John Bytheway: 00:01 Welcome to Part 2 with Dr. Gaye Strathearn, 1 Nephi 6-10.

Hank Smith: 00:07 Gaye, as we go through this, I just maybe ask you to comment on the items and the different things that are seen. Just like you said, Gaye, as the family part of the dream seems to transition into the very macro part of the dream between verses 18 and 19, that’s when you have all these other symbols you might say appearing. When he says, “I held the rod of iron extended on the bank of the river,” what comes to mind when you think of those two things, the rod of iron and the river?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 00:39 As in most things, river could have positive and negative connotations, and symbols often do that. If I’m remembering correctly, later, Nephi is going to say that it was dirty water and that Lehi didn’t see it quite as well. Clearly, I think the rod is not just to keep them on the path, but to help prevent them falling into the river. The other thing I think about, particularly if we see it in a more negative sense, is this seems to me to be a barrier between the tree of life and the great and spacious building. Even though it might come from pure water, a fountain that is good, but it becomes impure as it goes down and-

Hank Smith: 01:31 Yeah, tainted.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 01:33 In some ways, I see the river, and this is coming back to my thoughts about the tree of life in the Garden of Eden. In some ways, I wonder whether this river might be analogous in some way to the cherubim and the flaming sword to keep the fallen people out of the way so that they don’t become eternal or eternal life in a fallen state. Somehow the people in the great and spacious building would have to leave the building and make a journey, and maybe through the dark and dreary waste of their own and mists of darkness, but to show their commitment to pressing forward and continuing to go even when things get rough but realizing that there is a price to be paid. But as Lehi is trying to tell them, the benefits of those difficulties are absolutely worth any cost that it takes to get there.

John Bytheway: 02:37 The rod of iron comes up in verse 19 there. Like Gaye said, I like to call it’s a guide rail and a guard rail. It’s both, a guide and a guard. It’s going to protect you from falling into the river but it’s also a guide to the tree of life. One of the things I’ve noticed as I’ve pondered this is the rod comes up first and the mist of darkness doesn’t come till verse 23. It says it arose, which I think light comes from above. This darkness comes from beneath. There arose a mist of darkness. One of the things that impresses me here is if you are not already holding onto the rod of iron, when the mist of darkness comes, you may not be able to find it. That’s what it says. Those who commenced in the path, they lose their way and they wandered off.

  03:27 All of us will encounter mists of darkness. Hopefully, we are already holding on to the rod of iron and that will take us right through it. That’s what verse 24 says, “I beheld others pressing forward. They came forth, caught hold of the end of the rod of iron, and did press forward through the mist of darkness.” That’s the guide rail part, but we’ve got to be holding on even in our easy times so that when our hard times come, we’ve got the guide rail and we can get through.

Hank Smith: 03:58 Excellent. Let’s keep going here. Our first group is a numberless concourse of people pressing forward so they can get to the tree, but then the mists of darkness come, like you mentioned, John. Gaye, what do you make of this mist of darkness? Is it block their view of the tree? They can’t see the tree anymore?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 04:15 Yeah. I do think so or they distort the tree, because in a fog, we can still see things and we can still even see lights, but they’re distorted and they’re harder to see. What are the mists of darkness? That it could be lots of things, but I think it’s mortality. You haven’t got to be in the great and spacious building to come across difficulties in mortality. Sometimes these mists of darkness are just a result of living in a mortal condition. Maybe COVID was a mist of darkness in our day. Well, I’m just talking personally here. As a single person, COVID was particularly difficult for me. One of the things that was most difficult was that, for months, I wasn’t able to take the sacrament because there was no one in my household who could do that. It just wasn’t available to me. That means, for months, I didn’t have the opportunity ritually to go back to the sacrament table and to petition God for a further endowment of his spirit that the sacrament promises me.

  05:30 Part of that meant that I felt myself thinking, I can do this no church on Sunday thing. I got used to it because I saw things in a distorted way, I think, but I couldn’t wait until we were able to go back to church, because I knew that if I had stayed in that position much longer, it would’ve been so much harder for me to come back. I remember that first day being with the saints again symbolically, but also literally being shoulder to shoulder with them, communally, coming before the sacrament, how powerful that was for me and I had forgotten that. I think that was some mists of darkness for me, but I am so grateful that I got to go back to remember, and to experience that personally, and to be reminded that I’m not alone, and that there is power in the communalness of attending church that I don’t get when I’m just alone.

Hank Smith: 06:47 Wow, Gaye. What an insightful experience to make this come alive. John, I’ve heard you say something once where you said the mists of darkness, as Nephi describes them, “The temptations of the devil, which blindeth the eyes and hardeneth the hearts of the children of men.” I’ve heard you say before that the mists of darkness can be very isolating. That’s what Gaye talked about.

