Talk:Mosiah 18:1-5

From Feast upon the Word (http://feastupontheword.org). Copyright, Feast upon the Word.

v.5 It would be interesting to know exactly what the topography in the land of Mormon was like. Most likely it was a rain forest. It would not have been either an evergreen forest or a stand of deciduous trees. Neither would the clearing have been a Savannah. The clearing was most likely created by the fountain, which probably came from an underground spring. Because in a rain forest there are no leaves dropped annually as there are in a deciduous forest there is no layer of fertile topsoil and thus little in the way of the kinds of crops grown in North America will grow. It is unlikely the land around the fountain was cleared for planting. So this is a completely wild place where sunlight reaches small trees that must compete with those in the canopy for nourishment. The place where Alma hid was probably more like a thicket with many different kinds of seedlings springing up.

What a wonderful place for baptism. A place where there was living water and the sun shedding its light where the people who believed in Alma could walk out of the darkness of their previous lives just as they walked out of the dark forest. They could feel the warmth of the sun just as they felt the warmth of the gospel in their newly baptized state.