© 2024 The Interpreter Foundation. A 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
All content by The Interpreter Foundation, unless otherwise specified, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available here.
Interpreter Foundation is not owned, controlled by or affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. All research and opinions provided on this site are the sole responsibility of their respective authors, and should not be interpreted as the opinions of the Board, nor as official statements of LDS doctrine, belief or practice.
Thank you for pointing out these interesting parallels between King Benjamin’s sermon at the temple and important principles taught in the temple in our day. Unfortunately, the credibility of one aspect of your research is weakened considerably by citations to the 1828 Websters dictionary. Any attempt to suggest the meanings of words in the Book of Mormon is weakened if it doesn’t consider the substantial work of Royal Skousen and Stanford Carmack in the Book of Mormon Critical Text Project, arguably the most important Book of Mormon research to date. This research, and particularly Volume IV: Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, reveals significant evidence of language usage in the Book of Mormon from dialectical and earlier English, which must be taken into account as we attempt to determine the intended meaning of the words in the Book of Mormon. A good starting point might be Stanford Carmack, “Why the Oxford English Dictionary (and not Websters 1828),” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 15 (2015): 65–77, https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/why-the-oxford-english-dictionary-and-not-websters-1828/. Your suggested meanings for the words “trifle” and “unfold” (and perhaps “tidings”) should be reconsidered in light of the essential research of Skousen and Carmack.
The best token of an excellent, deeply insightful article for me is that I transfer many passages from the article into my Gospel Library, inserting them as marked notes in my scriptures. I did that over and over and over again with this article. So let me congratulate you on the superb job you did here. Let me join others you acknowledge as encouraging you in encouraging you to do more scripture scholarship. If other articles you write are half as good as this one, they will still be very worth reading.
Val, thank you so much for this high praise! I’m equally flattered and humbled.
Thanks for this article. As you know much of our society is influenced by the story of the fall and much blame is laid at the feet of Eve.
Seeing King Benjamin’s sermon as an endowment frames the “fault” fall differently and suggests perhaps how the endowment would be revealed in a different culture. He refers to the “transgression of Adam” and mentions Mary by name as the mother of the creator.
I’m not saying the Nephites had a wonderful view of women, perhaps they did. Or, perhaps King Benjamin presented it that way to improve their view of women. So many different options I’m not covering.
It is just interesting to see other representations of the endowment. Perhaps that can help some heal.
Excellent!
The Endowment is simply instructions about where we came from, how we got here, why we are here, and how to get back. How to get back includes covenants, the keeping of which promises unimaginable blessings of becoming like God.
“Kimball wrote of the endowment, noting that “there is a similarity of priesthood in masonry.” He told Pratt that Joseph believed Masonry was “taken from priesthood but has become degenerated.” (Page 2)
In their research of the origins of Free Masonry, Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, both Masons, tracked it back to the Knights Templar (The Hiram Key, 2001). Knight and Lomas deduced that while guarding the Temple Mount, the Templars discovered scrolls outlining the Temple Ceremony. This is reasonable, as even today the ordinances of the Temple are written down and kept in the Temple for training ordinance workers, and keeping the ordinances from degenerating.
Theodore, thank you for your comment! I agree with your basic summary of the endowment.
The work of Knight and Lomas about the origins of Masonic ritual are controversial, to say the least. Most researchers on Masonry dismiss their research methodologies and conclusions as bunk.
Regardless of the quality of their research, I personally agree with Joseph Smith’s assessment that there is something “taken from the priesthood” in Masonry, but how that happened is not totally apparent. I think it’s also true, as I stated in the paper, masonry “likely influenc[ed] some of the symbols and language of the endowment, [but] is an inadequate explanation for the origin and complexities of the endowment ceremony. The incorporation of elements of Masonic ritual into the endowment ceremony should not raise alarms for Latter-day Saints any more than the integration of language from the Bible, including anachronistic New Testament passages, into the Book of Mormon. In both instances, the prophet, guided by inspiration, drew upon available resources that corresponded to and enhanced the underlying ancient sources he was revealing.”
Another analogy might be helpful; viz, the singing of hymns. The hymns we sing in church today are largely influenced or outright borrowed from Protestantism. However, the practice of singing as a part of worship is obviously very ancient. It would be ludicrous to suggest that Joseph Smith “stole” the idea of hymns from protestants just because we sing protestant hymns. Our hymns may be protestant in style or form, but they are not protestant by nature. Likewise, the modern endowment ceremony may have masonic expressions, but the endowment is not masonic by nature–it is ancient.
I am aware of the controversy about the research of Knight and Lomas, but they ae the only ones who have put forth a plausible theory as to the origins of the Masonic rites, which tie back to the ancient Temple. Accepting a plausible tie-back would also add credibility to the LDS Endowment as being of ancient origin and to the Prophet’s statements about it.
Theodore,
Thanks again for your comments! If you haven’t yet read Jeffrey Bradshaw’s thoughts on this, I highly recommend his article in Interpreter called, “Freemasonry and the Origins of Modern Temple Ordinances.”
https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/freemasonry-and-the-origins-of-modern-temple-ordinances/
The St. Clair/Sinclair Family History site proposes a link to the Scottish founder of the Rosslyn Chapel (1484), William St Clair William St Clair, 3rd Prince of Orkney, and the Knights Templar. It also links his descendants to the early Scottish Masons. There are other links of the Masons to the Knights Templar mentioned there.
https://sinclairgenealogy.info/scotland/rosslyn-st-clair-family/knights-templar/
The Knights Templar appear to be the only direct link to the ancient Temple, upon which the Masonic rites are based.
(My wife, Beverley, is descended from the Scottish Sinclairs.)
Indecently, Beverley Herman/Sinclair Brandley was the only Jewish member of the Jerusalem Branch when it was first organized by President Harold B. Lee and Elder Gordon B. Hinckley in 1972.
“Incidentally” 🙂
Thank goodness, finally. The Book of Mormon is about the Temple and the Nephite endowment is clear all over it. If I wanted to write a better summary of the Temple Endowment than Moroni 7:25-26 I would be hard pressed to do it. If I wanted to write a full expliction of the Temple Endowment more specific and penetrating than Alma 12 and 13 I could not do it. And do not let’s get started on 2 Nephi 2, 9, Jacob (the entire book is a reverse endowment followed by a creation account in 7 scenes that pertains to the moral recreation of Israel). And it goes on and on and on from there.
I am dizzy with relief that we are recognizing this.
The time will come (not long hence) that this will be common knowledge in the Church and this might be something like “the condemnation being lifted.”
PS This is a great article thank you. Is what I meant!
Mark,
Thank you for your comment! It is exciting to think what the future holds for Book of Mormon and Temple scholarship!
Mark, do you have a source that discusses/explicates the reverse endowment in 2 Nephi? I am not asking skeptically. I would like to read the explication. If this is your idea and it is not elsewhere explicated, let me suggest that you write it up and submit it to the Interpreter.