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Abstract: Nephi saw in vision that in the latter-days “the saints of the church of the Lamb” and “covenant people of the Lord” who, though scattered across the earth, “were armed with righteousness and with the power of God in great glory” (1 Nephi 14:14). Nephi’s prophetic statement is loaded with meaning. This study explores how “armed with righteousness” means “clothed with righteousness” (Psalm 132:9) not merely in a martial, but also in a priestly sense (compare 1 Samuel 17:5; Isaiah 59:17). This concept relates to the latter-day temple and its ordinances, which enable the Lord’s people to “go forth” from the temple “armed with [the Lord’s] power” with his “name . . . upon them, and [his] glory be round about them” (Doctrine and Covenants 109:22). When we consider the spiritual power and protection associated with being “armed” or “clothed with righteousness,” we can better appreciate the value of temple ordinances that involve clothing or investiture. These ordinances help us “put on the Lord Jesus Christ”—investing the recipients with the priestly power of Christ’s Atonement, which authorizes them to do his work, enables them to withstand temptation, and enables them to stand in the spiritual battles of mortal life.





The expressions “armed with righteousness” (1 Nephi 14:14) and “clothed with righteousness” (Psalm 132:9) occur one time each in the scriptures. Evidence found elsewhere within scripture suggests that these two phrases derive from a single Hebrew idiom. One of the most important prophetic texts in the Book of Mormon, which gives [Page 334]readers a vision of the church that would be established after the book’s coming forth occurs, as part of Nephi’s vision of the Tree of Life (1 Nephi 11–14) in 1 Nephi 14:14:

And it came to pass that I, Nephi, beheld the power of the Lamb of God, that it descended upon the saints of the church of the Lamb, and upon the covenant people of the Lord, who were scattered upon all the face of the earth; and they were armed with righteousness and with the power of God in great glory.

Psalm 132, a temple hymn, contains the liturgical lines, “Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness; and let thy saints shout for joy” (Psalm 132:9).

In this study, I examine Nephi’s prophetic statement, “and they were armed with righteousness and with the power of God in great glory,” in the context of imagery from the Hebrew Bible—including temple imagery—and from the standpoint of Alma’s teaching on Melchizedek and priesthood in Alma 13. Unpacking this language and imagery helps us better understand the plea from the prophet Joseph Smith during his dedicatory prayer for the Kirtland temple on 27 March 1836 and how those words apply to us in our present circumstances:

And we ask thee, Holy Father, that thy servants may go forth from this house armed with thy power, and that thy name may be upon them, and thy glory be round about them, and thine angels have charge over them; And from this place they may bear exceedingly great and glorious tidings, in truth, unto the ends of the earth, that they may know that this is thy work, and that thou hast put forth thy hand, to fulfil that which thou hast spoken by the mouths of the prophets, concerning the last days. (Doctrine and Covenants 109:22–23)

Understanding 1 Nephi 14:14 as a temple text not only helps us better understand the Prophet’s petition in Doctrine and Covenants 109:22–23, but it also helps us better understand the overarching purpose of latter-day temples and the urgency of building them. This urgency has been a driving force in the ongoing restoration from the beginning. (See, for example, Doctrine and Covenants 36:8 where the Lord declared on 9 December 1830 to Edward Partridge that he [Page 335]would “suddenly come to [his] temple.”a id="footnote1anc" href="#footnote1sym" title="1. Matthew L. Bowen, “‘The Messenger of Salva

Abstract: Nephi laboriously copied many of the words of Isaiah in hopes that his readers would rejoice in Christ. While Isaiah 4:1 (2 Nephi 14:1) is generally not viewed as Messianic, there may be an allegorical interpretation that would place this verse among Isaiah’s other Messianic writings. A pre-Nicene patristic writer, Victorinus of Poetovio, interpreted the seven women of Isaiah 4:1 as representing the seven churches of the Apocalypse and the one man as Christ. Victorinus’s Christ-centered interpretation of Isaiah 4:1 has received very little attention in modern scholarship. This paper uses textual analysis to determine if a Christ-centered allegorical interpretation may be considered a strong reading of the verse and the surrounding text (Isaiah 3–4). The results of this analysis show that Isaiah 4:1 may symbolize Zion’s turning point in a doctrinally rich allegory of Zion’s sin, sorrow, repentance, and redemption through Jesus Christ.





