What does verse 10 mean? Why would the Lord say he does not want us to be healed? 2 Nephi 16:10

What does verse 10 mean? Why would the Lord say he does not want us to be healed? 2 Nephi 16:10

This is Nephi quoting Isaiah speaking Messianically, again. In this verse he says:

Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.

Obviously, the Savior wants to heal us. He wants us to see with our eyes and hear with our ears and understand with our hearts and be healed. 

It is similar to when Jesus calls Nathanael in John 1:43-47. The encounter goes something like this:

Jesus goes to Galilee and finds Philip.

Philip is from the same place as Andrew and Peter (Bethsaida). He goes and finds Nathanael and tells him he found the Messiah who Moses and all the prophets wrote about, and that his name is Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.

Nathanael says, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?"

Philip says, "Come and see!"

Jesus sees Nathanael coming and says, "There's a Jew who tells it like it is!" ("Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!")

It's not quite sarcasm, but it is definitely humor. This part of the scriptures always cracks me up. I think it's the same kind of humor when Jesus says something like, "Look, I've already bought your salvation. I'm standing right here. All you have to do is look at me. But no - no, instead, I think you should get lazy, slothful, bored, and tired - since otherwise you would see with your eyes, hear with your ears, and understand with your heart and actually be healed!"

It's like when my kids are whining and to get them to stop I say, "Hey! Can you please say that in a more whiny voice?"

Answer:
I think that Jesus Christ had a sense of humor, and that this verse is said - not quite sarcastically, but also not with the surface-level, obvious meaning.

Who is talking, "Go and tell this people - Hear ye indeed, but they understood not; and see ye indeed, but they perceived not"? (2 Nephi 16:9)

Who is talking, "Go and tell this people - Hear ye indeed, but they understood not; and see ye indeed, but they perceived not"? (2 Nephi 16:9)

(I must have had some major issues with this chapter. So far every single question this week has been from there!)

This is exactly comparable to Isaiah 6:9.

I really love how sometimes Jesus Christ speaks plainly about the fulfillment of prophecies in the Old Testament. In Matthew 13:14-15, Jesus explains why he teaches in parables. One reason is to fulfill "the prophecy of Esaias" (aka Isaiah).

Answer:
In this verse Isaiah was speaking Messianically, meaning as if he were Jesus Christ.

The Lord says, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Is the "us" here Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost? 2 Nephi 16:8

The Lord says, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Is the "us" here Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost? 2 Nephi 16:8

Answer:
Yes, I think so. Who else could it be?

How can you purge iniquity/sin with a live coal from the altar? 2 Nephi 16:6

How can you purge iniquity/sin with a live coal from the altar? 2 Nephi 16:6

See this post and this post about what is going on here.

Answer:
One way to sterilize a needle is to put it into a flame. Apparently this kind of dry heat burns or oxidizes the bacteria. The seraphim in this scene is similarly sterilizing or purifying Isaiah's mouth.

Why would/should Isaiah feel sad or upset about having unclean lips and seeing "the King, the Lord of Hosts"? 2 Nephi 16:5

Why would/should Isaiah feel sad or upset about having unclean lips and seeing "the King, the Lord of Hosts"? 2 Nephi 16:5

For a description of what is going on in this verse, see this post.

I have noticed a theme laced throughout the Old and New Testament having to do with the importance of words and language. Obviously, this is super interesting to me.

For example, Isaiah says (speaking as Jesus Christ): "I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands" (Isaiah 49:16). This seems to be an obvious reference to Jesus Christ's crucifixion, in which nails were driven through his hands. It's as though the marks from the nails were our sins and pains written into his body.

John the Beloved (JST version) says, "In the beginning was the gospel preached through the Son. And the gospel was the word, and the word was with the Son, and the Son was with God, and the Son was of God." (JST, John 1:1) This seems to be another obvious reference to the Savior and Heavenly Father in the premortal existence as creators of the world, and somehow their power is connected with words. 

I've been trying to gather a big giant pile of my words to create the "Kate Corpus." In so doing, I've made a list of all the places where I might find my typed words. There is no hope that I will be able to find everything that I have ever typed on a computer - but I definitely will be able to gather a lot of it, perhaps even most of it. Certainly most of the recent (in the past 2 years) writing.

In so doing, I've thought about how records are kept on the other side of the veil. Perfect records, without error. I wonder what that looks like. I imagine all of our thoughts and actions being recorded somewhere, somehow. I wonder if somehow, after we die, these "words" will be examined with some kind of tool that can see all the connections between all the words. Will we be judged on the frequency with which our lives were made of good? 

I started to shudder a bit. There's...stuff in my life that I don't want to be visible in any kind of divine concordancer tool. I just want to erase it.

