Seven chapters in the book of Jacob. I wanted to save chapters 5 and 6 to discuss together, so I'm "lumping" chapters 4 and 7 together. Thing is, they seem to go together pretty well when you consider them as the act of a real, live person who loved the Lord and acted on that love.
After delivering a powerful sermon to his people, Jacob takes on the daunting task of putting the message onto golden plates. He tells us that this is the only way to preserve the words: "But whatsoever things we write upon anything save it be upon plates must perish and vanish away..." (Jacob 4:2). He's right; in anything but the most arid of climates, any other written medium would eventually erode and be gone. I know, I know, the Dead Sea scrolls... Think of where they were, though: the most arid of climates. Jacob and his people were (presumably) in central America, most likely in a jungle type of area. Only a metal that does not corrode would survive for any length of time.
Think of what an effort it would take to inscribe words onto metal. "...I cannot write but a little of my words, because of the difficulty of engraving our words upon plates..." (Jacob 4:1). It would have required a metal instrument to literally scratch the writings onto metal plates. Thank goodness it is gold, which is relatively soft as metals go. Still, the effort would be tremendous. It helped that the words were recorded in a succinctly written language. Previously in 1st Nephi, we learn that these words were written in the language of the Egyptians, based on the learning of the Jews (see 1 Ne 1:2). Moroni explains why: "...we have written this record according to our knowledge, in the characters which are called among us the reformed Egyptian... And if our plates had been sufficiently large we should have written in Hebrew..." (Mormon 9:32-33). Two things come to mind: How likely is it that Lehi would have learned Egyptian sufficiently well, and taught his sons, that they could record these marvelous things in detail? I'll answer: The Lord prepared them for this life-work. Also, it kind of gives a window into the economic and social status of Lehi's family. Could a family who was scratching out a living day-to-day have been able to learn another language so fluently? I don't think so.
So, if it was so hard, why did they do it? Back to Jacob: "...we labor diligently to engraven these words upon plates, hoping that our beloved brethren and our children will receive them with thankful hearts... for this intent have we written these things, that they may know that we knew of Christ, and we had a hope of his glory..." (Jacob 4:3-4). We must be grateful for their efforts to painstakingly engrave their words for our benefit.
Chapter 7 of Jacob brings the first time in the Book of Mormon where we read of the great face-off between good and evil. A man called Sherem comes into the midst of the Nephites and "preaches" his beliefs. He is a smart man and is good with words; Jacob tells us that he uses much flattery in leading people away from Lord. In short, he teaches that there would be no Christ. He tells Jacob to his face that Jacob "... goest about much, preaching that which ye call the gospel, or the doctrine of Christ. And ye have led away much of this people that they pervert the right way of God... into the worship of a being which ye say shall come... this is blasphemy; for no man knoweth of such things..." (Jacob 7:6-7).
Of course, Jacob refutes this man, using powerful weapons: The truth, delivered by the power of the Spirit, and logical common sense. Sherem falls back on that tired old demand "...show me a sign by this power of the Holy Ghost, in the which ye know so much" (Jacob 7:13 - note the sarcasm in Sherem's words). End result: Sherem is disgraced, admits his wrongdoing and dies.
It's interesting to me that Sherem uses Satan's tried and true tactics: semblence of truth and flattery. I think most people can naturally discern truth. Satan knows this; he tries to make his lies resemble truth as closely as he can, then he disguises the lie with flattering words. People fall for the flattery and overlook what they shouldn't miss in the imposter truth.
This continues to happen today. The scary thing is that falling for this trick is a slippery slope. The more we accept the masquerading lie, the easier the next one is to swallow. Our day is full of examples of this. We need to keep close to the Holy Ghost to be able to ward off the flattery and discern the truth. We need to be courageous to expose the faux truth where we can. We need to be seasoned spiritual warriors to see truth and act to further God's kingdom on earth.
Don
I really loved this post. You always have such insights but this one was special. Your thoughts on how they would have done the engraving and learned Reformed Egyptian were food for thought! I hope people read this post, it's very informative.
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