The Hebrew Bible makes an early appearance in the Book of Mormon. Nephi, the first author, tells us that shortly after his family left their home in Jerusalem and set up camp near the Red Sea, his father, Lehi, sent him and his brothers back to retrieve “a record of the Jews … engraven upon plates of brass” (1 Nephi 3:3). When they returned with the records, Lehi was ecstatic. He reviewed them and discovered that they contained three types of content:
- “The five books of Moses, which gave an account of the creation of the world, and also of Adam and Eve”
- “A record of the Jews from the beginning, even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah”
- “The prophecies of the holy prophets, from the beginning, even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah; and also many prophecies which have been spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah” (1 Nephi 5:11-13).
Lehi also found genealogical information on these plates and was able to trace his lineage to Joseph, which directly connected him with the patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (1 Nephi 5:14-16).
Over time, his careful study of these records would yield extraordinary doctrinal treasures. From the plates, he learned about the life and mission of the Messiah, the scattering and promised gathering of his people, and the profound connections between Adam and Eve’s fall, moral agency, and the redemption offered by “the great Mediator of all men” (2 Nephi 2:27).
Overjoyed by these discoveries, Lehi prophesied “that these plates of brass should go forth unto all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people who were of his seed.” He further predicted “that these plates of brass should never perish; neither should they be dimmed any more by time” (1 Nephi 5:18-19).
These sacred writings connected him to both ancestors and descendants. The plates functioned as a kind of linchpin, binding past and future generations in their worship of God. (See Mosiah 1:3-7.)
Nephi concludes the story by telling us that he and his father both found the plates to be “desirable” and “of great worth,” and that they recognized the importance of bringing them along as they migrated to their new home.
Josiah and Lehi: The Power of Sacred Texts
About twenty years before Lehi and his family left Jerusalem, the king of Judah, Josiah, assigned his scribe, Shaphan, to oversee some repairs to the temple in Jerusalem. During these renovations, the high priest found a sacred record which he called “the book of the law.” When Shaphan read this book to King Josiah, the king’s response was heartfelt and dramatic. He “rent his clothes” as he recognized how far he and his people had strayed from God’s commandments. (See 2 Kings 22:3-13.) He called his people together and “read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of the Lord” (2 Kings 23:2). He vowed that his people would follow the instructions in this book going forward “with all their heart and all their soul,” and his people ceremonially stood to acknowledge that they accepted this covenant (2 Kings 23:3). Then, they celebrated the Passover, precisely as prescribed in the book. The author of 2 Kings describes this memorable event:
Surely there was not holden such a passover from the days of the judges that judged Israel, nor in all the days of the kings of Israel, nor of the kings of Judah.
2 Kings 23:22
Biblical scholars debate the exact content of the scroll which prompted this religious revival, but most agree that it was an early form of the book of Deuteronomy, and perhaps content from other parts of the Torah. Josiah’s repentance and conversion to a holier form of worship was prompted by hearing the word of God in the book of the law. The author of 2 Kings asserts that “like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; neither after him arose there any like him” (2 Kings 23:25).
Lehi was likely a young man at the time of this communal spiritual awakening. If he was living in Jerusalem, he certainly would have been aware of these events and might have even been among the assembly, hearing his king read the words of scripture and seeing the impact of those words on his entire community. Even though Josiah isn’t mentioned in the Book of Mormon, his influence as a devout and conscientious believer is an important part of Lehi’s spiritual heritage. Lehi may have been surrounded by mockers as he shared his testimony publicly, but not many years earlier, during his lifetime, the city had experienced a miraculous spiritual rebirth because their king engaged meaningfully with scripture.
Lehi’s subsequent spiritual experiences reinforced the importance of sacred texts. For example, not long before the family left Jerusalem, he saw a vision in which a heavenly being handed him a book and commanded him to read. “As he read, he was filled with the Spirit of the Lord” (1 Nephi 1:12), just as he was later when he examined the brass plates (1 Nephi 5:17). For Lehi, scripture was not only a source of spiritual truth but a tool to lead him and his family closer to God.
The Hebrew Bible: Origins and Structure
What we call the Hebrew Bible didn’t exist in Lehi’s time. Its components became accepted as scripture gradually—the Torah first, followed by the prophetic books, and finally, about 100 years after the birth of Jesus, an additional set of books known as the Writings.
