What's Your Verse? (Let's Ponderize Together)


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I stand corrected.

 

I had a Ward member tell me once that he also wondered about Omni...  Why the Lord included it... Then he continued with a story about how while on his mission he had an investigator gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon because of Omni.  Apparently that investigator needed the reassurance that he didn't need to be perfect, and he got that from Omni.

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A slight correction...  Mormon found the small plates of Nephi and inserted them per God's command...  He did not re-write them or need to find more time or material then it took him to insert them.

 

In addition, Mormon apparently knew about Nephi's small plates, possibly because they had been mentioned elsewhere in the record. He went searching specifically for them when he had finished his abridgment from Lehi down to the first Mosiah.

 

Of course, we no longer have that abridgement, called the Book of Lehi, it having been stolen from Martin Harris when Joseph Smith ill-advisedly loaned Martin the manuscript. The lack of this initial book has made the Book of Mormon difficult to understand for first-time readers because the structure seems messed up.

 

If we had that initial Book of Lehi, the Book of Mormon would make more structural sense. The Book of Lehi would open, probably with Mormon briefly introducing himself and explaining his abridgment, then moving directly into the narrative of Lehi and Nephi, down to the first Mosiah. Then you would have the insertion of the small plates, then Mormon's explanation of that insertion (Words of Mormon), then a continuation of the abridgment. But missing that initial book means we're joining the play in the second act. Fortunately, God's foreknowledge of events and commandments to keep the small plates means that we get a recap of the first act right at the beginning of the second. Convenient how that worked out.

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  • 2 months later...

My verse this week was...

Alma 37:6

“…behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.”

 

This is a great chapter on many aspects of the topic “knowledge.” The verses immediately surrounding this verse, in particular, discuss the scriptures and the knowledge gained by them. I wanted to ponder this particular verse in the context of gaining spiritual knowledge.

 

First, I pondered on what Alma was talking about in this verse. He is recalling the preservation of the record through the generations, it being passed from person to person, thus ensuring this spiritual knowledge being had for the people’s benefit through the ages. This made me think of the people who preserved and kept the Bible records, who worked to translate them into other languages and the eventual printing of the Bible. Just these “small things” that one by one culminated in this great thing—the Bible being mass produced for the people. And in an LDS context, that “small thing” lead to other small things, such as the migration of people looking for religious freedom which lead to the establishment of a free country and also the questionings of a young boy which eventually lead to the restoration of the gospel of Christ.

 

In studying, I came across this wonderful little quote by Elder Richard G. Scott, “Precious truth comes a small piece at a time through faith, with great exertion, and at times wrenching struggles.” This reminded me of the line upon line principle. Knowledge is gained little by little. And all those small things we come to know add up into great knowledge.

 

I’ve been missing this connection with knowledge in this verse. It is so easy for me to forget that knowledge comes by doing (John 7:17). It’s easy for me to think that theory is greater than experimentation, but that is definitely not true when it comes to spiritual knowledge. We can’t just read the scriptures; we have to do the things they tell us to in order to gain the greater knowledge even if they seem like small and simple things. I love how Alma ends this chapter with his discussion on the Liahona and relating it to the word of Christ. He says, “it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ, which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass…” and then ends by saying, “…let us not be slothful because of the easiness of the way…” Perhaps these “small things” aren’t really as small as we sometimes think they are when they lead to such great things.

 

Thoughts?

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My verse this week was...

Alma 37:6

“…behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.”

 

This is a great chapter on many aspects of the topic “knowledge.” The verses immediately surrounding this verse, in particular, discuss the scriptures and the knowledge gained by them. I wanted to ponder this particular verse in the context of gaining spiritual knowledge.

 

First, I pondered on what Alma was talking about in this verse. He is recalling the preservation of the record through the generations, it being passed from person to person, thus ensuring this spiritual knowledge being had for the people’s benefit through the ages. This made me think of the people who preserved and kept the Bible records, who worked to translate them into other languages and the eventual printing of the Bible. Just these “small things” that one by one culminated in this great thing—the Bible being mass produced for the people. And in an LDS context, that “small thing” lead to other small things, such as the migration of people looking for religious freedom which lead to the establishment of a free country and also the questionings of a young boy which eventually lead to the restoration of the gospel of Christ.

 

In studying, I came across this wonderful little quote by Elder Richard G. Scott, “Precious truth comes a small piece at a time through faith, with great exertion, and at times wrenching struggles.” This reminded me of the line upon line principle. Knowledge is gained little by little. And all those small things we come to know add up into great knowledge.

 

I’ve been missing this connection with knowledge in this verse. It is so easy for me to forget that knowledge comes by doing (John 7:17). It’s easy for me to think that theory is greater than experimentation, but that is definitely not true when it comes to spiritual knowledge. We can’t just read the scriptures; we have to do the things they tell us to in order to gain the greater knowledge even if they seem like small and simple things. I love how Alma ends this chapter with his discussion on the Liahona and relating it to the word of Christ. He says, “it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ, which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass…” and then ends by saying, “…let us not be slothful because of the easiness of the way…” Perhaps these “small things” aren’t really as small as we sometimes think they are when they lead to such great things.

