Follow Him: A Come, Follow Me Podcast - Moses 7 -- Part 1: Dr Avram Shannon

Episode Date: January 22, 2022

What will spur the Saints to build Zion? Dr. Avram Shannon joins Hank Smith and John Bytheway on the podcast and discusses the commandment to build Zion and how it parallels the City of Enoch and is an antitype to Cain’s city. The Savior’s return to Zion, the end of contention, and who will build and reside in Zion are all discussed in this compelling episode.Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.co/episodesFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Executive Producers/SponsorsDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: MarketingLisa Spice: Client Relations, Show Notes/TranscriptsJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Rough Video EditorAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsKrystal Roberts: French TranscriptsIgor Willians: Portuguese Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-pianoPlease rate and review the podcast.

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith and I'm John by the way, we love to learn, we love to laugh, we want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow him. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of Follow Him. I'm your host, Hank Smith, and I'm here with my almost translated co-host, John, by the way, John, to me, you are almost translated. He's not like that. He's like, you're not like that. Yeah, he's like, almost translated that.

That's not what I meant. We're talking about Enek today. I was like, what's he doing? I'd have been translated correctly. Hey, welcome everybody to follow him. John, we get to spend our entire day in one chapter. And so I had to find someone who could, who could teach us, I mean, all how many verses here? 60, 69 verses of Moses chapter seven. Tell us who's with us here. Yes, I'm very excited today. We have Dr. Avram Shannon with us. He was born in Quantico,

Virginia. I spent most of his young life in Virginia. He served as mission in the Oregon Portland mission and then Washington, Kenna with commission after the mission was split. Dr. Shannon earned a bachelor's degree in Near Eastern Studies from Brigham Young University. A master of studies in Jewish studies from the University of Oxford,

and a PhD in Near Eastern languages and cultures with a graduate interdisciplinary specialization in religions of the ancient Mediterranean from Ohio State University. And he and his wife, Thora, have seven children. When I tell my students, you know, when they have questions about Judaism, I say, you know, if I don't know, I know who I can ask. It's Dr. Offram Shannon. So give us a little bit of that. I'm sure it might come up through our discussion today, but use your mom grew up Jewish, right? So the whole story is my great great-grandmother. So her great-grandmother was Jewish, okay?

great-grandmother. So her great-grandmother was Jewish, okay? And came to the United States, and then it's hard to be Jewish in America. And so they they they they Christianized after about a generation. And then my mother converted back to Judaism as an adult. And she was actually pretty orthodox. She went to a high university in Athens, Ohio, so not Ohio State, but Ohio University, down in Athens. And after she finished her degree, she either was going to go to New York and join the Chesa-Dee, the orthodox Jews in New York, or she was gonna go to Seattle to go to the University of Washington for graduate program.

She chose to go Seattle, rather than go to New York University of Washington for graduate program. She chose to go Seattle, rather than go to New York. She moved into the department. There were I think seven girls in the department, six of them are Latter-day Saints, and she was number seven. She actually for a while there. She was going to shoo on Saturdays and then she did 10 shirts with with Latter-day Saints on Sundays. They gave her a calling because she could direct music so she was directing the music before she was in about two years. So she converts and then Avram is a very Jewish name I assume. Yes, I'm a Jewish name.

And so it's funny because all my kids I was actually I was talking my kids this morning about this actually all of my siblings have Scriptural names so there's Joshua. There's me Samuel Luke and then Saraya from the Book of Mormon there is my sister Often being that it's it's the Hebrew form of Abram Steven Ricks, you know the Hebrew teacher here over at BYU form of Abram. Stephen Ricks, the Hebrew teacher here, over at BYU, calls me his Judeo-celtic friend. My name's Judeo-celtic. That's so great. Abram, this week is our first come-fall-me-lesson in which we are, we're just in one single chapter, Moses 7. So how do you want to take us through this? We'll hand the reins over to you. Okay. So Moses 7 is really interesting. The book of Moses is JST Genesis. It's, you know, an extract of Joseph Smith's

JST, which is important to us because it's not really a standalone book, right? Sometimes we treat the, the, the book of Moses like it's, it's, but it's just pulled out of Genesis. But Moses 7 is intriguing because it's one of those few portions in the book of Moses that doesn't have strong background in Genesis, right? You know, you read Moses, Moses 2, Moses 3. Those are our creation accounts and stuff which you should talk about previously. Most of it is just, I mean,

Genesis with a few changes here and there. But again, Moses 6 and 7 here, which I think is part of why the Kumpo me focuses on this, is because you have, if there are people who have Genesis here, you have Genesis and Moses together, here really you've just got the book of Moses, which is important for us, because it's Latter-day

Saints, inx kind of a big deal for us Latter-day Saints. You know, I mean, he was extremely important in the early restoration. He's extremely important to Joseph Smith's self-interesting as a prophet, right? We don't have an doctor who haven't said anymore, but anymore, but back in the day in the early sections, when they had the code names that they would do for the various figures in there, one of Joseph's was Enic. Joseph identified in Revelation as Enic. A couple of verses in Genesis are the Genesis for Moses chapter six and seven. Is that right?

That is right. So it's it's Genesis 5 21 through 24 and it's part of this larger part where you have you know the description of so-and-so Lift so many years be get so-and-so and live the amazing years after that and then died right? It's this genealogical table and again in, in Genesis, the primary purpose is to get between sort of Seth and Noah. But in the middle there, this is weird little bit. It says, and Enic, this is verse 21 of Genesis 5, and Enic lived 60 and five years

and began Methuselah, okay? So far, exactly what we expect. Yeah. And Enic walked with God after you began Methuselah, 300 years, and begat sons and daughters. Okay, there's that walk with God. That's a little bit different. All the days of Enic were 365 years, and Enic walked with God and was not for God to took him. One of the things is, as Latter-day Saints were kind of spoiled sometimes,

because Mormon holds our hand a lot. Mormon kind of walks through, explains what he's doing, explains what his sources are, explains why he's doing it, Mormon kind of walks us through things. The biblical authors and editors don't do that. They presume that we're kind of already insiders as we read this stuff. There's no explanation about what it means to walk with God in Genesis. And Latter-day Saints were predisposed to read it positively because we have the book of Moses. There's actually a rabbinic source about Enic. Enic has kind of an intriguing mixed tradition

in Judaism. There's some parts of Judaism that really like Enic. There's other parts of Judaism that's like, eh! Basically they say, you've got two kids. And one kid is always obedient, stays next to you, does everything you ask. And one kid runs everywhere around the store

and is always touching things and pushing things and you can never find them. And basically they ask, which of these two kids are you gonna make holds your hand? Yeah, Okay. It's the one that's unique. So, he may be. He walked with God because he was all over the place.

