the universalist or inclusivist belief in unlimited atonement, or that Christ’s Atonement was on behalf of all mankind not solely the Christian elect. De Lubac illustrates this belief throughout many of his works, but perhaps nowhere more clearly than in Catholicism:

In making a human nature, it is human nature that he united to himself, that he enclosed in himself, and it is the latter, whole and entire, that in some sort he uses as a body. . . . Whole and entire he will bear it then to Calvary, whole and entire he will raise it from the dead, whole and entire he will save it. Christ the Redeemer does not offer salvation merely to each one; he effects it, he is himself the salvation of the whole, and for each one salvation consists in a personal ratification of his original “belonging” to Christ, so that he be not cast out, cut off from this Whole.49

It is from passages such as this that many misinterpret de Lubac’s universal offer of salvation as an actualization of universal salvation.50 However, de Lubac carefully distinguishes between the offer of salvation and its actualization: “We are concerned here . . . with the possibility of salvation, and not with its actual realization; with the divine summons and not with the human answer to it.”51

De Lubac maintains that “No soul of good will lacks the concrete means of salvation, in the fullest sense of the word. There is no man, no ‘unbeliever,’ whose supernatural conversion to God is not possible from the dawn of reason onward.”52 This is in large measure due to the created “grace” or “revelation of the Father” mentioned earlier, that is inherent in each person and naturally inclines them towards the divine: “The Son, from the very beginning and in every part of the world, gives a more or less obscure revelation of the Father to every creature, and that he can be the ‘Salvation of those who are born outside the Way.’”53

To de Lubac, the universal offer of salvation is extended to humanity as a whole, but the condition or actualization of that salvation is dependent upon an individual’s response to that invitation. While Christ has already effected the “salvation of the whole,” realization of that salvation comes from an individual’s decision to “[ratify] his original ‘belonging’ to Christ.” Personal salvation is thus effectuated and dependent upon an individual’s choosing to have unity or “become one with” the communal whole of humanity symbolized by the “Mystical Body of Christ.” Indeed, to de Lubac, traditional Christian rituals such as baptism “are the means of salvation,” precisely because they are
instruments of unity [that] . . . make real, renew or strengthen man’s union with Christ [and] by that very fact they make real, renew or strengthen his union with the Christian community. And this second aspect of the sacraments, the social aspect, is so intimately bound up with the first that it can often be said, indeed in certain cases it must be said, that it is through his union with the community that the Christian is united to Christ. . . . Just as redemption and revelation, even though they reach every individual soul, are none the less fundamentally not individual but social, so grace which is produced and maintained by the sacraments does not set up a purely individual relationship between the soul and God or Christ; rather does each individual receive such grace in proportion as he is joined, socially, to that one body whence flows this saving life-stream.54

While de Lubac nowhere explicitly states that baptism is not a requirement for salvation, it is certainly implicit in his theological conception. To de Lubac, baptism allows admission into “The kingdom of God,” (i.e. the Catholic faith), but does not grant salvation per se. Salvation, or participation in the Beatific vision, comes from a unity with Christ and humanity that is not necessarily dependent upon one’s relationship to the visible Church. Because all humanity is created with both a desire and a capacity for unity, de Lubac allows for the possibility of an individual attaining a salvific level of unity outside the Christian faith. This is perhaps the area of largest divergence between the soteriology of de Lubac and Joseph Smith. While de Lubac was capable of seeing the necessity of an expanded salvific vision, he was incapable of reconciling this expansion with a strict adherence to traditional ritual requirements such as baptism. In order to expand the Christian offer of salvation, de Lubac’s theology required a redefinition of the role of baptism in salvation.

De Lubac’s response to criticisms that this salvific vision diminished the need for the Church was to re-envision the salvific scope of the Catholic faith itself. While individual salvation might be possible outside of the visible Catholic church, “salvation for this body, for humanity consists in its receiving the form of Christ, and that is possible only through the Catholic Church. . . . In her alone mankind is refashioned and recreated.”55 The Catholic Church is then less about the salvation of individuals and is instead concerned primarily with the “corporate destiny of man.” It functions as the only banner under which ultimate unity can and will be achieved.

Outside Christianity humanity can doubtless be raised in an exceptional manner to certain spiritual heights, and it is our duty—one that is perhaps too often neglected—to explore these heights that we may give praise to the God of mercies for them. . . . But the topmost summit is never reached, and there is risk of being the farther off from it by mistaking for it some other outlying peak. . . . A critical judgement, not of individual souls—for their precise situation in relation to the Kingdom is never known save to God alone—but of objective systems as found in a society and as offering material for rational examination, shows that there is some essential factor missing from every religious “invention” that is not a following of Christ. There is something lacking, for example, in Buddhist charity: it is not Christian charity. Something is lacking in the spirituality of the great Hindu mystics: it is not the spirituality of St. John of the Cross. . . . Outside Christianity all is not necessarily corrupt; far from it . . . but what does not remain puerile is always in peril of going astray, or, however high it climbs, of ultimate collapse. Outside Christianity nothing attains its end, that only end, toward which, unknowingly, all human desires, all human endeavors, are in movement: the embrace of God in Christ. . . . Outside Christianity, again, humanity tries to collect its members together into unity. . . . Only that Ideal which Christ gave to his Church is pure enough and strong enough—for it did not issue from the brain of man, but is living and is called the Spirit of Christ—to inspire men to work for their own spiritual unity, as only the sacrifice of his Blood can bring their labor to fruition. It is only through the leavening of the Gospel within the Catholic community and by the aid of the Holy Spirit that this “divine Humanity” can be established.56