Isaiah 4:1 reads as follows in the King James Version: “And in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying, We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel: only let us be called by thy name, to take away our reproach.” Nephi included this verse in his Isaiah chapters of the Book of Mormon (see 2 Nephi 14:1). As an introduction to these Isaiah chapters, Nephi wrote that “my soul delighteth in proving unto my people that save Christ should come all men must perish” (2 Nephi 11:6). He then added “I write some of the words of Isaiah, that whoso of my people shall see these words may lift up their hearts and rejoice for all men. Now these are the words, and ye [Page 296]may liken them unto you and unto all men” (2 Nephi 11:8). Even though we may not typically place Isaiah 4:1 on the list of Messianic verses contained in Nephi’s Isaiah chapters,1 some have seen this verse as a testimony of Jesus Christ.

The earliest record of such an interpretation was made by Victorinus, a patristic commentator and Bishop of Poetovio (Ptuj in modern-day Slovenia), who was martyred during either the Diocletian or Numerien persecutions. Around AD 2602 Victorinus wrote, “The one man is Christ . . . the seven women are seven churches, receiving His bread, and clothed with his apparel, who ask that their reproach should be taken away, only that His name should be called upon them.”3 Victorinus was citing Isaiah 4:1 in a commentary on the seven churches of the Apocalypse (see Revelation 2–3). Unfortunately, we don’t know why Victorinus interpreted Isaiah 4:1 this way since, even though Victorinus wrote a commentary on Isaiah, that commentary has not survived.a id="footnote4anc" href="#footnote4sym" title="4. Jerome respected the work of Victorinus, and it is through Jerome that we know of Victorinus and his commentaries. Miran Špelič, “Jerome and Victorinus: A Complex Relationship Between the Compatriots,” Theological Quarterly 81, no. 2 (2021), 293–298. Victorinus’s reference to Isaiah 4:1 occurs in his commentary on the...

Abstract: This paper views the sacrament prayers and rituals of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the broader context of Christian eucharistic worship, focusing on how the Latter-day Saint observances both resemble and differ from those of other Christian communities. It argues that, contrary to what is often supposed, the Church has a relatively “high” eucharistic theology.





The aim of this article is to examine the sacrament ritual of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the broader context of Christian worship: more specifically, in the context of what Nicene Christian churches often refer to as the “eucharist.” An attempt will be made to identify both differences and similarities between the Latter-day Saint sacrament and the eucharistic rituals of other Christian communities.

This article is written by a scholar of the history of religions rather than by a practicing Latter-day Saint. Its emphasis is on comparing faith traditions, rather than on determining what is or is not theologically “correct.” It is recognized at the outset that Latter-day Saints believe that their practices come from revelation, and the intention is not to question (either explicitly or implicitly) the veracity of those beliefs. Rather, the intention is to increase understanding by making comparisons that often tend to go overlooked.

[Page 272]The Eucharist and its Origin

What is the eucharist? The term is not normally used in the Church of Jesus Christ, so some explanation may be in order. The word eucharist literally means thanksgiving in Greek: it comes from εὐχαριστέω (eucharisteó), “thank.” In the vocabulary of Christian practice, the eucharist may be defined as a ritual in which the participants consume food and drink in emulation of an episode in which Jesus Christ fed his disciples with bread and wine, associating those elements with his body and blood. The episode in question is recounted several times in the New Testament, and it appears to have taken place in Jerusalem, at a Passover meal or seder (known to Christians as the “Last Supper”), just before Jesus was crucified. The earliest New Testament account appears in Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians. In the King James Version, it reads as follows:

For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread: And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me. After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, this cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. (1 Corinthians 11:23–25)1

The next-earliest account appears in the Gospel of Mark:

And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat: this is my body. And he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them: and they all drank of it. And he said unto them, This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many. (Mark 14:22–24)

This account from Mark may arguably be traced back to a reconstructible original text written in Jesus’s own language, Aramaic.2