That's how they understand it exactly. Oh, interesting. Mormon and the biblical authors reminds me of like a tour guide. You've got Mormon, the tour guide, who's explaining every little detail. And then you've got this biblical tour guide who's like, oh, that was Enoch. Yeah, he walked with God. All right, let's keep going. Let's keep going.

Wait. No, it's true. So Joseph Smith gets to these four verses and then something happens. Like with Moses, one, he has this visionary revelry expansion to Genesis. Again, the equivalent there, you know, you start there in six, right? Again, you're going straight on through, right? Moses, 617, Seth, Enis, Kayn, Mahalil, Jared, and then Enic. Yeah, right in verse 25, Enic lives 65 years in Bakat, Mathuzela. Yeah, that's verse 21 of Genesis. Exactly. It's directly Genesis. And then yeah, it then it changes. It enters this narrative. And he lived 65 years and Begat-M, you know, and journey to the land among the people and as he journeyed. So you have this call narrative right in the middle there.

And so what what Joseph does, the revelation is the JST here, is he basically expands the inic story and explains, so what does it mean for you to walk with God? Why was inic not? What does it mean that God took him? What does it mean for God to come? What does it mean for these things? So yeah, four verses becomes, I can't even count them all. Here.

Is that 100 verses of material maybe a little more than that. Yeah, I'm gonna write that down. Four versus becomes 100 plus. Yeah. The JST tends to be expansive vis-a-vis Genesis, of course. But this is one of the places where you really see that expansion happening extensively. It's very clear from Genesis that Enic doesn't die

because everybody else does, right? I mean, the formula is, and so and so lived so many years, and we get many sons' daughters, and died. That Seth, Ken, and Jared. So it's very clear, whatever is happening in Genesis, Enic isn't dying. It breaks the formula there. So there is something weird there, which by the way is why Enic becomes in certain parts of ancient literature, he becomes kind of this because he's the one in the list that didn't die. Right, Bivoturfagers then and now are heavily attuned

to weird things in scripture, right? And so, and that's gonna be, I call them so the knobs and the text. It's when you read along, you kind of hit something and you're like, I gotta figure out what's going on here. Those become places where you're gonna get the most sort of interpretive explanation and exploration and that's true, JST2.

The Lord gives the most sort of revelation on the nobbiest places in the text. The nobbiest. Avram, is that the nobbious places in the text. Avram, is that the only mention of Enic in the Bible? Is these four verses in Genesis? No, he's mentioned twice in the New Testament. So he's mentioned once in the epistle to the Hebrews and he's mentioned once in the epistle of Jude.

In the epistle of Hebrews, just up there in chapter 11 in what's, again, the great table of Hebrews, just up there in chapter 11, in the great table of faith, by faith, that it all these things. He's there, by faith, he was not. So again, Hebrews actually understands what's going on there in Genesis. It's a very similar letter to St. S. Wood. There's nothing there that's kind of weird for us. There's no city. We'll give it a city in a second. The city is distinctive to the book of Moses. So it's kind of our most important part of the eonic narrative because it feeds so much into our own tradition is distinctive to restoration scripture. The Jew one is interesting because their eonic is not important except in so far as Jude quotes an apocryphal book of Enic. So as part of this intro I was talking about in the book of

in Enic is a figure, you find actually there's a whole subcategory of Enic literature. There's a whole subcategory of ancient stuff that's about and from and sort of through Enic. that's about and from and sort of through Enoch. So when is this, when is this these books, when are these found? Where do they come from? Are they called the Book of Enoch?

So one of them is, okay. Scholars kind of call them one first Enoch, second Enoch, third Enoch, but that's just because they're trying to work through them in terms of our, again, they're not ancient designations. They date, date of composition is probably, so this is really flourishes between about one BC, one hundred BC, rather, about, so about the first century BC and about the fourth

century AD is kind of the flourishing of sort of this enich literature. The biggest, most famous is probably First Enich. That's the one that Jude quotes there in the New Testament. The Lord comes to 10,000 of his saints. That 10,000 of his saints that come from Jude, coming from First Enich. That's our earliest one. So the book of Enoch is, or the Firsteenic here, actually all the Enoch's stuff, is part of this kind of,

one of the things we think of as we think about the process of, our scriptures coming together, it's worth noting that in the ancient world, we didn't have, especially originally ancient world, we didn't have books, right? The Bible wasn't a book. It was a primary, ancient Bible is primarily a scroll technology. And so you had scrolls. Hey, by the way, we've come back to scrolling. We have.

We scroll down now. And it's funny because the book is a superior piece of technology. You know, put your finger in. You can find things easier, but we took a step backwards when we... Back to scrolling. Back to scrolling.

Okay, sorry. Sorry, I put you on. That's a valid point. That's why we went to books. And so the funny thing is, is that when you have books, the question's different with scrolls, because we actually had these archeologically, and scrolls, you just had scroll cases.

And so it wasn't whether, you know, so you had a copy of Isaiah, and it was in a scroll. And you had a copy of, you know, the five books of Moses or whatever you had, you're pen to two, and you're Torah, and it was a scroll. And the question, and you had your book and you're taught and it was a scroll. And the question and you had your book of Enic and it was a scroll. And so you had these very and so and so there was not as much needs to determine what was the books that were you're going to read because you just collected them and they were just part of a sort of divine library.

But the move to a codex technology, the move to books, said the question becomes, what do you put between the covers? What gets to be there and what does it? And so there's all this stuff that's circulated in the ancient world, scriptural, quasi-scriptural, whatever that quasi-scriptural whatever that did it make the cuts. So along the way to the creation of the Bible, as we know it, books got pushed off by some group or another, and the first, second, third enich, these books got left behind. So for the enich stuff, again, enich for the intriguing, because again, it was not included because there were questions about authenticity, there were questions about, again, there's another class of sort of apocryphal type literature called pseudopigritha, which is writings that were not sure who the

author is or writings that we know are later that seem to be attributed to an earlier author. And again, if you go out and read the, oh, this is the straight-inic material, there are, by the way, connections between the apocalyptic material and between our enigmaterial in the Book of Moses. There are connections. We find the weeping god, we find enichas visions.