John Bytheway: 07:10 Yeah. That you can’t see in front of you, you can’t see behind you. It’s not just a mist in the darkness, it’s a mist of darkness. I mean, I imagine it not like a dark smoke or something, therefore the decision to press forward becomes very individual for all of us. One of the things that our friend, S. Michael Wilcox, pointed out once is that if it was a low-lying fog or mist like is in the Middle East, you could look up and see. The only thing Satan still wants you to see, he said, was the great spacious building. Also, the mist of darkness wouldn’t do anything to your hearing, but you could still hear the mocking coming from the building and you’re isolated and you’re alone. It’s just an interesting metaphor for am I going to press forward or not becoming an individual decision? I just love Lehi’s dream. It is so deep, it’s so amazing. Yeah, I think the mist of darkness isolates everybody, and eventually, it becomes a decision. Will I press forward or not?

Hank Smith: 08:13 Gaye, that’s our first group. And then he says, “I beheld others pressing forward. They caught hold of the end of the rod of iron,” we’ve talked about that, “pressing through the mist of darkness.” Then they get to the fruit, they partake of the fruit of the tree. After they had partaken of the fruit of the tree, they start to look around. Lehi seems to notice for the first time a great and spacious building in verse 26. What is Lehi seeing here? What do you make of this building? We talk about the building all the time. In fact, I have a book on my shelf called Lifestyles of the Great and Spacious by John Bytheway. I have that book on my shelf. This is a building we talk about often. What do you make of it?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 08:58 The first thing I notice there is it’s told, is it stood as it were in the air high above the earth. I want to contrast that to the tree which is firmly rooted. We’ve talked about the importance of those roots, to give its strength, to give its stability through the things that mortality can throw at us. But the spacious building has no foundation that suggests that it is whimsical, it’s not grounded in anything that’s internal, that it doesn’t have a foundation that will give strength in times of winds, or storms, or things like that. But it’s high in the air, it’s looking down. The people are looking down at those who are on the path to the tree so that there’s a sense of superiority maybe there that we know more than you guys, you idiots, on this path.

  10:04 I teach an introduction to the ancient Near East. As part of that, we look at the metamorphosis or the change over time between, say, the New Testament, where people believed in God and they read scripture through the lens of a belief in God, and the evolution where God eventually gets taken out of the equation in reading the scriptures because we can’t prove God. Human self-sufficiency rises up. We see the transition from, “You need to read scriptures. You need to do it in the right attitude of praying and seeking help from God,” to the point where a humanistic view, you don’t need God. You don’t need to pray before you read the scriptures. You just do it with your reason, your logic, your things, and how we see these cracks and then becoming wider and wider between groups as they’re thinking about the scriptures. I think, from a worldly perspective, we live in a very humanistic world. What humans can see and understand is all we need and all we see is a very limited view of eternity, a very small portion of eternity.

  11:29 People will tell you, “Well, that’s all you need to know.” But the Savior says, “No. I came to Earth,” Gospel of John, “to help you see that mortality is only a sliver. I’ve come to give you the eternal perspective from which you can make your choices.” But if I only see like this and I think that this is reality and this is my reality, I miss things. That’s why I think, for me, personally, I don’t understand eternity very well. My brain can’t cope with it. I can give a talk on it and I can quote scriptures and things like that, but the idea of eternity is just bigger than my mortal brain can comprehend. When I have questions or the world tells me that I should have questions, I don’t know the answer to that, but my response, at least I hope my response, is not to say, “Okay,” walk away because of your questions.

  12:35 My response is if I hang on, maybe I’ll learn some more stuff that God sees and God knows and those questions I have will no longer be questions, they’ll make sense because God has an eternal perspective, whereas I only have a mortal perspective. It’s worth hanging on. It’s worth pressing forward continually to the iron rod, understanding that the more I know of God and about God and from God, the more I’m going to have an eternal perspective. Those questions, I have total trust and faith that they will make sense once I see them as God sees them. People in the great and spacious building aren’t looking for that eternal perspective, in my opinion.

Hank Smith: 13:26 Wonderful. A couple of questions about the great and spacious building. It’s on the other side of the river of water. The people in it are old, young, male, female, and their attitude towards those partaking of the fruit of the tree is mocking and pointing their fingers. What is Lehi getting at? John, let’s go to you, and then Gaye, let’s go back to you. What do you see in the great and spacious building?

