Vain Jangling – Part 1

Idle curiosity is not the same thing as serious learning. I know that seems obvious, but how easily can we become stuck in patterns of scrolling and swiping, googling random questions and flitting about from one topic to the next without direction or purpose?

This is actually not a new problem. Paul warned Timothy and Titus repeatedly against engaging in time-wasting conversations on low-priority topics. Here are a few phrases he used to describe this debilitating practice:

• “Vain jangling” (1 Timothy 1:6)
• “Profane and vain babblings” (1 Timothy 6:20, 2 Timothy 2:16)
• “Foolish and unlearned questions” (2 Timothy 2:23)

Paul prophesied that, in a future day, people would “heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears.” As a result, they would “turn away their ears from the truth” and “be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4). Paul had seen this phenomenon of “itching ears” firsthand. He had tried to preach the gospel in Athens, where the people “spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing” (Acts 17:21). These people were willing to listen to his message, but they were too fickle to recognize its importance or to dedicate sustained time and energy to it.

Isaiah saw in a vision hungry and thirsty people dreaming that they were eating and drinking. When they woke up, their souls were still empty and faint. (See Isaiah 29:8, 2 Nephi 27:3.) This sounds like Paul’s prophecy that in the last days, people would be “ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Timothy 3:7).

What is the remedy? Focusing on what Paul called “sound doctrine.” (See 1 Timothy 1:10, 2 Timothy 4:3, Titus 1:9, Titus 2:1.) Prioritizing what’s important over what’s merely interesting. Learning from reliable sources of truth instead of indulging in speculative inquiry.

I recognize that an important prerequisite to learning is openness to new ideas. I’m not suggesting that we lock ourselves in a closet and avoid contact with a variety of information and experiences. But I am suggesting that the quest for exotic or unfamiliar ideas may represent a kind of escapism and that the truths which will bring us the most joy may be the simplest and the least ostentatious. I’m suggesting that we avoid “looking beyond the mark” and despising “the words of plainness,” when those very words may be what we need to light our path and help us move forward with sure footing. (See Jacob 4:14.)

Today, I will avoid “vain jangling.” I will build on the solid foundation of the truths I already know, and I will resist the temptation to be distracted by less important information.