De Lubac’s creative re-envisioning of the role of unity, baptism, and the Church in the salvation of souls widely expanded traditional Catholic conceptions of who might be saved. The universality of the offer of salvation within de Lubac’s theology, coupled with the actualization of salvation to non-Christians has often been misconstrued as universalism. Critics of de Lubac have argued that allowing for “implicit Christians” of other faiths ultimately removes the necessity of physically uniting oneself to the Church, becoming effectively, an unabashed soteriological pluralism.57 However, to suggest that de Lubac endorses soteriological pluralism, or even unconditional universalism, would be to misrepresent de Lubac’s entire theological vision. De Lubac consistently and repeatedly maintains that the Catholic Church is “by divine intention and Christ’s institution the only normal way of salvation.”58 He maintains these seemingly contradictory views by articulating that even individual salvation that takes place “outside the [visible] Church,” is ultimately derived from an individual’s latent catholicity, or their “very real though indirect and more often hidden bond with her [the Church’s] body.”59 To de Lubac, there is no salvation outside “the Church” properly understood, because “the Church” transcends the historical organization and encompasses all “soul[s] amenable to the suggestions of grace.”60

Of course the method of this salvation will differ according to whether the unbeliever has or has not encountered the Church. In the second case the only condition on which his salvation is possible is that he should be already a Catholic as it were by anticipation, since the Church is the “natural place” to which a soul amenable to the suggestions of grace spontaneously tends . . . . Far different is the case of the unbeliever who comes in contact with the Church—as long as she is shown to him in her true likeness, he has a strict obligation actually to enter her fold. . . . Those who do not know the Church are saved by her, therefore, in such a way that they incur the obligation of belonging to her even outwardly directly they come to know her.61

Thus, are readers left to puzzle out the particularities of de Lubac’s paradoxical soteriology. On the one hand, “it is by the Church and by the Church alone that you will be saved,” on the other, “the method of this salvation will differ according to whether the unbeliever has or has not encountered the Church.”62 If de Lubac’s thought seems paradoxical, it is intentionally so, left open ended so that his soteriology matches the “paradox of paradoxes . . . the Crucified God.”63

In many ways de Lubac’s pursuit of a more generous soteriology is constrained by his own tradition. While he is capable of discerning in the earliest Christian sources God’s desire and capacity to save all humanity, the traditional formulations available to de Lubac failed to offer a concrete method by which those who did not have access to the Church could be saved. As such de Lubac is unable to articulate his intuition in a systematic way. While De Lubac’s theological vision laudably synthesizes early Christian traditions to offer a hopeful and generous view of salvation, he is ultimately unable to go beyond the boundaries of traditional dogma in his pursuit of a more robust soteriological model. As it stands, de Lubac is more concerned with establishing “the possibility of salvation,” rather than offering a clear explanation of how non-Christians, or even non-Catholics, will be saved. In many ways de Lubac appears to be “kept from the truth” only “because [he] know[s] not where to find it” (Doctrine & Covenants 123:12).

The Revelations of Joseph Smith

The great Jehovah contemplated the whole of the events connected with the earth, pertaining to the plan of salvation, before it rolled into existence, or ever “the morning stars sang together” for joy; the past, the present, and the future were and are, with Him, one eternal “now.” . . . He comprehended the fall of man, and his redemption; He knew the plan of salvation and pointed it out. . . . He knows the situation of both the living and the dead, and has made ample provision for their redemption, according to their several circumstances, and the laws of the kingdom of God, whether in this world, or in the world to come.64

Joseph Smith has long been a controversial figure in the Christian religious landscape.65 His claim to revelatory visions from God, which overturned many traditional tenets of creedal Christianity, is often met with significant consternation from both Catholic and Protestant theologians. Because of this, and the relative obscurity of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, it is rare to find a mainstream Christian theologian who makes a significant effort to understand and objectively evaluate the theological claims presented by Smith.66 However, upon close investigation, the soteriological framework articulated by Joseph Smith is often conceptually compatible with the basic tenets of recent mainstream Christian theological constructions, including those of Henri de Lubac.

Joseph Smith’s soteriology at its most basic may be summed as follows:

1. God desires that all of humanity have an opportunity to be saved,

2. Christ is the only means of salvation, and

3. God provides a way through which each individual has the ability to access God’s salvific grace through Christ.

When put in such stark terms, Smith’s soteriology does not typically incite any particular dismay among most modern Christian theologians. However, the method through which Smith received such knowledge (a physical manifestation of both God the Father and Jesus Christ) often leads mainstream Christians to focus on theological differences rather than on similarities. Such is, unfortunately, often the nature of interdenominational theological dialogue.