John Bytheway: 13:57 It’s fascinating to me that the description of the occupants of the great and spacious building in verse 27, it says, “It was filled with people, both old and young.” There’s moms and dads out there trying to do Come, Follow Me with junior high students and high school students. I think if a bunch of old people came and said, “I don’t like the way you dress,” I don’t think they would care. But what if it was someone their own age or some one their own age talking to them about why do you go to seminary or some one their own age giving them a hard time? There’s a peer pressure element here when it talks about that they’re old and they’re young, they’re male and they’re female, and they have the best clothes on.

  14:37 Of all the things you could do in a building that’s spacious, you’d think there’d be, Elder Maxwell said, more to do in such a spacious building, like maybe a bowling alley. But the activity of choice is to go to the windows and point. There’s got to be more to do in there. The other thing that I find fascinating is what Gaye pointed out, it’s in the air. Thank you for these awesome footnotes. There’s a footnote to Ephesians 2:2. It has one of the strangest names for Satan that I’ve ever seen. It calls him the prince of the power of the air.

  15:15 I got out my McConkie New Testament commentary once to see what does that mean. I just thought, how did he see this coming? That the influence of Satan will be in the very air around us. I thought, oh my wifi, the great and spacious building is in the air. Wow. Elder McConkie wrote that in the ’70s, that it would be in the very air around us. That’s a very modern way to look at that footnote ties it to the modern age of the great and… It’s on the air, it’s in the air, it is everywhere.

Hank Smith: 15:56 Interesting. When it comes to the people in the building and the mocking and the pointing of the fingers, what comes to mind? For me, I see Korihor in this, Alma 30. The way he comes at the people is this foolish and vain hope.

John Bytheway: 16:15 Yolked and frenzied and deranged.

Hank Smith: 16:17 Yeah. It’s the effect of a frenzied mind. He says the derangement of your minds, it’s over and over. It seems to me that if I can get you feeling insecure, if I can get you feeling even stupid for believing, I’m going to rock you a little bit off the path. Is that what you see here, Gaye?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 16:40 Yeah. I don’t want to feel alienated from my peers. I still struggle with wanting the approval of the world at times because it can be immediate. Sometimes when you’re thinking about eternity, sometimes the approval of God is a little less immediate. It’s sometimes in a still small voice when I live in a very loud world. In other words, I’ve got to be very intentional to put myself in places where I am welcoming the spirit into my life and I’ve got to be intentional about listening. I’ve got to be intentional about remembering. I’ve got to be intentional about seeking for it. These experiences don’t usually come when I’m passive. These experience come when I’m seeking to be with God and to do His will, not mine. Sometimes the things of the world are in your face, and it’s hard to turn away or walk away and to disassociate from it, but I can’t disassociate into nothingness. The only way I can disassociate is an intentionality to come unto God and to do things His way, not mine. That’s hard sometimes.

Hank Smith: 18:12 John, I went and grabbed behind me my copy of the book. It’s called Finding Your Path in Lehi’s Dream. So I apologize. Lifestyles of the Great and Spacious is not the title. It’s called Finding Your Path in Lehi’s Dream. John, I’m guessing, in writing the book, you thought a lot about this great and spacious building. Talk to me a little bit more about it.

John Bytheway: 18:33 I had first moved into this ward and I had a wonderful guy stood up in the back of the room in High Priest Quorum one day, and said, “Listen, back when I was drinking and partying, I had a good time.” He said, “I had a great time. I have to admit, I was in the great and spacious laughing at you guys.” He said, “I did 25 years of field research in the great and spacious building.” He said, “You name it, I was addicted to it.” He said, “And then it turned on me. I lost my marriage, and I lost my job, and I lost the chance to raise my two daughters. In 25 years, I spent $500,000 on drugs and alcohol.” I’m, “Who is this guy?” I look around and I see he’s got a missionary tag on. His name’s Steve and he’s an addiction recovery missionary at the prison.

  19:24 What I love about Steve is he goes to the prison. Guess what he teaches them? Members or not, he teaches of Lehi’s dream. In the dream, we don’t see people leaving the great spacious and coming to the tree, but it happens all the time. It happened to Steve. I’ve been to the prison a few times with him to speak at a home evening. I’m grateful that it’s possible to leave the building and come to the tree. He says, “Hey, I was there and there’s nothing there. I lost just about everything there, but now I’m at the tree.” He’s been doing that out at the prison for more than 20 years now.

Hank Smith: 20:05 It reminds me of one of those last chapters of Revelation. Before the building falls, the Savior says, “Come out of her, my people, that you receive not of her plagues. Come out of her.”

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 20:17 Well, I was just looking at verse 33 and it says, “And great was the multitude that they’d enter into the strange building.” I thought that was interesting. It’s a strange building.

