Genesis 3-4, Moses 4-5
“The Fall of Adam and Eve”
January 19 - January 25
scriptures
commentary
Satan Opposes Jehovah in the Premortal Council
<p><strong>4:1. “here am I, send me.”</strong> BYU professors Richard Draper, Kent Brown, and Michael Rhodes noted that the Jewish meaning of this statement is “that the speaker is in the right path, ready to do the Lord’s bidding.”<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1">[1]</a> However, when Satan said, “Here am I, send me” (verse 1), his intentions were clearly in direct opposition to God’s. This means that his words were false in spirit—demonstrating that the devil was “a liar from the beginning” (Doctrine and Covenants 93:25).</p> <p>In addition, since Jesus Christ was already known by all to be God’s “Beloved and Chosen from the beginning” (Moses 4:2), the fact that Satan sought to answer the call was itself a direct challenge to the Father. BYU professor Brent Top correctly concluded that “the Father’s question ‘Whom shall I send?’ was . . . a call for our commitment and common consent rather than a request for résumés.”<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2">[2]</a> Note also that Satan’s self-centeredness is fittingly reflected in the wording of his proposal. With passionate rapid-fire delivery, he repeats the pronouns <em>I</em> and <em>me</em> six times in the short span of half a verse.</p> <p><strong>4:1. “I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost.” </strong>Joseph Smith clarified this frequently misunderstood statement in one of his discourses. William Clayton, in his rough notes of the discourse, recorded, “The contention in Heaven was—Jesus said there would be certain souls that would not be saved; and the Devil said he could save them all.”<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3">[3]</a> In comparing William Clayton’s notes with those of others who heard Joseph Smith’s discourse, additional details make it clear that the “contention in Heaven” was <em>not</em> about whether ordinary souls could make it to heaven if they were forced to be obedient in all things, as Latter-day Saints sometimes mistakenly teach. Rather, the contention in heaven had to do with Satan falsely claiming that he could save <em>even those who would commit the unpardonable sin</em>. According to George Laub’s notes, Joseph Smith said that Satan “boasted of himself saying, ‘Send me, I can save all, <em>even those who sinned against the Holy Ghost</em>.’”<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4">[4]</a> Contradicting Satan’s boast, Jesus Christ said he would “save all <em>except the sons of perdition</em>.”<a href="#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5">[5]</a> In other words, Jesus knew that through the gift of His Atonement, everyone <em>but</em> the sons of perdition could be “resurrected to [at least] a telestial glory, escaping the second, spiritual death.”<a href="#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6">[6]</a></p> <p>These statements raise a question: what must a person do to commit the unpardonable sin? The Church does <em>not</em> teach that an “individual who receives a witness of the Holy Ghost and then falls away or becomes less active in the Church is . . . guilty of the unpardonable sin.”<a href="#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7">[7]</a> Rather, Joseph Smith taught that such a person “must receive the Holy Ghost, have the heavens opened unto him, and know God, and then sin against him.”<a href="#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8">[8]</a> Thus, the kind of knowledge against which such persons tragically rebel is so sure and certain that very few mortals will ever qualify in this life to become sons of perdition. None of us should worry that we have committed the unpardonable sin and are beyond the reach of forgiveness through Christ’s Atonement.</p> <p>In short, Joseph Smith understood that when Satan proposed to “save all,” he was not thinking broadly, as Jesus did, about how to help all of God’s children attain a kingdom of glory but rather seems to have been focused on a narrow, selfish, and farfetched proposal whose stated objective was to “save” the sons of perdition. In trying to do away with the need for the Atonement, Satan sought “to redeem . . . all in their sins.”<a href="#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9">[9]</a> Of course, this impossible option would have been most appealing to those spirits who mistakenly thought they might benefit from it—namely, those who were already leaning toward the unpardonable sin, including, of course, Satan himself.</p> <p><strong>Source</strong></p> <p>Book of Moses Minute by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw</p> <p><strong>Related verses</strong></p> <p>Moses 4:1–4</p> <p> </p> <p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1">[1]</a> Richard D. Draper, S. Kent Brown, and Michael D. Rhodes, <em>The Pearl of Great Price: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 2005), 38; compare Genesis 22:1; Isaiah 6:8; Acts 9:10; Abraham 3:27.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2">[2]</a> Brent L. Top, <em>The Life Before: How Our Premortal Existence Affects Our Mortal Life</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1988), 109.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3">[3]</a> Joseph Smith Jr., April 7, 1844, in Joseph Fielding Smith, comp., <em>Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1969), 357.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4">[4]</a> Eugene England, "George Laub's Nauvoo Journal," <em>BYU Studies</em> 18, no. 2 (Winter 1978): 172; emphasis added and spelling and punctuation modernized.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5">[5]</a> Wilford Woodruff Journal, April 7, 1844, in Andrew F. Ehat and Lyndon W. Cook, comps. and eds., <em>The Words of Joseph Smith: The Contemporary Accounts of the Nauvoo Discourses of the Prophet Joseph</em> (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1980), 347; emphasis added and spelling and punctuation standardized.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6">[6]</a> Bruce R. McConkie, <em>The Promised Messiah: The First Coming of Christ</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1978), 271–275.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7">[7]</a> <em>Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2017), https://churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/book-of-mormon-seminary-teacher-manual-2017/introduction-to-the-book-of-alma/lesson-96-alma-39.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8">[8]</a> Joseph Smith Jr., in<em> History of the Church</em> (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1978), 6:314.</p> <p><a href="#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9">[9]</a> Orson Pratt, in<em> Journal of Discourses</em>, 26 vols. (London, England: Latter-day Saints’ Book Depot, 1854–1886), 21:288.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author:</strong> Jeffrey M. Bradshaw<br /><strong>General Editor:</strong> Taylor Halverson<br /><strong>Associate Editor:</strong> Morgan Tanner<br /><strong>Senior Editor:</strong> Sarah Whitney Johnson<br /><strong>Assistant Editor:</strong> Sam Lofgran<br /><strong>Assistant Editor:</strong> Verlanne Johnson</p>
Old Testament Minute: Genesis by BMC
video
What Happened Before the Creation and Fall? (Genesis 3:1-7)
<p>Casey Paul Griffiths, "Come, Follow Me Week 3, Part 1/7 (Jan 10 - Jan 16, Genesis 3-4; Moses 4–5)," Book of Mormon Central video, 2022.</p>
Casey Paul Griffiths