Before analyzing Joseph Smith’s soteriological framework, one must address a methodological problem that faces any individual attempting to synthesize his theology. The problem lies in what to make of Joseph Smith’s claims of revelation. Richard Lyman Bushman astutely articulates both the problem and a plausible solution:

A rhetorical problem vexes anyone who writes about the thought of Joseph Smith. Are his ideas to be attributed to him or to God? Some readers will consider it obvious that the revelations came from Joseph Smith’s mind and nowhere else. . . . The most important [response] is that Joseph Smith did not think that way. The signal feature of his life was his sense of being guided by revelation. . . . To blur the distinction—to insist that Smith devised every revelation himself—obscures the very quality that made the Prophet powerful. To get inside the movement, we have to think of Smith as the early Mormons thought of him and as he thought of himself—as a revelator.67

Viewing Smith in this light allows one to better piece together the “chaos of materials prepared by [Smith].”68 As Benjamin Park notes, this is no small feat: “Though they were perhaps a coherent whole in his mind, Smith’s teachings were never presented in a systematic order but rather . . . in ‘flashes and bursts.’ This collection of fragments has left many historians bewildered at the difficulty of presenting a coherent picture of his beliefs.”69 Joseph Smith’s untimely death at the hands of a mob in June 1844 cut short his revelatory efforts at a time when he was arguably at his prophetic height, as “it was not until the last three months of his life that Smith’s sermons started to piece together what had previously been only theological fragments; and in his private teachings, he began to expound these ideas to his closest followers.”70 As such, any attempt to distill Smith’s theological vision is unfortunately subject to interpretation of a variety of scattered texts, similar in fact, to the method required to extract primary elements of de Lubac’s theology.71

Joseph Smith was born shortly after the turn of the century in 1805 to a poor Yankee farm family. He grew up in a time known “for being rife with religious innovation, as numerous new religious movements emerged from the fertile ground of the Second Great Awakening.”72 The theological framework presented by Smith synthesizes or addresses many of the political, social, and religious ideologies of his day, and in many respects, the diverse religious background of his own family. Smith’s extended and immediate family variously belonged to, or were interested in, the New England Congregationalists, Presbyterianism, Universalism, Methodism, and predominantly, unorganized personal religious experience. Despite the varied religious experiences of the group, church attendance in the Smith family was sporadic at best, and religious education largely took place at home.

The soteriological vision revealed to Smith can be viewed as something of a middle road, more austere than the universalism favored by his grandfather, and more generous than the Calvinistic leanings of Presbyterianism to which his mother was inclined. Additionally, Joseph Smith’s formulations were influenced by his early and deeply personal encounter with a “virtuous pagan,” as his older brother Alvin died, unbaptized, in 1823.73 Joseph saw his brother Alvin as being “the noblest of my father’s family . . . [and] one of the noblest of the sons of men.”74 Because of this, it must have been particularly painful when the minister presiding at Alvin’s funeral intimated “that Alvin had gone to hell because of his refusal to attend church.”75 Perhaps unsurprisingly, one of Smith’s most powerful and explicit soteriological visions involved seeing his brother Alvin in the celestial kingdom (Doctrine and Covenants 137:5–6).

In many respects, similar to de Lubac, Smith’s soteriology rests heavily on understanding human nature. However, to properly contextualize Smith’s theology of human nature, one must understand his theological claims about pre-created man. He revealed that man was created spiritually by God, and lived with him as spirits before becoming embodied in the mortal world (Moses 6:51; see also Moses 3:5; Abraham 3:21–24; Alma 13:3; Helaman 14:17; Doctrine and Covenants 38:1; 49:17; 93:29).76 These created spirits were capable of progression and growth, contingent upon their choosing to heed the counsel of God the Father (Doctrine and Covenants 138:56; see also Alma 13:3).

Illuminating early Christian and Jewish tradition, Smith’s revelations elaborated on Satan’s fall from heaven, framing the event as a rebellion of a group of God’s spirit children (Moses 4:1–4; see also Jude 1:6; Revelation 12:9; Abraham 3:21–26). Those who supported God in this heavenly conflict were given, as a reward, the opportunity to come to earth, receive a mortal body, and continue their progression by being tested by mortality (Abraham 3:21–26; see also 2 Nephi 2:21; Alma 12:24, 34:32, 42:10). Those who did not (Satan and his followers) were “thrust down” and have no additional opportunity to progress, and instead have a “place prepared for them . . . which is hell” (Doctrine and Covenants 29:36–38). Those who “do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them,” in mortality will “have glory added upon their heads for ever and ever” (Abraham 3:25–26). Thus, for Joseph Smith, every individual living on the earth has already made a choice in the pre-mortal world to follow God (Abraham 3:26). Smith’s revelations on the cosmological “first act” of the premortal world powerfully restructured traditional frameworks of salvation. By attaching some amount of salvific significance to a premortal decision to follow God, soteriological questions about eternal reward or punishment for humankind were reframed into two parts: 1) salvation from death and hell, primarily associated with choices made in the premortal world, and 2) exaltation in a return to the presence of God, primarily associated with choices made in mortality.

Joseph Smith understood the pre-mortal decision to follow God as pivotal enough to necessitate some eternal reward. The reward is two-fold, and ultimately has ties to a two-part conception of Christ’s universal Atonement (2 Nephi 9:7, 10). The first part of the reward is given to every soul who inhabits the earth, that of a resurrected body akin to Christ’s own (Alma 11:44. See also: 1 Corinthians 15:20–22). In this, Christ’s defeat of death benefits all mankind unconditionally and universally (Alma 40:4; See also John 5:28–29).

