The Importance of Being Sarai

There are many hints in the Genesis account of Abraham's life that Sarai (later Sarah) is much more important than is explicitly stated.  Let me set out a few:

1. Sarai/Sarah's name means "princess" or "my princess."  This is interesting in itself, but doubly interesting because Abraham's brother married Milcah, whose name means "queen."  What are we really being shown here, that these two brothers marry royal women?
2. At the same time that Abram's name is changed to Abraham, Sarai's name is changed to Sarah.  A change in name reflects a change in status, for instance, a change in priesthood status.  Abraham isn't the only special one in this little family.
3. There's an oddity about Abraham's tent.  In both Genesis 12 and Genesis 13, the King James tells us that Abraham pitched "his tent."  Oddly, the original Hebrew in both cases clearly says "her tent," and the rabbis felt so strongly that this was mistaken that they inserted vowels to change the reading.  Was the tent originally Sarai's?  Interestingly enough, there is also a camouflaged "her tent" in Genesis 9 -- it's the place where Noah gets drunk.  The fact that "tents" so commonly stand in for temples makes these passages extra provocative.
4. Sarai is associated with the idea of goodness.  She has to lie to Pharaoh so that "it may be well" with Abram, yetav.  She lies, and Pharaoh "entreated Abram well," hetiv.  Tov is "good," and appears in the early chapters of Genesis in curious connections.  The first thing created is light, and it is tov.  Havilah, somehow connected with the Garden of Eden, is the land of "good" gold. And the tree in the Garden is also "good."  These chapters, so close together, suggest an association among Sarai, the Garden of Eden, the light of creation, and Havilah, the land of good gold.  How important is this idea of "goodness" to Nephi?  Seems important.
5. There's an oddity in the marriage, again involving royalty, and also involving ambivalence between brother and husband and a swap of persons, perhaps with a pointer connecting us with Egypt.  I don't know what's going on here, but the upshot seems to be that because of Sarah, Abraham becomes a shepherd and also gets followers -- the men are called 'avadim, which can mean "workers" but may also indicate ordinance-performing priests, and the women are called shefachot, a word the dictionary tells us is synonymous with "handmaid," a word used to describe the mothers of both Samuel and Jesus, for instance.

Who is Sarai?  I don't know, but the OT tells us that she's royal, she's priestly, she's associated with temples, and she confers elevated status.  So it looks like Abram married well.

Dwelt in Tents

Because they dwelt in tents, Abraham could say of his people "eternity was our covering and our rock and our salvation."  The rock and the salvation are the Worship of the Shalems and the Day of Atonement.  "Covering" is one way to understand the Hebrew root underlying the word we translate as "atone," "atonement."  "Eternity" is 'olam, the world, the cosmos, that which endures forever with God.

All this because they dwelt in tents.  What kinds of tents were these?  Were they the tents of the people of Shum?

1 Nephi 1-4

Team

Attached please find the outline, so far, of our lesson arc on Book of Mormon legal cases.  I'll add to the same outline for future lessons and circulate again.

I read 1 Nephi 1-4 today.  I had a couple of thoughts I'd like to share, because they're new thoughts to me.

1) Nephi's first use of the odd phrase "my father Lehi dwelt in a tent" is in 2:15 and is bracketed with a reference to returning to his father's tent in 3:1.  What do we find in between?  Nephi again says he wants to know the mysteries (a "hot button" word), he cries unto the Lord, the Lord promises him a promised land, and to make him a ruler and a teacher, and makes promises about his seed.  Sam believes, but Laman & Lemuel don't.

What's going on here?  Remember that references to Lehi's tent Bracket both Lehi's vision (7:22 and 9:1) and Nephi's explanatory second vision (10:16 and 15:1), which are both temple visions.  I think this is a very subtle but plain reference to Nephi, somewhere in the borders of the Red Sea, taking out his endowments or having some similar temple-like covenant and visionary experience.  I increasingly think that the whole point of 1 Nephi 1:1-2 is that Nephi is telling us that his book is all about the temple.

2) It's interesting that in telling of his killing of Laban, Nephi uses juridical imagery -- in other words, like Jacob confronting Laban in Genesis 31, he describes his experience in language and imagery drawn from trials.  The suit commences with the verb of motion (he "came near" in 4:7); the action is at the "house" of Laban, one of the city's leaders, and his "treasury", both public buildings; the Spirit presses its case and Nephi resists (v. 10) but when the Spirit persists (vv. 11ff), Nephi "shuts up" -- he surrenders; interestingly, the arguments that Nephi makes to himself have to do with the need to know the law (vv. 14-17); the remedy is carried out immediately (v. 18); Zoram, interestingly, thinks that Nephi's references to his brothers refer to the elders of the Jews (i.e., leaders of the tribe of Judah, the royal tribe) (vv. 22-27), who of course should have been worthy judges for Nephi's cause, only they're apostate; since there are no worthy elders, Nephi makes Zoram the judge -- he grabs him, makes his case and swears an oath, and when Zoram makes a return oath, Nephi knows he has been vindicated (vv. 30-37).

Cool, huh?

I'll check in again tomorrow.