Who Shall ascend #2 Flashcards
I want “Pure in Heart” to be part of my very long name. I want “Kind” to be
part of my long name. I want “loving” to be part of my long name. I want “Hard
Working” and “Responsible” to be part of my long name. I hope that we will
make it very apparent to the people that we live around that we have very long
names which describe who we really are and that those names will remind us how
to behave from day to day. We want as part of our name that covenant which
says that we are preparing to go to the temple to be sealed forever with someone
else who has a very long and righteous name, in the presence of God, who has
the longest and most righteous name of all, that God who has promised us all that
is his if we but keep his commandments. We dare not let anything tear us from
these sacred promises, these wonderful names that describe who we really are.
Each week we renew our covenant to take upon us the name of Christ.
“Jesus, name of wondrous love, name all other names above.”900
In the Book of Mormon one learns that if one is to “be found spotless,” it is because
he has been “cleansed by the blood of the Lamb,” “for there can no man be saved except
his garments are washed white; yea, his garments must be purified until they are cleansed
from all stain, through the blood of him of whom it has been spoken by our fathers, who
should come to redeem his people from their sins.” (Mormon 9:6, Alma 5:21, 1 Nephi
12:10-12, Alma 5:27, Alma 34:36, 3 Nephi 27:19)
This law is eternal; no unclean thing can enter into the temple’s Holy of Holies and be
in the presence of God. But notwithstanding the surety of the conditions, the promise is as
universal as the invitation is all inclusive. The Beatitude says “all” the pure in heart shall
see God. Section 93 spells that out very clearly:
1 Verily, thus saith the Lord: It shall come to pass that every soul who forsaketh
his sins and cometh unto me, and calleth on my name, and obeyeth my voice, and
keepeth my commandments, shall see my face and know that I am (D&C 93:1).
This promise, as is shown in the sequence of the Beatitudes, is designed to bring
peace. When the Prophet Joseph sent a manuscript copy of section 88 to his friends in
Missouri, he called it “the olive leaf which we have plucked from the Tree of Paradise, the
Lord’s message of peace to us.”901 The promises that Zion, the pure in heart, will see God
and be endowed with peace are real and powerful promises.
In this Beatitude, as in the Feast of Tabernacles temple drama, one who is pure in
heart is brought within the ancient Temple, where he passes through the veil to enter the
Holy of Holies to be where God’s throne is. In the Inspired Translation of the Bible, the
Prophet Joseph altered Psalm 42 so that it reads:
1 As the hart panteth after the water brooks,
so panteth my soul after thee; O God.
2 My soul thirsteth for to see God, for to see the living God;
when shall I come and appear before thee, O God? (JST Psalm 42:1-2).902
In this very real way, the drama was a time and place of orientation. There people
learned anew where they came from, how they came to be here, what they were expected
to do while they were here, and how they could return home again.
By doing that, it enabled the participants to transcend linear time and see themselves
as priests and sacral kings in sacred space within the reality of sacred time. Yet to do that,
they had to redefine linear time, not so much as a contrast to sacred time but in a way that
emphasized the overriding importance of their own personal odyssey through the pattern
of the cosmic myth—the importance of their overcoming the impossibilities and fulfilling
their covenants before returning home
As one considers the ancient Israelite temple drama, one discovers a sub-textual
message that runs through the whole of it like a great subterranean river that rushes
beneath the rocks and down the mountain side, raising itself occasionally to the surface as
springs of living water that refresh and give life to the trees who take root in the rocks.
That subtext has a single message, expressed again and again in the bubbling of the springs
and in the crystal spindrift of the cascading fountains: that message is the overriding
importance and the eternal necessity of the Savior’s Atonement.
Like a private language, there is an encoded language of the scriptures, sometimes
called “the tongue of angels.”944 The scriptures, through the power of the Holy Ghost,
speak to each of us in the language that is most meaningful to ourselves, and that evokes
the most powerful and profound images in our own minds. Thus the scriptures teach both
the new convert and the sacral king—the new student and the seasoned reader—using the
same words, but with quite different meanings.
