Were Worthy Participants in the Israelite Temple Drama “Endowed” as We Understand It?

As I have been preparing the first Come Follow Me Gospel Doctrine lesson for 2026, “Introduction to the Old Testament,” I have been struck by the things Joseph Smith may have learned from Moroni and from the Prophet's translation of the Book of Mormon about the fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ, which included the endowment and sealing ordinances, as it was taught and administered in its purity by Moses and his prophetic successors to the Israelites.

The Book of Mormon’s Pinnacle Temple Text: 3 Nephi—Part 3. For example, in Parts 1 and 2 of this blog, I summarize findings by LDS and non-LDS scholars about an annual temple drama or liturgy reenacted for centuries in ancient Israel, which Lehi and Nephi apparently brought with them to the New World. As will be apparent to active, endowed members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the substance of this temple drama parallels the LDS endowment in striking ways. Moreover, it appears that Mormon drew upon this temple drama to frame his narrative account in Third Nephi, including the Savior’s Sermon at the Temple in 3 Nephi 11-18. To be clear, John W. Welch, the leading LDS proponent of the Sermon as a “temple text,” does not argue that Jesus’ instructions at the temple constituted, in effect, an endowment ceremony, as we understand it. “Nowhere does Jesus say to us, ‘I am presenting a temple experience here.’ . . . [H]e says only, ‘Who hath ears to hear, let him hear’ (Matthew 13:9).”

3 Nephi One by One Walter Rane, 2003

However, while acknowledging that “individual teachings of the Sermon will apply in many gospel settings,” he concludes that “no other single interpretation  . . . makes more consistent sense of the Sermon as a whole or gives more meaning to all its parts than does” reading it in light of the LDS temple endowment.[1] 

More to the point of my ongoing blogs is our focus on what Joseph Smith may have learned both from the tutelage (and visions) Moroni and other angels gave and showed him and from the text of the Book of Mormon itself as he translated and later pondered and studied it throughout his life. Particularly what he might have learned about the role of temples in the gospel of Jesus Christ through the dispensations of the world. On this question, Welch’s concluding comment is apropos:

In light of all that can be said about temples in the Book of Mormon, it is finally well to remember that in 1829, when the Book of Mormon was translated, Joseph Smith had scarcely thought or dreamed of a temple. Two years later he and the Church would move to Kirtland, where a temple was dedicated in 1836. The ordinances of washing, anointing, and the washing of feet were performed in that temple, but the full endowment was not given until 1843 in Nauvoo. Joseph Smith did not live to see the completion of the Nauvoo Temple, but he completed the task of revealing its essential architectural and ceremonial components that epitomize the gospel of Jesus Christ and its eternal laws and ordinances. In retrospect, we can see today that the blueprint of the Restoration for worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ in his holy house was already largely embedded in the texts of the Book of Mormon.[2]

Were worthy participants in the Israelite temple drama “endowed” as we understand it? The Church in recent updates to its General Handbook offers the following doctrinal answer to the question whether Heavenly Father provided faithful followers of the gospel of Jesus Christ generally, from Adam to Moses and then from Moses to Christ, including Book of Mormon peoples, access to temple covenants and ordinances (or whether such individuals have to wait until the Millenium to receive such ordinances):

Since ancient times, whenever a faithful people has been on the earth, God has blessed them with temple covenants and ordinances. He has sometimes allowed His holy ordinances to be administered outside of temples when there was no dedicated temple (see Genesis 28:12–22; Exodus 24; Exodus 25:8–9; Ether 3).[3] But whenever the Lord has established His Church, He has commanded His people to build a house “unto [His] name.” There He reveals His ordinances and the glories of His kingdom and teaches the way of salvation. (See 2 Chronicles 3–5; 2 Nephi 5:16; Doctrine and Covenants 97:10–16; 124:29–39.)[4]

By the term “temple covenants and ordinances,” I believe the Church was referring to Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances, specifically the endowment and sealing ordinances, not the Law of Moses or Aaronic Priesthood temple sacrifices detailed in Leviticus 1-7. This conclusion is suggested by the context of the foregoing doctrinal statement, which is the introductory section to chapter 27 of the Handbook, entitled “Temple Ordinances for the Living.”

That the same requirements for exaltation that apply to us in the Dispensation of the Fullness of Times would also have applied to saints of former dispensations seems obvious, given the unchanging nature of God.[5]

In coming years, Joseph Smith would declare as much. In 1840 “Remarks on Priesthood,” the Prophet taught that God “set the ordinances [of the gospel] to be the same forever and ever, and set Adam to watch over them, to reveal them from heaven to man, or to send angels to reveal them.”[6] In 1843, he further taught that ordinances of the gospel were “instituted in the heavens before the foundation of the World . . . for the Salvation of men” and “ are not to be altered or changed, all must be saved on the same principles.”[7] 

President Russell M. Nelson echoed the doctrine of the eternal efficacy and unchanging nature of the ordinances of the gospel. Speaking earnestly in April 2019 General Conference to “many people whom I love, whom I admire, and whom I respect [but who] decline [Christ’s] invitation to be baptized “and, in time, make additional covenants with God in the temple,” explained that unless they did so, they would not “be with their loved ones after death.” To be so, they must make and keep covenants associated with “essential ordinances.”

