Old Testament # 4
“Because of
My Transgression My Eyes Are Opened”
Moses 4;
5:1–15; 6:48–62
Introduction
As I have said many times before, it is difficult to
remember what you believed before you knew what you now know. Growing up in the
Church of England, did I think that Satan was really a serpent in the Garden of
Eden? Did I believe that he tempted Eve only and not Adam? Did I think that the
whole thing was Eve’s fault? Did I have a skewed interpretation of original
sin? Thinking of these questions while preparing for this lesson has left
me supremely grateful for the clarity and simplicity of the Gospel and the
Restoration. Especially Restoration Scripture. There is so much to cover in
these three chapters—so much is pivotal to an understanding of the Plan of
Salvation and Christ’s Atonement—I can only pray that we will be taught by the
Spirit long before and after the 40 minutes or so we spend in class. And I
apologize for the length of this post, but having been down with a bad cold/flu
for nearly a week, such that I cannot go to Church, I’m spending a little more
time on this pivotal lesson.
There is some additional material for this lesson,
including a video from our new Prophet, President Russell M. Nelson. I will
post a link at the end.
I am sure you are all familiar with the term The Three
Pillars of Eternity. As far as I can find out, it was first coined by Elder
Bruce R. McConkie in a BYU devotional in 1981.[1]
I remember teaching Seminary in the late 80s in Germany when this was part of
the curriculum—in those days everything was a revelation to me! I was learning
just a little ahead of my students—my leaders obviously had a lot more faith in
me than I had in myself. The Creation, the Fall of Adam and Eve, and The
Atonement of Jesus Christ are inseparably connected.
Without any one of them all things
would lose their purpose and meaning, and the plans and designs of Deity would
come to naught. If there had been no creation, we would not be, neither the
earth, nor any form of life upon its face. All things, all the primal elements,
would be without form and void. God would have no spirit children; there would
be no mortal probation; and none of us would be on the way to immortality and
eternal life. If there had been no fall of man, there would not be a mortal
probation. Mortal man would not be, nor would there be animals or fowls or
fishes or life of any sort upon the earth. And, we repeat, none of us would be
on the way to immortality and eternal life. If there had been no atonement of
Christ, all things would be lost. The purposes of creation would vanish away.
Lucifer would triumph over men and become the captain of their souls. And, we
say it again, none of us would be on the way to immortality and eternal life. [2]
We can’t talk about the temple account here, but think
how much this adds to our understanding of these three pillars of eternity. Isn’t
it all about agency—the absolute and eternal necessity of the freedom to
choose, both the option and its consequences? And so a loving Heavenly Father
gave Adam and Eve two commandments: to multiply and replenish the earth (Moses
2:28) and not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Moses
3:17). But we know from Moses 5:11 and 2 Nephi 2:23 that if they hadn’t used
their agency and transgressed the second commandment, they would not have been
able to obey the first, and we wouldn’t have been here discussing this. It has
taken me many years to understand this. I never wanted Satan to win as it were;
I wanted there to be another way, but, as we learn from Talmage, Satan did not
win, even a very small victory:
Eve was fulfilling the foreseen
purposes of God by the part she took in the great drama of the fall; yet she
did not partake of the forbidden fruit with that object in view, but with
intent to act contrary to the divine command, being deceived by the sophistries
of Satan, who also, for that matter, furthered the purposes of the Creator by
tempting Eve; yet his design was to thwart the Lord’s plan. We are definitely
told that ‘he knew not the mind of God, wherefore he sought to destroy the
world’ [Moses 4:6]. Yet his diabolical effort, far from being the initiatory
step toward destruction, contributed to the plan of man’s eternal progression.
Adam’s part in the great event was essentially different from that of his wife;
he was not deceived; on the contrary he deliberately decided to do as Eve
desired, that he might carry out the purposes of his Maker with respect to the
race of men, whose first patriarch he was ordained to be.” (Articles of Faith,
pp. 69–70.)
Here is additional clarification from President Eyring:
We don’t know all the help Eve was to
Adam and to their family. But we do know of one great gift that she gave . . . :
she helped her family see the path home when the way ahead seemed hard. “And
Eve, his wife, heard all these things and was glad, saying: Were it not for our
transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good
and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth
unto all the obedient.” By revelation, Eve recognized the way home to God. She
knew that the Atonement of Jesus Christ made eternal life possible in families.
She was sure, as you can be, that as she kept her covenants with her Heavenly
Father, the Redeemer and the Holy Ghost would see her and her family through
whatever sorrows and disappointments would come. She knew she could trust in
Them.[3]
The manual lists the results of the Fall:
- Adam and Eve were able to
have children, which allowed us to come to earth and receive mortal bodies
(Moses 5:11; 6:48; 2 Nephi 2:23, 25).
- We experience physical death,
or separation of the physical body from the spirit (Moses 4:25; 6:48; 2 Nephi 9:6).
- We experience spiritual
death, or separation from God’s presence (Moses 4:29; 6:49; 2 Nephi 9:6).
- We are partakers of misery
and woe (Moses 6:48; Genesis 3:16–17).
- We are capable of sinning (Moses 6:49, 55; 2 Nephi 2:22–23).
- The ground is cursed, causing
us to need to work (Moses 4:23–25; Genesis 3:17–19).
- We can learn to recognize
good and evil (Moses 4:28; 6:55–56; 2 Nephi 2:23; Genesis 3:22).
- We can have joy in mortality
(Moses 5:10; 2 Nephi 2:23, 25).
