Enos - Jarom

1. E 1 what are the nurture and admonition of the Lord?  If the Lord = the fruit of the tree in 1 Nephi 8 and 11 = the shewbread, isn’t the Lord’s nurture the eating of the fruit?  Admonition is warning… is “nurture” the endowment, the eating of the fruit, and “admonition” the Day of Atonement, the great warning of the Lord’s coming?

2. E 2 the famous Biblical character who wrestled before God was Jacob (Genesis 32); he met an angel and was given a new name, which are temple images.  Genesis Jacob’s first encounter with angels is told in Genesis 28, an episode that is also rife with temple imagery: a dream, a ladder with angels ascending and descending it, the Lord above the ladder, a covenant promise about seed, and look what Genesis Jacob says in verse 17 – the “house of God” and the “gate of heaven”.  Enos is the new Genesis Jacob, the third patriarch in the line (Abraham-Isaac-Genesis Jacob, Nephi-Nephite Jacob-Enos), and here in Enos we similarly have the voice of the Lord making promises about Enos’s seed.

3. E 14  Interesting that the Lamanites want to destroy the Nephite records.  Why?  Because they contained or supported Nephi’s claim to legitimacy as a ruler and teacher?  Because they contained the teachings and writings of the visionary men, whom the Lamanites disliked, and against whom they had sent their missionary Sherem?

4. E 20  Interesting that “dwelling in tents”, which was repeated so often of Lehi, has now become the mark of the Lamanites’ savagery.  Is this a sign they haven’t progressed?  Is it irony – they hate the temple (God’s tent) and stick to their own tents instead?

5. E 22  The heirs to the “prophets” and “visionary men” continue to have “many prophets” among them.  (See also Jarom 4, 10-12.)

6. E 27 is temple imagery.  Enos plans to “put on immortality” (like a garment) and see God’s face.

7. J 1 Jarom is clearly not keeping their “genealogy” in any ordinary sense.  Where are the lateral branches, not to mention the women?  Instead, he’s making a record of who was in the line of keepers of the small plates.

8. J 2 Nephi wrote a book all about the temple, for the benefit of his brothers who rejected the temple.  Jarom finds that Nephi’s explanation is thorough, and has nothing significant to add.

9. J 5 This sounds like a defense to me, like the Lamanites in their grudge against the Nephites are at this point still saying that the Nephites had forsaken the law of Moses.  Since the shewbread was eaten on the Sabbath (Leviticus 24:8), and the Nephite endowment appears to contemplate the eating of the shewbread (1 Nephi 8, the bread = the fruit of the tree; remember that Christ is the “bread of heaven”), I wonder if Jarom’s statement in this verse that the Nephites kept the Sabbath day holy is a statement that the Nephites faithfully kept BOTH the law of Moses AND the visionary temple worship (see also verse 11, “the law of Moses and the intent for which it was given”).  Also, did the Lamanites accuse the Nephites of “profanity” or “blasphemy” in their temple rites?

10. J 10-12 are poignant, since they tell us how it might have gone for Jerusalem, if the Jerusalemites had repented.  I think Jarom includes the historical stuff on the temple plates because it’s specifically an account of how many of the temple prophecies about “seed” have been fulfilled.  We still see absolutely nothing of the kings and other secular actors.