askandanswer

May I suggest that those who solve it let the forum know that they have solved it, but that they don't post their answers until, say, early next week some time, or maybe just send their answers to Zil through private message?

Crocodile tears from the gator?

Perhaps that explains why he doesn't want any more educated women in his harem. 

Dear @askandanswer Remind me not to get on the wrong side of you!

This is the second time in less than two weeks that you have attempted to create the impression that some time in the distant past, you have had some of exposure to formal education. Give it up Zil, no one is ever likely to believe you, there is too much evidence to the contrary. For a start, if you had ever had any sort of contact with formal education, that would instantly disqualify you for membership in Gators' harem. 
My guess is that if you had ever had any contact with formal education processes, this probably would have taken place somewhere around 1967 - 1970? Or, more realistically, perhaps some time between 12:00 pm March 28, 1968, all the way through until 12:01 pm March 28, 1968?

Not true!

Perhaps another reason we have an angel with a trumpet on the temples is that the plates which Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon came forth on the very date of the Hebrew Feast of Trumpets in 1823.  See the January 2000 Ensign article "The Golden Plates and the Feast of Trumpets."  That is the date that Moroni gave Joseph the plates.  (He had seen them previously, but was not permitted to take them.)  The trumpet symbolizes the call for Israel to gather.  It's the call to repent and prepare for the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and the Feast of Tabernacles (God's return to his covenant people) in preparation for the coming New Year (Rosh Hashannah).  
Another significant date from the Hebrew calendar that coincides with Church history is that Moses, Elijah, and Jesus appeared in the Kirtland Temple on April 3, 1836.  That was the Passover in that year.  The Passover seder sets a place at the table reserved for Elijah's return.  There seems to be a synchronicity that we don't altogether understand with events of the Restoration and the Jewish calendar.  

I wish we knew more about our pre-mortal life, but we have been taught by the prophets and apostles on the matter.


 
The Prophet Joseph Smith said:

 
“God himself, finding he was in the midst of spirits and glory, because he was more intelligent, saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have a privilege to advance like himself. The relationship we have with God places us in a situation to advance in knowledge. He has power to institute laws to instruct the weaker intelligences, that they may be exalted with himself” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith [2007], 210).

 
Elder Bruce R. McConkie said (and this is particularly interesting to me):

 
“Being subject to law, and having their agency, all the spirits of men, while yet in the Eternal Presence, developed aptitudes, talents, capacities, and abilities of every sort, kind, and degree. During the long expanse of life which then was, an infinite variety of talents and abilities came into being. …

 
“The Lord endowed us all with agency; he gave us laws that would enable us to advance and progress and become like him; and he counseled and exhorted us to pursue the course leading to glory and exaltation. He himself was the embodiment and personification of all good things. Every desirable characteristic and trait dwelt in him in its eternal fulness. All of his obedient children started to become like him in one way or another. There was as great a variety and degree of talent and ability among us there as there is among us here. Some excelled in one way, others in another. The Firstborn excelled all of us in all things” (The Mortal Messiah, 4 vols. [1979–81], 1:23).

 
So, assuming we all were endowed with agency, it is reasonable to also assume that sin, in some degree, was possible in that realm of existence. Peter taught that Jesus is the lamb foreordained before the foundation of the world (1 Peter 1:20). So, we can conclude that the effects of the atonement were available even before the creation and the fall.

 
Robert J. Matthews, a BYU scholar, said in 2007 that the Grand Council might have been a series of meetings instead of only a single gathering. I quote:

 
“ ‘Grand Council’ is a term often used by the Prophet Joseph Smith to describe the setting for official, top-level, priesthood functions in the pre-earth life. The plan of God was introduced and taught in many meetings over an extended period of time - collectively called the Grand Council”. You can view his talk here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7noNAwLFr78

 
 
About the war in heaven, Elder Bruce R. McConkie said:

 
“What kind of war [was the War in Heaven]? The same kind that prevails on earth; the only kind Satan and spirit beings can wage—a war of words, a tumult of opinions, a conflict of ideologies; a war between truth and error” (Doctrinal New Testament Commentary, 3 vols. [1965–73], 3:518). I hope that helps!

Yes and Yes.
The law of Moses was given as a result of the children of Israel's lack of readiness to live a higher law. The higher law was removed and the law of Moses was received. The chapter gives evidences of people exercising faith, or of the servant exercising faith and miracles happening. In this case, the law of Moses was received by the faith of Moses with understanding that a more excellent way was prepared through gift of the Son (at least this is they way I have understood what is being taught).
Another option would be people who may not have faith to live a higher law, but they do have faith to receive a lesser law (in this way it could even be said by faith the children of Israel received a lesser law, because the did not have faith to live a higher law). Our lives can be similar. We may not have the faith to receive one blessing, but we do have faith to receive an alternative blessing.

An impostor, yes, but not a mysterious swamp creature. As noted in my earlier post, in reality, she was the the slightly attractive second kitchen assistant, Mrs Gator

We're forgetting the LDS member of Metallica.

All children of God who leave his kingdom are a loss. Let's not deny their eternal worth.

This has got me thinking. I wondering what are those qualities that DO make one person superior to another, assuming that there are any. And taking things a step further, are those qualities more or less likely to be found in certain groups people?
I denounce rascism and supremacy based on colour
And I especially denounce people who don't think much of the first star wars trilogy, Carb.