Nearly that was a big deal. We find some names. There's a Mahajah figure who we connected to the Mahuja in our apocalyptic stuffphal Enic stuff. There are a couple of places where that, but there are lots of places where it's very, very, very different. The way they treat angels, totally different about it, you know, that is a notion, you know, humans, angels, gods are the same kind of being, different spiritual ideas. No one can find angels are a separate class of created being.

There's no city. So there's connections, they say, oh, this is neat. The other places where you say, this is, this is totally different. This is not a lot of the same scripture. Okay. So this is why this is why this is wonderful because we feel, you know, this is reliable. Our Moses chapter 7, 6 and 7 about Enic for us is, no, this is scripture. This

is we can count on this. Um, Alvarm, let me ask you a question. Josh Sears talked about this when we had him on. When he says, listen, the JST sometimes gives us back ancient texts that was once written. And sometimes it's just new revelation. Would you say, that's going to be, maybe it's impossible to say, what Moses 6 and 7 is? So again, the question always is, and you're pointing it as possible to say, the question always is,

what's your criteria? I, how would you tell? How would you know? Right, without access to an actual ancient text. You couldn't know. You literally cannot tell. You cannot say yes, this is definitely ancient because we don't have anything to check it against.

Now, with the inic material, we do have ancient texts. And there are some connections, I already mentioned these, right? The we've been gotten things like that. I had my tie, I throw it over my shoulder. That's how I let my students know that I'm, you know, kind of just spinning my wheels here for a second. Oh, but we can definitely say 100% Joseph Smith seems to tap into an eniquity tradition that has continuity with other

inhibitions from the ancient world. Whether that was originally in Genesis or not, we cannot say. But it's very clear that Joseph Smith taps into something that has ancient connections. And for me, at that point, again, there's nothing that proves the, you know, Joseph's prophetic, but the Holy Ghost. But for me, that makes Joseph making it up no longer the easiest answer. It provides space for restoration. So I do think that there's, again, I think there's nothing unique. And there is space here for Joseph tapping into something that's very ancient. Yeah, I think our listeners are going to be interested in that.

I think they would say, does this mean that Joseph, you know, without having the materials that the later scholars have got it, wow, really close to right in a lot of places. Is that kind of what you're saying? If Joseph is guessing, he's guessing exactly right. It's kind of the world's greatest guesser. The way I pray, the way I don't know, it's the same thing with the Abraham stuff. There's a place in book of Abraham

that are very much, especially Abraham 1, that only fit in kind of second-linear NBC material there. And again, if Joseph's guessing, he's guessing exactly right with that. Wow. Well, it just, it kind of makes you wonder, what other backstories are there that we don't have? If, from four verses in Genesis, we can get all of this.

I wonder who else they, they went by kind of quickly in Genesis that has more that we'll get someday. Yeah, no, it's actually a really key thing, because of course, one of the things that's intriguing to you is generally reading scripture is learning, you know, that their issues are not our issues. Right? When you realize that the authors and editors of most of the Old Testament were judai, priests

and scribes, suddenly you understand why the emphasis on priests and temples and judai kings and IE their perspective feeds into, it's part of why we get, I suspect, why we get more Josephite material in Say the Book of Mormon. I was just reading the other day, Marona and the tradition of, you know, as this cloth is torn, you know, the whole Joseph thing. We've got these extra Joseph traditions

in the Book of Mormon, which makes sense because the Book of Mormon authors are Josephites. Josephites. Wow, that's great. It's why they're full of... You mean like Joseph V. Gipteite. Yeah, they're the same from Joseph. Yeah.

The eye comes from Joseph, he learns, and then we learn from Alma, they come through Manasseh. And so we would expect traditions about Joseph in a text like the Book of Mormon that we wouldn't expect from the biblical texts. The biblical text is written by Judeites from a Judeite perspective and from a livingable perspective. And so being aware of that, I think John's point is really good there. Being aware of that then helps us understand what is in point is really good there, being aware of that then helps us understand what is in and what's not.

And of course Joseph in the latter days is coming here and one of the things that JST definitely does, the JST is a Bible for Latter-day Saints. It's a Bible for the Restoration. The JST takes the Bible and says, look, this book still matters and this book still matters for you guys right now. And so the enigmaterials, special emphasis on the building of Zion is going to be something that church needs right now. A very later day theme that we talk about a lot.

Right. Something that mattered deeply to Joseph. I was going to say in the doctrine of Covenant's last year, almost you have the church organized, and then they start talking about Zion, the cause of Zion. And was this coming from his work in the JST, at least in some way? Yeah, absolutely. Again, again, it's worth noting that these Genesis chapters,

he's transiting these in like June and July of 1830. This is immediately after the restoration and the establishment of the Church in these latter days. So this is directly feeding into what he's doing, what he's thinking about in his prophetic mission and his prophetic self-understanding. Okay. So seven of course builds right off a six. One of the things to remember, of course course is your read scripture is that chapter and verse divisions are artificial. They are almost all of them not original to the text. If you go back to the Joseph Smith's original translation manuscripts, there are no chapter of verse divisions in the book of Moses. Those are put in by actually Brother Talmadge in 1902, 1902 image version of this.

So Moses 7 begins with a continuation of Moses 6. Moses 6 is all framed in terms of teachings to Adam. That's one of the key things. And that's really important as we think about what's going on then in Moses 7. Because the unique material is actually, it's almost a bridge between, in the same way, again,

remember that chapter Genesis 5 is trying to get from Seth to Noah. Noah's still a huge, important deal. And so Moses 7, even if the inic material, it's inic bridging us between Seth and Noah, or between Adam and Noah, and inic providing this covenantal bridge between our first parents and between, again,

because one of the things that Genesis is going to do, and actually Moses 7 is going to set up for this, Genesis understands the flood as new creation. The world is newly created, you get a new covenant, and so it's pushing us there in this attempt of bringing us through that. So I said, he says, first one, behold our father, Adam, taught these things. Many believed and become the sons of God, and maybe believe not. And this, by the way, this is part of, this is a major theme. Major theme in the book of Moses is this notion of the two ways. This idea that there are two ways, actually, as dominion, two ways to pick.

