A puzzling interchange between Lamanite King Lamoni and Ammon sheds light on Lamanite religious cosmology (see Alma 18:24-31).
The Dialogue of Earth and Sky:
Ammon: Believest thou that there is a God?
Lamoni: I do not know what that meaneth.
Ammon: Believest thou that there is a Great Spirit?
Lamoni: Yea.
Ammon: This is God. Believest thou that this Great Spirit, who is God, created all things which are in heaven and in the earth?
Lamoni: Yea, I believe that he created all things which are in the earth; but I do not know the heavens.
Ammon: The heavens is a place where God dwells and all his holy angels.
Lamoni: Is it above the earth?
The Book of Mormon's notion of the Great Spirit of the Lamanites comes across too much like Hiawatha. Isn't the dialogue just too simple, too pat, too silly, for words?
Now Lamoni isn't just being a tough egg nor is he obtuse. He certainly knows what the "heavens" are in the sense of skies of blue and the panoply of stars by night.
What Lamoni doesn't know is that anybody's religious system could possibly include the skies, or at least give first consideration to the skies, for Lamoni's worldview looks to the chthonic, the dark underworld, "the darkest abyss" (Mosiah 27:29)---at the opposite pole from celestial conceptions of a God who "looketh down upon all the children of men" (Alma 18:32).
All this recalls the Mesoamerican focus on the chthonic: the caves and serpents of the Olmec, the Maya, and even of the distant Cherokee and Inca. Given the fact that chthonic religions focus on the earth as mother, note how the queens of both Lamoni and his father (and the queen of Lehonti) play an active role in the stories of the (false) burial of their husbands, both of whom fall to the earth in a deep trance, a reflection of the dark passage. Nephite queens don't even exist.
The Dialogue of Earth and Sky: Dreams, Souls, and Curing in the Modern Aztec Universe, is the title of a book on modern Aztec chthonic religion by T.J. Knab (2004). There seems to be a call for a latter-day Ammon to visit modern Aztecs; in other words, the Book of Mormon, "sophisticated" or not, is not only relevant--it's crucial.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
More Powerful than the Sword: Alma 31:4-5, the Instruction for King Merikare, and Ramesses the Great
A Middle Kingdom Egyptian wisdom text, Instruction for King Merikare, affords a parallel to Alma 31:4-5 and Helaman 6:37 in the motif of word as sword in which we see the force of persuasion, as opposed to the sword, in circumstances of political peril.
Alma launches a mission in the land of Antionum to reclaim members of the separatist Zoramite movement. The religious mission has profound political ramifications, for, like other Nephite religious and political separatists, the Zoramites were likely to make a military pact with the enemy:
Now the Nephites greatly feared that the Zoramites would enter into a correspondence with the Lamanites, and that it would be the means of great loss on the part of the Nephites.
And now, as 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 the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them---therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God (Alma 31:4-5).
Now Merikare: "Be an artist in speech, then you will be victorious. For behold: the sword-arm of a king is his tongue. Stronger is the word than all fighting."
Commenting on Merikare, Jan Assmann observes: "The kings of the Twelfth Dynasty understood the close links between politics and the instantiation of meaning. As Carl Schmitt, a leading authority on authoritarian government, puts it: 'No political system can last even as long as one generation on technical grounds or by the assertion of power alone. Central to politics is the idea, for there can be no politics without authority, and no authority without an ethos of persuasion,'" Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 118-9.
Pharaoh, says Jan Assmann, "reigned not by force but by the power of the word," 118. Alma, the first Chief Judge of the Nephite polity, exemplified such an ethos of persuasion and thereby set a precedent for the exercise of representative political authority in Nephite society.
Alma was, in fact, a warrior of the word, who resigned his presiding judgeship in order to better exercise his powerful religio-political authority by "preach[ing] the word of God unto them, to stir them up. . .[and to] pull down, by the word of God, all the pride and craftiness and all the contentions which were among his people [all social unrest leading to separatism both religious and political], seeing no way that he might reclaim them save it were in bearing down in pure testimony [in the juridical sense] against them" (Alma 4:19).
At a later date, the converted Lamanites also hunt and destroy the Gadianton Robbers by preaching--so Helaman 6:37 (Hugh Nibley loved this verse).
"For behold: the sword-arm of a king is his tongue. Stronger is the word than all fighting."
As evidence for the proverb, we turn to Alma as warrior--strong indeed but like to fail:
And it came to pass that Alma fought with Amlici with the sword, face to face; and they did contend mightily, one with another.
And it came to pass that Alma, being a man of God, being exercised with much faith, cried, saying: O Lord, have mercy and spare my life, that I may be an instrument in thy hands to save and preserve this people.
Now when Alma had said these words he contended again with Amlici; and he was strengthened, insomuch that he slew Amlici with the sword (Alma 2:29-31; see also 32-3; and Alma 3:22 for Alma's wound).
So Ramesses the Great: "At the moment of ultimate danger [in the Battle of Qadesh], Ramesses II prays to Amun:
My voice echoing in Thebes,
The moment I called to him, I found Amun came.
Amun intervenes in the battle by 'giving his hand' to the king and, at the last minute, saving him from death or captivity," Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 241.
Notes: See Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 441 n.1 for the reference to "Instruction for King Merikare," ed. Helck, Die Lehre fuer Koenigh Merikare (Wiesbaden, 1977), 17-8; for Carl Schmitt, see same page, note 3: Roemischer Katholizismus und Politische Form, 2nd ed. (Munich, 1925), 23.