This has been true since the beginning of time. Adam and Eve, Noah and his wife, Abraham and Sarah, Lehi and Sariah, and all other devoted disciples of Jesus Christ—since the world was created—have made the same covenants with God. They have received the same ordinances that we as members of the Lord’s restored Church today have made: those covenants that we receive at baptism and in the temple.[8]

Still, in wondering whether any worthy Israelites from Moses’s day to Christ, including their Josephite Book of Mormon brethren, could have been endowed and sealed, we may ask—What about the Lord’s statement in 1832 to the Prophet Joseph Smith that after “the children of Israel” “hardened their hearts,” or rejected the gospel’s higher ordinances,

[Jehovah] took Moses out of their midst, and the Holy [Melchizedek] Priesthood also; And the lesser priesthood continued, which priesthood holdeth the key of the ministering of angels and the preparatory gospel; Which gospel is the gospel of repentance and of baptism, and the remission of sins, and the law of carnal commandments, which the Lord in his wrath caused to continue with the house of Aaron among the children of Israel until John, whom God raised (D&C 84:23)?

Does this mean that no faithful, worthy follower of the Messiah to come, Jesus Christ, from Moses's to Christ's day was endowed or sealed? Prophets and apostles from Joseph Smith to our day have answered “no,” that is not what this scripture means. The Prophet in 1841 answered “the question, Was the Priesthood of Melchizedek taken away when Moses died?” as follows:

“All Priesthood is Melchizedek, but there are different portions or degrees of it. That portion which brought Moses to speak with God face to face was taken away; but that which brought the ministry of angels remained.” He then added this important clarification: “All the prophets had the Melchizedek Priesthood and were ordained by God himself.”[9]

In other words, a “portion” or “degree” of the Melchizedek Priesthood continued with the House of Israel after Moses was translated. Moreover, from time-to-time men, including the prophets identified in the Old Testament, were ordained to the fulness of the Melchizedek Priesthood and authorized to administer its ordinances by special dispensation.

The same question that the Prophet Joseph raised in 1841 resurfaced, Robert L. Millet reports, in an April 22, 1849, meeting of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve:

Elder John Taylor asked President Brigham Young, “If Elijah, David, Solomon and the Prophets had the High Priesthood, how it was,” inasmuch as “the Lord took it away with Moses.” After much discussion, President Young “said he did not know, but wished he did.” Elder Taylor, who had not been with the Prophet Joseph when the answer was first given in 1841 (he was in England), “[concluded that] perhaps the Lord conferred [the High Priesthood] himself upon some at times whom he had considered worthy, but not with permission for them to continue it down upon others.”[10]

Christ Appearing to the Nephites Damir Krivenko

Elder Bruce R. McConkie, citing the Prophet Joseph Smith’s 1841 answer (in bold) highlighted above, clarified further whether and how the Lord made not only the Melchizedek Priesthood, but Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances, including the endowment and sealing ordinances, available at times and from time to time between the time of Moses and Christ as follows:

Because Moses held the higher or Melchizedek Priesthood, he had the fulness of the gospel: . . . he could thereby perform celestial marriages, which open the door to eternal life; and he could thereby seal people unto eternal life with callings and elections made sure . . ..[11] When Israel, as a people and as a whole, failed to live in harmony with the . . . fulness of the . . . gospel, [Christ] took the Melchizedek Priesthood . . . out of their midst in the sense that it did not continue and pass from one priesthood holder to another in the normal and usual sense of the word. The keys of the priesthood were taken away with Moses so that any future priesthood ordinations required specific divine authorization. . . .

Whenever any individual or any selected groups in Israel qualified for more light and greater blessings than were found in the Law of Moses, the Lord gave them the law of Christ in its fulness. Such was the case among the Nephites for six hundred continuous years. They kept the Law of Moses . . . But they also had the Melchizedek Priesthood and the fulness of the gospel [meaning the endowment and sealing ordinances]. We know this same state of superior enlightenment existed at many other times and places in Israel. There were at many times, and may have been at all times, prophets and righteous men in Israel who held this higher order of the priesthood.[12]

Elder McConkie’s statement echoes the teachings of his father-in-law, President Joseph Fielding Smith (the Tenth President of the Church): “The withdrawal of the higher priesthood was from the people [of Israel] as a body, but the Lord still left among them men holding the Melchizedek Priesthood, with power to officiate in all its ordinances, so far as he determined that these ordinances should be granted unto the people.”[13]

As to where the endowment and sealing ordinances would have been administered at those times and to those individuals or groups during Israel’s history and during Book of Mormon times who were deemed by authorized priesthood holders to be worthy of them, the Lord would answer this question in 1841. Speaking about the need for temples, including most importantly the Nauvoo Temple that He had commanded the Saints to build, the Lord asked His Saints—

How shall your washings be acceptable unto me, except ye perform them in a house which you have built to my name? For, for this cause I commanded Moses that he should build a tabernacle, that they should bear it with them in the wilderness, and [commanded David and Solomon] to build a house in the land of promise, that those ordinances might be revealed which had been hid from before the world was (D&C 124:37-38; 41).