Within the context of the Bible as a whole, the eucharist forms part of a web of symbolism that includes the narratives of the Old Testament. Latter-day Saint scholars have noted that it

[Page 273]invites one to remember the unleavened bread of the Passover, the manna from heaven, and, most pointedly,

Abstract: An early Christian text called the Revelation of the Magi presents itself as a history of the Magi before and after the birth of Jesus Christ. This text offers important insights into how the early Christian world may have conceptualized how other nations outside of Israel similarly looked forward to the advent of the Messiah, how they worshiped God, and how they knew who their Savior would be. The Book of Mormon similarly presents itself as text written by early believers in Jesus Christ. It is centered primarily around two civilizations outside the land of Israel who knew who Jesus was, worshiped him, and prophesied about him. Both texts begin with similar premises, and each shares a remarkable level of consistency in matters of doctrine and narrative. Furthermore, the Revelation of the Magi contains citations from a book of Adam that have striking similarities to details revealed in other Restoration scripture regarding Adam and his children. While the Revelation of the Magi is not scripture, it is nonetheless a text that many modern readers will find beneficial in highlighting beliefs of early Christians.





In 2008, a significant early Christian text was translated into English for the first time.1 This text, called the Revelation of the Magi, is purportedly a first-person retelling of the Magi’s experiences as [Page 236]they worshiped God, waited for the advent of his Son, traveled to Bethlehem to meet the newborn Savior, and continued to worship him following his birth. Since the initial dissertation, Landau has published more accessible copies.2 (Citations herein of Landau’s text use the abbreviation Rev. Magi, followed by chapter and verse numbers.3)

This text is fascinating, and it has received more detailed attention since its publication in English. However, it is still relatively obscure compared to other prominent Christian apocryphal writings such as those found at Nag Hammadi or the so-called Infancy Gospels. While these texts are not scripture for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or most Christians generally today), they are nonetheless fascinating and provide important windows into early Christian beliefs and attitudes. The Revelation of the Magi is a document that could be especially interesting to modern readers of the Bible, particularly Latter-day Saints.

The Nature of Christian Apocryphal Writings

To fully understand and appreciate the Revelation of the Magi, it is also important to understand the world in which it arose. While many Christians consider the biblical canon closed, this attitude largely arose well past what we consider “biblical times,” and many early Christians were composing texts they believed to be inspired and worthy of reading in churches. In fact, it was not until the second or third centuries that ...

Abstract: Grant Hardy has shown that Nephi, Mormon, and Moroni have distinctive personalities, rhetorical strategies, implied readers, and thematic concerns. Mormon lived within history and wrote as a historian. He focused on the particulars of time and place and person, on political and military matters. But, Hardy says, Mormon lacked audience awareness. I argue Mormon’s historiography was well adapted to the needs of his initial envisioned audience, the Alma family. Moroni, who lived most of his life outside of history, wrote intertextually, in dialog with voices speaking from the dust. And he wrote as a theologian especially attuned to the tragedy of human existence without God. Unlike his father, Moroni was a reluctant and, initially, untrained writer. His initial lack of confidence and competence and his growth as a writer and as a person are apparent in the five different endings for the Book of Mormon that he successively inscribed over the course of his life. Moroni’s ultimate model as he so effectively closed the large-plates record was Amaleki, last author of the small plates. This article critiques Hardy’s assessment of Mormon’s and extends his account of Moroni’s rhetorical effectiveness.





Human beings choose the world they live in. The choice is not wholly unconditioned, unconstrained. Many features of the chosen world—for example, many connections between acts and consequences—exist as brute facts. But the overarching mental map of the world is always chosen. It is an interpretation. One can choose to live in a world created by God and full of miracles. One can choose [Page 192]to live in a godless world in which everything is reduceable to inert matter in motion. And while these two worlds each have numerous inhabitants, there are many other worlds in which human beings may and do choose to live, many of them being subsets of these two overarching worlds. While all get to choose their world, none has a choice about choosing. God or the universe confronts all of us with a choice and respects our agency. For now, we live in whatever world we and our culture have co-created through interpretation.

