John Bytheway: 00:01 Welcome to part two with Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: Enos through Words of Mormon.

Hank Smith: 00:07 Gerrit, as we move forward, there’s something my son noticed the other day. He said, “Dad, in Omni, the chapter heading puts the years about 323 to 130 BC. Then you get to the next book, Words of Mormon, and the heading says 385 A.D.” He went, “Wait, we just skipped ahead 500 years.” Can you explain what’s happening here?

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 00:32 Boy, this is seriously one of the most fun parts of studying the Book of Mormon for me. You have to remember that I am a history nerd, which you already know if you’re listening to the podcast at this point. You’re thinking, “Yeah, this has been the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced.

  00:52 One of these fascinating aspects of the demonstration that this record is an actual record that actually exists, the All-Knowing author here, Mormon, is providing this interjection into his record, because I can only imagine what it was like when you were reading the Book of Mormon for the first time or when Joseph was translating it.

  01:18 When you’re reading the Book of Mormon for the first time, yeah, you go from, “Oh, let’s learn more about this King Benjamin person,” and the very next words on the next page are, “And now I, Mormon, begin to deliver up the record,” which I have no idea who Mormon is. Suddenly we went from Benjamin to this Mormon guy, and Mormon is explaining a lot about how this book came to be. That’s why this is such a precious part of our understanding of the plates: because Mormon explains his process.

  01:49 Now, we get a little bit of this from the book Mormon in the Book of Mormon. I don’t know a very clean way of saying the Book of Mormon in the Book of Mormon. That sounds like we’re opening a Pandora’s Box or looking in a lot of two-way mirrors.

  02:02 The reality is, in Mormon’s own book that he writes later in the book, he provides a history of how it is that he came to be given these records, how he came to be the one who was abridging these large Plates of Nephi and creating the book that we now call the Book of Mormon in general.

  02:23 This explanation that he has given here is to describe what records you’re reading. And talk about a spoiler alert. Boy, Mormon, in verse two, he’s going to let you know exactly what’s about to happen. If you’re holding off on waiting on that series before you find out, you don’t want to talk to Mormon, he’s going to let you know.

Hank Smith: 02:43 Yes, skip this one if you don’t want to know ahead.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 02:45 Right. He says, “I have witnessed almost all the destruction of my people, the Nephites”. We just found out that there’s a whole bunch more Nephites, that Zarahemla and them, that they got together and they’ve learned about the Gospel and it’s the greatest thing ever, and the very next words you’re going to read are, I’ve witnessed almost their entire destruction 516 years later, and it is many hundreds of years after the coming of Christ.

  03:08 Now, we’ve had prophesies that Christ was going to come, but we know He came now, because Mormon just said he came. “It’s many hundred years after the coming of Christ, and I deliver these records up into the hands of my son, and it supposeth me that he will witness the entire destruction of my people. But may God grant that he may survive them and he writes somewhat concerning them and somewhat concerning Christ, that perhaps someday, it may profit them.”

  03:33 And then he’s going to go on to explain why. This is like an explanatory note that’s put in for the reader. He’s made his record up to this point by abridging what was on the large plates of Nephi. Again, we talked about this a little bit with both Jarom and Omni, how they keep referring to these small plates, and the small plates we’re just supposed to have the prophesyings on them, and the larger plates were the ones that were supposed to have the larger history on them.

  04:00 He says that “I’d made an abridgment from the plates of Nephi,” and there he’s talking about these larger plates. He has gone through the heavy duty ones that talk about everything. He’s made an abridgment of it.

  04:13 One thing you’ll start to notice at this point in the Book of Mormon: Mormon is a great omniscient third-person author there, where he will interject himself and provide commentary. You’ll read about something and be like, “Oh, and thus we see the hearts of the children.” He can’t help himself but tell you the story, and then sometimes add in a little bit of commentary on his own because he’s the one who’s abridged this and put it together.

  04:40 That commentary is totally valuable because it helps us understand why he thought this part was valuable; but it’s also the reason why most of the Book of Mormon is in third person, which is something I’m sure you’ve already talked about.

  04:55 He is taking these records and he is abridging them or he’s rewriting them. He says he can’t even include a hundredth part. He’s taking bits and pieces of it from different authors that are there in the Plates of Nephi. He’s trying to create a story for us that includes all of the things that the Lord is inspiring him to put in there.

  05:20 Mormon, to me, is the first Mormon historian. He’s the first Latter-day Saint historian, but there’s, of course, no Latter-day Saints at the time. He’s taking records of other people and he’s using those sources to create a narrative that’s source-based to try to tell people what happened, and this is exactly what Mormon has done.

  05:41 The worst thing that can happen to a historian is they finish writing something, and then the next day, they find another source that’s totally important that you would’ve written about the entire time, but you didn’t have.