Assmann, 241ff., dwells on the theme of finding, with emphasis on the verb for find (Egyptian gmj) in the Ancient Egyptian quest to find God by means of revelation. His comments reflect the words of the Book of Abraham: Thy servant has sought thee earnestly; now I have found thee (Abraham 2:12).
Alma launches a mission in the land of Antionum to reclaim members of the separatist Zoramite movement. The religious mission has profound political ramifications, for, like other Nephite religious and political separatists, the Zoramites were likely to make a military pact with the enemy:
Now the Nephites greatly feared that the Zoramites would enter into a correspondence with the Lamanites, and that it would be the means of great loss on the part of the Nephites.
And now, as 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 the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them---therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God (Alma 31:4-5).
Now Merikare: "Be an artist in speech, then you will be victorious. For behold: the sword-arm of a king is his tongue. Stronger is the word than all fighting."
Commenting on Merikare, Jan Assmann observes: "The kings of the Twelfth Dynasty understood the close links between politics and the instantiation of meaning. As Carl Schmitt, a leading authority on authoritarian government, puts it: 'No political system can last even as long as one generation on technical grounds or by the assertion of power alone. Central to politics is the idea, for there can be no politics without authority, and no authority without an ethos of persuasion,'" Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 118-9.
Pharaoh, says Jan Assmann, "reigned not by force but by the power of the word," 118. Alma, the first Chief Judge of the Nephite polity, exemplified such an ethos of persuasion and thereby set a precedent for the exercise of representative political authority in Nephite society.
Alma was, in fact, a warrior of the word, who resigned his presiding judgeship in order to better exercise his powerful religio-political authority by "preach[ing] the word of God unto them, to stir them up. . .[and to] pull down, by the word of God, all the pride and craftiness and all the contentions which were among his people [all social unrest leading to separatism both religious and political], seeing no way that he might reclaim them save it were in bearing down in pure testimony [in the juridical sense] against them" (Alma 4:19).
At a later date, the converted Lamanites also hunt and destroy the Gadianton Robbers by preaching--so Helaman 6:37 (Hugh Nibley loved this verse).
"For behold: the sword-arm of a king is his tongue. Stronger is the word than all fighting."
As evidence for the proverb, we turn to Alma as warrior--strong indeed but like to fail:
And it came to pass that Alma fought with Amlici with the sword, face to face; and they did contend mightily, one with another.
And it came to pass that Alma, being a man of God, being exercised with much faith, cried, saying: O Lord, have mercy and spare my life, that I may be an instrument in thy hands to save and preserve this people.
Now when Alma had said these words he contended again with Amlici; and he was strengthened, insomuch that he slew Amlici with the sword (Alma 2:29-31; see also 32-3; and Alma 3:22 for Alma's wound).
So Ramesses the Great: "At the moment of ultimate danger [in the Battle of Qadesh], Ramesses II prays to Amun:
My voice echoing in Thebes,
The moment I called to him, I found Amun came.
Amun intervenes in the battle by 'giving his hand' to the king and, at the last minute, saving him from death or captivity," Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 241.
Notes: See Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 441 n.1 for the reference to "Instruction for King Merikare," ed. Helck, Die Lehre fuer Koenigh Merikare (Wiesbaden, 1977), 17-8; for Carl Schmitt, see same page, note 3: Roemischer Katholizismus und Politische Form, 2nd ed. (Munich, 1925), 23.
Assmann, 241ff., dwells on the theme of finding, with emphasis on the verb for find (Egyptian gmj) in the Ancient Egyptian quest to find God by means of revelation. His comments reflect the words of the Book of Abraham: Thy servant has sought thee earnestly; now I have found thee (Abraham 2:12).
Friday, March 12, 2010
Blessing: David and Samuel the Lamanite (1 Samuel 18:12 and Helaman 16:2-3, 6)
Few essays on Ancient Israel afford such beauty and majesty to the unsuspecting reader as Johannes Pedersen's chapter on "Blessing" in his classic Israel: Its Life and Culture. 2 vols. (Oxford University Press, 1973). For Pedersen Blessing is a vital, substantial power, an aura engulfing its possessor and everything that pertains to him.
Pedersen demonstrates the virtue of Blessing by showing step-by-tragic (or -blessed)-step how that power began to leave King Saul to devolve upon the head of David. The transfer of Blessing was moving forward nicely by the time Saul decided to eliminate his young rival:
1 Samuel 18:10-11:
10 And it came to pass on the morrow, that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul. . .and there was a javelin in Saul's hand.
11 And Saul cast the javelin; for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. And David avoided out of his presence twice.
1 Samuel 19:10:
And the evil spirit from the LORD was upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand: and David played with his hand.
And Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with the javelin; but he slipped away out of Saul's presence, and he smote the javelin into the wall: and David fled, and escaped that night.
"So strong was the blessing of David," Pedersen informs us, "that Saul could not even hit him at a distance of a few yards," Israel: Its Life and Culture I, 186, 191.
But Saul never gives up, not until the last drop of blessing has been squeezed from his nefesh, his soul, even as David grows in stature and authority. He accuses his daughter (and David's wife) Michal of treason and tries to injure his own son with a cast of the javelin, but David's blessing, like the protective hem of the shaikh's robe, now embraces even his family and friends.
An instructive parallel to the story, and to its underlying theme, appears in the Book of Helaman, which also speaks of spirits good and evil, of a wall, and the errant casting of weapons at a Blessed man:
But as many as there were who did not believe in the words of Samuel were angry with him; and they cast stones at him upon the wall, and also many shot arrows at him as he stood upon the wall, but the Spirit of the Lord was with him insomuch that they could not hit him with their stones neither with their arrows (Helaman 16:2).
