I cannot say who Laban was, but in my mind he was not a brother of the prophet. I cannot recon Joseph fantasizing killing his dead brother. That is a path I simply cannot go/entertain due to certain guardrails in my own understanding. I suspect Laban was a fictional character in the mind of Joseph Smith who may have reminded him of someone known to the Smith family, more particular Joseph Smith Sr.
The plates were a representation of the holy Bible.
I hope that helps.
It does thank you.
Shulem, I’m interested in your take on something about Abinadi.
Abinadi appears to understand the implications of Ether 3. He doesn’t merely know that God exists, he seems to know the same thing the brother of Jared saw—that the Lord is already a man-like being who will later take on mortal flesh.
Except Ether 3 ends with the vision being sealed.
How did Abinadi know what the brother of Jared knew if the information had been sealed?
Shulem wrote:That is a path I simply cannot go/entertain due to certain guardrails in my own understanding.
Shulem, I’m interested in your take on something about Abinadi.
Abinadi appears to understand the implications of Ether 3. He doesn’t merely know that God exists, he seems to know the same thing the brother of Jared saw—that the Lord is already a man-like being who will later take on mortal flesh.
Except Ether 3 ends with the vision being sealed.
How did Abinadi know what the brother of Jared knew if the information had been sealed?
Joseph Smith believed in the Trinity-Godhead when the Book of Mormon was produced -- pretty much the same as any other Christian church. But the Book of Mormon is very much a Protestant production being utterly anti-Catholic and rejecting the authority of all the Churches that came out of it but did not object to Christian understanding of the nature of God -- just the authority and certain doctrines that had gone awry.
The record in Ether 3 was sealed from men but in Joseph Smith's mind nothing remains sealed when God chooses to reveal something in hid own time and place: "I will show them in mine own due time unto the children of men."
Here are a few posts that might help you better understand my thinking:
Who was Alma? Who was Abinadi? What did it really mean in the mind of Joseph Smith?
And now, I wish to take this thread into a whole new place where readers can better understand what Joseph Smith was really doing in creating and inventing his Book of Mormon using imagination coupled with secretsymbolicrepresentation. Smith was interested in melding the Bible into his Book of Mormon in a secret and inventive way in which to make it seem authentic and genuine in every respect.
My friends, you will learn the mystery here, live on Discuss Mormonism! Are you ready? Are you buckled in your seat? Let Shulem take you for a ride you’ll never forget! Prepare to be thrilled.
Now for the mystery!
Buckle up, the ride will thrill you to no end. All aboard! The Book of Mormon train is now boarding and ready to go to the next destination -- The Twilight Zone.
And now, without further ado, I will reveal a great mystery pertaining to Joseph Smith’s Book of Mormon -- a mystery that was known only to him as he prepared his ideas and stories and readied them for the dictation process in which Cowdery wrote what Smith mumbled while his head was buried in a hat. This is the key and those who know the Book of Mormon will recognize it and understand what has been in front of them all this time and they didn’t realize it until NOW:
1) Prophet Abinadi = John the Baptist (Jesus Christ)
2) Alma the elder = Peter
3) King Noah = Pilot & the Jews
4) Alma the younger = Saint Paul
5) Sons of Mosiah = apostles of the Christian church
1) Prophet Abinadi = John the Baptist (Jesus Christ)
Jesus’s “Woe”
1. “Woe unto thee . . . at the day of judgment”
2. “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! . . . these things shall come upon this generation.”
3. “Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge”
4. “in sackcloth and ashes”
Abinadi’s “Wo”
1. “Wo be unto this people . . . will visit them in mine anger.”
2. “Yea, wo be unto this generation!”
3. “I say unto you, wo be unto you for perverting the ways of the Lord!”
4. “in sackcloth and ashes”
I don’t think it necessary for me to compare the message and teachings of Jesus with that of Abinadi’s ministry in order to show the amazing parallels between the two accounts. Suffice it to say, Abinadi’s message and sermon is like a plagiarizing shadow having an eerie familiarity that seems to parallel Christ’s ministry. Joseph Smith wrote those things into his script in order to bring his Book of Mormon character to Christian life! You’re welcome to read Abinadi’s words and while doing it think about the gospels of the New Testament. That’s what Joseph Smith did! (Mosiah 11-17)
“And now if Christ had not come into the world, speaking of things to come as though they had already come, there could have been no redemption.” Mosiah 16:6 (Cowdery wrote what Smith dictated!)
The above is somewhat reminiscent of king Benjamin’s address when he said, “whosoever should believe that Christ should come, the same might receive remission of their sins, and rejoice with exceedingly great joy, even as though he had already come among them.”
Joseph Smith was walking a tight line while authoring his stories. There is a fine line between then and now. I’m afraid that Smith tripped up in Mosiah 16:6 and seems to have corrected himself in mid-sentence.