- We can know the joy of our
redemption (Moses 5:11).
- We can obtain eternal life (Moses 5:11).
As I was reading the assigned and recommended scriptures
for this lesson, I was struck with the word sorrow. I know a little
Hebrew and so I wondered what other meanings for the Hebrew word translated as “sorrow”
might be. But first here is a nice comment by President Kimball:
“The Lord said to the woman:
‘… in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children.’ I wonder if those who
translated the Bible
might have used the term distress instead of sorrow. It would mean much
the same, except I think there is great gladness in most Latter-day Saint homes
when there is to be a child there. As He concludes this statement he says, ‘and
thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.’ (Gen.
3:16.) I have a question about the word rule. It gives the wrong
impression. I would prefer to use the word preside because that’s what
he does. A righteous husband presides over his wife and family.” (Spencer W.
Kimball, “The
Blessings and Responsibilities of Womanhood,” Ensign, Mar. 1976,
p. 72.)
Here is a commentary on the translation to “sorrow.”
The Hebrew word for “sorrow” in the
Genesis account (Genesis
3:16) is from atsab (aw-tsab), which means “labor” or “pain.” While
these words suggest that toil and suffering would be a part of Eve’s life, Eve
did not view the conditions that came upon her through the Fall to be a curse
(see Moses 5:11). Moses
4:22 “is a great revelation to women. Eve and her daughters can become
cocreators with God by preparing bodies for his spirit children to occupy on
earth and later in eternity. Mothering would entail inconvenience, suffering,
travail, and sorrow; these the Lord foretold as natural consequences and not as
a curse” (Rasmussen, Latter-day Saint Commentary, 17).[4]
2. The Atonement of Jesus Christ saves us from physical
and spiritual death. Moses 5:14–15; 6:50–54, 57–62.
The other video in the additional material is from
President Benson. Here is a quote:
“The plan of redemption must start with the
account of the fall of Adam. In the words of Moroni, ‘By Adam came the fall of
man. And because of the fall of man came Jesus Christ, … and because of Jesus
Christ came the redemption of man’ (Mormon
9:12). Just as a man does not really desire food until he is hungry, so he
does not desire the salvation of Christ until he knows why he needs Christ. No
one adequately and properly knows why he needs Christ until he understands and
accepts the doctrine of the Fall and its effect upon all mankind” (Ensign,
May 1987, 85).
If spiritual death is being alienated
from God, those times when the Spirit of God “like a fire is burning” give us a
glimpse of spiritual life, as it were. But unlike physical life which is a
black and white kind of thing—you are alive or dead—spiritual life is
dependent on agency isn’t it? The Atonement provides the way for us to return
to our Heavenly Father and receive exaltation and Celestial glory—the ultimate
spiritual life. But we choose to have spiritual life in mortality by following
the Plan of Salvation. Here is Elder Oaks:
The atonement of our Savior overcame
this spiritual death. The scriptures say, “The Son of God hath atoned for
original guilt” (Moses 6:54).
As Paul taught the Saints in Rome: “Therefore as by the offence of one judgment
came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free
gift came upon all men unto justification of life” (Rom. 5:18).
As a result of this atonement, “men will be punished for their own sins, and
not for Adam’s transgression” (A of F 1:2).
Our Savior has redeemed us from the
sin of Adam, but what about the effects of our own sins? Since “all have
sinned” (Rom.
3:23), we are all spiritually dead. Again, our only hope for life is our
Savior, who, the prophet Lehi taught, “offereth himself a sacrifice for sin, to
answer the ends of the law” (2 Ne. 2:7).
In order to lay claim upon our
Savior’s life-giving triumph over the spiritual death we suffer because of our
own sins, we must follow the conditions he has prescribed. As he has told us in
modern revelation, “I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might
not suffer if they would repent;
“But if they would not repent they
must suffer even as I” (D&C
19:16–17).[5]
3. Adam and Eve begin life as mortals,
bear children, teach them the gospel, and worship and obey God. Moses 5:1–9, 12.
“After many days”—how does one
quantify that. How many of us have persevered “many days” searching, asking,
suffering, toiling, before some kind of resolution comes? Adam and Eve left the
Garden with a set of instructions which apparently they did not know the reason
for, since the veil had been drawn over their minds. But, “after many days,” an
angel came to them and explained why they were to offer sacrifice. The
important thing is that up until that point, Adam and eve obeyed. Not blind
obedience, however. The manual tells us:
Elder Henry D. Taylor, who was an
Assistant to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, said: “I like the beautiful
lesson taught and the impressive example set by our first parent, Father Adam.
He was commanded by the Lord to offer the firstlings of his flocks as a
sacrifice. He did not know the reason for the request, but without hesitation
he was obedient to the commandment: ‘And after many days an angel of the Lord
appeared unto Adam, saying: Why dost thou offer sacrifices unto the Lord?’ Adam
responded with this magnificent, trusting reply: ‘I know not, save the Lord
commanded me.’ (Moses
5:5–6.) To Adam it was not a matter of blind obedience, but rather it
displayed his complete and unwavering confidence and faith in the word and
instruction from the Lord” (“Faith,” Improvement Era, Dec. 1970, 44).[6]
Obedience to the commandments of the
Lord is a matter of faith. The Prophet Joseph Smith said, “Whatever God
requires is right, … although we may not see the reason thereof till long after
the events transpire” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, sel.
Joseph Fielding Smith [1976], 256).
Additional Materials