  05:55 I had this experience a little bit on my dissertation because I was writing about the Latter-day Saints being expelled from the United States. I knew the Council of Fifty existed and that minutes of the Council of Fifty existed, but they also weren’t public. No one had access to them.

  06:12 So I had to write my dissertation, da, da, da, da, da. And wouldn’t you know it? I go to work on the Joseph Smith papers, and five years later, well, now the Council of Fifty minutes are accessible. It would change a lot of the things I say in my dissertation had I had those.

  06:27 Anyone who’s ever written anything has, after it’s been published, said, “Oh, man, I should have included this. Why didn’t I include this?” And Mormon has the same experience.

  06:37 “After I had made an abridgment from the Plates of Nephi down to the reign of King Benjamin, of whom Amaleki spake,” so he’s referencing this, there. “I searched among the records which have been delivered into my hands and I found these plates,” so a different set of plates, “which contained this small account of the prophets from Jacob down to the reign of King Benjamin, and also many of the words of Nephi.”

  07:03 He’s already done the abridgment, he’s already written what he’s going to write up to that point, and then he finds the small Plates of Nephi. Unlike the large plates, where he’s essentially rewriting what’s there, he’s creating his own narrative, he’s cutting things out, he’s adding things in; here, he says that he’s going to simply put them with the other plates.

  07:27 This is verse six: “For behold, I shall take these plates which contain these prophesyings and revelations and put them with the remainder of my record; for they are choice unto me and I know they will be choice unto my brethren.”

  07:44 I don’t know if he pops open the three-ring binder there of the Gold Plates, has to re-smelt the ore, or what he’s doing, but he doesn’t edit these Plates of Nephi; he simply puts those plates in with the other plates.

  08:01 He says, verse seven: “And I do this for a wise purpose, for thus it whispereth me, according to the workings of the Spirit of the Lord, which is in me, and now I do not know all things, but the Lord knoweth all things which are to come. Wherefore, He worketh in me to do His will.”

  08:20 Mormon could easily be asking the question, “Thanks for helping me find these after I was already done with my abridgment,” and the last thing you want to do is include it in your book, because then everyone knows you missed it. He feels inspired that these need to be there.

  08:37 Now, there’s all kinds of other records. I think it’s important at this point to jump back to 1 Nephi 9 to find out where these plates even come from in the first place. Go back to 1 Nephi 9. They’re in the valley of Lemuel. They haven’t even come to the new world yet.

  08:54 He says, “And now as I’ve spoken concerning these plates.” This is Nephi looking back, because he’s giving the narrative up to the time when they’re there, and now he’s looking back sometime in the future. He says, “And now, I have spoken concerning these plates. Behold, they are not the plates which I make a full account of the history of my people; for the plates upon which I make a full account of my people, I’ve given the name of Nephi, wherefore they’re called the plates of Nephi, after my own name; and these plates are also called the plates of Nephi.” So Nephi really hurt us, here.

Hank Smith: 09:27 Super helpful.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 09:28 “I made two sets of plates and I called them both the plates of Nephi.” It would’ve been great had he called one of the plates something else, but this is where we get this terminology of the large plates of Nephi and the small plates of Nephi. He’s already making these larger plates. That’s already going on.

  09:47 Nevertheless, verse three: “I received a commandment of the Lord that I should make these plates.” Now, these are the small plates. We know that because 1 Nephi is from the small plates, “That I should make these plates for the special purpose that there should be an account engraven of the ministry of my people.”

  10:07 He goes on to say, “The other plates are going to have more stuff in. It’s going to be about the wars and contentions. This one’s especially going to be focused on the prophesyings.” And verse five, he says: “The Lord commanded me to make these plates for a wise purpose in Him, which purpose I know not. But the Lord knoweth all things from the beginning; wherefore, He prepareth the way to accomplish all His works among the children of men. For behold, He hath all power unto the fulfilling of all of His words.”

  10:36 First of all, Nephi who’s already doing obviously a gargantuan job of keeping the record on the other plates, is told by God, “You need to make an entirely different set of plates.” Okay. And God doesn’t tell him why. God doesn’t say, “Well, this is going to be essential.” God just says, “You need to do this.” And Nephi’s response is: “The Lord knoweth all things.”

  11:01 And you know what’s really interesting? It’s essentially as if Mormon, who has searched that record, is quoting those verses from Nephi, quoting what Nephi had to say, because he says, “I do this for a wise purpose; for thus it whispereth unto me according to the workings of the Spirit, and the Lord is in me, and now I do not know all things, but the Lord knoweth all things which are to come.”

  11:28 Now go back to 1 Nephi 9:6: “For the Lord knoweth all things from the beginning and He prepareth a way.” I don’t know if Mormon here is quoting what Nephi said. We know that he’s read this because he just said, “I read it and I loved it, and that’s the reason why I’m putting it in here.”

  11:45 But both of them are doing something that is extra work for them. That isn’t what they were first commanded to do, and neither one of them is given any explanation from God about why they’re doing it. They’re just told, “You need to do it.”

