Abstract: This article examines Mormon’s comparison of Moroni, the Nephite military leader, to Ammon, the son of Mosiah, in Alma 48:18 and how Mormon’s use and repetition of ʾmn-related terminology (“faithful,” “firm,” “faith,” “verily [surely]”) in Alma 48:7–17 lays a foundation for this comparison. Ammon’s name, phonologically and perhaps etymologically, suggests the meaning “faithful.” Mormon goes to extraordinary lengths in the Lamanite conversion narratives to show that Ammon is not only worthy of this name, but that his faithfulness is the catalyst for the transition of many Lamanites from unbelief to covenant faithfulness. Thus, in comparing Moroni directly to Ammon, Mormon makes a most emphatic statement regarding Moroni’s covenant faithfulness. Moreover, this comparison reveals his admiration for both men.

At the conclusion of Mormon’s famed panegyric1 for Moroni (Alma 48:7–18), the first person to whom Mormon favorably compares Moroni is Ammon, the son of Mosiah (see Alma 48:18). Although Mormon’s comparison also includes the other sons of Mosiah, of them he only mentions Ammon by name, suggesting that he is the main focus of the comparison. A close examination of Mormon’s language leading up to this comparison reveals the logic of and the rhetorical preparation for it.

Mormon’s earlier account of Ammon in the Lamanite conversion narratives had emphasized “the faithfulness of Ammon” (e.g., [Page 224]Alma 18:2, 10) as a major catalyst in the conversion of numerous Lamanites to the gospel of Jesus Christ and the reversal of generations of unbelief to surpassing “faithfulness.”2 In Hebrew, concepts of being “faithful,”3 “believ[ing],”4 “steadfastness,”5 “faithfulness” (and “faith”), “trustworthiness,”6 and “firmness” were expressed with lexical forms of the Hebrew verbal root ʾmn7 (apparently cognate with Egyptian mn = “be firm, established, enduring”; “be fixed, stick fast …”; “remain”)8 which sound like and may even be cognate with the name Ammon. Indeed, the onomastic connection between Ammon and forms of ʾmn — aural or etymological — is evidenced by the profusion of ʾmn-related terminology in the Lamanite conversion narratives (Alma 17–27).9

In this study,

Presented at:

2016 Temple on Mount Zion ConferenceSaturday, November 5, 2016https://interpreterfoundation.org/conferences/2016-temple-on-mount-zion-conference/

Conference Proceedings:

Sacred Time, Sacred Space, & Sacred Meaning at https://interpreterfoundation.org/books/sacred-time-sacred-space-sacred-meaning/

Listen to an audio recording of this talk:

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In the September 10th Come, Follow Me segment of the Interpreter Radio Show, our hosts Terry Hutchinson, John Gee, and Kevin Christensen discuss New Testament lesson 41, “For the Perfecting of the Saints” covering Ephesians.

You can listen to or download the New Testament in Context segment of the September 10 broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show below. It will also be included in our podcast feed (https://interpreterfoundation.org/feeds/podcast). The other segments of the September 10 radio show can be accessed at https://interpreterfoundation.org/interpreter-radio-show-september-10-2023.

The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640, or you can listen live on the Internet at ktalkmedia.com.

 

Original air date: September 10, 2023. This recording has been edited to remove commercial breaks.

The Interpreter Radio Show is a weekly discussion of matters of interest to the hosts, guests, and callers of the show. The views expressed on the Interpreter Radio Show are those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Interpreter Foundation, nor should statements made on the show be construed as official doctrinal statements of the Church.