The Lord could have added, “For this cause I commanded Nephi that he should build a temple in the promised land” (1 Nephi 13:12; 14:2; 2 Nephi 5:16). Moreover, as noted earlier, scholars have discovered (are discovering?) that temples in addition to Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem may have existed in other places in Israel and outside of Israel.[14]

The phrases “those ordinances . . . hid from before the world was” or “before the foundation of the world” (D&C 124:38, 41) echo Joseph Smith’s statement that gospel ordinances (including the endowment and sealing ordinances) were “instituted in the heavens before the foundation of the World.” Such ordinances “prepared before the foundation of the world” (D&C 128:5) included, of course, baptisms for the dead, which were only performed (as other ordinances for the dead) after Christ’s resurrection.

Indeed, the Lord in verse 39 of Section 124 makes two further clarifying points. One is that “His people” “are always commanded to build [temples]” “unto my holy name.” (This is the scriptural basis for the General Handbook statement, “whenever the Lord has established His Church, He has commanded His people to build a house  ‘unto [His] name.’”). Second, that the “ordinance[s]” authorized to be performed in “my holy house” will always include “anointings,” “washings,” “baptism for the dead” (after Christ’s resurrection), “solemn assemblies” (which brings to my mind the Great Assembly in the Israelite temple drama), “memorials for your sacrifices by the sons of Levi,” “oracles in your most holy places,” and an “endowment.”

Then in a revelation recorded in 1842 (parts of which were possibly received much earlier) on the “the new and everlasting covenant” of marriage—what we refer to commonly as “temple marriage” (D&C 132:4-7)—the Lord provides six examples, stretching over 1100 years (from about 2100 to 990 B.C.), of individuals who received the sealing ordinance, namely, “my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as also Moses, David and Solomon” (D&C 132:1).

Christ further revealed that “Nathan, my servant, and others of the prophets who had the keys of this power” (D&C 132:39) officiated in this ordinance on behalf of David and Solomon, each of whom, therefore, would have held the Melchizedek Priesthood (and neither of whom was of the tribe of Levi but the tribe of Judah). While the Lord did not reveal where David and Solomon might have been sealed, His statement in Section 124 seems to be applicable. To be “acceptable unto” God, these and all other temple ordinances must be “perform[ed] in a house which you have built to my name” (D&C 124:37). The only exception to this rule is “in the days of your poverty, wherein ye are not able to build a house unto me” (D&C 124:30).

We have no record that Abraham, Isaac or Jacob were “able” to build temples. Moses did not build the Tabernacle until he was 81 (see Exodus 7:7; 12:2 40:17), after he had received his prophetic call (and after he had presumably been ordained and endowed) (see Moses 1). So, it appears that the sealings of these prophets (and related ordinations and endowments, assuming that the “same” eternal ordinances were required of them as are required of us) were most likely conducted somewhere other than a “house built unto” God, perhaps on a mountaintop or other authorized location.[15] 

But for David and Solomon, we know that during their lives a house or tabernacle “built to” the name of Christ did exist.[16] If so, then for me, as for Sidney B. Sperry, “it seems more reasonable to believe that Nathan and the other prophets would seal David’s wives and concubines to him [and endow them] in a holy place such as the tabernacle than in any other structure.”[17] 

With this background, we can confidently conclude that at least some righteous Israelites at various times in their history, and apparently all righteous Nephites during times they enjoyed worthy and authorized leaders in their history, had access to the endowment and sealing ordinances.

Thus, as Baker and Ricks conclude, “the authors of the Book of Mormon,” from Nephi to Moroni, “were privy to all the sacred rites and ordinances which were necessary to salvation,” meaning exaltation.[18] 

As to the specific role, if any, the temple drama reenacted annually at the Feast of Tabernacle ceremonies might have played in the receipt or renewal of covenants made in such endowments or the forms of such ceremonies, I do not believe we have enough information to draw any definitive conclusions. This is not surprising, as we would not expect that such details would have been publicly disclosed. Even if at this time we “do not know the meaning of all things,” this we do know, as Nephi declared, that God “loveth his children” (1 Nephi 11:17).