  12:04 So you have Nephi creating the record and then you have Mormon finding the record and putting it with the other plates, even though this doesn’t really make sense. “I’ve already abridged all of this. I’m now just adding even more to this? I thought you wanted this record to be small. But hey, whatever. I guess I’ll just put it in there.”

  12:24 Why does this matter? Now, I apologize for how excited I am. It matters because the Lord does know all things from the beginning. It matters because in June of 1828, Joseph Smith is translating the gold plates with Emma helping him, with Martin Harris helping him. They’re making some headway, but things are rough: Joseph’s super poor; his father-in-law, not terribly fond of him; and Emma is actually pregnant with their first child.

  13:03 And in the summer of 1828, Martin Harris, who has been just thoroughly harassed by his wife and his family because he’s essentially the only person outside of Joseph’s family who believes that Joseph Smith has plates. He’s the only person in 1828 who believes Joseph has plates and that Joseph saw an angel, and every other person that Joseph has told that story to has attacked him, has mocked him, has made fun of him, has claimed that he’s a liar, except for Martin Harris.

  13:36 Now, Martin Harris is a well-off guy. Joseph Smith comes from the bottom rung of society. His family’s so poor that while they’re translating the Book of Mormon, Joseph’s family is going to lose their home. Joseph himself with his farm down in Harmony can’t make the payments on it.

  13:53 Martin Harris is a well-off guy, and the Lord has commanded Joseph to bring forth the Book of Mormon to the world. There is no discernible way that Joseph can do that.

  14:05 To give you an idea: when Joseph finally gets the quote on how much it is to publish the Book of Mormon, and by the way, he’s got to pay upfront, it is $3,000. Now, that sounds like a lot if you’re a BYU professor, but for a lot of people listening, they’re like, “$3,000? $3,000 doesn’t seem like a whole lot maybe in our world. But in their world, the average person makes somewhere around $200 to $250 a year.

  14:37 Joseph bought a farm in Harmony that was almost 14 acres with a farmhouse on it, and apparently some other outbuildings and a well, the trees are already cut down on a lot of it, so it’s already farmable. He buys that 14-acre farm and house for $200.

  14:58 The cost of printing the Book of Mormon is 15 times Joseph Smith’s entire net worth if he did own his home, which he doesn’t, because he can’t make the payments on his own home. To put that in our perspective today, the Lord is essentially saying that you need to come up with, in a lump sum, 15, 16, 17 times the amount of money you make annually. That seems impossible. To me, it’s impossible. I would have to have an angel come to tell me to believe that I could do that.

  15:37 Martin Harris not only is the only person who believes Joseph: he’s the only means whereby Joseph can even perceive that there’s any way this could possibly be published.

  15:52 When Martin Harris comes down in June of 1828 and says to Joseph something to the effect, “Joseph, my wife, she’s relentless. She won’t stop. She doesn’t want me supporting you. My friends and family. I’m a prominent guy in the community. Just let me take the pages of the translation. Just let me take the pages. I can prove to them. They’ll know once they read it. They’ll know this comes from God.”

  16:21 Now, it’s not the first time Martin Harris has done this. Martin Harris already had the characters from the plates and had a copy of those characters who, according to Lucy Smith, he would show these characters to different people to try to prove, when he said, “Joseph has gold plates.” “Oh, he doesn’t really have gold plates.” “Well, look at these characters. Where do you think these characters come from?”

  16:43 It didn’t convince anybody, but as pressure continues to mount more and more and more, Martin Harris comes down and says, “I need to take the translation to show people what’s really going on. If they see this, they will know this has to come from God.”

  17:01 And Joseph of course asked the Lord, and is told flatly, “No, he can’t take them.” And Joseph asks again. “No, he can’t take them.” And then Joseph asks a third time. Finally, the Lord says, “Okay, but you have to make a covenant that you’ll only show them to these specified people,” which Martin Harris makes that covenant, makes his oath, and then he trundles off to Palmyra from Harmony with those pages.

  17:33 Now, Joseph, he’s a little out of sorts for a few weeks because right after Martin Harris leaves, Emma goes into labor, and the delivery is incredibly difficult. Joseph’s firstborn child dies immediately after birth and Emma nearly dies. Joseph is, according to Lucy, again, hovering by her bedside for weeks trying to nurse her back to health.

  18:01 To make matters worse, Emma was the primary scribe for most of that early portion of the translation. Emma will prevail upon Joseph to say, “Where is Martin? He was supposed to make a quick run up, show people the pages and come back, and he’s not back.” I won’t tell the entirety of that story here, but suffice to say someone steals the 116 pages from Martin Harris. They’re stolen.

  18:34 We don’t know who steals them, but that is often called the Book of Lehi, and likely it’s called that because that’s how Mormon titled his books from his abridgment: usually based upon the first prophet who speaks in that book. And then he provided a little bit of a heading and said, “This is an account of…” You go look at the book of Helaman, go look at the book of 3 Nephi. You’ll see how Mormon gives his titles and gives his little summary about what the book is about.

