Talk:Moro 7:1-19

Outline and unity of sermon

I love verse three and the use of the word hope. If I didn't believe in Christ and his teachings, if I didn't believe in the Church of Jesus Christ what hope would I have of life after death. What hope would I have of obtaining any source of true happiness here in this life. It is my hope and faith in this life that keeps me going and lifts me up! It gives me the courage needed to face my trials in this life. --Bhardle 18:17, 4 Dec 2005 (UTC)

I'm going to work on Moroni 7 a bit. To start off I want to take a crack at outlining the whole chapter. This interpretation assumes that there is one overarching message but several related mini-messages embedded along the way. The outline below is only trying to capture the overarching message. Others feel free to update this outline. IT is on the talk page because I don't think it is really ready for prime-time.

• v2-v3 Mormon is called to speak. He will speak to the peaceable followers of Christ--those ready to enter into Christ's rest.
• v4-v17 People should be judged by their works; works are only good works if done with real intent. This section serves both as an explanation for how Mormon is able to judge that those he is addressing are ready to enter into Christ's rest and as a lead-in for the next section.
• v18-v19 You must seek diligently to judge righteously so that you can know what is really good. And how will you be able to "lay hold" or acquire all those good things?
• v20-v39. We can lay hold on every good thing by asking God for it with faith in Christ. If we ask for a good thing, he will give it to us.
• v40-v43 To have faith you have to have hope. To have faith and hope we have to be meek and lowly of heart.
• v44-v48 If you really are meek and lowly of heart then you will have charity. If you don't have charity then nothing else is of value, but if you do have charity then at the last day you will be judged well. So pray to get this charity.

Comments/suggestions welcome. --Matthew Faulconer 15:22, 8 Feb 2006 (UTC)

I've been working on this chapter--which I love--but having a hard time in getting my mind around the whole thing. Is this several sort of related sermons with different points? Or is everything sort of making the same point. So on that vein I want to write up, for myself at least, but I'll write it here in case others find it useful my ideas around what I see as two other mini-sermons in this chapter. And then some thoughts around their relation to the overall sermon. The point of doing this is for me to work through in a very rough-draft way some of my thoughts before I post them to the commentary pages. Comments/edits welcome.

The first is on real-intent comprising about verses 4 to 17. I wonder if this mini-sermon isn't really a small sermon that is saying the same thing as the whole sermon from a different angle. The point of the small sermon is to tell us that if you don't do something with real intent than it is worthless. To me that is very much the same point that the entire chapter is making, namely, that without charity nothing else is of value. In other words, I think doing good with real-intent and having charity, or love like Christ has, be the motivation for your actions are really two ways of saying the same thing.

The second mini-sermon is on miracles. ooops. I have just run out of time. I'll have to take this up again later. --Matthew Faulconer 14:26, 10 Feb 2006 (UTC)

I've been thinking about this more and found a small chapter written on this by Monte Nyman in a compilation of essays about scripture (I'll add the source here later, when I have the book in hand). It was a little bit helpful, but mainly in getting me to think about the unity of the sermon here rather than offering any particular or specific insight.

I've also been reading and thinking a bit more about chiasmus and parallels in the scriptures. I think this is more common and less far-fetched than I had previously thought. I know I always try to tie in my opening point in my conclusion when giving a talk. So I don't think it's too much of a stretch to see an over-arching chiastic structure here, Moroni talking about real intent in the beginning of this sermon and then again at the end, as pertaining to charity.

It's understanding how the middle sermon on judging, faith and hope that seems more tricky. Having thought about this more, I appreciate your outline above better. I think you're description of vv. 20-39 is a good way of linking the first two mini-sermons.

Where I would disagree would be how to understand how charity fits in. I think charity is helping answer the question in v. 20 of how to lay hold upon every good thing. If this is the central question of the sermon, then having true charity and real intent are the ways to do the good that we know is right. And we obtain true charity, which is the pure love of Christ, by having faith in Christ. Moroni doesn't seem to tell us how this occurs (perhaps it is like 1 John 4 says, we love b/c he first loved us), but that we must have faith in Christ with hope and meekness, then we will have Christ's love (the love of Christ) in our hearts, which will ensure we have real intent to serve others.

These thoughts are still very rough, but I wanted to start working on them now.

