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Posted: Tuesday 26 February 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Jesus H. Christ: Does anyone know his name?
The answer to that question is "No", according to the Bible anyway.
His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself. Revelation 19:12
So although we know what Jes ...
Posted: Monday 18 February 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Is it OK to use perfume?
I was watching the 1966 movie "Hawaii" last night, when I came upon this dialog:
Jerusha Hale: I felt so good after my bath that I washed my skin with oil of lilac.
Abner Hale: I smell it. (Pause) Moses forbad the use of perfume.
Jerusha: Pr ...
Posted: Friday 08 February 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 19: Lamanite Attack!
In the last chapter, King Noah sent his army after Alma and his people. They managed to escape the pursuing army (with the help of God, no doubt). When the king's army returned, there was a division among the people. One strong man, Gideon, sough ...
Posted: Thursday 31 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 18: Mormon, Mormon, Mormon, Mormon, Mormon...
We met Alma last chapter, when he tried to convince King Noah not to kill Abinadi. It didn't go so well... it ended with King Noah burning Abinadi at the stake, and ordering the death of Alma, too. Alma managed to escape, and after he did he sta ...
Posted: Saturday 26 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 16-17: The end of Abinadi
Chapter 16 wraps up Abinadi's speech, and thankfully, it's the last we'll have to hear from him He continues with the usual threats (but this time quoting language from Matthew 22:13):
And then shall the wicked be cast out, and they shall have ca ...
Posted: Thursday 24 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
God killed Antiochus with an incurable bowel disease
I'm in the process of adding the Apocrypha (or Deuterocanonical books) to the SAB, highlighting and annotating as I go along. In 2 Machabees 9, I came across the story of Antiochus.
Anitochus was a Seleucid king who, according to 2 Machabees, m ...
Posted: Thursday 24 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
2 Machabees 9: God killed Antiochus with an incurable bowel disease
I'm in the process of adding the Apocrypha (or Deuterocanonical books) to the SAB, highlighting and annotating as I go along. In 2 Machabees 9, I came across the story of Antiochus.
Anitochus was a Seleucid king who, according to 2 Machabees, mis ...
Posted: Sunday 20 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 15: O, how beautiful upon the mountains are their feet!
In Mosiah 15, Abinadi continues his speech. He's done quoting Isaiah, and now he's getting to the important bit about Jesus and God, who are the same guy as it turns out. Here we go:
Abinadi said unto them: I would that ye should understand ...
Posted: Wednesday 16 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
God is as strong as a unicorn (You can't prove a negative)
"God ... is as strong as a unicorn." Numbers 23:22
Believers (and many skeptics) often say that you can't disprove the existence of God because you can't prove a negative.
But if that is true for God, isn't it also true for unicorns?
How do we ...
Posted: Saturday 12 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 14: A Complete Waste of a Golden Plate
In the last chapter, Mosiah 13, Abinadi was busy lecturing Noah and his priests about the 10 Commandments. Without explanation, he starts quoting his favorite book of the bible, Isaiah (chapter 53).
I would call it plagiarism, but he did cite his ...
Posted: Monday 07 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
A Jefferson Bible for the Twenty-first Century
The American Humanist Association has just published a new book -- A Jefferson Bible for the Twenty-first Century. It includes the entire text of the original "Jefferson Bible," along with lists of the best and the worst passages from the Gospel ...
Posted: Wednesday 02 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
1 Machabees 6-7: Elephants, sleeping soldiers, and a hanging head and hand
The killings in the first part of this story can't be blamed on God. Still, I have to tell you about them. Because of the elephants.
There was this battle, you see, between the Greeks and the Israelites. The Greek army had 100,000 footmen and 20,0 ...
Posted: Wednesday 02 January 2013 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 12-13: Abinadi's Trial
Chapter 12 starts out telling us that Abinadi has somehow managed to remain hidden from Noah's guards for 2 years, and and then he came back in disguise, to prophesy again to the people. He blew his cover awfully quick, though. He quoted the Lord ...
Posted: Sunday 16 December 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 11: Wicked King Noah
Zeniff's reign was at an end, and he conferred the kingdom upon his son, Noah. Noah was a wicked king. Unlike his father, he taxed the people, and spent the tax revenue on concubines, his priests, and a newly-constructed palace filled with prec ...