The second reward is to inherit some form of eternal glory, and is nearly universal as well. Only those who “denied the Holy Spirit after having received it, and [have] denied the Only Begotten Son of the Father,” will inherit the same punishment as Satan and his followers (Doctrine and Covenants 76:35–38). Smith’s revelations are silent as to the number of individuals who will receive this punishment, but seem to imply the number will be limited. Correspondingly, he maintained that the vast majority of humanity will receive some form of glory, though only the most faithful will receive the highest degree (Doctrine and Covenants 76). The universality of Christ’s Atonement ultimately has overcome the sinful effects of the original fall of Adam and Eve (Doctrine and Covenants 93:38). This is not to say that Smith believed the world was no longer in a fallen state. Sin, death, and sickness, all products of the fall, are still very much present in the world.

Joseph Smith contended that mankind was not born in a state of sin, but incurred sinfulness only through their own decisions. As such, humanity will be judged for their own personal “falls” but have the capacity to overcome those as well through Christ. The concrete reality of exaltation for an individual depends upon one’s moral action in life, as individuals will be judged according to their thoughts, words, deeds, and the desires of their hearts (Doctrine and Covenants 137:9; Mosiah 4:30). Human nature, both in the preexistent state and in mortality, is such that all individuals have the capacity to choose either good or evil (2 Nephi 2:26–27). The universality of Smith’s salvific vision is assisted by a belief in what is termed “the light of Christ” (Doctrine and Covenants 93:2). This light is a created aspect of every human soul and “proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:12). It is “the light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things, which is the law by which all things are governed” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:13). This light is variously associated with a desire for God, and a capacity to discern right from wrong:

The Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil; wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God. . . . And now, my brethren, seeing that ye know the light by which ye may judge, which light is the light of Christ, see that ye do not judge wrongfully; for with that same judgment which ye judge ye shall also be judged. (Moroni 7:16, 18)

As mentioned previously, a similar concept is reflected in de Lubac’s created “grace” or “revelation of the Father” inherent in each person that naturally inclines them towards the divine. Furthermore, de Lubac has also articulated a belief that Christ is “a source of universal light.”77

The universal aspects of Joseph Smith’s soteriological framework are held in careful balance with a staunchly exclusive view of the necessity of Christian faith for exaltation:

And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end. Amen. (2 Nephi 31:21)

Exaltation in the highest degree of eternal glory depends upon an individual “receiv[ing] the testimony of Jesus” and “being baptized after the manner of his burial” (Doctrine and Covenants 76:51). Being baptized “after the manner of his burial” includes the injunction that the ordinance be performed by one having authority given by God:

All the ordinances, systems, and administrations on the earth are of no use to the children of men, unless they are ordained and authorized of God; for nothing will save a man but a legal administrator; for none others will be acknowledged either by God or angels.78

Joseph Smith’s revealed soteriology is so faithful to the biblical injunction “except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God,” that the framework does not include any method for full salvific activity outside of the Church. For Smith, even those in other faiths, who practice what de Lubac would call an “implicit Christianity,” may at some point (often after death) obtain God’s salvific grace through accepting Christ and being vicariously baptized. Otherwise, their claim on salvific grace is limited to the universal aspects of God’s salvation, namely resurrection to a lesser degree of eternal glory.

[Baptism] is a sign and a commandment which God has set for man to enter into His kingdom. Those who seek to enter in any other way will seek in vain; for God will not receive them, neither will the angels acknowledge their works as accepted, for they have not obeyed the ordinances, nor attended to the signs which God ordained for the salvation of man, to prepare him for, and give him a title to, a celestial glory.79

While de Lubac argues a similar point about the necessity of the Church in all salvific progress, de Lubac must maintain his position through something of a pious agnosticism or studious ambiguity as to how salvation may still be obtained through the Church by those who remain outside the Christian fold at death.80 Smith, however, having no loyalty to traditional Christian creedal dogma, and capturing the spirit of earliest Christian tradition, articulated a doctrine of post-mortem evangelization through which deceased persons would be given an opportunity to receive the gospel in the same manner as the living.

Will they all be damned for not obeying the Gospel, when they never heard it? Certainly not. But they will possess the same privilege that we here enjoy, through the medium of the everlasting priesthood, which not only administers on earth, but also in heaven, and the wise dispensations of the great Jehovah.81

Thus came the voice of the Lord unto me, saying: All who have died without a knowledge of this gospel, who would have received it if they had been permitted to tarry, shall be heirs of the celestial kingdom of God; Also all that shall die henceforth without a knowledge of it, who would have received it with all their hearts, shall be heirs of that kingdom; For I, the Lord, will judge all men according to their works, according to the desire of their hearts. And I also beheld that all children who die before they arrive at the years of accountability are saved in the celestial kingdom of heaven. (Doctrine and Covenants 137:7–10)

Similar in many respects to early Christian “harrowing of hell” traditions, Joseph Smith’s conception is more robust due to its universal and ongoing status.82 In conjunction with post-mortem evangelization, Smith received revelation calling for vicarious ritual work for the deceased.83 This revelation was the ultimate key that allowed a perfect harmonizing of the demands of Christian faith and baptism for exaltation with the realities of unequal opportunity throughout history. “A view of these things,” said Smith, “reconciles the Scriptures of truth, justifies the ways of God to man, places the human family upon an equal footing, and harmonizes with every principle of righteousness, justice and truth.”84 For Smith, these revelations leveled the theological playing field, allowing God to judge all mankind against the same standards: their thoughts, words, deeds, and intentions.