  19:02 The first part that they had translated, 116 pages and months and months and months of work. Not only is the work arduous, affording the ink and the paper is expensive. Paper’s not cheap then. They actually have to have the paper given to them in order to be able to continue the translation because they are poor. Emma and Joseph and Martin have spent months and months and months on this, and it’s gone.

  19:31 Now, Martin finally tells the Smith family up in Palmyra, “It’s gone. It’s gone.” What he says is probably pretty indicative of what he thought at the time. He says, “I have lost my soul. I’ve lost my soul.” And Joseph asked him, “Have you brought condemnation upon me and you because you broke your oath?”

  19:54 Of course, Martin had. Not only was Martin supposed to take care of the pages, he was only supposed to show them to certain people, and he ended up showing them to other people. He’d broke his oath. And you know what? Nobody, not one person got converted because Martin Harris showed them the pages.

  20:16 Those pages are gone. We don’t know everything that happened with those pages, but what we do know is that the people who stole them stole them with the intent to try to destroy the Restoration of the Gospel, to try to destroy Joseph Smith, and to try to destroy the Book of Mormon.

  20:34 Just as a small tangent here, we all know the end of the story. Like I talked about before, it’s so easy to study the past because we already know what happens. We know God as a loving God, who is our Father, who desperately wants to forgive us of our sins. We know that because of the Restoration. We know that because of the revelations that Joseph received.

  21:07 That is not the world that Joseph and Martin live in. They live in a world in which the majority of Christian denominations believe that there are very, very, very few people that God has chosen already before the world existed to save; that only those people are going to be saved; and that God is a vengeful God; and that once you are out of His grace, you are out forever.

  21:36 When Joseph goes back to Harmony to tell his ailing wife, “You know the months that you spent on this? You know the sacrifice that you made being alienated from your family, being ridiculed by everyone because of these plates, because of this calling I was given by God? I just threw it all away. I didn’t listen to God.”

  21:57 He already knew that things were bad because he doesn’t just lose the plates and the interpreters; because the pages are lost. After he makes the third inquiry, he has them taken from him. He already has taken from him the plates because he continued to pester God about it.

  22:21 Joseph goes back to Harmony to tell his ailing wife, “I’ve lost my soul.” And for all I know, Joseph really does believe at this point that he’s going to go to hell. He doesn’t know what we all know about the Restoration. It hasn’t been revealed yet.

  22:40 And as he’s walking outside of his property, an angel of God appears to him, and this is where you get Doctrine and Covenants 3. This is actually the earliest recorded revelation of Joseph Smith. I know that section one and two come earlier, but this is the first recorded revelation of Joseph Smith.

  23:00 The angel appears to him and hands him the Seer Stones, the Urim and Thummim stones, the Interpreters, whatever you want to call them; and he receives this revelation. And it starts out with this: “The works and designs and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated, neither can they come to naught; for God doth not walk in crooked paths, neither doth He turn to the right nor to the left, neither doth He vary from that which He has said.” Verse three: “Remember, remember that it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men.”

  23:34 He goes on to chastise Joseph pretty severely. Because Joseph had made this covenant and he’d broken it. And why had Joseph broken it? In Joseph’s world, he couldn’t possibly see any way that he could maintain the publication of the Book of Mormon without Martin Harris.

  23:54 That is impossible. And it’s not like I’ve got people falling off the back of milk wagons everywhere believing the things that I’m saying. No one is believing me. Outside of my own family, who have no money at all, no one believes me at all. No one. I have to do this for Martin or I won’t even be able to do what God wants me to do.

  24:18 The Lord says, “For although a man may have many revelations and have power to do many mighty works, yet if he boasts in his own strength and sets at not the counsels of God,” the counsels of God told him multiple times not to take them, “and he follows after the dictates of his own will and carnal desires,” this is not a reference to Joseph carnally wanting something sinful. Carnal as in earthly.

  24:46 Your focus was, how could I possibly pay for this? I understand why you have that focus, and as God, I told you not to have that focus. Carnal desires. “He must fall and incur the vengeance of a just God upon you. Behold, you have been entrusted with these things, but how strict were your commandments; remember also the promises that you’ve made: that if you did not transgress them,” and then probably the biggest stinger, “Behold, how oft have you transgressed the commandments and laws of God and have gone on in the persuasions of men?”

  25:23 Boy, at this point in Joseph’s life, it took him four years to get the plates because he just couldn’t overcome all of the pressures of the world around him; and then he finally gets them and those pressures of the world are still there.

  25:39 Verse seven: “For behold, you should not have feared man more than God. You should have been faithful, and He would have extended His arm and supported you against all the fiery darts of the adversary, and He would have been with you in that time of trouble.”