I’ve got a new favourite piece of music. It’s the overture from Wagner’s Tannhauser. This is the music that I would like to hear being sung as I walk through the pearly gates into the Celestial Kingdom.
Picture this: After a period of mortality filled with struggle and difficulty and hardship, and slow but constant refinement, you eventually learn to fully submit your whole self to the will of the Father, and completely put aside the natural man. Having lived a good life and overcome the sorrows and snares of this life, you finally have your one-on-one interview with the Saviour. He listens to all that you have to say with perfect love and understanding, and you KNOW with all your soul that He knows you and loves you and understands you, and that He is so happy that you have endured mortality well and kept the faith. He puts His arm around your shoulders, looks into your face and says Well done thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. After shedding tears and feeling His love for you, and being overcome with gratitude for the mercy and power and glory of the Plan of Salvation, you look over towards the pearly gates, and see your loved ones who have preceded you. You get up off your knees and start walking towards them, through those gates, leaving this world behind, and entering into a new and eternal life. And this is what you hear:
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6OQCncAiC8

I don't need to denounce anything that is a given.  It is ridiculous to say that I support something because I don't publicly denounce it.

Love the racist, hate the racism.

So after trying, and failing in the plan suggested by the folk prophet, the slightly attractive second kitchen assistant, Mrs Gator, realised that that’s all he was – just a folk prophet, and not the real deal. So she decided to do what she should have done in the first plan and turn to the scriptures. After reading Joshua chapter 6, she decided that marching around the castle blowing trumpets was a very ZILly idea because she was trying to escape from the castle, not break into it, and besides, there was a severe shortage of trumpets in the castle at the time. So then she turned to the real, correctly translated, truer Book of Mormon and read Mosiah 22 and found out that the tried and tested way to escape from or into a place of captivity is to make some wine, give it to the guards, get them drunk and then get through or over the back pass, through the back wall, on the back side of the city. (See Mosiah 22:6 and Alma 55: 8 – 16) She decided to follow the example taught in the scriptures and to try this out.
Realising that the best home made brew was made with jojoba nuts (yes, there is such a kind of nut https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jojoba) she took her jojobags out of the cupboard and headed off for the secret garden. When she got near the garden, she realised that there were two ways in – through the gator over the fence. She climbed over the fence and headed for the jojoba nut shrubs. Along the way she passed by the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Having read in a poorly translated book that it’s fruit had the power to induce hallucinogenic visions that led the eater to believe they knew the difference between good and evil, she hacked off a few pieces of fruit. After gathering up three bags full of jojoba nuts, she stopped and thought maybe I (V)ort to get a few more, so she scrunched up and squashed down what she had already put into her bags so that she could put Maureen. Having got what she needed, she made her way back to the kitchen. After slicing the fruit and nuts, she began to sauté them in her frying pam.

A small diversion here:
Vort, be not deceived. The avatar of ztodd is a kitten, not a pig.

Dear Sister Gator
Notwithstanding the apparently warm welcome with which members of this forum appear to have extended to you, your application for membership of this forum has been 
DENIED
Once you have dempnstrated a more enlightened and discerning ability to choose a suitable male companion, the Board will be pleased to reconsider your application. 
With regrets,
Miss Prim
Secretary, Anti-gator Group
 

I think that in matters that might adversely impact on its reputation, the church tends to shoot first and ask questions later. It seems that in certain types of situations, an excess of caution by the church has led to an approach whereby you are guilty until proven innocent. We've had a situation in our stake in which a member of the stake with a prominent calling was charged with two offences, one of which was quite serious, and eventually found guilty of the lesser offence, for which they received a sentence of 6 months imprisonment, fully suspended for two years. During the various court procedures associated with the matter, particularly the sentencing, when other prominent church members around the stake were asked by the convicted person if they could provide character references, they were told by church authorities that no such references should be provided. Some leaders followed this counsel and did not provide a reference, and some ignored the counsel and provided a reference. Nothing bad happened to those who provided a reference, and nothing bad happened to the reputation of the church as a result of this matter. After the trial and sentence, some months later, the stake eventually got around to convening a disciplinary council and this person was excommunicated, and has since been rebaptised. I was a little surprised that the church felt that no discplinary action could commence until after the trial, and that no readmission procedures could commence until after the two year suspended sentence had been finished. This sounded to me a little like God's justice, and the process of rescuing a badly damaged soul and helping them to return, had to take a back-seat to the vagaries  and delays of temporal justice. What made things worse was that at the time this happened, the Courts in this part of the country had a huge backlog, and the person who was arrested had to wait more than 2 1/2 years until their trial came up. That's 2 1/2 years that they had to wait until the church felt that it could commence its disciplinary council and thus take this most important step in this person's repentance and rehabilitation process. And then another two years while they waited out their suspended sentence before the church was willing to consider taking the next major step in this person's repentance process by holding another disciplinary council, resulting in their rebaptism. The two processes of legal trial and disciplinary council, to me, seem to be quite seperate, with different purposes and methodologies, and I haven't yet worked out why the needs of temporal justice take precedence over saving a soul. The approach taken by the church seemed, to me, to be completely inconsistent with the teaching of Christ to go out and seek the lost sheep. In this case, what seemed to happen was that the lost sheep was thrown out of the fold, and then the gate was locked to prevent their return. 
It's times like this that we need to rely more on our faith than our reasoning and to have faith that God will make everything right in the end, and that until we get to the end, He will sustain us and help us overcome the obstacles, and give us the strength that we need to endure the trials if we continue to stay faithful.  

I wouldn't recommend it either, but for Zil I'm prepared to make an exception.

A small diversion here:
Vort, be not deceived. The avatar of ztodd is a kitten, not a pig.

Thanks for letting us know!

Dear Sister Gator
Notwithstanding the apparently warm welcome with which members of this forum appear to have extended to you, your application for membership of this forum has been 
DENIED
Once you have dempnstrated a more enlightened and discerning ability to choose a suitable male companion, the Board will be pleased to reconsider your application. 
With regrets,
Miss Prim
Secretary, Anti-gator Group
 

Now I'm really confused. I'm guessing that some days you are an Icelandic woman and some days you are not?