Posted: Saturday 08 December 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 9: The start of the Record of Zeniff
Chapters 9-22 in the Book of Mosiah are a flashback that recount the Record of Zeniff (Zeniff was the first guy to leave Zarahemla to try to find the Nephites.) If you remember, in the last post, King Limhi presented Ammon with two sets of plates ...
Posted: Sunday 02 December 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 8: A Seer is Greater Than a Prophet
After King Limhi is done with his speech, he makes Ammon tell everyone what his people have been up to since the time that Zeniff left the land of Zarahemla. Ammon agrees, and throws in King Benjamin's speech as a bonus.
8:1 And it came to pass t ...
Posted: Monday 26 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 7: A Nephite Family Reunion
Hello everyone! This is Philip, Steve's son. I have been working on editing the SAB book these last 8 months, and now I'll be blogging the Book of Mormon. With my help, we're hoping to get the Book of Mormon out in 2013. Steve will be contin ...
Posted: Friday 23 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
The Machabees brothers (Simon, Judas, and Jonathan) slaughter the heathens
After the Hanukkah killings. the Gentiles gathered together to fight the Israelites, who sent messengers "with their garments rent" to Judas asking for help.
The Gentiles ... assembled themselves together against the Israelites ... to destroy ...
Posted: Tuesday 20 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
All the fat is the Lord's: The Bible's guide to Thanksgiving dinner
There are some things that God cares deeply about -- sex, foreskins, menstruation, and animal sacrifice, for example.
And food.
Most Christians forget about that. They prepare and eat food on Thanksgiving that God abhors, while thanking him for it ...
Posted: Saturday 17 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 2-6: The King's Speech
In the last chapter, King Benjamin waxed old, selected his son Mosiah to succeed him, and gathered all of his subjects to hear his speech so he could rid his garments of their blood.
And it came to pass that after Mosiah had done as his father had ...
Posted: Thursday 15 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mosiah 1: King Benjamin teaches his sons Reformed Egyptian
Remember how, back in the Book of Omni, the Nephites discovered the land of Zarahemla while fleeing from the evil Lamanites? Well, that's where the Book of Mosiah takes place between 130 and 92 BCE (except for a flashback to 200 BCE in chapters 9-22 ...
Posted: Sunday 11 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
The Hanukkah killings
A year after God's slaughter of Georga's army, Lysias attacked Judas with army of 60,000.
The year following Lysias gathered together threescore thousand chosen men, and five thousand horsemen. 1 Machabees 4:28
Judas asked God to deliver the Syri ...
Posted: Friday 09 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Words of Mormon - whispered by the Spirit of the Lord to Mormon Jr.
"Words of Mormon" is a single-chapter, 18-verse "book" in the Book of Mormon. It was engraved on golden plates by a Mormon prophet named Mormon (whose father was also named Mormon) about 385 CE. Mormon Jr. entrusted the golden plates to his son Moro ...
Posted: Thursday 08 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Look what came in the mail today!
We just approved the mockup. Printing begins next week.
...
Posted: Saturday 03 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Judas and his unarmed men kill 3000 of Gorgias' soldiers
In Judas Machabeus' first set of God-assisted killings, He told his men not to worry about large opposing armies. Because success in war depends not on numbers, but on God. "The Lord himself will overthrow them." And that seemed to work well enough, ...
Posted: Saturday 03 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Judas and his unarmed men kill 3000 of Gorgias' soldiers
In Judas Machabeus' first set of God-assisted killings, He told his men not to worry about large opposing armies. Because success in war depends not on numbers, but on God. "The Lord himself will overthrow them." And that seemed to work well enough ...
Posted: Friday 02 November 2012 ( 11 years ago )
The Book of Omni: The Nephites discover the Mulekites and Jaredites (who also sailed from Israel to America)
The Book of Omni gets off to a great start for a book in the Book of Mormon with the words "Behold, it came to pass" but it goes downhill quickly from there. The purpose of Omni's little book is the same as the purpose of his father's book (the Bo ...
