2 And the angel said unto me: What beholdest thou? And I said: I behold many anations and kingdoms.
Is it just me, or do these first two verses sound vaguely Dr. Seuss-ish?
And here we have it, Major Book of Mormon Controversy No. 1!!!!!!!!!! The Great and Abominable Church, the Whore of All the Earth (Ouch). So the big discussion amongst members of the Church, or as I like to think of it, Bruce R. McConkie vs. Everyone, is: Which church is it? I think a better question might be: is it meant to be any one specific church?
Here is what Nephi says about this church:
1. It slays the Saints of God.
2. It tortures them and binds them down and yokes them with an iron yoke and brings them into captivity. It does not slice or dice them, however. What is with the intoxicating rhythm of this chapter? The whole thing sounds like a freaky Hop on Pop.
3. The Devil is the founder of it.
4. The church desires gold, silver, silks, fine clothing, and harlots.
5. They destroy the Saints for the praise of the world.
My instinct tells me that just as the Saints of God, in my humble opinion, are not limited only to those who belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but rather to all those who live righteous lives and accept Christ as the Savior of the world, so too are those who fight against the Church not under one umbrella organization, but rather found anywhere. I would wager that some of the whores of all the earth are even found in this very church. Mormons are not immune to wickedness and pride and vanity and such. In fact sometimes we see the worst of it.
That is a very uncomfortable thought, I think, but I also think it's a true one.
And then, in the middle of this charming description of the worst church ever, we have a reference to Christopher Columbus! I'm just glad I didn't end up in that chapter. What a downer.
I have always kinda had issues with the whole "Christopher Columbus being inspired" thing. Not that I doubt it. I mean it's in the Book of Mormon pretty clearly, it must be true. But based on the (admittedly highly revisionist) history I've read about Columbus, he doesn't seem like a very nice guy. In fact, quite often he sounds like a world-class (if you'll pardon the pun) jerk. I guess on the one hand, I should be grateful that Heavenly Father is willing to use even the most flawed among us to accomplish His purposes. I suppose I just don't like the fact that many American Mormons use these few verses in the Book of Mormon to justify deifying Columbus and refusing to believe anything bad that historians might say about him. Ditto with the Founding Fathers. I know I will have to meet them to be 100% sure, but I think some of them were probably pricks. But God worked through them anyway, just like He can work through me, if I let Him.
Also, according to Nephi, the Nephites resembled the British colonists on some level. So they were short and pale and had bad teeth, presumably? At least they were humble, right?
Kidding, Nephi, if you're reading this. You know I kid.
Is it just me, or do these first two verses sound vaguely Dr. Seuss-ish?
And here we have it, Major Book of Mormon Controversy No. 1!!!!!!!!!! The Great and Abominable Church, the Whore of All the Earth (Ouch). So the big discussion amongst members of the Church, or as I like to think of it, Bruce R. McConkie vs. Everyone, is: Which church is it? I think a better question might be: is it meant to be any one specific church?
Here is what Nephi says about this church:
1. It slays the Saints of God.
2. It tortures them and binds them down and yokes them with an iron yoke and brings them into captivity. It does not slice or dice them, however. What is with the intoxicating rhythm of this chapter? The whole thing sounds like a freaky Hop on Pop.
3. The Devil is the founder of it.
4. The church desires gold, silver, silks, fine clothing, and harlots.
5. They destroy the Saints for the praise of the world.
My instinct tells me that just as the Saints of God, in my humble opinion, are not limited only to those who belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but rather to all those who live righteous lives and accept Christ as the Savior of the world, so too are those who fight against the Church not under one umbrella organization, but rather found anywhere. I would wager that some of the whores of all the earth are even found in this very church. Mormons are not immune to wickedness and pride and vanity and such. In fact sometimes we see the worst of it.
That is a very uncomfortable thought, I think, but I also think it's a true one.
And then, in the middle of this charming description of the worst church ever, we have a reference to Christopher Columbus! I'm just glad I didn't end up in that chapter. What a downer.
I have always kinda had issues with the whole "Christopher Columbus being inspired" thing. Not that I doubt it. I mean it's in the Book of Mormon pretty clearly, it must be true. But based on the (admittedly highly revisionist) history I've read about Columbus, he doesn't seem like a very nice guy. In fact, quite often he sounds like a world-class (if you'll pardon the pun) jerk. I guess on the one hand, I should be grateful that Heavenly Father is willing to use even the most flawed among us to accomplish His purposes. I suppose I just don't like the fact that many American Mormons use these few verses in the Book of Mormon to justify deifying Columbus and refusing to believe anything bad that historians might say about him. Ditto with the Founding Fathers. I know I will have to meet them to be 100% sure, but I think some of them were probably pricks. But God worked through them anyway, just like He can work through me, if I let Him.
Also, according to Nephi, the Nephites resembled the British colonists on some level. So they were short and pale and had bad teeth, presumably? At least they were humble, right?
Kidding, Nephi, if you're reading this. You know I kid.
1 comment:
The great and abominable church is interesting. The problem with saying that it's the Catholic Church is that it just doesn't fit the picture well enough. Prostitutes? Killing and yoking the Saints? It just doesn't seem like something the Catholics did. On the other hand, it isn't very satisfying to say that the great and abominable is just whoever does these sorts of evil deeds because the metaphor of a church implies some kind of organization that the “evil people generally” interpretation doesn't satisfy. Why would Nephi see this as the formation of a Church if it were no different in quality from the evil that had already been present?
On the other hand, what organization has existed since the time of Christ and been behind most of the wrongdoing? There doesn't seem to be one. It sounds like a horribly far-fetched conspiracy theory, and while I can't prove that it isn't true, it seems unlikely that the scriptures would promote such a weird conspiracy theory like this. What use could it be to us to hear about some conspiracy that we can't identify? Here's what I propose: The church represents a certain social or cultural phenomenon that historians have not heretofore identified. They haven't identified it because they haven't been looking at history from a Mormon perspective, because there are a million ways to see history, and this is one of a million undiscovered ways. This social/cultural phenomenon involves a desire for treasure and prostitutes and a lack of scruples about how one gets them. It is responsible for the persecution of the early Saints.
The reason that I think this could work is that worldviews tend to be systematic. They have a certain structure to them, and when enough people have them, they create a certain social order. Whether or not this is an intentional order, whether or not they are conscious of how it is created and how it works, it creates an order. For example, most high schools have a certain popularity order. Some people are cooler than others; some people bow down to others because they are cooler. They probably don't think of these relationships as constituting an organization because they arise organically, without contracts or explicit rules. But you could say that they constitute a sort of organization because they are structured hierarchically and distribute certain powers. This organization arises from the values of each of its members. People who don't care what's “cool” or “popular” never get involved in the organization. Sometimes a common value or value-system is what unites the organization's members and gives structure to the organization. In this case, valuing popularity unites the members, and being judged popular determines rank.
Post a Comment