While the Lord continues to reveal “here a little, and there a little” (Isaiah 28:10; 2 Nephi 28:30; D&C 128:21) about the temple and the fulness of the gospel received therein, including through the ministry most recently of President Russell M. Nelson, there are “many great and important things pertaining to the Kingdom of God” that the Lord has yet to reveal about His work throughout the history of the world (Articles of Faith 9). But of one thing we can be assured. Whether “endowed” or not, those Israelites and Nephites who lived the principles and kept the covenants expressed in the words of the Psalms they would have sung as they approached the gates of the temple (in Act 2, Scene 8 of their temple drama and in the liturgy in its entirety), would by no means lose the ultimate blessing promised by Jehovah, even exaltation:

Who shall ascend into the hill [mountain or temple] of the LORD?     [and] who shall stand in his holy place? He [who] hath clean [innocent] hands, and a pure heart;     who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity [has not raised his hand to what is false],        nor [and has not] sworn deceitfully. He shall receive the blessing [blessings] from the LORD,     and righteousness from the God of his salvation (Psalms 24:3-5).[19]

Joseph Smith’s Translation of the Savior’s Quotation of Malachi 5-6. Around May 20, 1829 (by Jack Welch’s calculation),[20] the Prophet arrived at 3 Nephi 24 in the Nephite record. There Mormon described how Jesus commanded His disciples to “write the words which the Father had given unto Malachi” (3 Nephi 24:1). The translation the Lord gave Joseph Smith of Malachi’s words as they now stand in 3 Nephi 25:5-6 is identical to the King James translation of Malachi 4:5-6. Why didn’t the Lord have Joseph Smith include the changes quoted by Moroni during his four visits to the Prophet on September 21-22, 1823? In short, He has not told us.

Critics accuse Joseph Smith of “lifting bodily” passages from the Bible into the Book of Mormon. Hugh Nibley responded eloquently to these arguments in the 1960’s. Quoting from Nibley’s writings, FAIR’s website answers in part: “As to the ‘passages lifted bodily from the King James Version,’ we first ask, ‘How else does one quote scripture if not bodily?’ And why should anyone quoting the Bible to American readers of 1830 not follow the only version of the Bible known to them? Actually, the Bible passages quoted in the Book of Mormon often differ from the King James Version, but where the latter is correct there is every reason why it should be followed.”[21]

To truly appreciate how the Lord treats truths about His temples (including those truths in Malachi 4:5-6 explored more fully in chapter 2, “Moroni’s ‘Temple’ Lessons”), it is worth noting the findings of Royal Skousen, editor of the Book of Mormon critical text project, about the revelatory process the Lord employed to bring forth this key-stone volume of scripture in the course of the unfolding restoration:

Joseph Smith was literally reading off an already composed English-language text. Taken as a whole, the evidence in the manuscripts and in the language of the earliest text supports the hypothesis that the Book of Mormon was a precise text. I do not consider this conclusion apologetic, but instead as one demanded by the evidence.

The opposing viewpoint, that Joseph Smith got ideas and translated them into his own English, cannot be supported by the manuscript and textual evidence. The only substantive argument for this alternative view has been the nonstandard nature of the original text, with its implication that God would never speak ungrammatical English, so the nonstandard usage must be the result of Joseph Smith putting the ideas he received into his own language. Yet with the recent finding that the original vocabulary of the text appears to date from the 1500s and 1600s (not the 1800s), we now need to consider the possibility that the ungrammaticality of the original text may also date from that earlier period of time, not necessarily from Joseph’s own time and place. The evidence basically argues that Joseph Smith was not the author of the Book of Mormon, nor was he actually the translator. Instead, he was the revelator: through him the Lord revealed the English-language text (by means of the interpreters, later called the Urim and Thummim, and the seer stone). Such a view is consistent, I believe, with Joseph’s use elsewhere of the verb translate to mean “transmit” and the noun translation to mean “transmission” (as in the eighth Article of Faith).[22]

Thus, “rather than looking at a Bible (the absence of a Bible now near-definitively confirmed by the manuscript evidence and the unequivocal statements of witnesses to the translation to the Book of Mormon), Joseph was provided a page of text via his gift of seership. This page of text contained, in this view, the King James Bible text. Joseph was then free to alter the text for his audience.”[xxiii] In other words, the Lord gave to Joseph (in King James English) the same words He asked his Nephite scribe(s) to record on the plates of Nephi in their language.