 

Thoughts?

 

Reminds me of Abraham 1:2. I think we, our Mormon culture, has made it out to be harder than it is -- myself included.

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My verse this week was:

Alma 38:6

“…I would not that ye should think that I know these things of myself, but it is the Spirit of God which is in me which maketh these things known unto me; for if I had not been born of God I should not have known these things.”

 

Mostly I chose this verse because of the intriguing, to me, connection between knowledge and “born of God.” It made me want to study that topic again and see what else I could glean of this relationship. There are some interesting things there to think about. I found this cool verse in Jeremiah that I really liked in 24:7. “And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.”

 

Some other ponderings on this verse:  I wonder how often we think we need to gain spiritual knowledge on our own. Yes, we need to seek learning by study, but also by faith. How often do we let the Spirit be our teacher? I know the challenge for me is in discovering how the Spirit speaks to me.

 

Thoughts?

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And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

(Ether 12:27)

 

I have a powerful testimony of the promise contained in this scripture. 

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My verse this week was:

D&C 136:32-33

“Let him that is ignorant learn wisdom by humbling himself and calling upon the Lord his God, that his eyes may be opened that he may see, and his ears opened that he may hear;

For my Spirit is sent forth into the world to enlighten the humble and contrite, and to the condemnation of the ungodly.”

 

Love this verse! I read this and was like, duh, why didn’t I remember this connection between humility and knowledge before. Being humble does mean, in part, being teachable. Some related verses I found were Mosiah 4:11-12, D&C 1:28, D&C 67:10 and D&C 112:10.

 

Any thoughts on the connection between humility and knowledge?

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My verse this week was:

D&C 136:32-33

“Let him that is ignorant learn wisdom by humbling himself and calling upon the Lord his God, that his eyes may be opened that he may see, and his ears opened that he may hear;

For my Spirit is sent forth into the world to enlighten the humble and contrite, and to the condemnation of the ungodly.”

Love this verse! I read this and was like, duh, why didn’t I remember this connection between humility and knowledge before. Being humble does mean, in part, being teachable. Some related verses I found were Mosiah 4:11-12, D&C 1:28, D&C 67:10 and D&C 112:10.

Any thoughts on the connection between humility and knowledge?

I love these verses. In part because this is a form of understanding that is hidden from the world. Why humility is good for you?

Maybe this should be a separate thread? If you are not humble, you will not look for more answers. Reverence invites revealation. Humility causes you to earnestly turn to G-d.

Edited by Sunday21
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My verse from 1 Nephi. I will go and do the things that the Lord has commanded because I know that the Lord does not give commandments unto the children of men without preparing a way that they may fulfill the commandments.

Obeying the commandments often looks impossible. Thee reasons, Satan and obeying commandments without God's help sometimes IS Impossible. Also sometimes obeying commandments involves making choices, Eve and the apple, Nephi and killing Laban. You need the help of the Holy Ghost to help you make the right choice.

Edited by Sunday21
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I love these verses. In part because this is a form of understanding that is hidden from the world. Why humility is good for you?

Maybe this should be a separate thread? If you are not humble, you will not look for more answers. Reverence invites revealation. Humility causes you to earnestly turn to G-d.

 

Reverence (SMH, duh!). My list of "things related to knowledge" keeps getting bigger. I love it. So glad i decided to study this topic. I'm needing all these reminders.

 

My verse from 1 Nephi. I will go and do the things that the Lord has commanded because I know that the Lord does not give commandments unto the children of men without preparing a way that they may fulfill the commandments.

Obeying the commandments often looks impossible. Thee reasons, Satan and obeying commandments without God's help sometimes IS Impossible. Also sometimes obeying commandments involves makin choices, Eve and the apple, Nephi and killing Laban. You need the help of the Holy Ghost to help you make the right choice.

 

Love it. And that verse has some great ones in the footnotes, too. Like the example given later in 1 Nephi 17:3 or the famous one from Philippians about being able to do all things through Christ.

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What an uplifting idea. I liked the scripture you provided, too. Helaman 14:15-19 is meaningful to me and particularly helpful to me in my understanding of the nature of my Savior's atonement.

 

UT.starscoper thanks for posting Helaman 14:15-19.  As soon as I read:

"18 that whosoever repenteth the same is not hewn down and cast into the fire; but whosoever repenteth not is hewn down and cast into the fire;"

I noticed repetition in reverse so Chiasmus popped into my mind so I started hunting.  I had to cheat to get it to work, but this is what I came up with:

A. 14 a sign of his death
  B. 15 brought into the presence of the Lord
   Nested Chiasmus
   a 16 this death bringeth to pass the resurrection
       b 16 Adam (mankind) being cut off from the presence of the Lord
       b' 17 bringeth them (mankind) back into the presence of the Lord
   a' 17 the resurrection of Christ redeemeth mankind
 
Point: 18 that whosoever repenteth the same is not hewn down and cast into the fire; but whosoever repenteth not is hewn down and cast into the fire;
 
  B' 18 there cometh upon them again a spiritual death, yea, a second death, for they are cut off (from the presence of the Lord).
A' 19 brought down unto this second death
 
I don't know if this is what Helaman or Mormon had in mind, but it was fun to play with.
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Vort – Your illumination of the book of Lehi reminded me of something I read somewhere. (Sorry if I am a little off topic as to ponderizing, but I would like to add to what Vort said, but then really only geeks like what I will attempt)  

 

If you look at Alma 10: 1 Now these are the words which Amulek preached unto the people who were in the land of Ammonihah, saying:

 

 2 I am Amulek; I am the son of Giddonah, who was the son of Ishmael, who was a descendant of Aminadi; and it was that same Aminadi who interpreted the writing which was upon the wall of the temple, which was written by the finger of God.

