LeGrand L. Baker

1 Nephi 11:16  

16 And he said unto me: Knowest thou the condescension of God?
17 And I said unto him: I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things (1 Nephi 11:16-17).

“Condescension” is an interesting word. Since neither condescend nor condescension are found in the Old Testament, we cannot turn to the Hebrew to help discover its meaning. That leaves the Oxford English Dictionary as our best source. It reads:

Condescension, n.
The action, habit, or quality of condescending.
1. Voluntary abnegation for the nonce of the privileges of a superior; affability to one’s inferiors, with courteous disregard of difference of rank or position.
2. The action of descending or stooping to things unworthy. Obsolete.
3. Gracious, considerate, or submissive deference shown to another.
4. The action or fact of acceding or consenting.

Only the obsolete definition (#2) suggests a self-degradation of the helper that emphasizes the inferiority of those who are helped.

All of the other definitions suggest love and an acknowledgment of the others’s intrinsic worth—an assertion that the greater recognizes the value of the lesser. To condescend in this way is what the Savior required of his apostles when he said, “But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted” (Matthew 23:11-12). The Savior was even more explicit in a revelation to the Prophet Joseph, “

He that is ordained of God and sent forth, the same is appointed to be the greatest, notwithstanding he is the least and the servant of all”(D&C 50:26).

To help Nephi understand, the angel showed him that the Savior—the great Jehovah, the Father of Creation, the Only Begotten Son of the Eternal Father —would be born into this world as the child of Mary—he would become a little, helpless baby human being. He would have a body like we have—one that gets hungry, endures fatigue, and feels pain.

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1 Nephi 11:13-15 

13 And it came to pass that I looked and beheld the great city of Jerusalem, and also other cities. And I beheld the city of Nazareth; and in the city of Nazareth I beheld a virgin, and she was exceedingly fair and white.
14 And it came to pass that I saw the heavens open; and an angel came down and stood before me; and he said unto me: Nephi, what beholdest thou?
15 And I said unto him: A virgin, most beautiful and fair above all other virgins.

The Savior’s title “the Lamb of God” is used more frequently by Nephi while he is reporting this vision than anywhere else in the scriptures. While the title is clearly a reference to his Atonement, Nephi uses it to evoke another image as well. It is that of a little lamb—innocent, incapable of hurting anything or anyone, but completely vulnerable and easily hurt. Nephi tenderly describes the Savior as a baby held in Mary’s arms.

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1 Nephi 11:10-12 

10 And he said unto me: What desirest thou?
11 And I said unto him: To know the interpretation thereof—for I spake unto him as a man speaketh; for I beheld that he was in the form of a man; yet nevertheless, I knew that it was the Spirit of the Lord; and he spake unto me as a man speaketh with another
12 And it came to pass that he said unto me: Look! And I looked as if to look upon him, and I saw him not; for he had gone from before my presence.

The Spirit of the Lord asked Nephi what he desired, and Nephi responded that he wanted to know the meaning of the tree. Nephi does not tell us if the Lord answered his question or He had not told Nephi the meaning, Or perhaps Nephi chose not to tell us that part of their conversation. Nephi looked, but the Spirit of the Lord was gone. But rather he showed Nephi a vision of the city of Nazareth and of a beautiful virgin who was there.

An angel now appeared who will conduct Nephi through the rest of his interview. He first asked Nephi if he could identify the girl, then asked, “Knowest thou the condescension of God?” Nephi did not fully understand. The angel did not explain (or else Nephi chose not to share the explanation with us), but showed him another vision.

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1 Nephi 11:8-9 

8 And it came to pass that the Spirit said unto me: Look! And I looked and beheld a tree; and it was like unto the tree which my father had seen; and the beauty thereof was far beyond, yea, exceeding of all beauty; and the whiteness thereof did exceed the whiteness of the driven snow.{1}
9 And it came to pass after I had seen the tree, I said unto the Spirit: I behold thou hast shown unto me the tree which is precious above all.

Nephi wrote that he saw a tree that was whiter than the “driven snow.” He did not just say “whiter than snow.” The difference is that the “driven snow” is in the air, but just “snow” would be on the ground. When one tries to envision the Shechinah,{1} the best we might do is remember how a snowstorm looks when we turn on the bright lights of the car, or how snow looks when the wind is blowing it about on an otherwise bright, sunny day. The whiteness is simply too bright for our eyes to see beyond. What Nephi saw was probably something like that, a very bright opaque light that initially separated himself from the tree. Then he saw the tree itself, equally white, and which he recognized as being “precious above all.”

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FOOTNOTES

{1} See: “1 Nephi 8:10-12, Lehi’s description of the tree, the water, and the fruit.”

{2} For a discussion of the shechinah and the veils see the footnote at the end of the section called, “1 Nephi 1:1-6, A Three Act Play.” For further discussions see the section called, “1 Nephi 11:2-7, One Must Say and Do Truth.”