But why, we might further ask, wouldn’t the Lord want Moroni’s clarifications to be in the text of the Book of Mormon? Again, He has not said. The answer, however, may have something to do with the sacred nature of the subject matter. Brother Welch and other scholars, for example, have written extensively about temple themes that run through both Malachi’s writings and Jesus’ teaching at the temple, including the following:

Possible Temple Elements Reflected in Malachi 3-4 (3 Nephi 24-25)

Scripture          Temple Reference

3:1 (24:1)           the coming of a messenger of the covenant “suddenly to his temple” 3:3–10   making pure consecration of tithes and offerings

3:11                   rebuking Satan, the devourer

3:12                   being called “blessed” in a delightsome land  

3:14                   abiding the day of his coming judgment

3:16                   those who fear the Lord speaking often one to another

3:16                   keeping a book of remembrance of the names of the righteous

3:18                   being able to discern between the good and the evil

4:2 (25:2)           The Sun (Son) of Righteousness shall heal the sick

4:4                     emembering the Ten Commandments given at Mount Sinai

4:5                     sending the prophet Elijah

4:5–6                 bringing parents and children, ancestors and posterity, together

2:16                   hating divorce; covering violence with a garment

2:17                   preparing for the coming judgment of God.[24]

Recall that after the Savior had quoted Malachi chapters 3-4 to the Nephites, Jesus “expounded them” (3 Nephi 24:1; 26:1), revealing things (including possibly administering ordinances) that they were presumably asked not to write down (or, if they were written, Mormon and Moroni were directed not to include in their abridgement of those records).[25] As noted earlier, the Nephites gathered at the temple in Bountiful “were spiritually prepared and mature in their righteousness in the gospel.” They “qualified by personal righteousness,” as Elder McConkie wrote, “to see the face of their God.”[26]

In like manner, we see in the life of Joseph Smith, President Nelson and even in our own lives a similar pattern: “He that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day” (D&C 50:24).

Where might Joseph Smith have obtained his earliest ideas about the role of temples in the gospel of Jesus Christ? Certainly, he recognized, as Gerald E. Smith observed, “that the Jerusalem temple was [at] the center of [the Savior’s] life and ministry.” Moreover, after his resurrection, Christ’s early disciples continued “daily with one accord in the temple” (Acts 2:46). However, in the Christianity of Joseph Smith’s day (and even in our day), “any notion of separate distinctive temple worship had disappeared.”

The Book of Mormon, however, pointed in a different direction to the restoration of ancient temple worship—not with the Mosaic code, but with Christ at its center, modeled after the postresurrection temple at Bountiful. The Book of Mormon provided the earliest, indeed only, scriptural source for the meaning of a Christian temple, as if to imply that the Prophet’s modern commission might be to reverse the course of Christian history and restore the temple once again to its preeminent place as the holiest place of sacred worship, like the Hebrew Bible’s temple, the “House of the Lord."[27]

Notes

[1] Welch, Illuminating the Sermon at the Temple,115-16. In noting certain differences “between the Latter-day Saint temple experience and the Sermon,” Welch observes that “the Sermon at the Temple mainly reports the ordinances, laws, commandments, ritual elements, and covenants; little background drama or creation narrative is given.” He further hastens to add, “I do not think that the Nephite temple experience was exactly the same as today’s—which itself changes somewhat from time to time.” Ibid. 117. The same could also be said of, and would be even more applicable to, the ancient Israelite temple drama.

[2] Welch, “The Temple in the Book of Mormon,” 377. In his summary analysis of the varying roles temples played throughout Nephite history, Welch observes how such roles changed over the centuries. From the temple playing “a greater political role, especially in conjunction with the establishment and enhancement of kingships” from Nephi’s to Mosiah₂’s days; to the temple ritual being “filled with specific Israelite themes and terms, particularly those characteristic of the holy celebrations of the Day of Atonement and Feast of Tabernacles, which [King Benjamin] infused with Christian knowledge and perspectives;” to Alma₂’s temple-teaching focus “on the plan of salvation, [and] personal righteousness” “following the abandonment of kingship in the land of Zarahemla;” and to, with the coming of Christ in 3 Nephi and the end to “blood sacrifice and burnt offerings,” “a new sacred order” that was similar enough to “the prior Nephite ritual order” that the “people saw the continuity between the two” “and yet were amazed and astonished at how all of the old had become new, evidently down to minute details.” Ibid. 376-77.

[3] Note that in the context of this sentence (that God “allowed His holy ordinances to be administered outside of temples when there was no dedicated temple”), the scriptural references that the Church cites, in effect, suggest that Jacob (Genesis 28:12-22), the Seventy in Moses’s day (Exodus 24), and the Brother of Jared (Ether 3) all were endowed.

[4] General Handbook 27.0, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/general-handbook/27-temple-ordinances-for-the-living?lang=eng. This Handbook statement cites and echoes what scriptures and prophets, including President Russell M. Nelson, have taught, namely that “temple ordinances and covenants are ancient.” “Temple and Your Spiritual Foundation,” 94; Russell M. Nelson, “Becoming Exemplary Latter-day Saints,” Liahona (November 2018). For example, Explanations 2 and 7 of Facsimile 2 in the Book of Abraham refer to symbols “representing also the grand Key-words of the Holy Priesthood, as revealed [in temple ordinances] to Adam in the Garden of Eden, as also to Seth, Noah, Melchizedek, Abraham, and all to whom the Priesthood was revealed.”