In contrast with the Book of Mormon, which has a clearly defined provenance from Nephi to Mormon, the Hebrew Bible represents the efforts of numerous unnamed record preservers. As John Collins, a professor of divinity at Yale University writes:
The Bible is a product of history. It took shape over time, and its content and even its wording changed in the process. In this it is no different from any other book, except that the Bible is really a collection of books, and its composition and transmission is spread over an exceptionally long period of time.
Introduction to the Hebrew Bible: Third Edition, 10
The traditional Jewish name for the Hebrew Bible is Tanakh, a word formed from the names of its three major sections: Torah (the law), Neviʾim (the prophets), and Ketuvim (the writings). Although the 24 books in Tanakh correspond to books in the Old Testament, they are grouped and organized differently, so it’s useful to examine how it is structured.
The first five books are known as the Torah (תּוֹרָה), which means the Instruction or the Law. In the Old Testament, these books are commonly called the Pentateuch. They are also commonly known as the Five Books of Moses, even though they read as a biographical account rather than an autobiography. In the Hebrew Bible, each of these books is known by a prominent word near the beginning of the text.
| Hebrew Bible | Old Testament |
|---|---|
| 1. Bereshit (בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית) – “In the beginning” | 1. Genesis |
| 2. Shemot (שְׁמוֹת֙) – “Names” | 2. Exodus |
| 3. Vayikra (וַיִּקְרָ֨א) – “And he called” | 3. Leviticus |
| 4. Bamidbar (בְּמִדְבַּ֥ר) – “In the wilderness” | 4. Numbers |
| 5. Devarim (דְּבָרִ֣ים) – “Words” | 5. Deuteronomy |
The second group of books, Neviʾim, contains the words of prophets. This includes historical books such as Joshua and Kings (the Former Prophets) as well as books written by Isaiah, Jeremiah, and others (the Latter Prophets).
| Hebrew Bible | Old Testament |
|---|---|
| 6. Joshua | 6. Joshua |
| 7. Judges | 7. Judges |
| 8. Samuel | 9. 1 Samuel 10. 2 Samuel |
| 9. Kings | 11. 1 Kings 12. 2 Kings |
| 10. Isaiah | 23. Isaiah |
| 11. Jeremiah | 24. Jeremiah |
| 12. Ezekiel | 26. Ezekiel |
| 13. The Twelve | 28. Hosea 29. Joel 30. Amos 31. Obadiah 32. Jonah 33. Micah 34. Nahum 35. Habakkuk 36. Zephaniah 37. Haggai 38. Zechariah 39. Malachi |
The final collection of books, Ketuvim, includes poetry, wisdom literature, and other types of content.
| Hebrew Bible | Old Testament |
|---|---|
| 14. Psalms | 19. Psalms |
| 15. Proverbs | 20. Proverbs |
| 16. Job | 18. Job |
| 17. Song of Songs | 22. The Song of Solomon |
| 18. Ruth | 8. Ruth |
| 19. Lamentations | 25. Lamentations |
| 20. Ecclesiastes | 21. Ecclesiastes |
| 21. Esther | 17. Esther |
| 22. Daniel | 27. Daniel |
| 23. Ezra | 15. Ezra 16. Nehemiah |
| 24. Chronicles | 13. 1 Chronicles 14. 2 Chronicles |
During the life of Jesus the first two groups of books were generally accepted among the Jews as scripture. The third group was available but was not yet universally accepted as scripture. When Jesus says “the law and the prophets,” he is referring to the first two groups of books. (See Matthew 5:17; Matthew 7:12; Luke 16:16.) The fact that He used this same terminology during His post-mortal ministry on the American continent suggests that Lehi’s descendants also recognized these two collections of books in some form. (See 3 Nephi 12:17; 3 Nephi 14:12). And when a Pharisee asked him, “Which is the great commandment in the law?” he meant specifically the Torah. Jesus was so familiar with these books that He immediately responded with a passage from Deuteronomy 6:5 — “Thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might” — followed by another from Leviticus 19:18—“Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” He then added that these two commandments represented the essence of all scripture: “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (See Matthew 22:35-40.)