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1 Nephi 11:2-7 

2 And the Spirit said unto me: Behold, what desirest thou?
3 And I said: I desire to behold the things which my father saw.
4 And the Spirit said unto me: Believest thou that thy father saw the tree of which he hath spoken?
5 And I said: Yea, thou knowest that I believe all the words of my father.
6. And when I had spoken these words, the Spirit cried with a loud voice, saying: Hosanna to the Lord, the most high God; for he is God over all the earth, yea, even above all. And blessed art thou, Nephi, because thou believest in the Son of the most high God; wherefore, thou shalt behold the things that thou hast desired.
7 And behold this thing shall be given unto thee for a sign, that after thou hast beheld the tree which bore the fruit which thy father tasted, thou shalt also behold a man descending out of heaven, and him shall ye witness; and after ye have witnessed him ye shall bear record that it is the Son of God.

There is a pattern here that may be reminiscent of the judgment that we all will experience before we are permitted to enter the place where God is. Nephi is not automatically permitted to enter. Rather, he is asked questions which he must answer correctly. He does, and the person who stands before him rejoices at the answers. Even so, Nephi is not given immediate entrance. Rather, he is given promises that foreshadow and explain the experiences he is about to have.{1}

We live in a world where we are separated from the Savior by two veils. One is of the world around us—the one we see with our natural eyes. Beyond that is the Shechinah{2} —the veil of light that prophets see before they enter into his presence. An eternal principle is that while standing there, one must only speak truth. If one does not say truth one may not enter (2 Nephi 9:41-42). John quotes the Savior as saying it a little differently: “But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God” (John 3:21). A way to understand that is given by the Lord to the Prophet Joseph:

40 For intelligence cleaveth unto intelligence; wisdom receiveth wisdom; truth embraceth truth; virtue loveth virtue; light cleaveth unto light; mercy hath compassion on mercy and claimeth her own; justice continueth its course and claimeth its own; judgment goeth before the face of him who sitteth upon the throne and governeth and executeth all things (D&C 88:40).

When Paul wrote about the “whole armor of God,” he described it as one might describe the sacred clothing worn by the High Priest when he went behind the veil into the Holy of Holies. As far as we know, there were no symbolic markings on the High Priest’s garments. However, it is interesting that his belt was woven of the same colors as were woven into the veil. So he was encircled about by the colors of the veil.{3} That may have been what Paul was referring to when he wrote, “Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth” (Ephesians 6:14).

Levi’s vision where he is clothed with priesthood authority describes his clothing similarly.{4}

Nephi’s is one of several accounts where someone who is about to enter the place where God is, is asked questions that he is expected to answer truthfully. Two of those were Nephi and the brother of Jared. Job had a similar experience.{5}

Psalm 21 was sung during the Feast of Tabernacles temple drama when the king approached the veil of the temple, just before he entered the Holy of Holies.{6} Nephi’s experience was essentially the same: the Spirit asked, “Behold, what desirest thou?”

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FOOTNOTES

{1} There is a similar interview in Ether 3:7-9.

{2} For a definition of shechinah see the dictionary at the back of the LDS Bible.

{3} The accounts read:

5 And the curious girdle of his ephod, that was upon it, was of the same, according to the work thereof; of gold, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen; as the Lord commanded Moses (Exodus 39:5).
1 Moreover thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains [the veil] of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet: with cherubims of cunning work shalt thou make them (Exodus 26:1). The instructions state further that these curtains were put together to make one continuous veil, except for a place in the center where the veil could be parted to give access to the Holy of Holies.

{4} “The Testament of Levi” in The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs in The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English, ed. R. H. Charles, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 2:308-09. It is quoted above.

{5} For a discussion of Job’s experience see Who Shall Ascend into the Hill of the Lord, First edition, p. 155-57; Second edition, p. 116-18.

{6} For a discussion of Psalm 21 as a veil ceremony see Who Shall Ascend into the Hill of the Lord, First edition, p. 553-57; Second edition, p. 397-400.

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1 Nephi 11:1 

1 For it came to pass after I had desired to know the things that my father had seen, and believing that the Lord was able to make them known unto me, as I sat pondering in mine heart I was caught away in the Spirit of the Lord, yea, into an exceedingly high mountain, which I never had before seen, and upon which I never had before set my foot.{1}

The setting of this interview is important. It was on “an exceedingly high mountain, that I [Nephi] never had before seen, and upon which I never had before set my foot.” Enoch, in The Book of Enoch, describes its heights as the place of the throne of God.

This high mountain which thou hast seen, whose summit is like the throne of God, is His throne, where the Holy Great One, the Lord of Glory, the Eternal King, will sit, when He shall come down to visit the earth with goodness.{2}
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FOOTNOTES

{1} The ancient temples were designed to represent such a mountain. For a diagram showing the similarity between Mt. Sinai and Solomon’s Temple see Who Shall Ascend into the Hill of the Lord, First edition, p. 365; Second edition, p. 263.

{2} For Enoch’s description of the mountain see: The Book of Enoch, in R.H. Charles, The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, 2 vols. (Oxford, Clarendon Press) Chapters 24-25, 2:204-05. It is more fully quoted in the section called “1 Nephi 8:10-12, Lehi’s description of the tree, the water, and the fruit.”

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