  25:57 So after this pretty severe chastisement, again, Joseph’s still probably thinking that his soul was lost, has the Lord say to him in verse 10, “But remember, God is merciful. Repent of that which thou hast done, which is contrary to the commandment which I gave unto you, and thou art still chosen, and thou art called to the work,” where Joseph learns from the mouth of the Lord he is not cast off forever.

  26:35 Even though he has made an enormous transgression, even though it seems the entire work of the translation of the Book of Mormon is ended and it’s over and the Restoration comes to a full stop because of Joseph’s actions, God is merciful.

  26:55 The first thing that he told him is that it’s men’s ways that are frustrated; not God’s. Now, to get the full understanding of what God has to say about that, we have to jump to Doctrine and Covenants 10. The first part of this, or at least portions of this, are probably received at the same time in 1828, we don’t know exactly, the remainder of it in 1829, where God explains exactly what’s happened with those pages.

  27:20 That book of Lehi that Mormon has crafted with precision, that he has spent his own time on, carefully trying to get what portions need to come forward, that entire holy righteous book that is now gone into the hands of wicked people who didn’t just steal them to get rid of them, they didn’t just steal them to burn them; they have a plan, a plan to destroy Joseph Smith.

  27:46 Go to Doctrine and Covenants 10, and we’ll start with verse one, because he’s recapping here to the Lord of what’s happened: “Now, behold, I say unto you that because you delivered up those writings which you had power given unto you to translate by means of the Urim and Thummim into the hands of a wicked man, you have lost them.”

  28:06 This is interesting. This is actually one of the sections of the Doctrine and Covenants that Joseph will expand upon. In the original version of this, it just says, “Which He’d given unto you to translate,” and then later in 1835, Joseph wants to reiterate that it’s by the means of the Urim and Thummim, or the Lord does, and so that’s added. “Into the hands of a wicked man, you have lost them. And you also lost your gift at the same time, and your mind became darkened.”

  28:35 We always talk about Liberty Jail being the lowest point of Joseph’s life. Man, I have to believe the summer of 1828 is giving it a run for its money, where he doesn’t yet know enough to know the God that he’s even dealing with, because the Christian world around him is teaching him false things about that God. He hasn’t received those revelations yet.

  29:00 “Nevertheless, it is again restored to you.” We quote this scripture all the time, but this is the context in which God gives the scripture: “Pray always that you may come off conqueror; yea, that you may conquer Satan, that you may escape the hands of the servants of Satan that do uphold his work.”

  29:17 It’s a great quote generically, right? It’s important to pray. And by the way, Satan is trying to destroy you. In this case, this is specific. There literally are servants of Satan who have deliberately stolen these pages with the sole purpose of destroying Joseph.

  29:36 The Lord explains that they have altered the word, so they steal the pages, 116 of them, and then they start changing words in it. “They’ve altered the words which they read contrary from that which ye translated and caused to be written; and on this wise, the devil has sought to lay a cunning plan that he may destroy the work; for he put it into their hearts to do this, that by lying, they may say that they’ve caught you in the words that you’ve pretended to translate. Verily I say unto you that I will not suffer that Satan shall accomplish his evil designs.”

  30:10 One of the most fascinating aspects of Doctrine and Covenants 10, Doctrine and Covenants 3, Words of Mormon, to me, is the plan of these satanic individuals is that Joseph could retranslate word for word 116 pages that he had just lost.

  30:32 Anyone who’s copied anything ever knows that in a highly literate person, copying a page of the Bible, if you were to copy a page of the Bible, you will make at least three errors per page. Now, maybe they’re minor. Maybe you accidentally write a word twice. Maybe you leave out a line. Maybe you leave out a whole verse. There’s all kinds of things.

  30:53 But the reality is, you don’t need to alter any of the words for it to read differently if Joseph’s just copying this off of some manuscript somewhere. Or if he’s just making it up and just rewriting it, well, of course it’s not going to be exactly the same.

  31:08 But these people are almost acknowledging the prophetic power of Joseph Smith because they anticipate that he is going to bring forth the exact same words, which, even if Joseph was copying from a fake manuscript that he had, he couldn’t possibly have done that; and yet, that’s what they anticipate.

  31:35 It is a crazy thing that, in their attempts to alter the pages, to destroy the work, they’re essentially acknowledging that Joseph has this gift to do it. They’re acknowledging the miracle, like Caiaphas saying, “Because of the miracle, that’s why we’re going to destroy him.”

  31:55 It’s not that they don’t believe in the Sanhedrin that Lazarus was raised from the dead. The problem is, “What do we do because everyone believes Lazarus was raised from the dead?” And he explains that their hearts are corrupt. Satan has great hold upon their hearts and stirs them up to iniquity against that which is good.