Jesus also quoted frequently from the book of Psalms. On one occasion, He introduced a passage from a psalm by asking, “Is it not written in your law?” (John 10:34), indicating that He accepted the passage as scripture. On another occasion, He declared that David spoke the words of a psalm “by the Holy Ghost” (Mark 12:36), indicating that the psalms were divinely inspired. After His resurrection, He referenced all three categories of scriptural books when He assured His disciples, “All things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me” (Luke 24:44), including at least the psalms (and perhaps by extension the other Writings) in the scriptural canon.
The Old Testament: Origins and Structure
Following the example of Jesus, His apostles frequently referenced the accepted Jewish scriptures as they taught about His life, mission, atoning sacrifice, and resurrection. Matthew opens his Gospel with a genealogy connecting Jesus to King David and back to Abraham. He frames each major event at the beginning of Jesus’ life—the virgin birth, the visit of the wise men, Herod’s massacre of infants in Bethlehem, and the family’s migration to Egypt and back to Nazareth—as a fulfillment of prophecy. (See Matthew 1:22-23; 2:4-6, 14-18, 23.)
Peter explained the miracle on the day of Pentecost by quoting from the books of Joel and Psalms. (See Acts 2:14-36.) The epistle to the Hebrews shows how institutions established in the Torah, including the priesthood, sacrifices, and the tabernacle, prefigure the ministry of Jesus and presents Him as the ultimate realization of those earthly symbols. And Paul, who was himself a former Pharisee and well-versed in Hebrew scripture, promised church members in Corinth that the Spirit of the Lord could remove the “veil” which covered their minds, so that they could see the glory of God in those ancient scriptures and be changed by it. (See 2 Corinthians 3:14-18.)
As the church expanded beyond Israel, early Christians relied heavily on a Greek translation of Israel’s scriptures known as the Septuagint. This library of scrolls, completed about 150 years before the birth of Jesus, included the Torah, the prophets, some of the writings, and a number of other books. Collectively, these documents eventually came to be known as ta biblia (τα βιβλία), which means “the writings” or “the documents.” In modern Greek, biblia means “books,” but books as we know them didn’t exist at the time. The main point is that the word biblia, the predecessor of the English word Bible, was a generic word to describe a library, not a single book.
In about the year 200 CE, a theologian named Tertullian began using the term “Old Testament” to describe the Hebrew scriptures. He borrowed this term from 2 Corinthians 3:14, where Paul refers to the Jewish scriptures as the palaias diathēkēs (παλαιᾶς διαθήκης), which means “old covenant,” as contrasted with the “new covenant” established by Christ at the Last Supper. (See Luke 22:20; 1 Corinthians 11:25.) The Latin version of this term was vetus testamentum, and that term became the accepted label for all of the scriptures which preceded the life of Jesus.
In the fourth century, under the leadership of Constantine, Christians began producing codices, bound volumes which function like modern books. Now that all of these writings could be included in a single document, the order of the books became important. Instead of adopting the Jewish groupings of law, prophets, and writings, Christians began to organize the Old Testament in a way that emphasized the sacred history. The five books of Moses, now commonly called the Pentateuch, already traced events from the Creation through the death of Moses. By reclassifying some of the other books as historical, that story line could continue all the way through the Babylonian exile and the reconstruction of the temple. The non-historical books were then grouped into two categories: wisdom and poetry, including the books of Psalms and Proverbs, and the prophets, which were divided into the relatively long books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel (the greater prophets) and twelve relatively shorter books (the lesser prophets). In subsequent centuries, there was substantial variation in the ordering of the books, but by the publication of the Paris Bible in about 1230 CE, the structure of the Old Testament as we know it today had become standardized.
- The Pentateuch (5 books): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
- History (12 books): Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther
- Wisdom and Poetry (5 books): Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon
- The Prophets (17 books)
- The Greater Prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel
- The Lesser Prophets: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi
The Old Testament’s structure reflects how early Christians read Israel’s scriptures as sacred history testifying of Christ.
Contents of the Brass Plates
As explained in my last two posts, neither the Hebrew Bible nor the Old Testament existed in their current form when Lehi and his family took their journey toward their promised land. So what was written on the brass plates which Lehi so urgently wanted to bring with them? Even though we don’t have a complete table of contents, we can make some reasonable assumptions based on three types of evidence within the text: Nephi’s overview, attributed quotations, and implicit references.