When they saw that they could not hit him with their stones and their arrows, they cried unto their captains, saying: Take this fellow and bind him, for behold he hath a devil; and because of the power of the devil which is in him [note: a bound relative clause: that particular devil that is in him; that duende] we cannot hit him with our stones and arrows. Therefore take him and bind him [what is done with one mad or possessed], and away with him" (16:6).
In that most familiar of all Book of Mormon paintings, Arnold Friberg portrays Samuel, un-hit, to be sure, but at a very safe distance to begin with. The Fribergian walls of Zarahemla make up a berg indeed---a veritable tower of strength.
As David, who escapes down the wall of his home by night, so Samuel--leaping from the wall--flees Nephite lands (Helaman 16:7). It cannot have been too high a wall. . .
The story makes no sense, as Blessing, unless Samuel was an easy mark--in pointblank range.
And the point of the story is to illustrate that the Blessing had now, in large measure, departed from the Nephites to devolve upon their former enemies, the Lamanites:
And thus we see that the Spirit of the Lord began to withdraw from the Nephites, because of the wickedness and the hardness of their hearts.
And thus we see that the Lord began to pour out his Spirit upon the Lamanites, because of their easiness and willingness to believe in his words (Helaman 6: 35-36; see the whole argument as powerfully and conclusively set forth in verses 34-39).
Pedersen demonstrates the virtue of Blessing by showing step-by-tragic (or -blessed)-step how that power began to leave King Saul to devolve upon the head of David. The transfer of Blessing was moving forward nicely by the time Saul decided to eliminate his young rival:
1 Samuel 18:10-11:
10 And it came to pass on the morrow, that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul. . .and there was a javelin in Saul's hand.
11 And Saul cast the javelin; for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. And David avoided out of his presence twice.
1 Samuel 19:10:
And the evil spirit from the LORD was upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand: and David played with his hand.
And Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with the javelin; but he slipped away out of Saul's presence, and he smote the javelin into the wall: and David fled, and escaped that night.
"So strong was the blessing of David," Pedersen informs us, "that Saul could not even hit him at a distance of a few yards," Israel: Its Life and Culture I, 186, 191.
But Saul never gives up, not until the last drop of blessing has been squeezed from his nefesh, his soul, even as David grows in stature and authority. He accuses his daughter (and David's wife) Michal of treason and tries to injure his own son with a cast of the javelin, but David's blessing, like the protective hem of the shaikh's robe, now embraces even his family and friends.
An instructive parallel to the story, and to its underlying theme, appears in the Book of Helaman, which also speaks of spirits good and evil, of a wall, and the errant casting of weapons at a Blessed man:
But as many as there were who did not believe in the words of Samuel were angry with him; and they cast stones at him upon the wall, and also many shot arrows at him as he stood upon the wall, but the Spirit of the Lord was with him insomuch that they could not hit him with their stones neither with their arrows (Helaman 16:2).
When they saw that they could not hit him with their stones and their arrows, they cried unto their captains, saying: Take this fellow and bind him, for behold he hath a devil; and because of the power of the devil which is in him [note: a bound relative clause: that particular devil that is in him; that duende] we cannot hit him with our stones and arrows. Therefore take him and bind him [what is done with one mad or possessed], and away with him" (16:6).
In that most familiar of all Book of Mormon paintings, Arnold Friberg portrays Samuel, un-hit, to be sure, but at a very safe distance to begin with. The Fribergian walls of Zarahemla make up a berg indeed---a veritable tower of strength.
As David, who escapes down the wall of his home by night, so Samuel--leaping from the wall--flees Nephite lands (Helaman 16:7). It cannot have been too high a wall. . .
The story makes no sense, as Blessing, unless Samuel was an easy mark--in pointblank range.
And the point of the story is to illustrate that the Blessing had now, in large measure, departed from the Nephites to devolve upon their former enemies, the Lamanites:
And thus we see that the Spirit of the Lord began to withdraw from the Nephites, because of the wickedness and the hardness of their hearts.
And thus we see that the Lord began to pour out his Spirit upon the Lamanites, because of their easiness and willingness to believe in his words (Helaman 6: 35-36; see the whole argument as powerfully and conclusively set forth in verses 34-39).
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Names of Women in the Book of Mormon
Why are so few women named in The Book of Mormon? There are visions of Mary, beautiful above all, but not a single Jaredite woman is named; the same holds true for the Nephites. In fact only two women march through the pages of Ancient American religious history by name: Sariah and Abish. Thousands of years, two names.
Most would say three names: Sariah, Abish, Isabel. But, as Hugh Nibley has pointed out, Isabel is not a personal name, rather a name associated with hierodules. For Nephites, as for moderns attuned to the Bible, Jezebel names every harlot.
On the other hand, you do have "the queen" (two of these), "the daughter of Jared," "the daughters of Ishmael," and "their mothers" (of the stripling warriors), real women all, though nameless, as we consider names.
So why do Sariah and Abish luck out? The answer is simple.
As with several other cultures of the ancient world, the names of Nephite and Lamanite (and, seemingly, Jaredite) women were not for public consumption. I recall the words of the Athenian lady who blasted an admirer of her white arms by retorting "my elbow is not on public display."
So who can be named, and survive the public glare? Sariah is the founding mother of the tribe, namesake and image of the Princess Sarah, the mother of the entire race. Her name is powerful and above reproach, a blessing, a grace: "My mother, Sariah." What about Abish? Abish is a servant ("the woman servant," in fact), and servants just don't matter; they have nothing to hide or to parade. Yet Abish, though servant, plays a dramatic role in the Book of Alma, an irony that the book is at pains to declare. And Isabel? She (and her ilk) are prostitutes; no need to shield infamy.