 

 3 And Aminadi was a descendant of Nephi, who was the son of Lehi,

 

Now if you look at the estimated date either at the top of the page in the new heading or at the bottom of the page if you have the old scriptures you will see 82 BC

 

Now go back to Mosiah 1 and look at the dates (130 - 124 BC).  Hang in there with me for a moment; it will be geeky if you like that kind of stuff.  So any date before 130 BC will be back into the Book of Lehi.  OK so we have to account for 48 years from 130 BC to 82 BC .  Now if you will accept that there are approximately 25 years between generations then we can compute Amulek (82 BC) to his father Giddonah (82 + 25 = 107 BC) to his father Ishmael (107 BC + 25 = 132 BC) to  Aminadi (132 + ???) Don’t know but it will be at least 25 so go 132 + 25 = 157 BC. That right there puts us back into the Book of Lehi (the lost 116 pages)

 

Now when Mormon writes in verse 2 “it was that same Aminadi” He is assuming we know the story of the writing on the temple wall by the finger of God because he already included it in the Book of Lehi.  And a quick search on Aminidai will reveal there is no such story in our current BoM.

 

OK, now let’s take it out of the realm of geeky and push it to something more meaningful as to understanding Amulek. From verse 3 we learn that Amulek is a direct descendant of Nephi through his ancestor Aminadi.  That smells like royal blood to me.  It was the kings who, until the rein of judges, held the Melchizedek Priesthood and were the custodians’ of the relics and scriptures on plates.  This could means that Amulek had access to the scriptures because of his lineage or some other means.  This could also sheds light why Amulek, a citizen of Ammonihah, of all places, knew so much deep doctrine. This is a stretch, but the reason Amulek stressed that fact that he was royal may be because there were others in Ammonihah who were not Nephites by blood, but were pre-existing natives adopted in to the Nephite culture.

 

So we went from geeky to unsupported interesting.  

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Nice observations, Sojourn. I, too, have assumed that Aminadi was possibly mentioned earlier in the abridgment, in the lost part. Or possibly not; Amulek was speaking to his fellow Nephites, not to us, so his reference would have been for their benefit.

 

To some extent, the interpretation of this verse is dependent upon whether this phrase ("...and it was that same Aminadi...") was part of Amulek's quotation, or whether Mormon was inserting a parenthetical identification. If it was Mormon's parenthetical insertion, then surely he wrote about Aminadi before. If it was part of Amulek's speech, then it's anyone's guess whether Mormon wrote about it before.

 

More musings: I find it interesting that Daniel's "writing on the wall" experience, which this story very obviously echoes, took place (probably) around 500 BC. Aminadi lived perhaps as early as 200 BC. So the two dates, though not particularly close, can be viewed as part of the same general historical era. The Lehites were long gone from Jerusalem by the time of Daniel's experience in Babylon. This idea of children of Israel in exile from Jerusalem reading the writings of the finger of God written on a wall is the common thread, and makes me wonder if God does not choose a certain means at a certain period for doing his work among various of his children around the world. For example, at Christ's coming, he organized twelve disciples to consciously imitate the roles and duties of the twelve apostles in Jerusalem.

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To some extent, the interpretation of this verse is dependent upon whether this phrase ("...and it was that same Aminadi...") was part of Amulek's quotation, or whether Mormon was inserting a parenthetical identification. If it was Mormon's parenthetical insertion, then surely he wrote about Aminadi before. If it was part of Amulek's speech, then it's anyone's guess whether Mormon wrote about it before.

 

Vort - I see what you are pointing out and I don't disagree.  I did find two other similar quotations that may or may not be of interest:

 

Alma 49:16
16 And behold, Moroni had appointed Lehi to be chief captain over the men of that city; and it was that same Lehi who fought with the Lamanites in the valley on the east of the river Sidon.
 
 
Helaman 5:21
21 And it came to pass that they were taken by an army of the Lamanites and cast into prison; yea, even in that same prison in which Ammon and his brethren were cast by the servants of Limhi.
 
We do see the same language and we know what is being referred to in the two above mentioned cases; not a slam dunk though.
 
One other musing as you say. The fact that Aminidi interpreted the writing on the wall may indicate that Aminidi was the king because we most often find in the Book of Mormon that it is the king who has the Nephite interrupters, and curiously the interrupters just show up in early Nephite writings without explanation from whence they came; unless I missed it.  I am guessing that it was explained in the 116 pages.  And, yes, we find out later that they were originally Jaridite interrupters.
Edited by Sojourn
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