But when you put something online, you pretty much accept that you no longer have control of it. Your writing is gone forever, if you ever really own your words at all. Or your DNA, for that matter.

This caused me to think about the scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 58:42: "Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more."

Basically, Jesus Christ's atonement works like an eraser - a permanent delete button - in my Kate-as-a-person Corpus. 

Answer:

When Isaiah is bemoaning the fact that he has "unclean lips" it is the same worry and self-loathing that I understand. He doesn't want to be unclean before God, but his "words" (including, I think, his thoughts, his actions) were painfully obvious in their flaws. 

Yes. That sounds pretty upsetting.

What does "a cloud of smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night" mean? 2 Nephi 14:5

What does "a cloud of smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night" mean? 2 Nephi 14:5

This by far was my favorite question to answer this week. I thought of the answer as I was sitting in church behind the organ, taking the sacrament. It was a really good feeling.

Nephi is quoting his younger brother Jacob who is quoting Isaiah 4. They are discussing the millennial day - when Jesus Christ will return to earth again.

The promise is that the Lord will create a cloud and smoke in the daytime and a shining flame of fire in the night to belong on every home in mount Zion, and that this will be a defense.

I was confused about the smoke and the flame metaphor, but I thought about it a little bit. This answer comes from my thoughts, not from searching other scriptures and concordances. It would be interesting to study this that way eventually.

Smoke and flames have a physical presence. At night, a fire illuminates darkness and is visible from very far away. Meanwhile, smoke during the day is also visible from a great distance.

What would being visible from a great distance have to do with defending the homes of those who have made covenants with God - with the saints of Zion?

I wonder if this could be a metaphor for communication across impossibly great distances. This world of instant communication in which we live definitely has some specific digital tools that are highly strengthening to the spirituality of saints - and all people in general.

Whatever the metaphor symbolizes specifically, it is clearly about constant visibility, a constant, steady presence - something that is tangible, powerful, and clear. You can't miss a flaming fire when you walk by it. You can't miss a giant cloud of smoke, either. Ever see a forest fire? I have. You can't avoid the smoke.

Something about the people who live on mount Zion will be visible, powerful, clear, and undeniable. I guess the next question is who lives on mount Zion, where is it, and how can I get there?

The answer to what Zion is and who lives there is in Latter-day scripture:
Doctrine and Covenants 97:21 clearly says that Zion is the pure in heart.

I am not sure I know exactly what that means yet, but I will try to find out.

Addendum: this is also a reference to the Lord leading the Israelites out of Egypt.

Is Jesus Christ the "God of my Salvation"? 2 Nephi 9:44

Is Jesus Christ the "God of my Salvation"? 2 Nephi 9:44

Jacob is pleading with his children and future readers of the Book of Mormon to remember his words.

First he uses a really weird metaphor that I don't understand: "I take off my garments and I shake them before you." From a Latter-day Saint perspective, that sounds a lot like taking off the physical representations of his covenant to obey and follow God. I don't get why he would do that, but maybe it's like what a person might do if he is reading a good book and wants to really emphasize and point out how good it is - he might take the book, show it to someone in their face, and point at a specific passage which he cares about. That might be what Jacob is doing here, except with clothing that symbolizes covenants with God?

Then he says, "I pray the God of my salvation that he view me with his all-searching eye." This is a bit clearer in Czech: "modlím se k Bohu spasení svého, aby na mne pohlédl všepronikajícím okem svým."

Clearly he is praying TO God.

This is probably what caught my eye. Is he praying to Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ?

Answer: I think I have already talked at length about this in the past several weeks. It's the idea that God is three separate, distinct personages that work together so unitedly that it doesn't often matter (and it isn't often possible) to disambiguate them from one another. God the Father in a way could be considered the God of my Salvation - without the design of the plan, there'd be no salvation. Jesus Christ is the executor of the Atonement, so obviously he could be considered the God of my Salvation. The Holy Ghost is the way that we can know any of it, so without him we couldn't be saved either.

Basically: yes, but probably not exclusively.

I believe that Heavenly Father knows our thoughts and our hearts - even better than we ourselves know them. It is interesting to me that Jacob seems to want him to know them. Sometimes (okay, quite often) I feel like hiding them, because of shame or whatever other bad feeling. I have to constantly remind myself that they aren't really hidden - not fully, not ever. It is comforting but also super disturbing. It makes me highly grateful that I have the chance to purge myself from them each week when I take the sacrament and renew my baptismal covenant. What a relief that I can become clean again. The weight of having to worry about my thoughts is pretty heavy. I can turn them over to God and feel much better.

It would probably be agony to not be able to experience this. I don't really know. I haven't.