Hank Smith: 20:27 Strange building to Nephi and Lehi. Yeah.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 20:31 “And after they did enter into that building, they did point the finger of scorn at me.” Now it becomes personal, but then I love the response. It’s point the finger of scorn at me and those partaking of the fruit also, “but we heeded them not.” That’s the hard part, but that’s part of the intentionality. If we’re focused on Christ, we’re focused on the tree, then it’s easier to heed them not, but it’s hard. John, what you were saying there about people leaving the building, I really think that Lehi is going through this dream hoping that his sons will leave the building.

  21:19 But he comes to the realization, “He exceedingly feared,” verse 36, “for Laman and Lemuel. Yea, he feared lest they should be cast off from the presence of the Lord. And he did exhort them with all of the feelings of a tender parent that they would hearken unto the words, that perhaps the Lord would be merciful unto them and not cast onto them. Yea, my father did preach unto them.” Again, he never gives up on them. This dream is not positive for his hopes. He never gives up hope on his sons just as the Father doesn’t give up on us.

John Bytheway: 21:58 Yeah. Do you know what I’ve always wondered about this, Gaye? You mentioned this before. It reminds me of A Christmas Carol. It reminds me of when Ebenezer Scrooge says to the spirit of Christmas future, “Are these the shadows of things that must be or are these the shadows of things that might be?” It sounds like Lehi, his interpretation was these are things that might be if things stay as they are this. That’s why he could persuade them with all the feeling of a tender parent, because he believes there’s still an opportunity for Laman and Lemuel to not become what the dream seems to show.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 22:39 Yeah. Oh, yeah. I think that that’s reflective, when we go to chapter 10, where I see him doing his interpretation of it.

Hank Smith: 22:48 Gaye, you mentioned earlier Alma 32 and how Alma taps into this language a little bit. You also mentioned earlier tasting of the fruit of the tree and then leaving it behind. They’re ashamed and they fall away into forbidden paths and how that can be scary. The idea that I can have these experiences, partake of the fruit of the tree and then that somehow I can be drawn away from that, that’s a scary idea. As I was looking at it, in Lehi’s Dream, Lehi says in verse 28, that this group of people had tasted of the fruit of the tree and they were ashamed.

  23:29 But if you go to Alma 32, Alma says, “Once you have this fruit,” this is Alma 32:42, right at the end he says, “you shall feast upon this fruit until you are filled, that you hunger not, neither shall you thirst.” I wonder if there’s a key there to understanding how to stay at the tree. If you really want to stay at the tree, you don’t taste of the fruit. You feast until you are no longer interested in the building. Eat and eat and eat. I think of Nephi, Nephi’s over there eating the fruit. He’s making tree of life jam, tree of life pie. This is all he’s interested in, is this fruit. When that becomes your focus and you are filled with the fruit, the building loses its pull.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 24:19 Lure. Yeah.

Hank Smith: 24:19 Yeah. It loses its attractiveness. You’re just, “Why would I go there? It’s strange.” I like that you pointed it out. Why would I go over there? That’s a strange place to be. That’s a strange building. For anybody like me that’s worried, I don’t want to partake of the fruit and then end up walking away. I don’t want to be in that group. Keep feasting. Just keep feasting every day. As you do that, Gaye, don’t you think the building loses its pull?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 24:47 Absolutely. I can’t just walk away from the building and be passive. I’ve got to be actively involved in finding ways that can engage me and give me opportunities to feel the spirit and to feel of that love, but that’s something I’ve got to be intentional about.

Hank Smith: 25:05 Yeah. I picture Nephi there with his fruit. His mouth is full all the time and he’s looking at the building. “Do you want some fruit? Well, I’m going to stay here and keep eating. This is really good.”

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 25:19 It could be easy in the gospel to be passive. I go to church, I warm a seat, go through the motions, and I don’t do it. I can also say that, from experience, when I do that, I walk away and go, check, I’ve been to church. But when I’m actively involved, whether it’s in a sacrament meeting, and I don’t have to be actively involved in terms of giving talks or anything, but when I’m actively involved in the experience of sacrament and of partaking of the sacrament, and when I’m actively involved in the experience of either Relief Society or Sunday School, I come away from church feeling very differently. Instead of it being a checkbox, I come away thinking, I love this gospel. I’m grateful for a Heavenly Father who loves me, for His Savior, and for a Restoration, and living prophets. It’s a different thing than when I’m just being passive.

