Comments on Mosiah 15

     In this chapter Abinadi is using the term "God" pretty
loosely.  Generally, when LDS persons speak they use "God" to
refer to the "Father" and "Lord" to refer to the "Son" so as to
avoid confusion.  This is carried even further when "Eloheim" is
applied to the Father and Jehovah is applied to the "Son" as
though they were proper nouns.  In the Scriptures, the names are
not proper nouns and are used ambiguously as name-titles instead. 
The same goes with "God" here.  Abinadi is obviously speaking
most often of "God the Son".

v1-5  Abinadi's statements here are somewhat confusing.  For a
simplified distillation of what he said see 7:27.

v2-3  God the Son becomes both the Father and Son because of his
mixed divine and mortal parentage.  He inherits his divinity from
this Father and his mortality from his mother.  Thus, he has the
power of the Father, but is inferior to the Father because of his
mortal aspect, hence the Son.

v4 "they are one God", I would assume Abinadi is saying that the
Father and Son are "one", both in unity and numerically, in the
person of Christ.  I don't see this as a unity statement of the
God the Father and God the Son being at unity as the preceding v.
1-3 are all referring to God the Son and how God the Son
personifies both the Father and the Son.

v5 "And thus the flesh becoming subject to the Spirit", given
license I would change the capital "S" in "Spirit" to a lowercase
"s" just as the "f" in "flesh" is lowercase.  The capital "S"
leads one to automatically assume the Holy Ghost is being
referenced, when the subject is Jesus' flesh body being subject
to his spirit body.  
     Yes, Jesus' spirit was completely in accord to the Holy
Spirit, but that's not the subject here.  The subject is the
uniqueness of Christ in that he mastered his flesh such that it
was always in complete subjection to his spirit.  No other mortal
did so.

v10-25  Now that Abinadi has finished what he was supposed to
tell them (cf. 13:3), he now answers their question concerning
the Isaiah quote originally posed in 12:20-24.
     Those who are born again to be the spiritual children of
Christ (v. 10-12), including the prophets (v. 13), are those who
publish peace and say to Zion "Thy God reigneth!" (v. 14).
     Abinadi then praises the past (v. 15), present (v. 16),
future (v. 17), and even eternal persons (v. 17) who publish
peace and herald Zion (v. 18).
     He then discusses the physical salvation brought about by
the Resurrection (v. 19-25).

v15-17  On the reference to the feet contrast 1 Ne. 13:37 which
omits "feet" from a similar statement.  For a more thorough
discussion of the feet and the passage in general, see my
comments on Isa. 52 on the LDS Seminar archive.

v28-31 deal with the rest of the Isaiah quote in 12:22-24 and
place the fulfilment in a Millennial setting.



Copyright © 2001 by S. Kurt Neumiller <kurtn@cybcon.com>.  All rights 
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