  32:15 “They love darkness rather than light. He stirreth them up that he may lead their souls to destruction. He saith unto them, Deceive and lie in wait to catch that ye may destroy. Behold, this is no harm. And thus he flattereth them and telleth them that it is no sin to lie; that they may catch a man in a lie, that they may destroy him. And he flattereth them and leadeth them along until he draggeth their souls down to hell.”

  32:42 Joseph then receives in Doctrine and Covenants 10, the explanation of how all of the work that they’ve done is not lost forever to the children of men; that you can’t retranslate that portion that’s gone, but that there is going to be a way that God can still bring it forth.

  33:06 This is verse 35, we can go down to verse 38: “Verily I say unto you that an account of those things that you have written, which have gone out of your hands, is engraven upon the plates of Nephi.” He’s talking now about the small plates of Nephi.

  33:20 Joseph would’ve known that there’s multiple plates because I’m sure that in the Book of Lehi, there’s a conversation about, “Oh, I’m writing plates. I’ve got larger plates here and I’ve got smaller plates,” so he would’ve known that there was two sets of plates that are going on.

  33:34 And apparently one of the things that was in the lost 116 pages is an explanation of the smaller plates, because Joseph is told here that “You remember that it was said in those writings that a more particular account was given of these things upon the plates of Nephi.” Joseph, in his translation, already knows about the small plates and he already knows that they are more geared towards prophesyings, because that’s part of the translation that he’s already received.

  34:01 “And now because the account which is engraven upon the plates of Nephi is more particular concerning the things which in my wisdom I would bring to the knowledge of the people in this account; therefore, you shall translate the engravings which are on the plates of Nephi down until you come to the reign of King Benjamin or until you come to that which you have translated and which you have retained. And behold, you shall publish it as the record of Nephi; and thus, I will confound those who have altered my words. I will not suffer that they shall destroy my work. Yea, I will show unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil.”

  34:46 They’ve only got a part or an abridgment of the account of Nephi. “Behold, there are many things engraven upon the plates of Nephi which do throw greater views upon my gospel; therefore, it is wisdom in me that you should translate this first part of the engravings of Nephi and send forth in this work.”

  35:05 All the way back to 600 years before Christ, Nephi is inspired by God to make another set of plates. You fast-forward to almost 400 years after Christ, and Mormon is inspired to take that second record and to put it with this larger work that he’s done. And neither one of them is given any explanation about why.

  35:36 We, as rational creatures, desperately want to know the why for everything. But the reality is, having faith means stepping into that darkness, because you know the person who’s calling you is the Savior. Knowing the voice, you step forward. And it doesn’t make sense, and it doesn’t equal out, and maybe it seems contrary to everything that we want to do.

  36:09 We see prophets all the time get told to teach and to do things, and they don’t even know why. If prophets themselves don’t have all of the answers, how could we possibly expect to have them all? I’m so grateful that God has called prophets so that I am not left rudderless to try to figure everything out on my own. I know that revelation to the church, to the world, only comes from one place: it comes to the prophet that God has given the keys to that revelation.

  36:45 So when I have a great question about, “How are things going to go? Should I do this? Should I do that?” I don’t have to come up with the answer myself. I can hear what President Nelson has to say, and then that can become my answer.

  37:00 As I give up my carnal desires to follow a prophet of God, this incredible two millennia in the making, Jesus knows more than 2000 years later Joseph’s going to sin and that people are going to steal those pages because of his sin and he’s going to prepare a way that we still have the Book of Mormon.

  37:28 But we just sit back and think for a minute: we are all of the time feeling lost and lonely and worried, and, “I just don’t know if God really recognizes me,” this is the same God who planned more than 2000 years in advance for a sin Joseph was going to commit so that we would all still have the words of Nephi.

  37:57 I know I’m a little too excited about the Words of Mormon, but it is such a powerful testimony to God having His hand in things to all of us having the necessity of putting our faith in the Lord. I know we don’t have answers to every question, but we have answers to the most important question: who is my Savior? What is His church? And all the other questions will eventually be answered.

  38:27 I love Words of Mormon. I love it.

Hank Smith: 38:30 Gerrit, we had our own little mini version of this, and as you were talking, I thought, “Who was it?” I honestly did not remember this, and I don’t know if you did either, but I thought, “Who was it over two years ago who joined us for Section 3 and Section 10?” So I’m like, “I can’t remember,” so I went back just briefly and looked it up, and it was none other than Gerrit Dirkmaat. You were our fourth guest.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 38:52 When you’re a one-trick pony, you do the trick all the time. When you have a very limited skill set.

Hank Smith: 39:00 We’ll have to link people to that, because I’d love to hear more about this from Gerrit. Well, actually, we planned on this two and a half years ago.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 39:07 Yeah, there you go. You already knew.

John Bytheway: 39:08 Or someone did.

Hank Smith: 39:08 We already knew. And Gerrit, I think the question from Joseph Smith, and maybe from some of our listeners, Joseph Smith might say, “You knew? You knew so far in advance? Why didn’t you just stop me? Why didn’t you stop me from making that mistake?” What do you think the Lord would say?