While the clarifying statement in the Handbook may be fairly recent (see “The Latest Changes to the General Handbook,” December 18, 2020, https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/general-handbook-update-december-2020#:~:text=Chapter%2027%3A%20%E2%80%9CTemple%20Ordinances%20for,the%20handbook%20has%20been%20reworked.0), this doctrine is not new. In a 1974 Ensign article, Robert A. Matthews summarized the doctrine, stating that “ordinances that are now performed in the temple have been available to men and women living upon the earth whenever the gospel was preached and received among them.” “Were the blessings of the temple available to the saints in Jesus’ time, or did they become available after his death?” Ensign (September 1974), https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1974/09/i-have-a-question/were-the-blessings-of-the-temple-available-to-the-saints-in-jesus-time?lang=eng.

[5] See Mormon 9:9–10, 19 (“God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and in him there is no variableness neither shadow of changing”); Moroni 8:18 (God is not “a changeable being; but he is unchangeable from all eternity to all eternity”); D&C 3:2; 20:17; 132:11 (“Behold, mine house is a house of order, saith the Lord God, and not a house of confusion”).

6] Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, 168 (emphasis added). See also ibid., 90 (“The order of the house of God has been, and ever will be, the same, even after Christ comes; and after the termination of the thousand years it will be the same; and we shall finally enter into the celestial kingdom of God, and enjoy it [the endowment] forever.). 

[7] History, 1838–1856, volume D-1 [1 August 1842–1 July 1843], p. 1572, The Joseph Smith Papers, accessed December 22, 2025, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1838-1856-volume-d-1-1-august-1842-1-july-1843/217. See also Quentin L. Cook, “Safely Gathered Home,” Liahona (May 2023)(“During the Council in Heaven in the premortal existence, the plan of salvation was discussed and sustained. It included certain laws and ordinances of the priesthood instituted before the foundation of the world”). Andrew Skinner suggests, “Probing reflection on the temple ceremony teaches us that in our premortal existence we possessed an extensive knowledge” of the Savior’s redemptive mission, including the ordinances established “from the foundation of the world” to enable us to receive exaltation, including the “symbolism and specific tokens centering on the bodily sacrifice of Christ” (Skinner, Temple Worship, 50, 52).

[8] Nelson, ““Come, Follow Me.”

[9] Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, 180-81.

[10] Robert L. Millet, “Prophets and Priesthood in the Old Testament” in Sperry Symposium Classics: The Old Testament, ed. Paul Y. Hoskisson (Provo and Salt Lake City: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, and Deseret Book 2005), 48–68, https://rsc.byu.edu/sperry-symposium-classics-old-testament/prophets-priesthood-old-testament#:~:text=Almost%20seven%20years%20later%2C%20Brother,is%20beyond%20the%20power%20of.

[11] Elder McConkie may have had reference here to the “fulness of the priesthood” temple ordinance, also referred to as the “second anointing,” which Joseph Smith administered on a limited basis beginning in 1843. See Fluckiger, 286-87

[12] McConkie, Mortal Messiah Book 1, 59-61. Summarizing Elder McConkie and other prophetic explanations on whether Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances could have been administered after the time of Moses, Millet adds” “When Moses was translated, the keys of the Melchizedek Priesthood were taken from among the Israelites as a body and the patriarchal order of priesthood ceased. True, there were still men like Aaron, his sons, and the seventy elders of Israel who bore the Melchizedek Priesthood. But no longer did the Melchizedek Priesthood pass from father to son. Thereafter, the priesthood of administration among the people generally was the Aaronic Priesthood. The ordination of men to the Melchizedek Priesthood and the bestowal of its keys came by special dispensation [meaning that God Himself performed the ordination or sent a divine messenger to do so]. Millet, “Prophets and Priesthood in the Old Testament.”

[13] Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, 3:85, quoted by Millet, Prophets and Priesthood in the Old Testament.”