The paucity of female names in The Book of Mormon evidences its ancient origins. After all, if the Prophet Joseph Smith's mind really conformed to Fawn Brodie's description of "his plastic fancy"-- "His imagination spilled over like a spring freshet"--shouldn't the names of Nephite and Lamanite women overflow and dazzle the pages of Alma (in Western usage a female name)? Why does the freshet go dry? Shouldn't we find Mara, Zaraptah, and--to be sure--Laneah?
But how about the Bible? Aren't there a lot of named women in its pages? I find the following statement in notes prepared by Hugh Nibley for his Old Testament Sunday School Class:
"Now he [Samson] finds another lady friend: all the women so far have been great--and scrupulously unnamed. Now we come to a vicious creature, and the editors can't wait to tell us her name--Delilah. SHE is the dame fatale."
Jacob must have had many daughters. Why does Dinah alone appear, and then only in a story of disgrace and retribution? And the same holds true in book after book: named women in the Judean chronicles are as often as not the subjects of a fall from palatial grace. Nephi, a well-educated Judean male, almost chokes when he has to mention his sisters (in the very last historical portion of his writings).
And were the Nephites chauvinists? Hugh Nibley, when teaching Jacob's sermon on chastity, would point this out. Like the Ancient Greeks, the greatest of history's chauvinists, so the Nephites. . .
After all, that lovely white elbow didn't just come from genetics---the poor Greek lady passed all her days locked safely away from the glare of the sun.
Notes
The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ may be found here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm?lang=eng
Isabel is discussed in Hugh Nibley's The Prophetic Book of Mormon.
Delilah: Hugh Nibley, unpublished, typed class notes for The Book of Judges, found on the Website of Bruce J. Porter. Sunday School with Hugh Nibley, I fondly recall, was no Sunday School picnic. It was more like dusk come Ramadan--dinner is served. Yet all was seasoned with grace.
Fawn Brodie: No Man Knows my History, 27.
PS: If anyone has already heard or read a like explanation for the naming of Sariah and Abish (or for the omission of other female names in the Book of Mormon), please hasten to bring the source to my attention.
Grant Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon: A Reader's Guide, 288 n 3 (2010), lists bibliography for studies on Nephite attitudes about women..
Most would say three names: Sariah, Abish, Isabel. But, as Hugh Nibley has pointed out, Isabel is not a personal name, rather a name associated with hierodules. For Nephites, as for moderns attuned to the Bible, Jezebel names every harlot.
On the other hand, you do have "the queen" (two of these), "the daughter of Jared," "the daughters of Ishmael," and "their mothers" (of the stripling warriors), real women all, though nameless, as we consider names.
So why do Sariah and Abish luck out? The answer is simple.
As with several other cultures of the ancient world, the names of Nephite and Lamanite (and, seemingly, Jaredite) women were not for public consumption. I recall the words of the Athenian lady who blasted an admirer of her white arms by retorting "my elbow is not on public display."
So who can be named, and survive the public glare? Sariah is the founding mother of the tribe, namesake and image of the Princess Sarah, the mother of the entire race. Her name is powerful and above reproach, a blessing, a grace: "My mother, Sariah." What about Abish? Abish is a servant ("the woman servant," in fact), and servants just don't matter; they have nothing to hide or to parade. Yet Abish, though servant, plays a dramatic role in the Book of Alma, an irony that the book is at pains to declare. And Isabel? She (and her ilk) are prostitutes; no need to shield infamy.
The paucity of female names in The Book of Mormon evidences its ancient origins. After all, if the Prophet Joseph Smith's mind really conformed to Fawn Brodie's description of "his plastic fancy"-- "His imagination spilled over like a spring freshet"--shouldn't the names of Nephite and Lamanite women overflow and dazzle the pages of Alma (in Western usage a female name)? Why does the freshet go dry? Shouldn't we find Mara, Zaraptah, and--to be sure--Laneah?
But how about the Bible? Aren't there a lot of named women in its pages? I find the following statement in notes prepared by Hugh Nibley for his Old Testament Sunday School Class:
"Now he [Samson] finds another lady friend: all the women so far have been great--and scrupulously unnamed. Now we come to a vicious creature, and the editors can't wait to tell us her name--Delilah. SHE is the dame fatale."
Jacob must have had many daughters. Why does Dinah alone appear, and then only in a story of disgrace and retribution? And the same holds true in book after book: named women in the Judean chronicles are as often as not the subjects of a fall from palatial grace. Nephi, a well-educated Judean male, almost chokes when he has to mention his sisters (in the very last historical portion of his writings).
And were the Nephites chauvinists? Hugh Nibley, when teaching Jacob's sermon on chastity, would point this out. Like the Ancient Greeks, the greatest of history's chauvinists, so the Nephites. . .
After all, that lovely white elbow didn't just come from genetics---the poor Greek lady passed all her days locked safely away from the glare of the sun.
Notes
The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ may be found here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm?lang=eng
Isabel is discussed in Hugh Nibley's The Prophetic Book of Mormon.
Delilah: Hugh Nibley, unpublished, typed class notes for The Book of Judges, found on the Website of Bruce J. Porter. Sunday School with Hugh Nibley, I fondly recall, was no Sunday School picnic. It was more like dusk come Ramadan--dinner is served. Yet all was seasoned with grace.
Fawn Brodie: No Man Knows my History, 27.
PS: If anyone has already heard or read a like explanation for the naming of Sariah and Abish (or for the omission of other female names in the Book of Mormon), please hasten to bring the source to my attention.