 

Abstract: Although unable to write more than a hundredth part of his people’s history, Mormon seemingly found the time and plate-space to deliver literary justice on behalf of Gideon, who suffered a martyr’s death at the hand of the wicked Nehor. This article applies a literary approach buttressed by evidence from the Book of Mormon to suggest that Mormon intentionally supplied tightly-controlled repetitive elements, like the repetition of names, to point the reader to discover multiple literary sub-narratives connected by a carefully crafted network of themes running under the main narratives of the scriptures. The theories espoused in this work may have begun with the recognition of the reader-arresting repetition of Gideon’s name in Alma 6:7-8, but driven by scriptural data points soon connected Gideon with Abinadi, the Ammonites, and others. The repetitive and referential use of the moniker Nehor, Gideon’s murderer, on various peoples by Mormon seemed to connect thematically and organically to a justice prophesied by Abinadi. In parallel with the theme of justice laid upon the Nehor-populations, evidence is marshaled to also suggest that Mormon referenced the place-name of Gideon to intentionally hearken back to the man Gideon. Following the role of Gideon, as a place, we propose Mormon constructed a path for the martyr Gideon via proxy to meet the resurrected Lord in Bountiful. Mormon’s concern for the individual and his technique for rewriting Gideon’s story through proxy ultimately symbolizes the role Christ’s atoning power can take in each of our lives to save us.

Under the hands of its authors, the Book of Mormon creatively blends stringent didacticism and literary artistry into a piercing message of hope in the face of the tragedy of its own narrative. Mormon, the principle of three main authors of the book that bears his name, lived at the end-time of his people, a time of harsh brutality where he was [Page 168]exposed to “a continual scene of wickedness” (Mormon 2:18) and “blood and carnage” (Mormon 4:11). Somehow, surrounded by a people who “[had] lost their love, one towards another” and were “without mercy” (Moroni 9:5, 18), Mormon, in contrast, was miraculously “filled with charity” (Moroni 8:17). Rising above the cruel injustices of his own time, Mormon was able to revisit the records of his ancestors and pity their comparatively lesser injustices. On at least one occasion, this paper will suggest that Mormon’s sentimentality and compassion may have even moved him to mete out justice through literary means for injustices met on a man named Gideon. It is in this spirit of a narrator-focused approach that I attempt to discover the meaning behind Mormon’s repeated references to Gideon’s martyrdom at the hands of Nehor.

Increased attention to the narrators of the Book of Mormon has been a noteworthy trend in Book of Mormon scholarship since roughly 2010.1 This paper proposes that Mormon’s repetition of the names of Gideon and Nehor throughout the Book of Mormon are not coincidental, but serve as markers for the reader to discover authorial intent. Therefore, these repetitive and possibly intentional markers are catalogued as part of a methodology to read the Book of Mormon as the narrators intended and to uncover as much meaning as possible. These findings suggest that these narrators, like Mormon,

Presented at:

2016 Temple on Mount Zion ConferenceSaturday, November 5, 2016https://interpreterfoundation.org/conferences/2016-temple-on-mount-zion-conference/

Conference Proceedings:

Sacred Time, Sacred Space, & Sacred Meaning at https://interpreterfoundation.org/books/sacred-time-sacred-space-sacred-meaning/

Listen to an audio recording of this talk:

  Download audio recording

 

 

In the September 3rd Come, Follow Me segment of the Interpreter Radio Show, with moderator Terry Hutchinson, our hosts Spencer Kraus, Brent Schmidt, and Hales Swift discuss New Testament lesson 40, “Walk in the Spirit” covering Galatians.

You can listen to or download the New Testament in Context segment of the September 3 broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show below. It will also be included in our podcast feed (https://interpreterfoundation.org/feeds/podcast). The other segments of the September 3 radio show can be accessed at https://interpreterfoundation.org/interpreter-radio-show-september-3-2023.

The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640, or you can listen live on the Internet at ktalkmedia.com.

 

Original air date: September 3, 2023. This recording has been edited to remove commercial breaks.

The Interpreter Radio Show is a weekly discussion of matters of interest to the hosts, guests, and callers of the show. The views expressed on the Interpreter Radio Show are those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Interpreter Foundation, nor should statements made on the show be construed as official doctrinal statements of the Church.