We've got the devil's way. You've got the Lord's way, you know, Kane versus Abel, you know, those who believe, those who followed, sons of God, daughters of... And again, it's always framing this in these dichotomies, which is, you can choose one or the other. Right, there are two ways to do this. Okay, and then, Enoch, again, he begins to prophesy, and so we have sort of two prophecies in the Enoch.

And it's worth noting here, especially as we're here And so we have sort of two prophecies in the enich. And it's worth noting here, especially as we're here in Moses 7, say, three through, we'll go three through about nine. Right, you've got all these place names, right? Shoe, Mankindin, and Henny, and Omner, and Shem, and Hannah, and Hannah and Iha. We of course have no idea where these are.

And we can't know where these are. They're not attachable to place names. And this is important because of that verse about Cain in there, in verses 6 through 8. One of the things, of course, that people in church, but especially people opposed the church, have done with the pro-Great price, is they've used to justify their racist readings and things, or to accuse Latter-day Saints of being racists. And of course, there's some discussion

about blackness and things here. But it's worth noting, these are not the Canaanites from later in the Bible, first of all. Okay, so these are not the Canaanites in the land. Again, when Abraham comes land of Canaan, when we get to in a couple chapters in Genesis, these are different people. There's also a tendency with this. Again, because of historical things and whatever, you know, there was even in the church, and it's not just unique to Latter-day Saints, but you know, to connect, say, oh, well, person having a descent couldn't have priesthood because then it from Cain, and the point of versus

like this here, with that. But of course, Cain is not Cainan. And so this is not talking about the descendants of Cain. I get to start a period full stop. There's actually no discussion of Cain and priesthood anywhere in the scriptures. Not here, not in the book of Abraham. There is no scripture where Cain is discussed in connection to priesthood. Which is part of why the church now again disavows it says and the explanation that described dark skin as a sign of God's disfavor. Okay, so this is Enic. He's prophesying in the Lord says prophesied to the people of

Canaan, but this is pre-Flood, so we shouldn't connect these to the Canaanites that we're gonna hear from in a few weeks. We get into Genesis 11, yeah. Right, and neither should we connect them to Cain. Both sides just separate them out. Since we don't know any of these things, we actually don't know what they're doing. Like I said, the ancient texts did all the time. They're always talking about things that make sense to them that don't matter to us.

But I do think, this is the fleet feeds into what's going on there, as? They're always talking about things that make sense to them that don't matter to us. But I do think this is this leads into what's going on there. As we go to 10 and 11, that's I think we're the real meat of this chapter begins. And 10 and 11, again, the Lord says, go to this people and say to them, repent. Let's come out and smite you, we'll talk about it for a second.

And he gave me a commandment that I should baptize the name of the Father and the Son, which will grace and truth, and of the Holy Ghost, which birth record of the Father and the Son. And this is particularly important. This is probably where I would begin, where I would break, is probably here at 10, because this is what begins the beginning of sort of, we have sort of three things going on in 7. And the first of those is the establishment of Zion. And really, and this of course is part of why this has as a resonance for Latter-day Saints.

Okay, so this is the message that the Lord says, this is, Enoch, this is the message I want you to give. Exactly. And why find so compelling about this is this tells us the principles on which Zion is established. Sometimes as Latter-day Saints, as we talk, we get this notion that there's some kind of special dispensation of doctrine or something that the Lord has to give us before we can establish Zion. The principles on which Zion was established by Enic, our repentance, faith, baptism, it's nothing

to be special, there's no particular change that we need to have in order to establish Zion. And this is something I find very important because we sometimes use that as an excuse not to try and establish Zion. Elder Christopherson gave a great talk called Come to Zion. But one of the things he points out is that we have a responsibility, is that a day of saints, to build Zion. That's part of what we are supposed to be doing.

And one of the reasons I love this here in in Moses 10 and 11 is It reminds us that we're not waiting for something special to build Zion We have the tools right now that we need to build Zion Yeah, I'm seeing I'm seeing all first principles here aren't you John? Versus repent a leapt repent. 11, baptized. 11, holy ghost, and 11. 13, and so great. 13 was the faith of Enic, yeah.

Enic's gonna, he's gonna start the message of how we're gonna build Zion, and it's gonna be the same things you and I hear today. That's right. Building Zion is not some kind of special extra thing that the Lord's people get on top of it. It's God's work, period. I mean, it's the Prince of the Gospel. It's the fundamental, again, doctrine of Covenants. We've been just talking about this last year.

Dock of Covenants frames consecration, frames Zion in terms of the law of the celestial kingdom. I mean, this is what God wants us to do. He wants his people to be one. And the foundation here is, I mean, yeah, if you just read 10 through 13, you'd have, you'd have a Second Nephi 31 and third Nephi chapter 11 and all these, this is how we're gonna, if you really want to be part of my work, here is what you want to do. Repent, be baptized, receive the Holy Ghost, repent again in verse 12, Repent, be baptized, receive the Holy Ghost. Repent again in verse 12, verse 13, have great faith. I love the prevalence of first principles in all of the scriptures. If they really are the first principles, then they really are the first principles.

And we should expect to see them and we do. Can I, Abrom, just ask you one more time? I think it was a really interesting point you made. So, I put in my margin, did I write this right? A pre-flood canine, not related to the post-flood canine. That's right. So, they just decided to name it that post-flood, but we have no idea why.