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 39:29 I think He would probably say, “The entire purpose of the creation of this Earth is that as sons and daughters of a Heavenly Father and a Heavenly Mother, we made an active choice to come to a world that was filled with sin and sorrow and sickness and horror, and some happiness and joy, too, sometimes, so that we could become like our Father in Heaven.”

  40:01 The entire point in the creation of the world was so that there would be a Fall so we could progress through adversity to become like our Heavenly Father. I don’t want to put too many words in Joseph’s mouth, but you know what Joseph Smith doesn’t do going forward after 1828? He doesn’t ask God three times anymore. He doesn’t have an answer and he just does it.

  40:32 Could Joseph have gotten to that place without having gone through that? I believe that if God could make us all like Him without us suffering and going through adversity that He would; but we have to become like God the same way God became God: and that is through a mortal experience where there is suffering and there is trials.

  41:01 To the people listening who are thinking, “Well, why didn’t God stop me from making that terrible decision?” That’s the agreement you made when you came to Earth: that you would, through your agency, make great decisions and poor ones; but when you make the poor ones knowing that there is a Savior who will atone for your sins.

Hank Smith: 41:21 I’ve had some fun with this with my kids, one, to show them that Mormon clearly didn’t know his first 116 pages, however many it was, was going to be lost, because he writes Words of Mormon as if the reader knows who he is: “And now I Mormon, about to deliver up the record which I have been making,” and us the reader going, “I’ve never heard of you. What do you mean you’ve been making the record?”

  41:45 I’ve toyed with this fun idea with my boys. Can you imagine Mormon talking to them, “I loved your book.” He’s like, “Yeah, I loved Alma. I loved 3 Nephi.” And he says, “What did you think of Lehi? What did you think of Lehi?” “Oh, there’s no Book of Lehi.” “What do you mean there’s no Book of Lehi? I worked really hard.” “Yeah, there isn’t one.”

  42:03 He goes to his son Moroni. “Why is there no Book of Lehi?” Moroni says, “I think you’ve got to go talk to those two over there.”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 42:13 “Look, I told him not to.”

Hank Smith: 42:15 “I told him.”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 42:17 There would be a lot of shifting of blame. The one nice thing that Mormon could take away from it is Joseph and Emma and Martin Harris, in the translation of that, did learn things from the Book of Lehi that at least Joseph learned, we know that from Doctrine and Covenants 10, that we don’t have them, it’s a great tragedy, obviously; and yet, we still have what we need in the Book of Mormon for it to be another testament of Jesus.

Hank Smith: 42:48 When I was younger, I remember thinking, “Oh, no big deal. We already have enough scripture, anyway. I’m glad they lost it. I don’t have more to read.” But now as I’ve come to love these books of Mosiah and Alma, I’m like, “What did Mormon say? What was he teaching? What would we know?”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 43:05 You can only assume that he’s interjecting the same way that he is in Alma, where he provides this commentary. Mormon’s almost providing application throughout. “Because of the exceedingly great length of the war, there are many people that have fallen away; and then there’s other people who got closer to God.” He’s providing this application in commentary all throughout.

  43:23 I would love to have heard Mormon’s commentary on Laman and Lemuel. It would’ve been the greatest. When the angel appears and tells them to go back, and the first thing Laman and Lemuel say is, “How is it possible that the Lord will deliver Laman into our hands? He is a mighty man. He could command 50.”

  43:43 I can only assume at that point, Mormon interjects the record and like, “He can command 50, really.”

Hank Smith: 43:49 “Thus we see.”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 43:50 “Thus we see how vain and foolish the hearts of the children of man.”

John Bytheway: 43:56 I love the fact that we can apply this to when we don’t understand something, but we can say, “If I’m being asked, there must be a wise purpose.” That’s a great application for this.

  44:08 And then I love that even when we mess up, Section 10:45, Well, get the Plates of Nephi. They throw greater views upon my gospel, that you can mess up and the Lord will, even after that, give you something even better, which is a great lesson.

Hank Smith: 44:23 What a blessing, all that teaches us about the Lord. “I want you to go through this learning process. I’m not going to save you from it, but I can create a way that your mistakes become your blessings.”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 44:36 It really is a good analogy to the Atonement. God already knows by the virtue of the fact that we’re coming here that we are going to sin. He doesn’t stop us from sinning, He doesn’t force us to not sin; but He provides a way through the atonement of His Son that, even though we have sinned, we can still become like Him.

  44:59 It’s wonderful, as Elder Holland has said, to be on God’s side, we’re on the winning team, that we don’t have to wonder whether or not things are going to work out in the end, because we know they will because of God. And Joseph needs to learn things are going to work out because God is the one in control.