  26:23 There were two New Testament scholars, Davies and Allison. They talk about this metaphor that a disciple of Jesus Christ is not a passive spectator sitting in the grandstand and watching the game going on down in the field. Instead, a disciple of Jesus Christ is somebody who has skin in the game, who is down in the field giving their all to help the success of what’s going on. I’ve thought about that. I’m a nobody, but the church is made up of nobodies who, every day, do things that helps the Kingdom of God move forward in incrementally small ways but important ways. That’s what I mean about being engaged in it. I’m not going to be speaking at general conference. I might be in the nursery, but those are the things that help move the Kingdom of God forward in its manifested destiny. That’s where I need to be engaged in the trenches because I have a vested interest in the outcome of what happens rather than being acted upon.

John Bytheway: 27:48 Oh. We had Justin and Aislin Dyer here. Was that John, John, John, and Jude?

Hank Smith: 27:54 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 27:54 I can’t stop thinking about something that Aislin said that I thought was so good. She said, “An adult is someone who contributes more than they consume.” Elder Bednar has talked about this. He talks about his wife going to church and finding somebody that I can lift and help and serve, and being really engaged, like you just said. Not to check the box but to go, there’s somebody here I can lift or talk to or help. I’m going to contribute more than I consume.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 28:20 I love that idea.

Hank Smith: 28:21 Me too. Hey, real quick before we get onto the interpretation in chapter 10, have either of you noticed, and this is just something to think about, that the four groups in Lehi’s dream almost match perfectly the four soils in the parable of the sower? You’ve got these first people who want to get to the tree, but the mist of darkness comes and that fits the stony ground, then you’ve got these people who get to the tree, but then the things of this world choke the word and it becomes unfruitful. You’ve got people who are not interested in the tree at all. They’re trying to get to the building, but that would be the wayside. You’ve got those who go to the tree and end up staying there, similar to the Savior saying those that have the good soil and bring forth fruit, just something to chew on.

John Bytheway: 29:13 Hank, that’s one of my hot buttons. This is just average Brother Bytheway talking. Lehi’s dream is part four of a four-part story. It’s the soil, the seed, the season, then the supper. The soil is Matthew 13, parable of the four kinds of soil. When Alma notices the Zoramites, he doesn’t teach them the parable of the sower. He sees that they’re good soil, the poor among the Zoramites. He turns and says, “I’m going to tell you about this word I want you to plant in your hearts based on what I just heard on the Rameumptom you don’t believe in, but if you’ll give place that this word, this seed may be planted in your hearts.” He tells them to plant this word, which is Christ.

  29:59 The season, he says, “You’re going to need faith, diligence, and patience. That’s the fertilizer FDP to grow this.” He says, “If you neglect the tree, you will never partake of the fruit of the tree of life.” There’s part four right there. I think they’re all connected. I think, of course, the four soils correspond with the four groups in Lehi’s Dream because it’s the same story, in my opinion. It’s so fun that, in all the standard works, we have the soil, the seed, the season, and the supper all connected that way. To me, that’s thrilling to see how that all works together and how they correspond so perfectly.

Hank Smith: 30:40 Well, I’m glad I wasn’t crazy with that thought. Gaye, you mentioned that chapter 10 is Lehi’s interpretation. I don’t know if many of our listeners, me included, attach chapter 10 to chapter 8. We can just leave chapter 8 on its own and then we move on not bringing it with us. You’re saying bring Lehi’s dream with you into chapter 10.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 31:02 Absolutely. There’s a reason we don’t often make the connection, because Nephi has put chapter 9 in there which breaks things up. Chapter 10 is he’s saying, “Okay. From this point on, I’m going to talk about my stuff. I’m not just abridging my father’s stuff anymore.” But what does he do? He immediately goes to his father. This, again, is important to him. I’m on the small plates and I’m doing my stuff but I’m still going to talk about my dad. One of the reasons why I think that this is the interpretation is because if we go to the end of chapter 10, we’ve got this segue from what Lehi is teaching to Nephi and his experience, and then him going to segue into his vision experience. After he hears his dad teaching in chapter 10, notice what we have in verse 17, “And it came to pass that after I, Nephi, having heard all the words of my father concerning the things which he saw in a vision,” the rest of the chapter has been talking about what might be seen as other things.

  32:14 But he’s saying, “No, I’m listening to him talking about his vision and also the things which he spake by the power of the Holy Ghost, which power he received by faith on the son of God, and the Son of God was the Messiah who should come,” and as we’ll see that’s going to be important in this chapter, “I, Nephi, was desirous also that I might see, and hear, and know of these things by the power of the Holy Ghost, which is the gift of God unto all those who diligently seek him, as well in times of old as in the time that he should manifest himself unto the children of men. For he’s the same yesterday.” And then verse 19, “For he that diligently seeketh shall find, and the mysteries of God shall be unfolded unto them by the power of the Holy Ghost.” As I read these verses, we know later on that Laman and Lemuel had absolutely no idea what their father is talking about.

