Feasting on the Word by Richard Dilworth Rust

 

7/10

I read this one a little less than 7 months ago. I purchased it from a church bookstore during my mission and finally got around to reading it two decades later. It's a book about the literature of the Book of Mormon and had some very interesting insights. The topics covered were (1) Narrators and Narratives; (2) Epic Elements; (3) Poetry; (4) Sermons; (5) Letters and Autobiography; (6) Imagery; (7) Typology; and (8) Larger Perspectives. The Typology section was probably my favorite. I enjoyed this book for the most part, but you are bound to endure at least a little bit of less than entertaining moments in a book like this. Overall though, there were some very interesting insights that I had never seen before which were fun to discover.

I'll share one fun example from the Narrators and Narratives chapter. Rust talks about how there is an "ancient principle that repetition can help alert and convince people," especially threefold repetition. He uses the Ask, Seek, Knock as a common example where a person is to speak, then move, then use "vigorous action - each operation more intense than the last." He then points out several examples of this concept that is found in the Book of Mormon. One example of "a given event happening three times with a crucial change introduced the third time" is with the three visits to Laban to get the brass plates. "Each effort is put into motion by a pledge, and the pledges become more and more intense." "Nephi is three times 'constrained by the Spirit' to kill [Laban]." "Nephi thinks of three reasons why he could be justified in taking Laban's life" After Laban is killed, "Nephi then makes three levels of appeal to Zoram." Before they return to their parents, "A three-part pattern is found as well in Sariah's lament to Lehi" which is "counterbalanced by Sariah's three-part praise uttered at the return of her sons." "For his part, Nephi affirms that he and his father [(1)] obtained the records, [(2)] searched these scriptures, and [(3)] carried the records with them so the Lord's commandments could be preserved."