[14] See “Did Ancient Israelites Build Temples outside of Jerusalem? (2 Nephi 5:16),” KnoWhy 31 (February 11, 2016), https://knowhy.bookofmormoncentral.org/sites/default/files/knowhy-pdf/2016/did_ancient_israelites_build_temples_outside_of_jerusalem.pdf. An AI review of non-LDS literature noted that a significant body of mainstream academic and archaeological literature supports the existence of Israelite temples and cultic sites outside of Jerusalem during the Iron Age (c. 1200–586 BCE), including (1) The Temple at Tel Moza (Judah): discovered just 4 miles from Jerusalem, this temple operated simultaneously with Solomon’s Temple, challenging the traditional view that Jerusalem was the only sanctioned site for sacrifice. See Shua Kisilevitz, “The Iron IIA Judahite Temple at Tel Moẓa.” Tel Aviv 42, no. 2 (2015): 147–164; Shua Kisilevitz and Lipschits Oded, “Another Temple in Judah! The Prospect of Judahite Cultic Centralisation in Light of the New Discoveries at Tel Moẓa,” Biblical Archaeology Review 46, no. 1 (2020): 40–49; (2) the Temple at Arad (Judah): Excavated in the 1960s, this is one of the most famous examples of an Iron Age Israelite temple. It featured a "Holy of Holies" and altars for sacrifice. See Ze'ev Herzog, Aharoni Miriam, Anson F. Rainey, and Shmuel Moshkovitz, “The Israelite Fortress at Arad,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 254 (1984): 1–34; Ze'ev Herzog, "The Arad Fortresses,” in The Archaeology of Israel: Constructing the Past, Interpreting the Present, eds. Neil Asher Silberman and David Small, 111–136 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press), 1997; (3) The Jewish Temple at Elephantine (Egypt): While outside the land of Israel, this temple (built by a Jewish military colony) is the closest historical parallel to the Nephite temple mentioned in 2 Nephi 5:16, as it was built by refugees in a new land. See Bezalel Porten, “The Religion of the Jews of Elephantine in Light of the Aramaic Papyri,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 28, no. 2 (1969): 116–121; Almut Rohrmoser, “The Elephantine Temple,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets, ed. Carolyn J. Sharp (Oxford University Press), 2016. In addition to these specific sites, the following articles summarize the archaeological data for various “high places” (bamot) and regional temples throughout the kingdoms of Israel and Judah: William G Dever, “Did God Have a Wife?” Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans), 2005 (see Chapter 5, which discusses various provincial shrines and temples like those at Dan and Beersheba); Ziony Zevit, The Religions of Ancient Israel: A Synthesis of Parallactic Approaches, (London: Continuum), 2001 (considered a definitive academic source on the diversity of Israelite worship sites); Mordechai Aviam, “The First Temple Period: Shrines and Temples,” in The Architecture of Ancient Israel: From the Prehistoric to the Persian Periods, ed. Aharon Kempinski and Ronny Reich, 251–259 (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society), 1992. As noted in this and other chapters, non-LDS researchers have also observed how Bible editors (specifically in the editorial history of 2 Kings) attempted to centralize worship in Jerusalem, often obscuring the reality that many other temples existed. See Israel Finkelstein, “The Forgotten Kingdom: The Archaeology and History of Northern Israel” Ancient Near East Monographs 5 (2013) (discusses temples and shrines in the Northern Kingdom of Israel); Lisbeth S. Fried, “The High Places (Bāmôt) and the Reforms of Hezekiah and Josiah: An Archaeological Investigation,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 122, no. 3 (2002): 437–465. Of course, we do not know whether authorized priesthood holders officiated at any of these sites. Their existence, however, supports the idea that if there were officiators authorized by God to administer His higher ordinances during Israel’s long history, there may have been other places other than Jerusalem where such ordinances might have been available. This might include during periods, such as Lehi’s day, where apparently those who had charge of Solomon’s temple opposed the authorized servants of God.

[15] See Millet, “Prophets and Priesthood in the Old Testament (“Surely if and when God elected to make available the ordinances of the priesthood to certain individuals—including the endowment and sealing blessings—he could do so in the wilderness or on mountaintops.).

[16] See 2 Samuel 6:17 (“And they brought in the ark of the LORD, and set it in his place, in the midst of the tabernacle that David had pitched for it: and David offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the LORD”). For arguments about the extent to which the Melchizedek Priesthood and Melchizedek Priesthood ordinances were available to faithful saints from Moses to Malachi, see Vivian McConkie Adams, “Aaronic and Melchizedek Priesthood Operation From Moses to Malachi,” Meridian Magazine, July 5, 2022, https://latterdaysaintmag.com/aaronic-and-melchizedek-priesthood-operation-from-moses-to-malachi/?utm_source=iContact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=scot-maurine-proctor&utm_content=Tuesday+July+5%2C+2022. Sister Vivian McConkie quotes her father, Bruce R. McConkie, who stated: “After the days of Moses, the ruling, governing, theocratic power in Israel was the Aaronic Priesthood. But most of the time, if not at all times, there were prophets and seers and congregations of brethren who held the Melchizedek Priesthood, which enabled them to perform celestial marriages. (A New Witness for the Articles of Faith, 506). Sister McConkie further  opined that “Lehi held Melchizedek priesthood and keys sufficient to lead his family to a promised land with fully functioning temples and no Aaronic or preparatory priesthood. That he, Jeremiah, and Ezekial were quorum associated seems likely.” She also comments on how the Lord “directed the prophet Samuel to prepare Saul for [his kingly] office with sacred instruction on the roof of the Seer’s house. The circumstances might suggest to us a priesthood endowment, followed by an anointing the next morning naming Saul as Captain of the Lord’s inheritance, or Israel’s king. The king of the Lord’s inheritance can only be Melchizedek priesthood bearing. (1 Sam. 9:25, 10:1) Immediately Saul is found prophesying among the prophets who also held Melchizedek priesthood. (1 Sam. 10: 5-6, 10-13) . . . It is on this wise that David and Solomon came to rule Israel in their turn–holding Melchizedek priesthood. Solomon built the temple David envisioned. Temple construction and implementation is the province of the high priesthood only. Elders and seventies cannot assume this obligation.”