  33:10 “Have you understood this?” They said, “No, we have no idea” Nephi is going to say, “But have you asked?” They’re going, “No, God doesn’t make anything known to us.” But the response is Nephi seems not to have fully understood either, and so he says, “I need to not just have my dad talk about it, but I need to have my own personal experience with the Holy Ghost. I’m going to seek to do that. I was desirous that I might see, and hear, and know these things. I don’t want to just hear what dad’s saying. I want to see what he saw so that I can know not just vicariously from my dad’s experience but from my own personal experience. I know I’m going to have to pay a price for that and I’m willing to do it.” That leads us into chapter 11.

  34:05 My interest in here is going, okay, we’ve seen the vision dream, but what do we have in chapter 10? Verse 2, “Behold, it came to pass after my father had made an end of speaking the words of the dream and also of exhorting them to the diligence, he spake concerning the Jews.” Now what I think is happening, and when I get upstairs, I’m tracking Lehi down, because I want to ask him point-blank what is going on here, but this is how I’m reading it. I think he’s had his dream and he started off because he was thinking about his family, his immediate family. We’ve talked about how it segues into not just people in general, but more specifically probably the seed of Laman and Lemuel. But now I think that Lehi is starting to think broadly. “What is it that is going to help if there’s a possibility for my sons to come back?” If there’s a possibility that God can be merciful to them and to their children who are bearing the impact of the rippling effects of their choices, is there hope for them?

  35:23 I want to connect that with Zenos’s allegory because this is the same way that Jacob is going to introduce them to the allegory. Frankly, in Romans 11, when Paul seems to be giving a shortened version of Zenos’s allegory, he’s asking the same thing. Is there hope for Israel who have broken their covenants and turned away from God? Paul’s going to give the CliffsNotes version of the allegory. I wonder whether Lehi is thinking likewise, because notice verse 3 in what he goes to, “Concerning the Jews, that after they should be destroyed, even the great city of Jerusalem, and many be carried away captive into Babylon, according to the own time of the Lord, they should return again. Yea, even brought back out of captivity, and that they should be brought back out of captivity that they should possess again the land of their inheritance.”

  36:27 Now, all through the Book of Mormon here, we’ve had Lehi prophesying that it was important for us to leave even though Laman and Lemuel didn’t like it because Jerusalem is going to be destroyed, then Nephi telling Laman and Lemuel when they’re in the rebelling, “If you can trust in God, then we’re going to see the benefit of what has come from listening to a prophet and following through.” Then the vision comes up and it starts talking about, we talked about this, that this man in a white robe led them through a dark and dreary place. How does Lehi open his teaching, his open teaching here? He talks about the destruction of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple in what would be considered to be one of the darkest times in all of Jewish history up to the Holocaust. What does he talk about here?

  37:34 He’s starting, “This is our dark and dreary wasteland.” The impact of that is not just for a day or two, but this is years that come from it. Not only has Jerusalem become desolate, but the people are taken away. They’re in Babylon, they’ve got to exist in Babylon, and it’s going to take about 70 years before they come back. When they come back, what do they find of Jerusalem? They weep for once what was a great and wonderful city and temple, but it’s all gone, so he brings it back to this. That’s why I see the connection. He goes on and says, “But there will be a return.” Can there be a return for Laman and Lemuel? Is it possible that there’s a return for them or for their posterity because the Lord does return again. “Yea, even he brought them back out of captivity, and after they should be brought back out of captivity, they should possess again the land of their inheritance,” which is difficult for Lehi and his family because their inheritance is going to be different. We talked about that.

Hank Smith: 38:56 Gaye, verse 3, this destruction of the southern kingdom of Judah and maybe the entire scattering of Israel, and even verse 6, “all mankind were in a lost and fallen state.” I’m seeing the dark and dreary waste. What a fascinating connection.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 39:13 Yeah. What is it that brings them out of this? In the dream, it is Lehi praying and eventually then being led to the tree. But here, verse 4, again, it’s going to take some time but, “Yea, even 600 years from the time that my father left Jerusalem, a prophet would the Lord God raise up among the Jews, even the Messiah or the Savior of the world.” This is the hours in the dark and dreary place, but the hope of the tree is the Savior. “He also spake concerning the prophets and how a great number testified these things concerning this Messiah, of whom he had spoken, or this Redeemer of the world. Wherefore, all mankind,” as you said, “was lost and fallen state, and ever would be save they should rely on this Redeemer.” He spoke also of another prophet and he’s going to talk about John the Baptist here.