Nephi’s Overview
During the narrative of obtaining and examining the brass plates, Lehi’s son Nephi gives us two similar descriptions of their content. When Lehi first gives Nephi and his brothers the assignment to obtain the plates, he says:
Laban hath the record of the Jews and also a genealogy of my forefathers, and they are engraven upon plates of brass.
1 Nephi 3:3
Lehi may not have known very much about the plates at that point. After Nephi and his brothers obtain the brass plates and Lehi examines them, Nephi gives us an expanded description of their contents:
My father, Lehi, took the records which were engraven upon the plates of brass, and he did search them from the beginning.
And he beheld that they did contain the five books of Moses, which gave an account of the creation of the world, and also of Adam and Eve, who were our first parents;
And also a record of the Jews from the beginning, even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah;
And also the prophecies of the holy prophets, from the beginning, even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah; and also many prophecies which have been spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah.
And it came to pass that my father, Lehi, also found upon the plates of brass a genealogy of his fathers; wherefore he knew that he was a descendant of Joseph; yea, even that Joseph who was the son of Jacob, who was sold into Egypt, and who was preserved by the hand of the Lord, that he might preserve his father, Jacob, and all his household from perishing with famine.
And they were also led out of captivity and out of the land of Egypt, by that same God who had preserved them.
1 Nephi 5:10-15
Nephi’s three categories of content parallel the eventual structure of the Hebrew Bible, but we should be careful not to read too much into that similarity. Biblical scholars agree, for example, that the Torah as we know it was completed after the Babylonian Exile. And with only one named prophet, Jeremiah, we will need other clues to determine which prophets and other writings were included.
Nephi twice cautions us that anything written after Zedekiah’s reign, when Nephi obtained the plates, couldn’t possibly have been included. However, even this reminder indicates that Nephi’s knowledge was not limited to the contents of the plates, and that he had at least a general familiarity with the scriptural text that many of his future readers would call the Bible. (See 1 Nephi 13:20-23; 2 Nephi 29:3-6.)
Attributed Quotations
Isaiah’s writings were definitely on the brass plates. Nephi tells us so (1 Nephi 19:21-23). He then proceeds to quote 15 chapters and paraphrase another from Isaiah’s book. (See 1 Nephi 20-21; 2 Nephi 12-24; 2 Nephi 27.) Abinadi and the priests of King Noah had access to Isaiah’s writings, even though they had no contact with King Benjamin, who kept the brass plates at the time. (See Mosiah 12:20-24; 14.) And when Jesus visited Lehi’s descendants after His resurrection, he elaborated at length on several passages from Isaiah and quoted another complete chapter. (See 3 Nephi 16; 20-22.) In all, about one third of Isaiah’s book (21 out of 66 chapters) is quoted in the Book of Mormon. Twice on the second day of Jesus’s ministry, He urges the people to “search” Isaiah’s words, indicating that they had access to this book.
Jesus also included a passage from the book of Micah in his discussion of Isaiah, which suggests that Lehi’s people were also familiar with those words. (See 3 Nephi 20:10-22; 21:11-25.)
Jesus also quoted two chapters from the book of Malachi and asked that they be written. These chapters could not have been on the brass plates, because they were written about 150 years after Lehi left Jerusalem.
So outside of the Torah, two Old Testament prophets are explicitly quoted in the Book of Mormon—Isaiah and Micah—and a third—Malachi—is quoted even though his writings were definitely not on the brass plates.
Implicit References
Other Old Testament books clearly influence Book of Mormon writers even though they are not explicitly mentioned. For example, John Hilton III, a religion professor at BYU, has identified 43 phrases which are distinctive to the book of Psalms and which also appear in the Book of Mormon (“Old Testament Psalms in the Book of Mormon,” in Ascending the Mountain of the Lord: Temple, Praise, and Worship in the Old Testament, 291–311). While it’s possible that some of these phrases were simply familiar to Lehi’s family because of their experiences in Jerusalem, Alma’s extensive elaboration on Psalm 95 during his sermon in Ammonihah suggests that this text was part of the Lehite scriptural canon.