We don't have, part of the problem, of course, we don't have the underlying language for any of so we don't know Yeah, what this looks like is this the same is it kind of on again like you have in in in Genesis maybe Maybe not there's two or three letters that can have an avalanum and there's two or three You know there's a couple of case you got a cut and a pull on them and there's two or three, you know, there's a couple of K's, you got to cut and pull in, in, in, or it's, it's cut sounds in Hebrew. I would not even be comfortable saying this is even

the same name. It might be, but, but then it certainly might not be. Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of day Saints would maybe have a tendency to read this and go, Oh, this is obviously the people of Kane, and this is the same Kane and where Abraham goes and goes and look, here's the blackness that came upon the children of Cain, and all of a sudden we're making connections that the scriptures don't make. That's right. We always need to be very, very, very, very, very careful about systemizing scripture. One of the things we do with Latter-day Saints is we're trying to circumscribe all truth and do one great whole else. We're trying to do, but sometimes we forget things we do is, out of the day, say, we're trying to circumscribe all truth and do one great whole. So we're trying to do. But

sometimes we forget when we do that, that scripture is definitely, it's ad hawk revelation, right? It comes to certain people at certain times. And you can make connections. So I love what you eat. It might not even be the same word, even though it's us us it looks like exactly the same word. That's interesting. So, so, Enoch wants to build a people. This sounds, you know, this sounds a lot like Joseph Smith and even our day. He wants to build a people who send her their life on God and give themselves to God. So, what's the rest of his message? What are we going to do next?

Yeah, I mean, and the beauty of this and the beauty of Moses 7 is, of course, Joseph Smith wanted to build a people who followed God and were one heart. President Nelson wants to build a people who followed God or in one heart. Ynic did it. And so really the great beauty of, or rather God through Enic, even, the great beauty of Moses 7 is we have a Zion success story. And those unfortunately are few and far between Scripture. But here we have a success story. And again, you have the stuff, the land and things like that. But really, that brings us us into, you know, 718, this is our Zion verse, right? And the Lord called us people Zion because there have one heart and one mind and dwell in righteousness and there was no poor among them. And again, in that great talk, Belder Christopherson, Elder Christopherson suggests, first of all, he points out, and I think this is really important.

First of all, he points out, and I think this is really important. The Lord doesn't make his people Zion. He doesn't make them one heart, one mind. He doesn't drive out the poor among them. He doesn't make them don't write justness. After they have become one heart mind, after they have an unlimited poverty, after they have done these things, then the Lord says, and now you're Zion. Zion is something that we do. It's not something the Lord does to us. The Lord called his people Zion because they were already one heart and one mind. They were already dwelling in righteousness. They were already

no poor among them. And I think so he's so key. Yeah. That word, the Lord called his people. The Lord didn't make his people Zion. The Lord called his people. The Lord didn't make his people's ion. The Lord called his people's ion because they chose it. And we might say they applied the principles of Zion. They became of one heart of one mind. They worked on being united and repenting and all of the, applying the gospel together. I mean, there's still obviously grace in this, right? I mean, obviously you can't repent without Jesus grace. You together. I mean, there's still obviously grace in this, right? I mean, obviously, you can't repent without Jesus grace.

You know, I mean, absolutely. Can you remember, recall the reference, Elder Christophsend, I want to put it in my margin. That was... The talk's called Come Desire, and Elder Christophsend gave an October conference in 2008. It's one of the great talks on Zion. It's just powerful stuff Elder Christophsend there. One thing I learned last year by studying

the North American government side, I don't think I'd ever really seen before, is the Lord says, here's Missouri, go build Zion. And they're so worried about the place and their enemies. And he doesn't seem overly concerned about the place or the enemies. It's always about the people. He's like, he said, I can take care of your enemies and the place is ready for you.

It's about your hearts that I, that's the difficult part for, for the Lord, because I'm not gonna force this on you, because the moment I force you on you, it's not Zion. Yes. And it's kind of actually funny there, Dr. Goodman. I'm funny. And it's funny in a sad way. I mean, the Lord makes it very clear, it's like, this is your fault, guys. Missouri was all your fault. If the Lord does not let us off the hook for that one, he's like, you could have done this, but you didn't.

Which is a little hard, but it actually one thing, in terms of two ways, one thing I love about Enic City is they're actually two cities of Enic in the book of Moses. If you remember, all the way back in Moses 5, and also it's also there in Genesis, right? Remember, Cain, Cain's a farmer, Cain's cursed, and it's very clear, went to him, by the way,

the cursed on Cain's the camp farm anymore. That's very explicit from Scripture. Cain's cursed as the camp farm anymore. That's very explicit from scripture. Canes curses you can't farm anymore. But what does he do? He goes and he builds a city. And he calls the name of that city. This is very, uh, Moses 542. And can you, his wife, and she conceived in Bear Enoch. So, can't also the son named Enoch.

And he also be getting maize into the daughters. And he built a city. And he called them and said after the name of his son, Enic. And it's a place of, well, it's a place of industry and see combination. So like, every other city, basically. So you have these two cities build up, these two cities of Enic. That's right. Fascinating. And the book of Moses does a comparison. Instead of saying, oh, cities are all bad. Which, again, you can make an argument for that.

In terms of what's going on there in Moses 5. Instead, what Moses does, Moses 7, and says, but look what you can do with cities if you do them God's way. Look what a redeemed city looks like. So inexity of Enic is the city of the way God wants cities to be. One heart, one mind, no poverty. Cain city of Enic is the way that everyone's in the world's ever looked like. People try, you know, it's it's core or a hard doctor. I mean, two combinations are fundamentally fruited in this notion of ever-emprosp to their genius. And you don't need anybody else. And again, fundamentally, Cain kills Abel because Cain sees Abel as an object, not as a person. And so you have these, again, this comparison of what the book of Moses is making between,

we have a CDV to care. This is the wrong way to do it. We've seen it get here, city of Poland, a Zion, this is the right way to do it. So how, I mean, I guess this is such a big question, but how do they do it? Like, I mean, we want to do it. Here's a Zion success story. I think many of the, obviously, the people listening to our podcast are going, hey, I want to live in Zion. I have this, I have the, a quote from other Christopherson here. We will become of one heart and one mind as we individually place the savior at the center

of our lives. I've noticed for me personally, Avram, that I'm, I'm like, yeah, I'm ready for Zion as soon as everyone else is ready for Zion, right? Like, I always tell my students, I always say, Zion be super easy to build if we're just me. You know, but of course, the key point, and this is actually the real struggle with it,

is there is no Zion without everybody else. Zion is definitionally a community of faith. And again, we saw this Amplie in our doctrine of governance here this last year. But sometimes we say things like, oh, you know, I know the church is true without the people in it.

Right. But one thing that Zion reminds us is there is no church without the people in it. There's not some kind of super special magical church out in heaven that we're kind of sending you. It's just us. And it's the same thing with Zion. It's Zion's just us.