Grant Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon: A Reader's Guide, 288 n 3 (2010), lists bibliography for studies on Nephite attitudes about women..
Monday, March 8, 2010
Honoring God's Living Prophets
John Bernhisel lived at the Prophet’s home in Nauvoo, and whenever the Prophet entered, he would stand. When Joseph insisted ceremony was unnecessary "and asked why he did so," Bernhisel replied: “Because I love to honor the man whom God honors” (see The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine 3 [1912]:174).
Skip ahead half a century, and you will see that same sentiment (taken from Esther 6:9 and usually reserved for leaders in the body politic) emblazoned on a banner displayed in the chapel of the Salt Lake Temple at a special event honoring another Prophet, Lorenzo Snow: We delight to honor the man whom God hath honored (see Elder Joseph W. McMurrin, Conference Report, Oct. 1918; Elder McMurrin also discusses the Bernhisel story).
A Century later:
Sunday, October 1, 2006
"In attendance at the afternoon session of Conference. A beautiful thing happened. As the congregation sang a verse from We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet, two young ladies in the center plaza section stood up, and instantly thousands of us were on our feet. I looked up and saw all the members of the Twelve and President Monson standing (President Faust was in a wheelchair), and then President Hinckley struggled to his feet. I weep now as I write these words. And we all remained standing together through the closing prayer, an event surely unique in the history of these conferences.
We also had the wonderful opportunity of waving at President Hinckley. I felt he stood to salute us, to salute the Prophet Joseph, to salute the sacred office he now holds."
Honoring two Prophets:
March 1, 2007
"200th anniversary of the birth of President Wilford Woodruff, held in the Assembly Hall. Beautiful presentation of 97 white roses by children [dressed in white] to President Gordon B. Hinckley in honor of both President Woodruff and President Hinckley. Elder and Sister Holland, both of whom spoke wonderfully, received the roses and will deliver them to President Hinckley's office in the morning. Beautiful, peaceful meeting. The Hollands just beamed like children."
And today's Prophet, Thomas S. Monson, again returning the favor, often reminds hearers that the Lord will "delight to honor those who serve me in righteousness and truth unto the end. Great shall be their reward and eternal shall be their glory" (Doctrine and Covenants 76:5).
Honor redounds to those who honor God and His prophets.
Doctor John Bernhisel was the epitome of an honorable man: "He was at Washington intimately associated with the Hon. Simon Cameron, Wm. H. Seward, Daniel Webster and President Abraham Lincoln. Much correspondence passed between them, a considerable amount of which is still preserved and in our collection," The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine 3:176. Indeed: "At Washington he was held in universal esteem and respect. But this was the same in every circle in which he moved," says his son, David M. Bernhisel, 176.
Long before he joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Bernhisel, who belonged to the University of Pennsylvania, Class of 1827, was cultivating friendships that would bless the Church forever: "This class included among its members such eminent persons as [Thaddeus Stevens], Simon Cameron, Col. Thomas Kane and his brother Dr. Kane, the Arctic explorer," 173.
I return to the story about Bernhisel and the Prophet and give it in full because I have never seen it in print anywhere else--and because it bears repeating: "The Doctor became intimately associated with the Prophet Joseph Smith, and the two men became devoted friends. The Prophet insisting, my father took up his residence at the 'Mansion House' and became a member of his private family. Here the two sat at the same table and discoursed familiarly together. It is related of the Doctor that he invariably arose when Joseph Smith entered the room. On one occasion when he was gently reproved by Joseph Smith, and asked why he did so, he gracefully replied: 'Because I love to honor the man whom God honors,'" 174.
Notes: David M. Bernhisel, son of John M. Bernhisel, wrote the article, "Dr. John Milton Bernhisel: Utah's First Delegate to the National Congress," The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine 3: 173-177.
Skip ahead half a century, and you will see that same sentiment (taken from Esther 6:9 and usually reserved for leaders in the body politic) emblazoned on a banner displayed in the chapel of the Salt Lake Temple at a special event honoring another Prophet, Lorenzo Snow: We delight to honor the man whom God hath honored (see Elder Joseph W. McMurrin, Conference Report, Oct. 1918; Elder McMurrin also discusses the Bernhisel story).
A Century later:
Sunday, October 1, 2006
"In attendance at the afternoon session of Conference. A beautiful thing happened. As the congregation sang a verse from We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet, two young ladies in the center plaza section stood up, and instantly thousands of us were on our feet. I looked up and saw all the members of the Twelve and President Monson standing (President Faust was in a wheelchair), and then President Hinckley struggled to his feet. I weep now as I write these words. And we all remained standing together through the closing prayer, an event surely unique in the history of these conferences.
We also had the wonderful opportunity of waving at President Hinckley. I felt he stood to salute us, to salute the Prophet Joseph, to salute the sacred office he now holds."
Honoring two Prophets:
March 1, 2007
"200th anniversary of the birth of President Wilford Woodruff, held in the Assembly Hall. Beautiful presentation of 97 white roses by children [dressed in white] to President Gordon B. Hinckley in honor of both President Woodruff and President Hinckley. Elder and Sister Holland, both of whom spoke wonderfully, received the roses and will deliver them to President Hinckley's office in the morning. Beautiful, peaceful meeting. The Hollands just beamed like children."
And today's Prophet, Thomas S. Monson, again returning the favor, often reminds hearers that the Lord will "delight to honor those who serve me in righteousness and truth unto the end. Great shall be their reward and eternal shall be their glory" (Doctrine and Covenants 76:5).