Extra-Biblical Writings
The brass plates also included content which is not in the Old Testament. When an angel showed Nephi the compilation and impact of the Bible, he used the brass plates as a reference point:
The book that thou beholdest is a record of the Jews, which contains the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; and it also containeth many of the prophecies of the holy prophets; and it is a record like unto the engravings which are upon the plates of brass, save there are not so many; nevertheless, they contain the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; wherefore, they are of great worth unto the Gentiles.
1 Nephi 13:23
An important element of this description is the phrase “there are not so many.” In other words, the brass plates contained more content than the Old Testament. Nephi underscores this point when he references three prophets—Zenos, Zenock, and Neum—who do not appear in the Hebrew Bible or in the Old Testament. (See 1 Nephi 19:10-16; compare Alma 33:3-17.)
Inclusion of Old Testament Books on the Brass Plates
With each of these evidentiary lenses in mind, we can classify each book of the Old Testament as either definitely, possibly, or almost certainly not included in the brass plates.
| Old Testament Book | Included in Brass Plates? |
|---|---|
| Genesis | Yes |
| Exodus | Yes |
| Leviticus | Yes |
| Numbers | Yes |
| Deuteronomy | Yes |
| Joshua | Possibly |
| Judges | Possibly |
| Ruth | Possibly |
| 1 Samuel | Possibly |
| 2 Samuel | Possibly |
| 1 Kings | Possibly |
| 2 Kings | Possibly |
| 1 Chronicles | No: post-exilic |
| 2 Chronicles | No: post-exilic |
| Ezra | No: post-exilic |
| Nehemiah | No: post-exilic |
| Esther | No: post-exilic |
| Job | Unlikely: probably post-exilic |
| Psalms | Probably: quoted extensively |
| Proverbs | Possibly |
| Ecclesiastes | No: post-exilic |
| Song of Solomon | Possibly |
| Isaiah | Yes |
| Jeremiah | Yes, partial |
| Lamentations | No: written after the destruction of Jerusalem |
| Ezekiel | No: post-exilic |
| Daniel | No: post-exilic |
| Hosea | Possibly: contemporary with Isaiah |
| Joel | No: post-exilic |
| Amos | Possibly: contemporary with Isaiah |
| Obadiah | No: post-exilic |
| Jonah | Possibly: timing unclear |
| Micah | Yes |
| Nahum | Possibly: between Isaiah and Lehi |
| Habakkuk | Possibly: contemporary with Lehi |
| Zephaniah | Possibly: contemporary with Lehi |
| Haggai | No: post-exilic |
| Zechariah | No: post-exilic |
| Malachi | No: post-exilic – but quoted by Jesus |
So out of 39 Old Testament books, eight were definitely included in the brass plates in some form, another 16 might plausibly have been included, and 15 were written after Lehi and his family left Jerusalem.
Benefits of the Brass Plates
Book of Mormon authors repeatedly emphasize the importance of the brass plates to their people and explain some of the blessings they received through these inspired writings.
Lehi emphasizes the value of the plates in preserving the Jewish identity of his family. As a father who taught his sons in “the learning of the Jews” (1 Nephi 1:2), he clearly wanted his descendants to be connected with their spiritual heritage. So a document which explained the history of his people, particularly their relationship with God, and which placed him personally in the narrative would help his children feel a sense of inclusion. They were part of Israel and heirs to the promises God had made to their ancestors. No matter how far they traveled from Jerusalem, from the temple, and from the institutions of Israelite culture, this record would keep them grounded and connected.
Nephi uses the brass plates as a second witness of spiritual truths he has learned by revelation. He reads to his brothers from the plates to “persuade them to believe in the Lord their Redeemer” (1 Nephi 19:23), and he writes extensive passages from Isaiah in order to “prove” to his descendants “that [his] words are true” (2 Nephi 11:3).
King Benjamin valued the brass plates as a memory aid, telling his sons that “it were not possible that our father, Lehi, could have remembered all these things, to have taught them to his children, except it were for the help of these plates” (Mosiah 1:4). He tells them that the physical plates make it possible for them to have God’s commandments “always before our eyes” (Mosiah 1:5), echoing language from the Torah. (See Deuteronomy 6:6-12.)
Finally, Alma emphasized the importance of the plates in persuading people to repent. He specifically mentioned their usefulness to the sons of Mosiah, saying:
Were it not for these things that these records do contain, which are on these plates, Ammon and his brethren could not have convinced so many thousands of the Lamanites of the incorrect tradition of their fathers; yea, these records and their words brought them unto repentance; that is, they brought them to the knowledge of the Lord their God, and to rejoice in Jesus Christ their Redeemer.