Standing upon its broad platform, encircled by the mantle of truth, the man
of God, by faith, peers into the future, withdraws the curtains of eternity, unveils
the mystery of the heavens, and through the dark vista of unnumbered years,
beholds the purposes of the great Elohim, as they roll forth in all their majesty
and power and glory. Thus standing upon a narrow neck of space, and beholding
the past, present, and the future, he sees himself an eternal being claiming an
affinity with God, a son of God, a spark of Deity struck from the fire of his
eternal blaze. He looks upon the world and man, in all their various phases,
knows his true interests, and with intelligence imparted by his Father Celestial, he
comprehends their origin and destiny.
His intelligence, lit up by God and followed out, will be expansive as the
world and spread through space; his law is the law of love; his rule, the rule of
right to all. He loves his neighbor, and he does him good; he loves his God and
therefore worships him; he sees the power of truth, which, like the light of God,
spreads through all space, illuminates all worlds, and penetrates where men or
angels, God or spheres are known; he clings to it. Truth is his helmet, buckler,
shield, his rock, defense; his all in time and in eternity. Men call him a fool
because he cannot be directed by their folly, nor follow in their erratic, truculent
wake. But while they are grasping at shadows, he lays hold of the substance.
While they are content with a rickety sprawling religion, fashionable for a time,
but having nothing to do with eternity, and smother the highest, noblest
principles of man, he dare acknowledge God; and acknowledging him, he dare
obey him and confess that faith which God has given to him. He grasps at all
truths, human and divine. He has no darling dogma to sustain or favorite creed to
uphold. He has nothing to lose but error, and nothing to gain but truth. He digs,
labors, and searches for it as for hidden treasure; and while others are content with chaff and husks of straw, he seizes on the kernel, substance, the gist of all that’s good, and clings to all that will ennoble and exalt the human family.946 President John Taylor:
In this very real way, the drama was a time and place of orientation. There people
learned anew where they came from, how they came to be here, what they were expected
to do while they were here, and how they could return home again.
By doing that, it enabled the participants to transcend linear time and see themselves
as priests and sacral kings in sacred space within the reality of sacred time. Yet to do that,
they had to redefine linear time, not so much as a contrast to sacred time but in a way that
emphasized the overriding importance of their own personal odyssey through the pattern
of the cosmic myth—the importance of their overcoming the impossibilities and fulfilling
their covenants before returning home.
Though argument does not create conviction, lack of it destroys belief. What seems
to be proved may not be embraced; but what no one shows the ability to defend is quickly
abandoned. Rational argument does not create belief, but it maintains a climate in which
belief may flourish (Austin Farrer, commenting on C. S. Lewis)
Reading the book of Psalms is crucial to understanding the religion of ancient Israel.
The themes of the Psalms are temple, the kingship of God and the kingship and man,
Messiah, and priesthood.
It is interesting that the sacrament prayers—another Nephite document (Moroni 4:3; 5:2)
repeated in the Doctrine and Covenants (D & C 20:77, 79)—–reflect features of the
treaty/ covenant pattern; it is truly astonishing that features of the treaty/covenant pattern
are also to be seen in ceremonies performed in the sacredest places on earth.
This is a paraphrase of Isaiah, so it comes from his culture rather than from Moroni’s.
In the Near Eastern desert, when a man married, he gave his wife a tent, just large enough
for the two of them. It was then hers, and she was responsible for it. As her family grew,
she made additional flaps for the tent, and added more stakes to secure it. Thus, Moroni’s
statement may be a reference to family homes—eternal families— “forever” —rather than
being about future church units of wards and stakes. The Isaiah passage that Moroni
paraphrased is also about God’s promise of eternal families. It reads:
2 Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine
habitations: spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes (Isaiah
54:2).
“Thine habitations” are homes. The tents are the places where families dwell. Moroni
continues:
and strengthen thy stakes and enlarge thy borders forever, that thou mayest no
more be confounded, that the covenants of the Eternal Father which he hath
made unto thee, O house of Israel, may be fulfilled (Moroni 10:31b).
gift, nor the unclean thing. There will always be counterfeits, and they must be
left alone.