Honor redounds to those who honor God and His prophets.
Doctor John Bernhisel was the epitome of an honorable man: "He was at Washington intimately associated with the Hon. Simon Cameron, Wm. H. Seward, Daniel Webster and President Abraham Lincoln. Much correspondence passed between them, a considerable amount of which is still preserved and in our collection," The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine 3:176. Indeed: "At Washington he was held in universal esteem and respect. But this was the same in every circle in which he moved," says his son, David M. Bernhisel, 176.
Long before he joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Bernhisel, who belonged to the University of Pennsylvania, Class of 1827, was cultivating friendships that would bless the Church forever: "This class included among its members such eminent persons as [Thaddeus Stevens], Simon Cameron, Col. Thomas Kane and his brother Dr. Kane, the Arctic explorer," 173.
I return to the story about Bernhisel and the Prophet and give it in full because I have never seen it in print anywhere else--and because it bears repeating: "The Doctor became intimately associated with the Prophet Joseph Smith, and the two men became devoted friends. The Prophet insisting, my father took up his residence at the 'Mansion House' and became a member of his private family. Here the two sat at the same table and discoursed familiarly together. It is related of the Doctor that he invariably arose when Joseph Smith entered the room. On one occasion when he was gently reproved by Joseph Smith, and asked why he did so, he gracefully replied: 'Because I love to honor the man whom God honors,'" 174.
Notes: David M. Bernhisel, son of John M. Bernhisel, wrote the article, "Dr. John Milton Bernhisel: Utah's First Delegate to the National Congress," The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine 3: 173-177.
Let us now praise famous men: Josiah
As Ben Sirach intones: Let us now praise famous men.
1 The remembrance of Josias is like the composition of the perfume that is made by the art of the apothecary: it is sweet as honey in all mouths and as musick at a banquet of wine.
2 He behaved himself uprightly in the conversion of the people, and took away the abominations of iniquity.
3 He directed his heart unto the Lord [compare Alma 37:36], and in the time of the ungodly he established the worship of God (Sirach 49:1-3).
I praise the zeal of Josiah for a jealous God:
And he brought out the grove [Hebrew Asherah, the whore of Babylon, the mother of abominations] from the house of the LORD, without Jerusalem, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the children of the people (II Kings 23:6).
This verse, like those describing the Messianic cleansing of the temple of Herod, stands proud.
Why praise Josiah? In the likeness of Moses: "I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount" [mount as Temple] (Deuteronomy 9:21). Here is the prototype for all of Israel's idolatry; the pattern for its removal.
Why praise Josiah? As type and shadow of Messiah he cleansed the holy temple.
Why praise Josiah? Like Melchizedek, priest and king, "none were greater"; for "like unto him was there no king before him . . . neither after him arose there any like him" (2 Kings 23:25).
Why praise Josiah? The announcement of his birth foreshadows that great Annunciation yet to be: "Josiah by name" was one of six men who have been given a name by God before their birth, the others being Isaac, Moses, Solomon, [Ishmael], and the Messiah" (Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 1:122.) God named Josiah by the mouth of a man of God raised up for that very purpose and sent on a run with the news of the name and a sign of overthrow and restoration, even as it was with John the Forerunner (1 Kings 13). Names were also foretold for John the Baptist, John the Revelator, Joseph Smith, Sr., and the Prophet Joseph Smith, which makes 10 in all. The name Josiah, by the way, "apparently appears in an abbreviated form as the name Ya'osh in the Lachish Letters" (M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings, 281 n.22), and thus sustains the Book of Mormon attestation of the very same name, Josh (See also Hugh Nibley, "The Lachish Letters," The Prophetic Book of Mormon).
Why praise Josiah? Hark the Herald Angels Sing: Hinneh-ven nolad leve't-david Yoshiyyahu shemo: "Behold a son is born to the House of David: Josiah is his name!" (1 Kings 13). And the very name testifies of Jehovah (-iah) as "a token of a changed inner Judaean relation to Yhwh"; a practice in naming that parallels "the first reformation by Moses" even as it heralds, by prophetic annunciation, "the act of general reformation [to be] inaugurated by King Josiah (Yoshiyahu)" (Nibley, "The Lachish Letters," The Prophetic Book of Mormon, 388, quoting Harry Torczyner, Lachish I). Indeed the name Mosiah suggests "both the early reform of Moses and its later imitation by Mosiah" (389). Such names reflect both forerunner and the seal (Elias and Elijah). Josiah, by name and deed, thus links the generations of faithful Israel.
Why praise Josiah? Even in his tragic death, Josiah attests and teaches the universality of God as Father of all humankind; for God even speaks to Pharaoh ("the words of Necho from the mouth of God," 2 Chr.35:22). Here, again, Josiah foreshadows Messiah as Restorer of the Covenant with Israel, and thence with all mankind.
Why praise Josiah? He was a model for the righteous kings of The Book of Mormon. Like Benjamin at Mosiah's coronation, Joash at his own accession (2 Kings 11:14), and Solomon at the dedication of the temple (2 Chronicles 6:13), Josiah stood on a tower-pillar or -platform at the holy temple and brought his assembled people under covenant (John Welch, Terrence L. Szink, et al., "Upon the Tower of Benjamin," 97-9, and "Benjamin's Tower and Old Testament Pillars," 100-02, in Pressing Forward with the Book of Mormon, Provo, 1999). As Hugh Nibley points out, righteous King Mosiah combines the names Moses and Josiah, lawgiver and restorer of the law, in one blessed name. And, like Josiah, the Risen Christ standing in the midst of the people at the Temple of Bountiful, establishes his gospel covenant.