Posted: Monday 29 October 2012 ( 11 years ago )
God helps Judas Machabeus destroy the wicked
After Matthathias died, his son, Judas Machabeus, replaced him as the leader of the Jewish terrorists His first act was to burn "them that troubled his people" (with fire).
His [Mathathias'] son Judas, called Machabeus, rose up in his stead. 1 ...
Posted: Sunday 28 October 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Jarom writes a few words about the Lamanites (who love murder and drink the blood of beasts)
The fifteen-verse Book of Jarom was, as you might expect, written by Jarom, who was the son of Enos, who was the son of Jacob, who was the son of Lehi, who was a descendant of Joseph, who was the son of Jacob (aka "Israel" in the Bible). The purpose ...
Posted: Saturday 27 October 2012 ( 11 years ago )
Mathathias and his friends slay the wicked sinners, circumcise the the uncircumcised, and yield not the horn to the sinner
The first killing from First Machabees was a terrorist attack, in which Mathathias murdered a Jew who was offering a sacrifice to an idol, along with an officer of the king who happened to be in the area at the time. The author of First Machabees p ...
Posted: Friday 26 October 2012 ( 11 years ago )
You've done an awesome job, Enos!
Guess what words the Book of Enos starts with.
I'll give you a hint. It's he same phrase that the previous two books of the Book of Mormon (2 Nephi and Jacob) started with, and it is used (by my count anyway) 1424 times in the Book of Mormon. ...
Posted: Wednesday 24 October 2012 ( 12 years ago )
The first 1 Machabees killing: Mathathias' double murder
First Machabees was written in the latter part of the second century BCE. It is considered sacred scripture to more than a billion Christians, members of the Catholic, Orthodox, and Coptic churches. Another billion or so Christians (the Protest ...
Posted: Saturday 20 October 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Jacob 6-7: The sign of Sherem
In chapter 6, Jacob tells us about Jesus, who will be coming 500 or so years in the future. He warns the Nephites that they must believe in Jesus (centuries before he was born) or they'll burn forever in hell. Of course, he and his older brothe ...
Posted: Wednesday 17 October 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Surah 96 (The Clot): Muhammad's first revelation
"The Clot" (Al-Alaq) was the first surah that Muhammad (I'll just call him "Mo") claimed to receive from Allah. Mo was about 40 years old at the time (ca. 610 CE).
Here's the story from the Hadith (Sahih Al-Bukhari Hadith - 6.478), as told by Aish ...
Posted: Sunday 07 October 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Jacob 5: A tale of two olive trees (and a new SAB category)
In the last chapter, Jacob told us (using many more words than was necessary) about the difficulty of engraving words on plates. Now he tells us about two olive trees.
This is the longest and most boring chapter in the most boring book ever writte ...
Posted: Friday 05 October 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Jacob 4: On the difficulty of engraving words upon plates
Jacob begins chapter 4 by using 150 words to tell us that he can't use many words because of the difficulty of engraving words on plates.
Now behold, it came to pass that I, Jacob, having ministered much unto my people in word, (and I cannot write ...
Posted: Friday 28 September 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Jacob 3: Repent or "their skins will be whiter than yours."
Remember how God cursed the Lamanites (Native Americans) by darkening their skin? Well, he'll do it to you too, if you don't repent. That is the lesson of Jacob 3.
Back 2 Nephi 5, in God cursed the Lamanites, causing "a skin of blackness to come ...
Posted: Tuesday 25 September 2012 ( 12 years ago )
What if we could edit the Bible? (Opening Karl Giberson's can of worms)
Is there a Bible-believer who hasn't asked that question?
Yes, I'm sure there are many, perhaps even most. Because most people who believe in the Bible have never read it (all of it, that is, not just carefully selected bits and pieces).
But what ...
Posted: Friday 21 September 2012 ( 12 years ago )
No one was murdered (or blinded) because of this image
In my last post, I displayed the recent Muhammad cartoons that are causing such an uproar in the Muslim world. I hope no one was blinded by looking at them.
Here is a similar (but nsfw) cartoon that was featured in recent Onion article, with the c ...
Posted: Thursday 13 September 2012 ( 12 years ago )
Yahweh's Amazing Test (Abraham, Genesis 22)
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