 

 

In this episode of The Interpreter Radio Show, our hosts are Terry Hutchinson, John Gee, and Kevin Christensen. They discuss Come, Follow Me New Testament lesson 41, Brigham Young, and the Mountain Meadows Massacre. You can listen to or download the September 10th broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show below. These audio tracks are also included in our podcast feed (https://interpreterfoundation.org/feeds/podcast).

The “New Testament in Context” portion of this show, for the Come, Follow Me New Testament lesson 41, “For the Perfecting of the Saints” covering Ephesians, will also be posted separately on Tuesday, September 26.

The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640, or you can listen live on the Internet at ktalkmedia.com.

Original air date: September 10, 2023. These recording have been edited to remove commercial breaks.

The New Testament in Context Lesson 41: “For the Perfecting of the Saints” covering Ephesians

Gospel Advocacy: Edited Brigham Young words from “wife” to “wives”

Podcast: Download

Discussion: Vengeance is Mine about the Mountain Meadows Massacre with authors Rick Turley and Barbara Brown

Podcast: Download

The Interpreter Radio Show is a weekly discussion of matters of interest to the hosts, guests, and callers of the show. The views expressed on the Interpreter Radio Show are those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Interpreter Foundation, nor should statements made on the show be construed as official doctrinal statements of the Church.

 

Abstract: Although much has been taught about covenants in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, little attention has been given to the witnesses of those covenants. In this paper I focus on the importance of witnessing the covenants that we make with God — especially the gospel covenant — rather than on the process of making them. Instead of emphasizing the teachings of Latter-day Saint leaders and authors, I prioritize the standard works of the Church in my analysis of this topic. I begin with a discussion of covenants and witnesses in the Hebrew Bible, and then proceed with an examination of the same from the Book of Mormon. I identify the ordinances of baptism and the sacrament as witnesses of the gospel covenant and clarify that it is through the blood of Christ that we are cleansed from sin rather than through the waters of baptism. I conclude by observing the importance of faithfully witnessing the gospel covenant to serve God and keep his commandments.

From the earliest of times, God has established a pattern of covenant making with his people. Some Jewish scholars have even postulated that the first use of the word covenant in the Bible occurs in the very first word of the book of Genesis, בראשית (bereshit), translated as “In the beginning” in most English Bibles.1 Following this theory, the word אש (esh), or fire, is sandwiched between the four letters of the word for covenant ברית (brit). The result is בר-אש-ית (br-esh-it), which when rendered ברית אש (brit esh) means covenant of fire.

In antiquity, witnesses and testimonies (עדים, edim) or signs and tokens (אתת, otot) always accompanied and served as public evidences [Page 128]of these divine covenants. In fact, it is interesting that in the Book of Mormon only the secret combinations had secret signs:

And it came to pass that they did have their signs, yea, their secret signs and their secret words — and this that they might distinguish a brother who had entered into the covenant, that whatsoever wickedness his brother should do, he should not be injured by his brother, nor by those who did belong to his band who had taken this covenant. (Helaman 6:22)2

For the sake of simplicity, throughout this paper I refer to עדים (edim, witnesses or testimonies) and אתת (otot, signs or tokens) using the collective term witnesses of the covenant. These witnesses often served as reminders or as warnings to the people to be faithful to the covenantal agreement. In this paper, I discuss the principal covenants in the Hebrew Bible and the Book of Mormon, correlated with their associated witnesses.

While Latter-day Saint authors and Church leaders have written and spoken much about covenants, covenant-making, and covenant-keeping, the topic of covenantal witnesses has been largely overlooked. Hence, this paper will focus mainly on the witnesses of the covenant and will primarily rely on scriptural sources rather than on the sermons or writings of Latter-day Saint Church leaders or authors.

Old Testament Covenants and Witnesses

The Old Testament contains accounts of many covenants and witnesses to those covenants. These include Noah, Abraham, Sinai, Moab, the Transjordan witness, Shechem, and Nehemiah. Each of these are discussed in the following sections.

Noah

The first time that the word covenant (ברית, brit) is used explicitly in the Bible is when God, speaking to Noah prior to the flood, said,