Fundament one, Edochrosophon that talks suggests that we need all three of these things to build Zion. Any one of these is a great thing. Any one of these is huge part of what God wants us to do. But to be a Zion people, we need to keep the commandments to the right-justness. We need to have that kind of unity that the Lord wants us to have. We need to have it so that there are no poor among us. We have to eliminate poverty. And again, out of suffering that he says, he says, the Lord has measured individual societies

by how will they take care of the poor and needy among them. Every time I read that quote, I'm like, woo, how am I doing? This reminds me of like thinking about how to answer that question is, is fourth Nephi? Yes. There was no contention. It says four different times because the love of God,

which dwelt in the hearts of the people, and it mentions there were no poor. So, fourth Nephi one is kind of another, we did it, we created a Zion because of the love of God which dwelt in the hearts of the people it says. Yes. We divide the world into categories, right?

Male, female, black, white, let it disainting, non-let it disainting. Gay, let it say it non-letter, they say it. Gay, straight, all these various categories that we, you know, these various identities, and it's not that these are somehow wrong, right? One of the things that I love about Zion is Zion takes everybody. I mean, you think about how the Lord's created this world

and you look, you just go outside and you look at people, right? You go to whatever, you go to your classes, your awards, and you look you just go outside and you look at people right you go to whatever You go to your classes your ward and you see how many different kinds of people the Lord is created How many of my people there are in this world and I love it. It's clear to me the Lord loves all of us But what we do is we take these categories and then we treat people like objects We treat them again. We're this is back to Second Nephi 2. Lehi reminds us that the Lord created things to act and things to be acted upon.

And fundamentally, core-word doctrine, fundamentally, seek combinations, is treating people like things to be acted upon rather than as things to act. Honestly, Facebook's the anti-Zion. You know, they said we don't agree with her whatever and suddenly, suddenly they're an object. They're no longer a person. And then we act on them. And rather than saying, oh wait, no, you're a thing to act, not a thing to act about.

Fundamentally, Cain killing Abel was Cain deciding that Abel was something to be acted upon, rather than something to act. And for me, as I think about building Zion, fundamentally, it's about learning to treat people the way God treats them, which is like people. Yeah, when I use a hammer, I don't think about how it feels. I don't think about, right, if it's going to be sad, I'm going to use it until it's worn out, I'm going to get a new one. That's not people. I was just looking for it, but this reminds me, because I use a verse when I teach Vokomormon

about, look, they're treating people like things and things like people. It's Mormon 8.39, where this is Marona taking over his father's record, but he says, why do you adorn yourselves with that which hath no life? And yet suffer the hungry, the needy, the naked in the sick. And I wanna add who have life to pass by you and notice them not.

You're treating things like people and people like things. It sounds to me like Mormon 839. And we'll see this later on. The one thing that makes God really, really mad. Is his children hurting each other. His children mistreating each other. I have a Matt Tanks question there about how do we do this? Sometimes you look at it

and say, man, this is hard. And we just stop trying. We look around and we say, you know, in part of it, you know, we disagree. Right? There's no contention to land back here. Our fourth Nephi, um, example. But of course, no contention does not mean no disagreement. Everybody doesn't think the same in Zion, but the secret is learning how do you get there? How do you learn to disagree in God's way? Because part of it, and this is another key thing about this, about consecration, about the cause I know about each and every one of us. The consecrated, I have different gifts than my wife, than my children, than my students, than my bishop, then my release study president. I have different gifts than, wife, then my children, then my students, then my bishop, then my release study president. I have different gifts than, you know, the consecrated

Alvam Shannon is not the same as the consecrated Hank Smith or John, by the way. Sometimes, a lot of day saints, we get this notion that we have to give up individuality if we build Zion. To be one means we have to give up our individuality if we build Zion. To be one means we have to give up what makes us think of the us. And one of the things is very clear and very important is in Zion, you are the most like you you will ever be.

Because remember, God has always known you and he loves you for it. It's you he wants and so the consecrated you is still going to be and it's going to be the most like you you could possibly be. This is the object. What is just with called the object of that we should all be looking? The cause of Zion is the most important thing he says. Yeah. And we should be thinking about this all day all night. But for me, I'm the one, and this is going to be a problem, is I'm ready to build Zion.

But I look around me, I'm like, well, no one else is ready. It looks like it's ready to build Zion. So I'm going to go ahead and just wait. I'll hold my efforts off until everybody else is ready to build Zion when it takes people who are ready to build Zion and then just get started for other people to say I'm going to do it too. Fundamentally because we don't, and this is I think your to your point Hank, because we don't know what everybody's potential are, We don't know what everybody's bringing to the table.

That person that we're looking at and saying, oh, well, they're not building science, so I won't either. Maybe they are at this point. Maybe that's what they have to give. And it's not our job to say, yes, you're not doing it. I'm not doing it. We say, okay, this is what you're giving.

Here's what I can give. Let's do this all together. Because the whole point of Zion in some ways is, there are lots of things that I can't give 100% in. I'm just, there are things that I'm really good at, I think that I'm not really good at. There was one time, I was a Ward clerk. I had to do the Friends of Scouting.

Friends of Scouting. And I collected the money, I was the clerk, but nobody had trained me how to deposit the money. So I sat on it for a year, until we got audited, and they found the envelope with all of the money and pledged it. And Bishop said, what is this, brother Shannon? And I said, I didn't know what to do.

We got all the pledges to rent. It was fine. They got them out. Everything turned out okay in the end. Are you ever going to cash that check? Right. And somebody could look at that and say, Pfft.

Well, he's not building Zion. But of course, what I needed was somebody come and say, let me help you. And fundamentally, I think for me, the real question about building Zion is to ask, how can I help? Let me help. Wow. So it's the idea. I'm not going to worry if so and so, if Shannon or if Peter is building Zion, I'm going to worry if I am building Zion and I'm going to give my full efforts and and assume the best in in others. It's a legend of, you know, getting what you deserve, right? Not as good we deserve, right? It's not so bad as all that. But we're so concerned some time with fairness. But we're so concerned some time with fairness. And one of the beautiful things about the Gospel of Jesus Christ is it's fundamentally unfair.

