“I Shall Gather In”: The Name Joseph, Iterative Divine Action, and the Latter-day Harvest Ingathering of Israel as Themes in 3 Nephi

Title

“I Shall Gather In”: The Name Joseph, Iterative Divine Action, and the Latter-day Harvest Ingathering of Israel as Themes in 3 Nephi

Publication Type

Journal Article

Year of Publication

2024

Authors

Journal

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Pagination

1–38

Volume

62

Publisher

The Interpreter Foundation

Abstract

The identity of “the people of Nephi who were spared, and also those who had been called Lamanites, who had been spared” (3 Nephi 10:18) as “a remnant of the seed of Joseph” (3 Nephi 5:23; 10:17; compare Alma 46:23–27; Ether 13:6–10) or “a remnant of the house of Joseph” (3 Nephi 15:12) is key to understanding Jesus’s Isaiah-based teaching at the temple in Bountiful in 3 Nephi. That teaching emphasizes iterative divine action (implied in the name Joseph [yôsēp], compare yôsîp) to restore and gather Israel and Judah. Like Mormon’s prophecies in 3 Nephi 5:23–26 and 26:8, Jesus’s sermon frequently describes the gathering of Israel in language that recalls Isaiah 11:11–12, especially the verbs yôsîp, ʾāsap, and qibbēṣ. The name Joseph is etiologized in terms of the Hebrew verbs ʾāsap (“take away,” “gather in”) and yāsap (“add,” “do again”), and the verbs ʾāsap (“gather in”) and qibbēṣ (“gather together”) are elsewhere used in harvest contexts, suggesting that ancient prophets and the Lord himself conceived of the gathering of Israel as a harvest ingathering.

Subject Keywords

Onomastics
Gathering of Israel
Missionary Work
Seed of Joseph (Son of Jacob/Israel)
Sermon at the Temple
Language – Hebrew

Bibliographic Citation

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