Hank Smith: 45:20 I have this thought from President Eyring written in my scriptures, this is from a BYU-Idaho devotional back in 2005: “The Lord really knows us. He knows the future. I don’t know how He knows it in such detail, but He knows the future. He knows every challenge ahead of you. He knows every opportunity ahead of you. He knows your power and wants to lift you to every opportunity and to be able to go through every trial that is ahead of you.”

  45:49 If we look closely what you’ve taught us today, Gerrit, it tells us quite a bit about the Lord, His nature. It never says the Lord’s nature, but you can see behind it this background of a very loving teacher.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 46:03 The reality that’s going to become clearer and clearer to Joseph as he lives throughout his life as the Prophet of the Restoration is the essential nature of mortality as a learning place, and that that’s the purpose whereby we can progress to become like God.

  46:22 It is incredible and beautiful and terrifying, and knowing that God knows everything that’s going to happen, it sometimes can make us almost paralyzed with fear. If He already knows, then He already knows how to best help us when we are struggling.

John Bytheway: 46:37 What you’re saying reminds me of Moses 6:55: “They taste the bitter that they may know to prize the good.” Such an interesting verse. And Joseph going through this knows now, “Hey, if God asks, now I know,” like you said.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 46:53 It’s a powerful thing. Joseph is going to be totally devoted to God going forward. It wasn’t like he was rebelling openly against God, but Joseph, from the time that he was trying to get the plates to the time that the Book of Mormon is published, is always struggling with the fact that he can’t seem to see how things are going to work out; and if he can’t come up with a plan of how it’s going to work out, then how could it possibly work out?

  47:19 And the Lord keeps having to just tell him, “I’m going to take care of it. Just trust Me.” It seems to be really hard. And in fairness to Joseph, his family is utterly poverty-stricken. Like the people in the ancient world who were looking for bread, all they do all day long is work like crazy and sit there and try to figure out how they’re going to pay their debts because they can’t.

  47:45 When something involving money, like this massive outlay to publish the Book of Mormon, I don’t blame Joseph that all he can think is, “There’s just no way. If Martin loses faith in this, then that’s it. We’re done.” And instead of thinking, “If Martin loses faith, the Lord’s going to provide some other way, because this is the Lord’s work, and His work will not be frustrated.”

  48:11 And Joseph does feel more like that going forward, where he’s just going to trust that, somehow, someone’s going to show up with some money for the Kirtland Temple, and they will.

Hank Smith: 48:23 The Come, Follow Me Manual has a great question in this section: “When have you seen God working through you or others?” This isn’t about Mormon, Nephi and Joseph Smith and Martin Harris and Emma. This also can be about us as we look back in our life going, “Oh, wow. That did work out well.”

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 48:41 The one thing you’ll never really know in this world, maybe not til after this world, maybe God will keep it from us even after this world, is what other people think of you when they think of you. We don’t know who it is we’ve impacted somewhere along the way. Maybe we’ve impacted them for ill, maybe they have a negative thought about the gospel because of something stupid that I said or did, which is entirely possible.

Hank Smith: 49:07 Probable, actually.

Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat: 49:08 Probably. Very likely. Certainly. And maybe on the other hand, that our actions have made a huge difference. I know in my own life that there are people who have, without knowing, intervened in my life to talk to me, to comfort me, to just spend time with me, who couldn’t possibly have known what I was going through, but the Spirit did; and the Spirit spoke to them, and they followed the prompting of that Spirit.

  49:46 Hopefully one of the applications we can take away from this is: live so that when the Holy Spirit impresses you to reach out to someone else who’s struggling, who you may not even know is struggling, that you can be that person who’s that change point in someone’s life. And you may not even know it. You may not find out for years, but the Lord knows. The Lord knows all things.

Hank Smith: 50:12 Gerrit. What a treat it has been to have you with us today. We’ve missed you. It’s been too long. John, what a great day to bring in some church history, which I know you love, here to the Book of Mormon.

John Bytheway: 50:24 Yeah, really helpful to understand this; Words of Mormon, especially. Hopefully a lot of people are going, “Oh.”

Hank Smith: 50:31 We want to thank Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat for being with us today. We hope everyone will go check out the Standard of Truth Podcast. We want to thank our executive producer, Shannon Sorensen; our sponsors David and Verla Sorensen; and always, every episode, we remember our founder, Steve Sorensen. Join us next week. We’re jumping into the book of Mosiah on followHIM.

  50:53 Before you skip to the next episode, I have some important information. This episode’s transcript and show notes are available on our website, FollowHim.co. That’s FollowHim.co. On our website, you’ll also find our two books: Finding Jesus Christ in the Old Testament, and Finding Jesus Christ in the New Testament. Both books are full of short and powerful quotes and insights from all our episodes from the Old and New Testaments. The digital copies of these books are absolutely free. You can watch the podcast on YouTube. Also, our Facebook and Instagram accounts have videos and extras you won’t find anywhere else.

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President Russell M. Nelson: 51:48 Whatever questions or problems you have, the answer is always found in the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Turn to Him. Follow Him.