--RobertC 18:39, 15 Mar 2006 (UTC)

Verse 5

Matthew, sorry I haven't been following the work you've been doing on these verses very closely--now I'd like to help. First, I have a bit of a nit-pick regarding the exegesis of verse 5: It currently reads "this phrase describes how we should attempt to understand other people". However, it seems at first blush that Mormon is just explaining why and how he is judging others in vv. 3-4. It's not until vv. 14-15 that he starts to talk about how these verses should be applied by his listeners. Of course, it seems common now-days that speakers tell personal stories and it's implicit that we should be applying the lessons to ourselves, and that is how we should be reading Mormon's sermon.

On a related note, it seems we could read vv. 3-18 as simply a tangent to the main sermon that starts in v. 21 where Mormon says "now I come to that faith which I said I would speak", which is what Moroni says Mormon will be speaking about in v. 1. Nevertheless, I think we can find a better reason than simply a tangent for why this mini-sermon preceeds the discussion of faith, hope and charity.

More later.

--RobertC 18:32, 21 Feb 2006 (UTC)

I like what you did. I agree with your claim about the exegesis on verse 5. I think that text was written by Chickenpig--but it is true I hadn't addressed it. In any case, I like the way you have updated things. --Matthew Faulconer 07:32, 22 Feb 2006 (UTC)

works ye shall know them

Robert, do you think what you write about works is the same or different than what I identify above in my outline of the chapter? I feel like there is some difference and wanted to revise what you wrote to suggest two alternatives but I wasn't able to clearly express the alternatives in my mind. I think I need more clarification in terms of how you are reading this first before I should attempt to revise what you wrote.

As I read this the point here is to explain how to know what is good so that you can have as a goal to acquire the good. Once your goal is to acquire the good, you will need faith to do that. Is that the same as what you are saying? --Matthew Faulconer 14:59, 22 Feb 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think we are basically in agreement. I'm not sure my thoughts here is very well thought-out. I was simply thinking about Alma's sermon on faith in Alma 32 and how there's a parallel in Mormon's sermon. Alma discusses how to see if a seed is good, then explains how to continue nourishing faith in that good seed. The parallel is that Mormon is discussing how to judge before he talks about faith. However, I use the term "teaching" in the exegesis which seems appropriate in the context of Alma's sermon (what else do the seeds symbolize?), but not so appropriate for Mormon's sermon here (Mormon says "by their works ye shall know them"--it seems a bit funny/awkward thinking about teachings having works...). This is why I don't think the exegesis I added was very well thought-out.

What seems vague here is what Mormon's discussion of how to judge good from evil should be applied to. Should it be applied to judging prophets and angels (verses 22-23), or the teachings of prophets and angels? Or should it be applied to judging other people, or the teachings of other people? If other people, why is it important that we are able to judge other people? Or should it be applied to ourselves, or our own actions?

I think a key question Mormon is trying to answer in this sermon is expressed in v. 20: "how is it possible that ye can lay hold upon every good thing?" In the light of this question, perhaps all the questions I pose above are addressed: We need to judge our own actions and intents, and those whom we allow to influence us in order to "lay hold upon every good thing".

Out of time, I'll have to try and develop this thought later.

--RobertC 06:43, 23 Feb 2006 (UTC)

Matthew, I really like all the improvements you've made on this page. I was little concerned your writeup overstated the difference between Alma and Mormon's views on faith and judgment. I'm not particularly pleased how I worded the point I was trying to make, but I trust you understand where I'm trying to go with the revision. It could surely be made more concisely or more clearly. Also, the reason I changed "alternately" to "another" is that I wanted to have less of an either-or connotation, since I don't see the interpretations as mutually exclusive. I don't have a particularly strong preference on either of these changes.... --RobertC 13:06, 2 Mar 2006 (UTC)

I like what you did. Thank you. I agree that in this particular case and generally when different interpretations are given those interpretation should be presented in a way that doesn't suggest they are mutually exclusive since more often than not, they are not. In this case changing "alternately" to "another" accomplishes that nicely. --Matthew Faulconer 17:36, 2 Mar 2006 (UTC)

question headers

I like 'em. --Matthew Faulconer 15:01, 22 Feb 2006 (UTC)

ecclesiastical leader

The footnote connects Moroni's calling with 3 Ne 5:13. I think of an ecclesiastical leader as someone more than a person called to preach. For that reason, I'm going to remove the ecclesiastical leader bit and refer instead to 3 Ne 5:13. Feel free to re-edit. --Matthew Faulconer 07:27, 27 Feb 2006 (UTC)