Elder McConkie also taught “that the righteous dead who lived from the day of Adam to the time when Christ broke the bands of death ‘were with Christ in his resurrection’ (D&C 133:54-56)” with “celestial bodies,” citing Matt. 27:52-53. Mormon Doctrine, 639. See also Hel. 14:25; 3 Nephi 23:9-13. How could all these saints receive celestial bodies if they had not kept the celestial law, including receiving the ordinances of exaltation—temple ordinances?

[17] Sidney B. Sperry, “Ancient Temples and Their Functions,” Ensign, January 1972; see also Richard O. Cowan, Temples Dot the Earth, Cove Fort, 1997, 11–13.

[18] Baker and Ricks, Who Shall Ascend into the Hill of the Lord? 644. In concluding that Mormon and Moroni understood “all the sacred rites and ordinances which were necessary to salvation,” it appears that Baker and Ricks were referring to salvation in the Celestial Kingdom of God, or, in other words, “exaltation.” Citing D&C 124:38, which affirms that the Tabernacle and Solomon’s temple were built to administer ordinances “hid from before the world was,” they reason that “the Lord’s people in these Old Testament times had access to at least some temple ordinances.” Ibid. 26-27.

[19] Baker and Ricks, Who Shall Ascend into the Hill of the Lord? 332, bracketed translation by Peter C. Craigie, “Psalms 1-50,” Word Biblical Commentary (Waco, Texas: Word Books, 1961), 19.

[20] Ibid. 47.

[21] “Does the Book of Mormon plagiarize the King James Bible?” FAIR: Faithful Answers, Informed Response, https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Bible_passages_in_the_Book_of_Mormon#cite_note-1. Compare Welch, Illuminating the Sermon at the Temple, 179-85 (in adducing evidence and arguments countering the claim that Joseph Smith “plagiarized” the Book of Mormon Sermon at the Temple from the biblical Sermon on the Mount, Welch argues that “for one who believes that Joseph Smith received any part of the book through the gift and power of God, it is a relatively small step from there to believe the Sermon at the Temple was similarly translated and dictated under the direction of divine inspiration; that is, if the spiritual mechanisms or procedures were in place to accomplish the translation of the some ninety-five percent of the book that has no biblical counterpart, those mechanisms could just as well have supplied the rest,” in which case God could have “projected a text similar to the biblical texts through Joseph Smith” or “brought the English texts of the Bible especially to Joseph’s memory as those words were appropriate and helpful in producing the Book of Mormon translation”).

[22] “Royal Skousen: My Testimony of the Book of Mormon, Scholarly and Personal,” FAIR, https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/testimonies/scholars/royal-skousen. His critical text was published in The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press), 2009.

[23] “Does the Book of Mormon plagiarize the King James Bible?” FAIR.

[24] Scripture Central, John W. Welch Notes, “3 Nephi 24,” https://archive.bookofmormoncentral.org/sites/default/files/archive-files/pdf/welch/2020-09-29/3_nephi_20-26_formatted.pdf.

[25] “Mormon and Moroni likely knew from additional records available to them what the Savior taught on this occasion. The context in 3 Nephi suggests that the resurrected Jesus spoke to His Twelve [disciples] about covenants, priesthood, and sealing. Thus, when speaking to Joseph Smith, Moroni’s variation of Malachi’s words may well have been based directly on the clarifications and teachings of the Lord that aren’t found in the Book of Mormon.” Doctrine and Covenants Central KnoWhy #591, “Why Did Moroni Quote Malachi about Elijah’s Coming?” January 19, 2021, https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/knowhy/why-did-moroni-quote-malachi-about-elijahs-coming/. Of course, when Moroni visited Joseph Smtih he was resurrected (JS-H 1:30-33) and, as Keith Thompson points out, “presumably walk[ed] and talk[ed] with Christ and God and others of the ancient prophets, including potentially Malachi himself” (Thompson, 9). Thus, what Moroni then knew about Malachi’s prophesy in all probability far exceeded what he and Mormon would have gleaned from the Nephite records to which they each had access in mortality. In giving Joseph Smith the King James translation of Malachi 4:5-6 for 3 Nephi 25:5-6 and later directing Moroni to amplify on that translation in his first appearance to the Prophet (and to later direct that this amplification be canonized in D&C 2), the Lord was not only teaching Joseph, but all who would sincerely read and study His revelations, “line upon line” and “precept upon precept.”

[26] Gerald Hansen Jr., "Gathering to the Temple: Teachings of the Second Day," in The Book of Mormon: 3 Nephi 9–30, This Is My Gospel, Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, 1993, 211–23, quoting Bruce R. McConkie, Promised Messiah, 609.

[27] Smith, Schooling the Prophet, 146.