Joseph Smith’s conception of the standards of judgement also necessitated a restructuring of the traditional formulation of heaven. Speaking on John 14:2, he said:

There are mansions for those who obey a celestial law, and there are other mansions for those who come short of the law, every man in his own order. “But,” says one, “I believe in one universal heaven and hell, where all go, and are all alike, and equally miserable or equally happy.” What! Where all are huddled together—the honorable, virtuous, and murderers, and whoremongers, when it is written that they shall be judged according to the deeds done in the body? . . .

Paul says, “There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory. So is also the resurrection of the dead” [1 Corinthians 15:41–42].85

For Smith, since nearly all individuals will be rewarded some measure of salvific grace by virtue of the universality of Christ’s Atonement, there must be a delineation between those who were wholly faithful to God’s commands in this life and those who were not. Because there is such a range of levels of commitment to Christ beyond verbal profession, Smith asserted there must be a similar spectrum of reward beyond the traditional bipartite segregation of heaven and hell. Mirroring Paul’s division of resurrected bodies found in 1 Corinthians 15:40–41, Smith’s revelations describe three distinct “kingdoms” akin in relational glory to the relative brightness of the stars, the moon, and the sun (Doctrine and Covenants 76). Exaltation in the highest, or celestial, kingdom is reserved for those who receive salvation in its fullest sense through their strict adherence to Christ’s ritual and moral commandments:

They are they who received the testimony of Jesus, and believed on his name and were baptized after the manner of his burial, being buried in the water in his name, and this according to the commandment which he has given. . . . These shall dwell in the presence of God and his Christ forever and ever. . . . These are they who are just men made perfect through Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, who wrought out this perfect atonement through the shedding of his own blood. These are they whose bodies are celestial, whose glory is that of the sun, even the glory of God, the highest of all, whose glory the sun of the firmament is written of as being typical. (Doctrine and Covenants 76:51–52; 62; 69–70)

The inhabitants of the second kingdom, or the terrestrial world, are individuals who, for various reasons, did not fully embrace Christ:

Behold, these are they who died without law. . . . Who received not the testimony of Jesus in the flesh, but afterwards received it. These are they who are honorable men of the earth, who were blinded by the craftiness of men. These are they who receive of his glory, but not of his fulness. These are they who receive of the presence of the Son, but not of the fulness of the Father. Wherefore, they are bodies terrestrial, and not bodies celestial, and differ in glory as the moon differs from the sun. These are they who are not valiant in the testimony of Jesus; wherefore, they obtain not the crown over the kingdom of our God. (Doctrine and Covenants 76:72; 74–79)

Lastly, the individuals who inherit the telestial world are those who through their actions reject the grace offered them by Christ in the mortal world. Interestingly, Smith highlights that many of these individuals reject the testimony of Jesus because of their fixation on individual teachers or prophets. This conception finds parallels in de Lubac’s conviction that “schismatics” or “provokers of dissension” within the church are those for whom unity with Christ will be most difficult to achieve.86 Smith continues:

These are they who received not the gospel of Christ, neither the testimony of Jesus. . . . For these are they who are of Paul, and of Apollos, and of Cephas. These are they who say they are some of one and some of another—some of Christ and some of John, and some of Moses, and some of Elias, and some of Esaias, and some of Isaiah, and some of Enoch; But received not the gospel, neither the testimony of Jesus, neither the prophets, neither the everlasting covenant. . . . These are they who are liars, and sorcerers, and adulterers, and whoremongers, and whosoever loves and makes a lie. (Doctrine and Covenants 76:81–112).

In a truly novel way (but perhaps unsurprisingly given his prior interactions with the Divine), Joseph Smith’s soteriological vision separates the members of the Godhead and assigns each of them a “divine jurisdiction” or a kingdom where their presence is directly manifest. Grace is thus offered “by degrees,” with individuals receiving a measure of the Godhead’s presence directly proportional to their acceptance of Christ and adherence to his teachings. Only the most faithful will obtain exaltation in the highest kingdom and will be allowed to dwell in the presence of the complete Godhead of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The terrestrial world offers the “presence of the Son, but not of the fulness of the Father,” while the telestial world only allows for the ministration of the Holy Spirit. This unique tripart separation of the Godhead is critical in enabling Smith’s soteriological vision to both expand the offer of salvation while remaining faithful to traditional Christian moral and ritual commandments. For Smith, this salvific model was the ultimate evidence that Christ’s Atonement was for all men, offered to all men, and a powerful expression of God’s love for humanity.