How does one claim, on one hand, that God's ways are ultimately beyond human comprehension and, at the same time, claim that his or her own interpretations of those same ways are correct?
Funny that.
Nipper is just going to have to come to terms that his Jesus (imaginary friend) is not going to return during his lifetime.
How many Christians over the past 2,000 years died disappointed that the prophecy failed? Millions upon millions!
How does one claim, on one hand, that God's ways are ultimately beyond human comprehension and, at the same time, claim that his or her own interpretations of those same ways are correct?
Funny that.
Nipper is just going to have to come to terms that his Jesus (imaginary friend) is not going to return during his lifetime.
How many Christians over the past 2,000 years died disappointed that the prophecy failed? Millions upon millions!
We don't know, and it's impossible to calculate, but it is reasonable to say that many millions of Christians have lived and died expecting Jesus' return during their lifetimes, only to die before it occurred.
Premise 1. Eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable.
Premise 2. The best evidence for the Book of Mormon is eyewitness testimony.
Conclusion. Therefore, the best evidence for the Book of Mormon is notoriously unreliable.
Nipper is just going to have to come to terms that his Jesus (imaginary friend) is not going to return during his lifetime.
How many Christians over the past 2,000 years died disappointed that the prophecy failed? Millions upon millions!
We don't know, and it's impossible to calculate, but it is reasonable to say that many millions of Christians have lived and died expecting Jesus' return during their lifetimes, only to die before it occurred.
Right. Consider the Great Disappointment "in the Millerite movement was the reaction that followed preacher William Miller's proclamation that Jesus Christ would return to the Earth by 1844, which he called the Second Advent...The Millerites had to deal with their own shattered expectations, as well as considerable criticism and even violence from the public. Many followers had given up their possessions in expectation of Christ's return."
"Our fondest hopes and expectations were blasted, and such a spirit of weeping came over us as I never experienced before…. We wept, and wept, till the day dawned." (When Time Shall Be No More, p 81, Paul Boyer)
And yet, to this day people still believe in the prophecy and die never realizing it in their lifetime.
We don't know, and it's impossible to calculate, but it is reasonable to say that many millions of Christians have lived and died expecting Jesus' return during their lifetimes, only to die before it occurred.
Right. Consider the Great Disappointment "in the Millerite movement was the reaction that followed preacher William Miller's proclamation that Jesus Christ would return to the Earth by 1844, which he called the Second Advent...The Millerites had to deal with their own shattered expectations, as well as considerable criticism and even violence from the public. Many followers had given up their possessions in expectation of Christ's return."
"Our fondest hopes and expectations were blasted, and such a spirit of weeping came over us as I never experienced before…. We wept, and wept, till the day dawned." (When Time Shall Be No More, p 81, Paul Boyer)
And yet, to this day people still believe in the prophecy and die never realizing it in their lifetime.
I sincerely hope you are having a great evening, Jersey.
I AM.
I get that people holding on to a belief about Jesus, despite the objective evidence, are doing so because it provides something in their lives that otherwise would be missing. I see that it provides people with a comfort or a hope without which they would find their lives harder to process. I get that. But that doesn’t make a second earthly visitation by someone mentioned in the Iron Age blogs of writers with their own agendas, and who died a really long time ago, a real event that’s going to happen.
Premise 1. Eyewitness testimony is notoriously unreliable.
Premise 2. The best evidence for the Book of Mormon is eyewitness testimony.
Conclusion. Therefore, the best evidence for the Book of Mormon is notoriously unreliable.
I get that people holding on to a belief about Jesus, despite the objective evidence, are doing so because it provides something in their lives that otherwise would be missing. I see that it provides people with a comfort or a hope without which they would find their lives harder to process. I get that. But that doesn’t make a second earthly visitation by someone mentioned in the Iron Age blogs of writers with their own agendas, and who died a really long time ago, a real event that’s going to happen.
On a serious note, I read the patriarchal blessing of my missionary companion in the MTC and later while we served together in London England and his blessing specifically stated that he would live in the flesh to help build Zion in Jackson County. I understand he passed away several years ago from cancer. I can only imagine he was disappointed at the outcome.
1000 years is like a day with the LORD. GOD created the entire universe and everything in it over the course of 6 days and on the 7th day GOD rested, The 7th day represents the Millennial Kingdom.
You did not answer the question and we already had this discussion up in the celestial thread, beginning here. The comparison between God's reconning and man's reconning based on how the planet moves in its solar system and how God oversees the entire universe is a metaphorical difference of expressing time. The Bible does not mark the Second Coming to have anything to do with the timeline counting down to Christ's return. You Christians make that crap up to apologize for your Lord being AWOL.
Daniel 7:13-14
13 “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. 14 He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.
Zechariah 12:10
Mourning for the One They Pierced
10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit[a] of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.
Zechariah 14:4
4 And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives,
Which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, from east to west, making a very large valley;
Half of the mountain shall move toward the north and half of it toward the south.