The world we choose to live in determines, among many other things, how we read scripture. Those who have chosen to live in God’s world read a different Bible and Book of Mormon than those who have chosen to live in a godless world. Dan Vogel and Dan Peterson do not read the same Book of Mormon. For Vogel, the Book of Mormon is a purely naturalistic product of Joseph Smith’s nineteenth century. For Peterson, the text has both ancient and nineteenth century provenance, being composed anciently and translated in the nineteenth century. For Vogel, Joseph Smith was the sole, purely naturalistic, human author of the book. For Peterson, the book has multiple authors and, since most of those authors are prophets, God strongly influenced the book’s construction and content. While those living in these alternative worlds may sometimes agree, e.g., about the Mosiah-first composition/translation of the text we now have, for the most part, their interpretations are not just incompatible but incommensurable. It is, thus, noteworthy when a scholar identifies a way of reading the Book of Mormon that is equally valid for those who live in these incompatible and incommensurable worlds. In Understanding the Book of Mormon, Grant Hardy has accomplished that difficult and noteworthy task.1

Understanding the Book of Mormon was published by Oxford University Press and is meant to address readers in both worlds, both faithful Latter-day-Saint and secular non-LDS readers. Hardy makes the book relevant to both groups by bracketing the main issue that divides them, the question of the book’s historicity. Hardy is able to bracket this contentious issue ...

Abstract: In Words of Mormon 1:8, Mormon declares, “And my prayer to God is concerning my brethren, that they may once again come to the knowledge of God, yea, the redemption of Christ; that they may once again be a delightsome people.” The expression “that they may once again” plausibly reflects the Hebrew idiom wayyôsipû or wayyôsipû ʿôd. Mormon’s apparent double-use of the wayyôsipû (ʿôd) idiom in Words of Mormon 1:8 (or some Nephite scribal equivalent), like 2 Nephi 5:2–3, recalls language in the Joseph story (Genesis 37:5, 8). The original Lamanite covenant, as an extension of the Abrahamic covenant, involved the complete abandonment of fraternal hatred and the violent means through which they had given expression to it (see Alma 24:12–13; 15–18); Mormon declared that a similar commitment would again be necessary when the descendants of Lehi (“the remnant of this people who are spared,” Mormon 7:1) were restored to the covenant in the future (Mormon 7:4–5). Thus, Mormon’s prayer—in the tradition of the prayers of Nephi, Enos, and others—is that the descendants of the Lamanites (and Nephite dissenters) would, through iterative divine action, regain their covenant identity as the seed of Joseph and partakers of the Abrahamic covenant.





A previous study1 proposes that Nephi permuted biblical wordplay on the name Joseph from Genesis 37:5, 8 (“and they hated him yet the more [wayyôsipû ʿôd]”) as a means of drawing autobiographical parallels between himself and his ancestor Joseph (the patriarch) [Page 166]throughout his small plates record.2 Nephi’s use of this biblical wordplay culminates in the statement that marked a tipping point in his relationship with his brothers, paving the way for a final separation in mortality from them: “Behold, it came to pass that I, Nephi, did cry much unto the Lord my God, because of the anger of my brethren. But behold, their anger did increase [yāsap] against me, insomuch that they did seek to take away my life” (2 Nephi 5:2).

The name Joseph (“may he [God] add”) derives from the verb yāsap, which means “to add” or “increase,”3 but can also have the more nuanced senses “to continue to do, carry on doing” something or “to do [something] again, more.”4 I have further proposed that Nephi used a wordplay on the name of Joseph in terms of yāsap when he juxtaposed quotations from Isaiah 11:11 and 29:14 in 2 Nephi 25:17, 21 (“And the Lord will set his hand again [yôsîp] the second time to restore his people from their lost and fallen state. Wherefore, he will proceed [yôsīp] to do a marvelous work and a wonder among the children of men . . . that the promise may be fulfilled unto Joseph”) and 2 Nephi 29:1 (“But behold, there shall be many—at that day when I shall proceed [yôsīp] to do a marvelous work among them, that I may remember my covenants which I have made unto the children of men, that I may set my hand again [*wĕʾōsîp yādî] the second time to recover my people”)...