While one portion of the human race is judging and condemning the other without mercy, the Great Parent of the universe looks upon the whole of the human family with a fatherly care and paternal regard.87

He will award judgment or mercy to all nations according to their several deserts, their means of obtaining intelligence, the laws by which they are governed, the facilities afforded them of obtaining correct information, and His inscrutable designs in relation to the human family.88

Men will be held accountable for the things which they have and not for the things they have not.89

Summary and Conclusions

Thousands of years of Christian debate have ultimately failed to produce any consensus on a solution to the soteriological problem of evil. Apparent contradictions or tensions between the Christian belief in a loving God and the ritual and moral requirements articulated in the Bible have confounded Christian theologians and laymen alike for two millennia. Furthermore, traditional creedal Christian solutions to the issue have largely failed to withstand the test of time, as modern believers have, by and large, continued to struggle with the issue.

It is the incredible complexity of the issue that makes Joseph Smith’s soteriological vision so compelling. With no formal theological training, Smith was able to articulate a consistent and systematic soteriological framework that not only addressed this ancient controversy, but anticipated modern concerns that were yet to be explicitly articulated. Smith’s revelations provide clarity and coherence to a subject traditionally rife with paradox and obfuscation. As David Paulsen has noted:

[This] view could be seen as a comprehensive synthesis of all the major Christian responses to the question, affirming important strands of universalism, inclusivism, and restrictivism, all of which coalesce in the doctrine of postmortem evangelization.90

Most of the issues presented by the Catholic modernist crisis and the world wars, to which de Lubac’s theology is a response, were already adequately anticipated and addressed by Smith’s revelations over one hundred years prior. However, for Catholics, de Lubac’s theology does provide valuable insight on the subject. His theological efforts influenced many of the changes to Catholic practice and doctrine introduced at the Second Vatican Council in the 1960’s, such as allowing churches to conduct mass in local languages rather than Latin. These changes are widely viewed as having helped reestablish the perceived value of the Church to the modern lay Catholic. These contributions are all the more noteworthy because de Lubac is also widely considered to be one of the Catholic theologians who was most in tune with the “spirit” of earliest Christianity due to his deep knowledge of, and appreciation for, the writings of the early Church fathers. Perhaps it should come as no surprise then that in many respects de Lubac’s theological reflections mirror the revelation of the restored gospel received by Joseph Smith.

There are several significant parallels between the theology of de Lubac and Joseph Smith. De Lubac’s insistence on humanity’s “inherent grace” was a bold theological claim in his day, a claim that in many respects mirrors Smith’s conception of “the light of Christ.” Both concepts are integral in their respective accounts of salvation. De Lubac’s insistence on the unbreakable connection between the Jewish people and Christianity resembles Smith’s renewal of biblical covenant theology. Additionally, de Lubac’s belief in a shared salvific destiny for all humanity echoes Smith’s conception of a nearly universal “salvation” granted to mankind due to their faithfulness in the premortal world. Smith’s articulation of varying “degrees” of glory and salvation correlated with the presence of the Godhead also anticipated de Lubac’s articulation of the role of “unity with the divine” in man’s ultimate soteriological status, as only those who achieve transcendent unity with the totality of God will ultimately be saved in the highest degree of glory.

The purpose of this paper has been to show how two theologians have attempted to reconcile the exclusive message of Christianity with the reality of a largely un-Christian world. The care with which both de Lubac and Smith approach the question of the salvation of the unbeliever is paradigmatic of the charity each of us should exercise when addressing modern religious issues. One should not too quickly reject the formulations of the past, nor conversely, the concerns of the present. De Lubac and Smith both model how, in an age of religious decline, one may articulate afresh the essential message of Christianity.

Most importantly, the theologies of both Henri de Lubac and Joseph Smith highlight God’s desire that all be saved. Each posits the universality of Christ’s atoning sacrifice and, in their own fashion, allow it to affect good souls in all religious traditions. However, each resolutely maintains the exclusive merit of the Christian faith, thus resisting the all too easy path to soteriological pluralism. Upholding these three tenets is tremendously important as the Christian tradition attempts to reaffirm its relevance in the modern world.

Timothy Gervais received a BA in history from Brigham Young University in 2013 and a Master of Theological Studies from Loyola University Maryland in 2016. Timothy currently resides in Prince Frederick, Maryland, with his wife and two children, where he works as a CPA.

1 . Jonathan Wong, “Blind Men, an Elephant, and a King: The Problem of Soteriocentric Pluralism,” Anglican Theological Review 95, no. 1 (2013): 81–82.

2 . “Universal salvation, either as hope or as dogma, is now so widely accepted that many theologians assume it virtually without argument.” Richard Baukham, “Universalism: A Historical Survey,” Themelios 4, no. 2 (September 1978): 47.

3 . Wong, “Blind Men,” 81, 84.

4 . Porphyry as quoted in Philip Schaff, ed., A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, vol. 1, The Confessions and Letters of St. Augustine (Buffalo, NY: The Christian Literature Company, 1886), 416, oll.libertyfund.org/titles/schaff-a-select-library-of-the-nicene-and-post
-nicene-fathers-of-the-christian-church-vol-1.

5 . Robert L. Millet, “The Soteriological Problem of Evil,” Religious Educator 2, no. 2 (2001): 75, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/re/vol2/iss2/9/.

6 . Gabriel Fackre, Ronald H. Nash, John Sanders, What About Those Who Have Never Heard?: Three Views on the Destiny of the Unevangelized (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995), 7.

7 . Michael Hamkin Lee, “Theology of Religions and the Intuitive Dimension: How Do We Construct and Perceive God’s Fairness,” Missiology: An International Review 42, no.2 (2014), 139.

