Wednesday, November 29, 2023

Keys to Understanding Isaiah

Nephi’s Six keys to understanding Isaiah:

 

Key No. 1: Be “filled with the spirit of prophecy”

Key No. 2: Learn “manner of prophesying among the Jews”

Key No. 3: Know concerning the “Judgments of God”

Key No. 4: Live in the last days

Key No. 5: Be familiar with the “regions round about” Jerusalem

Key No. 6: Search diligently


Donald Parry on no. 2: 


Key No 2: Learn the “Manner of Prophesying among the Jews” (2 Nephi 25:1)

 

Nephi held Key #2 to be of sufficient import that he referred to it several times in the first six verses of 2 Nephi 25: “the manner of the Jews” (v. 2); “the things of the prophets” (v. 5); “the things which were spoken unto the Jews” (v. 5); “the manner of the things of the Jews” (v. 5); and “the manner of the Jews” (v. 6). In my view, this “manner of prophesying” pertains to Isaiah’s use of poetic parallelisms, symbols, prophetic speech forms, and much more. Symbols and parallelisms are two barriers that we must overcome to understand Isaiah . . . . (Donald W. Parry, Search Diligently The Words of Isaiah [Provo, Utah: BYU Religious Studies Center; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2023], 43)