Why praise Josiah? As a reflection of the Prophet Joseph Smith and the latter-day restoration, he discovered a lost book of scripture, and, acting alone, through its dissemination resurrected a priesthood and a gospel dispensation from apostasy and restored the holy temple.
Why praise Josiah? He typifies all of us as we walk our individual roads of repentance, as we "discover the scriptures for ourselves--and not just discover them once, but rediscover them again and again. In this regard, the story of King Josiah in the Old Testament is a most profitable one to 'liken … unto [our]selves' (1 Nephi 19:24). To me, it is one of the finest stories in all of the scriptures." (Spencer W. Kimball in First Presidency Message: "How Rare a Possession--the Scriptures!," Ensign, September 1976).
Why praise Josiah? Because such a beloved modern prophet, Spencer W. Kimball, in humble striving after righteousness, likens the example of Josiah unto himself.
And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the LORD with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses [he, like the Christ, fulfills all the law by fulfilling the greatest commandment]; neither after him arose there any like him [as was said of Melchizedek, the priestly type of Christ] (2 Kings 23:25).
Notes: Some Latter-day Saints are fervid followers of Margaret Barker's engaging works, in which King Josiah is disparaged. But let it be remembered that Ms. Barker, like J.R.R. Tolkien of mythopoeic renown, typifies the dream-charged West Midlands. Like Tolkien, Margaret Barker quixotically attempts to write something more than scholarship--she reaches for Scripture. I might applaud such endeavor, lovely in purpose, while never taking it seriously as either scholarship or theology--or even heresy. Neither should any other reflective person. Hugh Nibley, as Sister Ann Madsen wisely noted in her recent Nibley memorial address, always stayed within his game plan, never got into left field.
II Kings 23:3: And the king stood by [Hebrew al = stood on] a pillar [that is, the center place], and made a covenant before the LORD. The Targum calls this a "platform"; Josephus, Antiq. X.63 has epi tou bematos, Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor, II Kings, The Anchor Bible, 285 n.3.
Trampling the Asherah: Another moment in Israelite history that stands proud was the overthrow of Ahab and Jezebel. After teaching students about the Jubilee rites of Deuteronomy 15, Professor James Sanders was wont to say: "Pushing Jezebel out the window was a Jubilee event." For the Asherah cult of Manesseh as part of "the 'nonorthodox' popular religion" of Ancient Israel, see the cogent--and withering--remarks of Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor, Anchor Bible: II Kings, 268 n.7.
1 The remembrance of Josias is like the composition of the perfume that is made by the art of the apothecary: it is sweet as honey in all mouths and as musick at a banquet of wine.
2 He behaved himself uprightly in the conversion of the people, and took away the abominations of iniquity.
3 He directed his heart unto the Lord [compare Alma 37:36], and in the time of the ungodly he established the worship of God (Sirach 49:1-3).
I praise the zeal of Josiah for a jealous God:
And he brought out the grove [Hebrew Asherah, the whore of Babylon, the mother of abominations] from the house of the LORD, without Jerusalem, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the children of the people (II Kings 23:6).
This verse, like those describing the Messianic cleansing of the temple of Herod, stands proud.
Why praise Josiah? In the likeness of Moses: "I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount" [mount as Temple] (Deuteronomy 9:21). Here is the prototype for all of Israel's idolatry; the pattern for its removal.
Why praise Josiah? As type and shadow of Messiah he cleansed the holy temple.
Why praise Josiah? Like Melchizedek, priest and king, "none were greater"; for "like unto him was there no king before him . . . neither after him arose there any like him" (2 Kings 23:25).
Why praise Josiah? The announcement of his birth foreshadows that great Annunciation yet to be: "Josiah by name" was one of six men who have been given a name by God before their birth, the others being Isaac, Moses, Solomon, [Ishmael], and the Messiah" (Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 1:122.) God named Josiah by the mouth of a man of God raised up for that very purpose and sent on a run with the news of the name and a sign of overthrow and restoration, even as it was with John the Forerunner (1 Kings 13). Names were also foretold for John the Baptist, John the Revelator, Joseph Smith, Sr., and the Prophet Joseph Smith, which makes 10 in all. The name Josiah, by the way, "apparently appears in an abbreviated form as the name Ya'osh in the Lachish Letters" (M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings, 281 n.22), and thus sustains the Book of Mormon attestation of the very same name, Josh (See also Hugh Nibley, "The Lachish Letters," The Prophetic Book of Mormon).
Why praise Josiah? Hark the Herald Angels Sing: Hinneh-ven nolad leve't-david Yoshiyyahu shemo: "Behold a son is born to the House of David: Josiah is his name!" (1 Kings 13). And the very name testifies of Jehovah (-iah) as "a token of a changed inner Judaean relation to Yhwh"; a practice in naming that parallels "the first reformation by Moses" even as it heralds, by prophetic annunciation, "the act of general reformation [to be] inaugurated by King Josiah (Yoshiyahu)" (Nibley, "The Lachish Letters," The Prophetic Book of Mormon, 388, quoting Harry Torczyner, Lachish I). Indeed the name Mosiah suggests "both the early reform of Moses and its later imitation by Mosiah" (389). Such names reflect both forerunner and the seal (Elias and Elijah). Josiah, by name and deed, thus links the generations of faithful Israel.
Why praise Josiah? Even in his tragic death, Josiah attests and teaches the universality of God as Father of all humankind; for God even speaks to Pharaoh ("the words of Necho from the mouth of God," 2 Chr.35:22). Here, again, Josiah foreshadows Messiah as Restorer of the Covenant with Israel, and thence with all mankind.