  40:21 He’s going to talk about how he prepares the way for the coming of the Messiah. I’ve thought about how Lehi, in a very real sense, for his family, is like John the Baptist, preparing them for the tree, going there ahead of his family to partake of the fruit, to get a sense of it, to know how joyous it is, and then invite people to come to participate with him, acting in very John the Baptist way. “Preparing the way of the Lord, making the paths straight, for there standeth one among you whom you know not, and he’s mightier than I, whose shoe’s latchet I’m not worthy,” helping him see that this isn’t any ordinary tree. “And my father said he should baptize in Bethabara with water.”

  41:16 Even the Messiah is this, the water of the fountain as it originally comes out, the cleansing power of the clean water. “And after he baptized the Messiah with water, he should behold and bear record that he had baptized the Lamb of God, who should take away the sins of the world.” How would that resonate with Lehi as he’s thinking about Laman and Lemuel and thinking of the hope that there is for them because of the coming Messiah of Jesus Christ?

Hank Smith: 41:53 Gaye, this is awesome.

John Bytheway: 41:55 That’s really great.

Hank Smith: 41:57 The dark and dreary waste, the hours in the dark and dreary waste, the Messiah, the tree is introduced. How did I not ever see this? “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,” right out of the dream.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 42:11 For Lehi’s family, that’s okay because they can go directly to the tree. It’s the others that have this path and need the rod and everything.

Hank Smith: 42:20 I beheld a straight and narrow path. I mean, it’s right out of the dream. I feel so frustrated sometimes when something’s right in front of me and I’ve never seen it before. The water, the baptism of Christ, this is playing out almost exactly like the dream.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 42:39 Yeah. Verse 11, he talks about, the dwindling of the Jews in unbelief. “And after they have slain the Messiah, who should come, after he had been slain, he should rise from the dead and should make himself manifest, by the Holy Ghost, to the Gentiles.” And then this, notice the language, “Yea, even my father spake much concerning the Gentiles and also concerning the house of Israel, that they should be compared like unto an olive tree, whose branches should be broken off and should be scattered upon the face of all the earth.” Where have we seen that language before? Well, we haven’t seen it yet, but we all know it. This is Zenos’s allegory. This is another reason why it makes me think is this what Lehi has been reading, studying, searching, thinking about?

Hank Smith: 43:29 What has he been thinking about that led to the vision that led to the dream?

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 43:36 Yeah. 13, “Wherefore, he said it must needs be that we should be led with one accord into the land of promise, unto the fulfilling of the word of the Lord, that we should be scattered upon all of the face of the earth.” Again, this is Lehi seeing things a little bit differently, and then verse 14 about the scattering. “And after the house of Israel should be scattered,” us, “they should be gathered again but in a different place, or, in fine, after the Gentiles had received the fullness of the gospel, the natural branches of the olive tree, or the remnants of the house of Israel, should be grafted in, or come to the knowledge of the true Messiah, their Lord and their Redeemer.” Again, that’s Zenos’s allegory.

  44:24 We are being scattered. My family is being scattered, but we will be gathered, and it will be gathered as we come to know about the true Messiah and the Lord and Redeemer. They’re the two places where I’m thinking again that this is the allegory is motivated. It’s when Nephi hears this that he says, “I need to know more. I don’t understand that, but I need help,” and he’s willing to pay the price to have that experience. An experience similar to his father ends up being way more expansive than even the experience of his father. I love this stuff. I love this stuff.

Hank Smith: 45:09 Man, Gaye. It’s almost like I think in my own teaching and reading, I go directly from Lehi’s chapter 8, Lehi’s dream to Nephi’s vision, chapter 11, and I’ve never looked at chapter 10 the way you have shown it here, and said, “Look. Look, he’s interpreting the dream.”

John Bytheway: 45:29 I think you’re right. Lehi must have had Zenos’s allegory on his mind. Usually, when you get scattered, I like to call it, you get scattered brain, you lose your testimony, then you lose your real estate. Except, in this case, Lehi was scattered to preserve this part of the house of Israel. The Zenos’s allegory can answer the question of, well, we haven’t lost our testimony but we’re getting scattered, so how’s this going to work? Zenos’s allegory answers that, so no wonder that’s on his mind. See, Hank, I’m like you. I sometimes rush through chapter 10 to get to 11-15.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 46:06 The goal of Zenos’s allegory is the fruit. It’s not the tree, it’s the fruit that comes from it. How is it that Israel, even though they have these ups and downs, but God is doing this, is orchestrating all of these things he does so that he can get as much fruit as possible, as many souls of the children of men to return to him and partake in eternal life. I love that part because I hope that I’m one of them even though I have my dream experiences too.