If it were fair, we'd all go to hell. So many of the parables, especially the laborers and the vineyard, the prodigal son, is looking sideways instead of, oh look, I got, I was paid. It was, hey, what about, hey, hey, wait a minute. It's looking sideways and comparing. Isn't that what C.S. Lewis said? The pride isn't pleasure in having something, but having more of it than the next man. Yep, exactly. Interesting. People will ask me, you know, when do you think the second coming is going to be? And over the years, my mind has become, I think the Lord's waiting on us. He's like, I'm ready. When you're ready, you want to build Zion? I've, soon as it's there, I'll be there.

And so we're waiting for him. He's waiting for us. So what would you say if someone listening said, okay, I'm in, I want to build Zion. What do I do? I think what Elder Christopherson says is, is case start with you, your family, your word and your stake. Start with your circle of influence. And look for ways to help. The secret to building Zion is just to go and build Zion. We talk ourselves out of it.

We say, oh, we can't do it. Oh, we can't whatever and say, no, no, no, we can do it. If nothing else from this experience, talking together comes to any of your listeners. My firm testimony that we can build Zion right now. We have all the tools and all the ability. We can do it. And I would say the real secret is just to do it. Repent of your sins. Help other people. Look for people who need your help. Again, find a way however you want to do it. This is not about politics. But we have to eliminate poverty. Find a way however you think is the best way to do that. That's fine. I have my opinions about how I think I would do it.

But honestly, this notion of we cannot say, oh, well, they're just poor, whatever. We have to find a way to eliminate poverty. So find ways to help people who are less fortunate than us, or if you're the poor, find ways to be helped. As we've been talking about Zion, scriptures keep coming to mind that, I mean, it's just over and over, right?

Jacob, too, it's the pride in your hearts and your sins, your sexual sins that are keeping you from God, then King Benjamin, right? You're turning away the poor. You are, you're not keeping the commandments. So we can build Zion. Repend of our sins, find ways to, to help those who are suffering. Yeah. That's it. Right. Again, obviously, that's not it because we'd have done it yet, but that's it. There's a, the church has rekind of articulated the articulated the mission of the church.

Do you remember the days of President Kimball? It was proclaimed the gospel, perfect the saints redeemed the dead, and then President Monson added, take care of the poor and needy, and now the newest handbook has it to live the gospel, care for those in need. I like that it just says in, sometimes somebody that is wealthy by some measure is in need. So it's, it's live the gospel, care for those in need. Let's see, live, care, invite all to come into Christ and unite families for eternity. And you know, that could be one way to answer. How do we create Zion

Live the gospel care for those in need invite all to come to Christ unite families for eternity back to dosa Smith and the idea that you know the cause of Zion is the object This is what the church is organized for This is what the restoration is for it's to to build Zion. And so if you want to build Zion, live the gospel. Do the things you're asked to do. Help each other. And Avram, I like what you said earlier. This isn't about money. It's about hearts. Right? Because you could say, oh, if we just had enough money, we'd make everybody equal, but that wouldn't change anybody's heart Yes, they were of one heart and one mind because of their hearts. There was no poor It wasn't there was no poor so that changed their hearts

Yes would be the Lord be pleased in if our hearts were changed in the poor among us I think he would I absolutely the Lord would be absolutely happy if we could eliminate poverty without changing our hearts But that wouldn't be Zion I would would just offer some says to build Zion, you've gotta have all three. Yeah, this is great stuff. And it has to be by choice, right? Cause I could say, well, that's force everyone to be of one heart and one mind

and take care of the poor. But is that Zion? Well, again, back to Second-Evite 2 for a second, and things to act and things to be acted upon, what makes our doctrine work is the fact that we are agents. I mean, Second-Evite 2 is what? It's about the atonement, but it's no mistake. When Lehigh started laying out the atonement,

he lays out first this notion of choice and having choices and being able to choose. Agency is fundamental and foundational to that of this ain't doctrine. So we're choosing Zion in a way. We have to choose Zion. We have to choose to become Zionish. Yes.

Yeah, you have to, it has to be chosen. Because you know, why doesn't the Lord just make us then? If he wants Zion so bad, make us. Well, if he made us, it's not Zion. Righteousness is only righteousness. If it's freely chosen. Yeah, freely given, freely received. That's Paul's phrase for it. So we all just kind of sit and stare at verse 18 for a while. My dissertation advisor once asked me when still be like, we'll tell you what, you know, write an dissertation and he's like, you know, how you get a rhinoceros off of him? One bite at a time. You know how you build Zion? One heart at a time. One brick at a time. One brick at a time. You just, you just do it. And I really think,

for me, that's the real secret is, is we just, we just got to do it. I think for me, that's the real secret is, is we just, we just gotta do it. Yeah, I'll go get started in my way, and I'll hope people choose to do it in their way, or join me in my way, help me out. Or even I'll presume that they're doing it in their way. Ooh, I like that. I'll presume that they are,

I'll presume that we're doing this together. And I'll move forward. And I'll move forward. Mother Teresa. Yeah. And I'll move forward. And I'll move forward. Mother Teresa. Yeah. Right? Yeah, exactly.

In my sphere of influence, I will do good. Yeah. I don't have a reference for this. It's just one of those I've heard that Mother Teresa had said, we're not called to be successful in all things. We're called to be faithful in all things. And we're all faithfully trying to build Zion. I like that idea. I wanted to mention one more thing that I had written in my scriptures. I have no idea

where it came from. I just wrote it down years ago, but under where it said, and there was no poor among them, we've been talking about poverty. I also put that everyone is valued. I don't see someone as less valuable to Zion because of fill in the blank, the way they look, how much money they have, how much, you know, anything at all, any characteristic of them, I don't see them as less valuable. There is no poor among them, meaning everyone is valued. I have no idea why I wrote that in or who told me to do it,

but... And I think it feeds on what we talked a little earlier is the problem is the comparison Definitioly no poor among them means no rich among them But we're not talking about monetary amounts here. We're talking about Everybody having what they want in need sufficient for their needsufficient for their needs. A sufficient for their needs. And again, part of this is by this is so hard, right? I mean, there's so much we want.