8 . Schaff, Confessions of Augustine, 762.

9 . Kenneth W. Brewer, “Rob Bell and John Wesley on the Fate of the Lost and Those Who Never Heard the Gospel,” Wesleyan Theological Journal 48, no. 1 (March 1, 2013): 125–26.

10 . See Robert Louis Wilken, The First Thousand Years; A Global History of Christianity (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 65–66.

11 . Sidney Z. Ehler and John B. Morrall, trans. and eds., Church and State through the Centuries: A Collection of Historic Documents with Commentaries (London: Burns & Oates, 1954), 4–7, archive.org/details/churchstatethrou0000sidn
/page/n5/mode/2up.

12 . Sixtus IV, Superna caelestis, April 14, 1482, at The Franciscan Archive (website), franciscan-archive.org/bullarium/supern-e.html.

13 . “Especially since the age of exploration and colonialism, many Christians at some point have been troubled by the implications of affirming the long-held Christian tradition of exclusivism. We are confronted with troubling realities like the asymmetric access to the Christian gospel throughout the world and human history.” Lee, “Theology of Religions,” 140.

14 . Alexander VI, Inter Caetera, May 4, 1493, at Papal Encyclicals Online (website), papalencyclicals.net/Alex06/alex06inter.htm.

15 . See David P. Hunt, “Middle Knowledge and the Soteriological Problem of Evil,” Religious Studies 27, no. 1 (March 1991): 3–26.

16 . Hunt, “Middle Knowledge,” 4.

17 . Baukham, Universalism, 47.

18 . Baukham, Universalism, 48–49.

19 . Henri de Lubac, Catholicism: Christ and the Common Destiny of Man, trans. Lancelot C. Sheppard and Elizabeth Englund (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988), 217–19.

20 . Kevin L. Hughes, “‘Christianity is Never Triumphant’: Henri de Lubac, La Nouvelle Theologie, and the Crucible of the Great War,” (presentation, American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA, 24 November 2014).

21 . Hughes, “‘Christianity is Never Triumphant’,” 1.

22 . Hughes, “‘Christianity is Never Triumphant’,” 2.

23 . Robin Darling Young, “An Imagined Unity: Henri de Lubac & the Ironies of Ressourcement,” Commonweal 139, no. 15 (2012): 19.

24 . Patrick Cruitt, “We Are Not Saved Alone,” Church Life Journal, McGrath Institute for Church Life, 17 January 2018, churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles
/salvation-cannot-occur-in-isolation/.

25 . Henri de Lubac, “Spiritual Warfare,” in Theology in History, trans. Anne Englund Nash (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1996), terrenouvelle.home
.blog/spiritual-warfare-henri-de-lubac-1943/#:~:text=The%20Christian%20concept%20of%20life,wanting%20to%20preserve%20the%20gospel!

26 . Kevin L. Hughes, “Deep Reasonings: Sources Chretiennes, Ressourcement, and the Logic of Scripture in the Years Before—and After—Vatican II,” Modern Theology 29, no. 4 (October 2013): 37.

27 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 42–43.

28 . Hughes, “Deep Reasonings,” 37.

29 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 177.

30 . Hughes, “Deep Reasonings,” 37.

31 . Kevin L. Hughes, “Ressourcement and Resistance: La nouvelle théologie, the Fathers, and the Bible, against Fascism,” (unpublished manuscript, 2014) p. 16.

32 . Hughes, “Deep Reasonings,” 36.

33 . Hughes, “Deep Reasonings,” 36.

34 . Hughes, “Deep Reasonings,” 39.

35 . De Lubac, “Spiritual Warfare,” 489, terrenouvelle.home.blog/spiritual-warfare
-henri-de-lubac-1943/#:~:text=The%20Christian%20concept%20of%20life,wanting%20to%20preserve%20the%20gospel!.

36 . A.N. Williams, “The Future of the Past: The Contemporary Significance of the Nouvelle Théologie,” International Journal of Systematic Theology 7, no. 4 (October 2005): 350.

37 . Williams, “The Future of the Past,” 350.

38 . Hans Boersma, “Nature and the Supernatural in la nouvelle theologie: The Recovery of a Sacramental Mindset,” New Blackfriars 93, no. 1043 (2012): 34.

39 . David Grumett, “Eucharist, Matter and the Supernatural: Why de Lubac Needs Teilhard,” International Journal of Systematic Theology 10, no. 2 (April 2008): 166–67.

40 . “Specifically, de Lubac objected to two developments in the neo-Thomist tradition: the rise of the notion of pure nature and the denial of a natural human desire for the beatific vision.” Boersma, “Nature and Supernatural,” 36.

41 . David L. Schindler, The Mystery of the Supernatural (New York: Crossroads Publishing Company, 1998), xi.

42 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 29.

43 . “Thus the unity of the Mystical Body of Christ, a supernatural unity, supposes a previous natural unity, the unity of the human race.” De Lubac, Catholicism, 25.

44 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 29–33.

45 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 35.

46 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 133.

47 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 222–23.

48 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 37–39.

49 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 38–39.

50 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 220.

51 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 220n13.

52 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 219–20.

53 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 218.

54 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 82.

55 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 223.

56 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 223–26.

57 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 220–22.