John Bytheway: 46:42 Just another reason to send the boys back to get the plates of brass, because Zenos’s allegory was on there and then Lehi reads it and all this comes out. This is great. Thank you.

Hank Smith: 46:54 Yeah, this has been absolutely fantastic. You pointed out chapter 10:6, they’re lost and fallen state, and they’re going to stay there unless they rely on the Redeemer. We tie that back to Lehi being in the dark and dreary waste seeing the tree. You’ll know this quote exactly. President Benson said, “You need to understand the Fall before you can truly desire the Atonement.” Man, I love this stuff too, because, John, you pointed out earlier that the angel, the man in the white robe, showed Lehi where he was. It didn’t necessarily lead him to that.

John Bytheway: 47:36 He led him through it through the darkness. Yeah.

Hank Smith: 47:39 Yeah. “Look, this is where you are. You are in…” Lehi comprehends the Fall in chapter 8:7, “I beheld myself, I’m in a dark and dreary waste.” I never saw the Fall in the dark and dreary waste until Gaye pointed out chapter 10’s relationship to chapter 8. This is expansive. I love this stuff. That really just made my day, all of it. For me, in my Christ and the Everlasting Gospel class, we spend a full day, if not a day and a half, on the Fall. Because if you don’t understand the Fall, Jesus is a great guy and he teaches great things, but I don’t know if I need Him.

John Bytheway: 48:21 I feel like the church goes through a Fall. The apostasy was the Fall and the Restoration was the Atonement to bring it all back. It’s another pattern. That’s why when you teach Lehi’s dream, don’t skip that part about going through the darkness because that’s, “I need help. I need the tree.”

Hank Smith: 48:42 Goodness. I’ve had these scriptures for 20 something years and I never wrote the Fall by chapter 8:7, never once.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 48:51 Can I just say though, as part of this, that I’ve thought about bits and pieces of this over the years for a number of years, but preparing for today, the Spirit helps you see and teaches you things that you just don’t see sometimes. He does it because you’re being intentional, trying to understand. It is a reminder to me of how powerful the scriptures are and can be when we let the Spirit teach us. It doesn’t mean that we don’t have to do some work on our own in preparation. Again, this is the intentional part, not being passive. The Spirit doesn’t teach me when I’m being passive, but it does teach me in powerful ways when I’m a seeker, and the scriptures are such a wonderful source.

  49:47 You can spend a lifetime studying these things, but there’s always something new that the Spirit can teach us always. I think that will go on for eternity. I don’t know when it’ll stop, if it’ll stop, because I’m a Bible person. I love the Bible and I spend a lot of my time on there, but these experiences are a reminder to me of why I also love the Book of Mormon and need to spend time in it for my personal growth and spiritual journey to the tree, so I can partake of the fruit that happens when the Spirit teaches me.

Hank Smith: 50:23 Yeah, I would describe my experience today being taught, sweet above all that is sweet. It is the fruit. This is part of partaking of the fruit. John, I’m shocked on chapter 10.

John Bytheway: 50:36 Yeah, that’s really cool. I’ve got notes all over my margins now that tie it back to the tree of life, tie it back to Zenos’s allegory. Okay, like this flew out of Joseph Smith’s imagination, right?

Hank Smith: 50:48 Yeah. Gaye. What a treat. I mean, what a fruit, I should say, it has been.

John Bytheway: 50:57 What a feast.

Hank Smith: 50:59 Yeah, a feast really. I feel so full. In this moment, this space that I’m in right now, the building has lost its appeal. I want to keep doing this. I don’t want to stop. Oh, what a good day. What a good day, John.

John Bytheway: 51:15 Yeah. I love this, because now I’m seeing that’s why they needed the brass plates, and then Lehi reads Zenos’s allegory that we have in Jacob 5. “How’s this all going to work? We just got scattered. How do we get back?” Sees the dream and then summarizes it again, 1 Nephi 10, “This is how it’s going to work and how we’ll come to the knowledge of the true Messiah in the end.” Never saw it that way. That’s so good.

Hank Smith: 51:39 Wow, yeah. Gaye, thank you for your time, not just your time here with us, but for the decades you’ve spent studying.

Dr. Gaye Strathearn: 51:48 All glory goes to God. All glory. Thank you.

Hank Smith: 51:53 Thank you for spending your time with us. It has been time well spent. We want to thank Dr. Gaye Strathearn for being with us today. We want to thank our executive producer, Shannon Sorensen, our sponsors, David and Verla Sorensen, and we always remember our founder, Steve Sorensen. Join us next week. We’re in the next few chapters of the Book of Mormon on followHIM.