But I was doing the 10 commandments in Hebrew ones, just working through it. And there's that great bit about, that should not covet. And of course, you know, we're like, covet, what's covet mean? The verb there means that should not want. And it's a really, they're like, cove, what's cove it mean? The verb there means, the actual not want. And it's a really,

you're like, oh, that's much harder suddenly, God. That's much harder. My house currently, I would love a larger kitchen. My kitchen is currently terrible to cook in. I just, I just,

oh, those things every day I'm cooking and I'm like, why did I think this is a good idea to move here? I love to cook, go whatever. But I don't know that I need very many more bedrooms than I already have even what I want need

differs from person to person and so having no poor among us is not saying there's one standard for what that means But it means that nobody feels the want Nobody feels like they don't have enough both economically spiritually feels the want. Nobody feels like they don't have enough. Both economically, spiritually, physically, whatever. Nobody feels like they are outside of the community and they are outside of what it is. This is such a fantastic discussion. So Al Vramit, we looked at one heart, we looked at one mind, dwelt in righteousness. Right? What does that phrase mean to you? Well, of course, dwelt there means to live or to stay or to sit, right? It's this notion that there's some things that are specific to building Zion. Again, being one heart mind, the United Kingdom,

the United Kingdom, the eliminating poverty, making sure that everybody feels wanted. But of course, the Gotham Jesus Christ is fundamentally relational. And that's just the fact that it's no mistake that the two Rick commandments are love God and love your neighbor, that are fundamentally relational in that sense. And fundamentally, building Zion then is about those relationships. And one heart and one mind no more among us is about our horizontal relationships. Darling, and righteousness is about our vertical relationship.

Our relationship with God. Our relationship with God. And so fundamentally, I think that this key notion of both loving God and loving each other is how you build Zion. And you've got to have all of it to build Zion. Elder Christopherson, Zion is Zion because of the character, attributes, and faithfulness of her citizens. If we would establish Zion in our homes, branches, wards, and stakes, we must rise to this standard. There's no other

way to do it. We must rise to this standard. It will be necessary. And here's the three you you were talking about. It will be necessary one to become unified in one heart, one mind, two to become individually and collectively a holy people, three to care for the poor and needy with such effectiveness that we eliminate poverty among us. We cannot wait until Zion comes for these things to happen. Zion will come only as they happen, as we choose them. It's very daunting, it's very powerful, but again, Elder Christophus and more than anything

else, he says, but it's something that we can do. When I hear about President Monson giving up his vacation days to visit the 90 widows in his ward, or when I hear about George Albert Smith, Turkey dinners, yeah. Yeah, George Albert Smith who took his brand new coat off at the humanitarian aid center and set it on the donation table. We have so many stories of people who are amazing men and women who are doing this, who have dedicated their life to the Lord, and they've overcome selfishness. John, do you

remember the quote that we shared with this from Edward Partridge? Do you remember? Edward Partridge, who basically was in charge of Zion for a long time said, I have torn myself from the affection of this world's good. I have torn myself from the affection of this world's goods. Man, I wish I had it right in front of me. I can remember writing it down in my doctrine of covenants and just thinking about that. How do you tear yourself? But I mean, we have example after example, after example, don't we have rum of people who do have decided that they're gonna do it? Just in my ward last week,

there was a brother who was giving a talk and told what experience is a teenager where his dad about a pair of new shoes and they were walking downtown somewhere and there was a guy that had no shoes and this brother took off his shoes. As a teenage boy, took off his shoes and gave him to this man and then they went and they bought a less nice pair of shoes before that.

I mean, literally, there are stories of saints giving the shoes off their feet. It's powerful. All right, let me tell you a story. This was on NPR. So not, not, you know, the desert news. This was National Public Radio said a, and this is back when you could say Mormon, a Mormon bishop in Taylor's, Vil Utah went to great lengths last Sunday to teach his congregation a lesson. David Musselman disguised himself as a homeless person and walked around outside the church before the service He said quote the majority of the people of my ward just ignored me and went great went to great lengths to not make eye contact

Some stopped gave him an apple crackers or $20 Quote I was most impressed with the children The children were very eager. They wanted to reach out and help me in some way. He was also told by several members of his ward to leave the property. I had some people that went out of their way to let me know this was not a place to ask for charity and I was not welcome. Sorry. We're still trying here. Bishop Musselman told only his second counselor

that he would be disguised as the homeless man. He purposely walked into the front of the chapel and sat in the front row at the beginning of sacrament meeting. After his counselor's talk, the bishop had the counselor lean forward across the stand and whisperer he wanted to say a few words. The second counselor informed the congregation, quote, brothers and sisters, this homeless man would like to say a few words. Sorry, I just describing him that way. This homeless man, this homeless man, not this man.

After receiving a few where he looks, Bishopman walked to the stand behind the pulpit and began thanking the people for the kindness they showed. He talked about some of the money he had received and said he wanted to give a portion of it back as a token of appreciation. He asked where the bishop was, so he could give the money to him. When no one spoke, Bishop Musselman took off his wig and glasses to show that he was, in fact, the Ward's Bishop. Listen to this. It had a shock value, I did not anticipate.

I really did not have any idea that the members of my Ward would gasp as big as they did. Some started crying. Others said nothing. Many came forward to apologize for their indifference to the bishop at the end of the service and announced they wanted to do something to atone for their actions. Muscleman said, I felt horrible that they felt so horrible. But he said, I believe the experiment was more potent than any sermon I could have given on the subject. It did have the effect I'd hoped it would have.

Then he said this, I learned something that I was not expecting. We don't always have to give money or food. But if we really believe what we say we believe shouldn't we smile and make eye contact and allow everyone a little bit of human dignity. We treat them like people. Like people. And not like objects. Yeah.

And the other part of the children, isn't that interesting? Right? We, as, as, what did the Savior say? Except you become as this little child you will in, no wise end under the kingdom of heaven. So can you imagine telling the bishop to leave the property? And then afterwards he's the bishop and you're like, hey, remember what I said to you about? Yeah. People would start crying. They just felt so indicted at that point. Wow. I mean, King Benjamin, when you're in the service of your fellow beings, you are in the service of your God.

Overn, we've spent a lot of time on one verse. We've really, but every family, I would maybe say every family who's listening spends some time in Moses 7, 18, talk about it with your kids. What does it mean? You can do the build Zion right now because you can do it right now.

Just sit down and say, what can I do? Just anything to build Zion right now because you can do it right now. Just sit down and say, what can I do? Just anything to build Zion. Absolutely. Please join us for part two of this podcast. you