58 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 222.

59 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 240.

60 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 236.

61 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 236–37.

62 . De Lubac, Catholicism, 236–37.

63 . Hughes, “‘Christianity is Never Triumphant’,” 6.

64 . Joseph Smith, History of the Church, ed. B. H. Roberts, vol. 4, 2nd ed. rev. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1976), 597, gutenberg.org/cache/epub/60708
/pg60708-images.html.

65 . “It is unlikely there will ever be consensus on Joseph Smith’s character or his achievements. The multiplication of scholarly studies and the discovery of new sources have only heightened the controversies surrounding his life. . . . For a character as controversial as Smith, pure objectivity is impossible.” Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), xix.

66 . David Paulsen, “Joseph Smith Challenges the Theological World,” BYU Studies 44, no. 4 (2005): 176–77, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol44/iss
4/16/.

67 . Bushman, Joseph Smith, xxi.

68 . Parley P. Pratt, “Proclamation. To the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: Greeting,” Millennial Star 5 (March 1845): 152, catalog.churchofjesus
christ.org/assets/0396a6ef-6202-4931-b1c3-edae4cc019bc/0/7.

69 . Benjamin E. Park, “(Re)Interpreting Early Mormon Thought: Synthesizing Joseph Smith’s Theology and the Process of Religion Formation,” Dialogue 45, no. 2 (Summer 2012): 62, dialoguejournal.com/articles/reinterpreting
-early-mormon-thought-synthesizing-joseph-smiths-theology-and-the
-process-of-religion-formation/.

70 . Park, “(Re)Interpreting,” 61.

71 . “The challenge we face lies in the fact that [Henri de Lubac] never wrote a systematic christology and, so, it has to be gleaned from his extensive writings on a myriad of subjects.” Noel O’Sullivan, Christ and Creation: Christology as the Key to Interpreting the Theology of Creation in the Works of Henri de Lubac, (Bern, CH: Peter Lang, 2009), 7. “Smith was by nature eclectic, rather than systematic, and his teachings were emblematic of that approach. Though they were perhaps a coherent whole in his mind, Smith’s teachings were never presented in a systematic order but rather, as Richard Bushman aptly described, in ‘flashes and bursts.’” Park, “(Re)Interpreting,” 62.

72 . Park, “(Re)Interpreting,” 64.

73 . Steven C. Harper, “Joseph Smith and the Kirtland Temple,” in Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer, ed. Richard Neitzel Holzapfel and Kent P. Jackson (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University [BYU]; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2010), rsc.byu.edu/joseph-smith-prophet-seer
/joseph-smith-kirtland-temple-1836.

74 . Harper, “Joseph Smith,” rsc.byu.edu/joseph-smith-prophet-seer/joseph
-smith-kirtland-temple-1836.

75 . Bushman, Joseph Smith, 110.

76 . See also Job 38:4–7; Ecclesiastes 12:7; Jeremiah 1:4–5; Acts 17:28; Ephesians 1:3–4; Hebrews 12:9.

77 . O’Sullivan, Christ and Creation, 456.

78 . History of the Church, 5:259.

79 . History of the Church, 4:554. See also Loren Blake Spendlove, “Witness of the Covenant,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 58 (2023): 147, journal.interpreterfoundation.org/witness-of-the-covenant/.

80 . “[Unbelievers] though they themselves are not in the normal way of salvation, they will be able nevertheless to obtain this salvation by virtue of those mysterious bonds which unite them to the faithful.” De Lubac, Catholicism, 233.

81 . Teachings of Presidents of The Church: Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2007), 408.

82 . See David L. Paulsen, Roger D. Cook, Kendel J. Christensen, “The Harrowing of Hell: Salvation for the Dead in Early Christianity,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 19, no. 1 (2010), scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol19/iss1/7/.

83 . “Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?” (1 Corinthians 15:29). See also Doctrine and Covenants 124:29; 127:5; 128.

84 . Teachings of Presidents, 409.

85 . Teachings of Presidents, 219–20.

86 . “It follows that the schismatic or the provoker of dissension outrages what is dearest to Christ, for he commits a crime against that ‘spiritual body’ for which Christ sacrificed his carnal body. It is a violation of that vital charity which is the guardian of unity. Conversely he who does not keep charity cannot speak in the name of unity. . . . Injury done to one or to the other—and one is never injured without injury to the other as well—is to rend the Church, the seamless robe that Christ willed to put on that he might dwell among us. It is a rending, so far as it is in man’s power, of the very body of Christ. . . . It is an onslaught on the very society of the human race. In truth it is self-destruction, in that the schismatic cuts himself off from the tree of life.” De Lubac, Catholicism, 78–79.

87 . Teachings of Presidents, 39.

88 . Teachings of Presidents, 404.

89 . Teachings of Presidents, 405.

90 . David L. Paulsen and Brent Alvord, “Joseph Smith and the Problem of the Unevangelized,” review of No Other Name: An Investigation into the Destiny of the Unevangelized, by John Sanders, and What about Those Who Have Never Heard? Three Views on the Destiny of the Unevangelized, by Gabriel Fackre, Ronald H. Nash, and John Sanders, FARMS Review of Books 17, no. 1 (2005), 188, scholarsarchive.byu.edu/msr/vol17/iss1/8.