Alma 37:9
For Book of Mormon prophets, the brass plates were more than a historical record. They were an essential part of their identity: connecting them to intergenerational covenants, testifying of the Savior, and bringing them closer to God.
Four Foundational Strategies
We have reviewed the gradual emergence and standardization of the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament and examined their relationship to the contents of the brass plates. We have also discussed the impact of those writings on Lehi and his descendants, including the influence of King Josiah.
With this background in place, we are prepared to begin engaging with the books of the Old Testament. Four foundational strategies modeled by the Book of Mormon will inform our study of all of these books: (1) a search for precious things in plain sight, (2) prioritizing holistic over selective reading, (3) synthesizing themes across the books, and (4) finding Christ in the writings of all the prophets.
Strategy 1: Finding Plain and Precious Things
Early in the Book of Mormon, Nephi sees a vision in which an angel shows him the rise of Christianity and the formation of the Bible. The angel informs him that “many plain and precious things” will be removed from the book, causing many believers to “stumble” (1 Nephi 13:26-29). But Nephi and his descendants will help to mitigate this problem. Their words (the Book of Mormon) will restore lost truths, effectively plugging the gap in the scriptural record (see 1 Nephi 13:34-35, 40).
It’s tempting to interpret this prophecy simplistically, visualizing malicious or negligent scribes deleting or distorting words and phrases, thus rendering the text more opaque and less complete. But while there is some evidence to support this interpretation, the angel’s prophecy may have a broader meaning, more applicable to us as readers. Every time we open the Bible, we bring with us thousands of years of cultural and historical baggage which affects the meaning we derive from the text. Phrases, stories, and prophetic teachings have acquired implicit meanings through centuries of use, which may inhibit our direct engagement with the texts. Perhaps the Book of Mormon restores “plain and precious things” not only by filling in details and doctrines but also by showing us how to engage with the text more fruitfully. The “plain and precious things,” in other words, may actually be on the page but hidden from our view until we learn to recognize them.
Strategy 2: Holistic Reading
Nephi could have shared a handful of carefully curated passages to demonstrate that Isaiah had anticipated the life and mission of Jesus Christ. Instead, he quoted fifteen chapters and paraphrased another. This editorial decision indicates that Nephi valued the entirety of the message and wanted his future readers to do the same.
When King Noah’s priests asked Abinadi to explain a brief passage from Isaiah, he quoted Exodus 20 and Isaiah 53 as part of his response (see Mosiah 13; 14). When Jesus expounded on the same passage, he quoted Isaiah 54 (see 3 Nephi 22). The message is clear: Don’t be satisfied with snippets. Read the text in full, and strive to understand and internalize its overall message, not just the convenient or easily accessible portions.
Strategy 3: Synthesis and Integration
As we’ve seen, the books in the Old Testament were written by different authors to different audiences at different times. It is useful therefore to treat it as a library of books instead of a single book with a coherent message. Nevertheless, during the Savior’s ministry among Lehi’s descendants, He “expounded all the scriptures in one” (3 Nephi 23:6, 14), demonstrating that there are common themes among these disparate writings and that there is value in finding those connections.
Strategy 4: Finding Christ
Multiple times, Book of Mormon prophets, and even the Savior Himself, make the bold claim that all prophets testify of Christ (see Jacob 4:4; Mosiah 13:33-35; Helaman 8:16–20; 3 Nephi 20:23-24). It’s possible to find passages in the Old Testament which foreshadow the life and atoning sacrifice of Jesus at various levels of specificity. However, much of the text does not refer to Jesus, either specifically or obliquely.
However, a recurring topic in the Old Testament, and perhaps its central message, is that God will gather and redeem His covenant people. Accepting the premise that all prophets testify of Christ in some way, we will look for principles which help us understand the Savior’s purpose and mission. What does it mean to be saved or redeemed? How does God offer us this gift, and what can we do to receive it?
Taken together, these four strategies describe a posture of sustained, attentive reading—one that allows meaning to emerge over time as texts are read in sequence and in conversation with one another. With this posture in mind, we now turn to the Old Testament, beginning with the book of Genesis.