Why praise Josiah? He was a model for the righteous kings of The Book of Mormon. Like Benjamin at Mosiah's coronation, Joash at his own accession (2 Kings 11:14), and Solomon at the dedication of the temple (2 Chronicles 6:13), Josiah stood on a tower-pillar or -platform at the holy temple and brought his assembled people under covenant (John Welch, Terrence L. Szink, et al., "Upon the Tower of Benjamin," 97-9, and "Benjamin's Tower and Old Testament Pillars," 100-02, in Pressing Forward with the Book of Mormon, Provo, 1999). As Hugh Nibley points out, righteous King Mosiah combines the names Moses and Josiah, lawgiver and restorer of the law, in one blessed name. And, like Josiah, the Risen Christ standing in the midst of the people at the Temple of Bountiful, establishes his gospel covenant.
Why praise Josiah? As a reflection of the Prophet Joseph Smith and the latter-day restoration, he discovered a lost book of scripture, and, acting alone, through its dissemination resurrected a priesthood and a gospel dispensation from apostasy and restored the holy temple.
Why praise Josiah? He typifies all of us as we walk our individual roads of repentance, as we "discover the scriptures for ourselves--and not just discover them once, but rediscover them again and again. In this regard, the story of King Josiah in the Old Testament is a most profitable one to 'liken … unto [our]selves' (1 Nephi 19:24). To me, it is one of the finest stories in all of the scriptures." (Spencer W. Kimball in First Presidency Message: "How Rare a Possession--the Scriptures!," Ensign, September 1976).
Why praise Josiah? Because such a beloved modern prophet, Spencer W. Kimball, in humble striving after righteousness, likens the example of Josiah unto himself.
And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the LORD with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses [he, like the Christ, fulfills all the law by fulfilling the greatest commandment]; neither after him arose there any like him [as was said of Melchizedek, the priestly type of Christ] (2 Kings 23:25).
Notes: Some Latter-day Saints are fervid followers of Margaret Barker's engaging works, in which King Josiah is disparaged. But let it be remembered that Ms. Barker, like J.R.R. Tolkien of mythopoeic renown, typifies the dream-charged West Midlands. Like Tolkien, Margaret Barker quixotically attempts to write something more than scholarship--she reaches for Scripture. I might applaud such endeavor, lovely in purpose, while never taking it seriously as either scholarship or theology--or even heresy. Neither should any other reflective person. Hugh Nibley, as Sister Ann Madsen wisely noted in her recent Nibley memorial address, always stayed within his game plan, never got into left field.
II Kings 23:3: And the king stood by [Hebrew al = stood on] a pillar [that is, the center place], and made a covenant before the LORD. The Targum calls this a "platform"; Josephus, Antiq. X.63 has epi tou bematos, Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor, II Kings, The Anchor Bible, 285 n.3.
Trampling the Asherah: Another moment in Israelite history that stands proud was the overthrow of Ahab and Jezebel. After teaching students about the Jubilee rites of Deuteronomy 15, Professor James Sanders was wont to say: "Pushing Jezebel out the window was a Jubilee event." For the Asherah cult of Manesseh as part of "the 'nonorthodox' popular religion" of Ancient Israel, see the cogent--and withering--remarks of Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor, Anchor Bible: II Kings, 268 n.7.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Mystery of the Knight Mangum Building
Lounging, as was my custom of an afternoon, in the comfortable offices of Dr. David Pratt, Pleasant Professor of British History, I darkened my brow over his tale of a curious, changeable spot, just overhead, that grew by stages in his imagination as the years wheeled by; until, at last, stirred, he flew tiptoe from the desk and jimmied off a ceiling panel, and there—“What was it?” I spluttered—“A cake!” he screamed. “Now where would that come from?” A little white cake. Of rock.
I like a good mystery and so passed things along to ma mère, who never at a loss for wherefores, laws, and such like, from my tenderest days, promptly set out in keen detail the value of snacks on demand, her roomate’s mastermind, the swift as midnight raid, the prized crème deluxe, the heavy tread of feet, the quick upward glances, the chair, the jimmied shingle, a knock, innocent faces--and all that followed. Those were the days, she expostulated, when dorm mothers still strode the darkened hallways, armed with writs from the academic senate and wired for kitchen raids and ladders.
“Well,” I demanded, “Didn’t she get back to it?”
“Who knows? There was always a lot going on, and she was like that.”
O Cake!
Sweet Cake!
To you I sing,
which once a thing
of powder, salt, and butter.
What madness caused
those too cruel laws
that pushed you into rafters?
What care and thought
in she who wrought
and mindful turned the batter--
Then you forgot
and left to rot
for twenty years thereafter.
I like a good mystery and so passed things along to ma mère, who never at a loss for wherefores, laws, and such like, from my tenderest days, promptly set out in keen detail the value of snacks on demand, her roomate’s mastermind, the swift as midnight raid, the prized crème deluxe, the heavy tread of feet, the quick upward glances, the chair, the jimmied shingle, a knock, innocent faces--and all that followed. Those were the days, she expostulated, when dorm mothers still strode the darkened hallways, armed with writs from the academic senate and wired for kitchen raids and ladders.
“Well,” I demanded, “Didn’t she get back to it?”
“Who knows? There was always a lot going on, and she was like that.”
O Cake!
Sweet Cake!
To you I sing,
which once a thing
of powder, salt, and butter.
What madness caused
those too cruel laws
that pushed you into rafters?
What care and thought
in she who wrought
and mindful turned the batter--
Then you forgot
and left to rot
for twenty years thereafter.
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