Cwic Clips- The Beatitudes, The Temple & Lehi's Dream

The Beatitudes seem to take place in a temple/ritual setting with significant temple imagery. Lehi's Dream is compared.

but going through this type of a filter

understanding that the temple is a part

of the Scriptures helps us understand

that the doctrine that is being drawn

from the by the prophets and given to

the people is doctrine that is drawn

from the temple and oftentimes we may go

to the temple we go through the

ordinances we sit and listen we know

we're serving we are serving those on

the other side of the veil but there is

an immense amount of doctrine that we

get specifically in the temple that is

something that has really helped me a

lot to understand the Scriptures more

and to understand principles of the

gospel more is just really focusing on

what I learn as I go through the temple

and the doctrine that is presented there

that helps me understand more what I

find in the scriptures and we look then

at the Beatitudes which are found in

verses 3 through 11 and each of these

verses begins with blessed are they or

blessed are ye but blessed are is how

they all begin these are called the

Beatitudes because they come from the

Latin term Beatus or beatus which

means fortunate or happy or joy one

thing I think about when thinking about

the meaning of the that term Beatitudes

is number one thinking of a temple again

is oil the anointing oil was known as

the oil of joy and so that is a

temple term that is used right there the

other would be the Tree of Life itself

is known as a tree of joy and a tree

of happiness and we think about the

terminology now we used to call God's

plan more the plan of salvation now from

the brethren we usually hear the term

plan of happiness and I think that we

can think of the plan of happiness also

not just in a sense of what brings us

joy because it does but if we put it

into a temple setting

we realize that as we get through the

temple to our end in the temple that the

plan of happiness is the plan of

progression toward the Tree of Life

which represents joy where he represents

happiness think of Lehigh's vision where

he had he's filled with joy as he gets

to the tree of life and partakes of the

fruit there and so that's what you

know that's what the Beatitudes mean it

means it means joy and so it puts us

a little bit more into a temple type of

terminology and setting one thing I

learned recently going down to verse

five where it is blessed are the meek

from Le Grand Baker and Stephen Rex in

their book who shall ascend into the

hill of the Lord one thing they bring up

is that for them the research that they

did that meek really means

covenant-keeping so that was something

very interesting to me that the meek

would inherit the earth but it is the

covenant keepers that would inherit the

earth or the obedient that are going to

inherit the earth so I thought that was

pretty interesting

going down to verse eight pure in heart

this is something that's kind of

interesting to me john welch talks about

this being completely in Aaronic

priesthood type of a chapter here as we

go through the Beatitudes but I I'm not

sure that's totally true verse eight is

the one where we hear about being pure

and heart and this seems much more like

a higher law in Melchizedek law the type

of a verse it's a requirement to reach

the Holy of Holies and to see the face

of God and we see this in a number of

other scriptures especially in the

Doctrine Covenants section 67 sections

ninety three sections 95 all talk about

being pure in heart as a requirement to

get to see the face of God and again

when we talk about seeing the face of

God we're talking about the temple also

that is a temple reference it is getting

through the veil to see the face of God

and so think of that and when we talk

in that filter that temple filter in the

scriptures well we whenever you see

the face of God think of the temple

think of going through the veil and as

you see the Beatitudes here the way

these apparently seem to be set up is

that these are requirements to be able

to get into the temple or to progress

through the temple we see this as

blessed are they blessed are thee Jesus

here obviously is talking or at least

he's speaking to his disciples

through his followers here but he's

referring third person to somebody else

blessed are the meek blessed are they

who and then all of a sudden he changes

that in verse 11 Jesus changes where he

says blessed are ye when men shall

revile you and persecute you and shall

say all manner of evil against you

falsely for my sake so he's been in the

third person they've gone through the

requirements here of everything that you

need to progress or to even get in

possibly to the temple and now he's

addressing them directly as if maybe

they now that you've gone through those

requirements and agreed to these

requirements

now we're addressing you directly as

initiates here this verse 11

makes me think about shame and again

referring back to Lehigh's vision which

could very well be a temple text a lot

of the verbiage there and the principles

there are a temple type of a text

but it makes me think about Lehi’s

vision and the great and spacious

building it is shame that is being cast

from the Great and spacious building to

those that are partaking of the fruit

that are having this joy so it's almost

as if it's a known thing being that this

is ritual and maybe something scripted

that Jesus is saying okay now that

you've gone through all of these

requirements understand that you may be

persecuted and that you may have shame

at you because of the way that you're

going to live because of the agreements

that you've made here in verse 13 we

talked about the salt of the earth and

again all I'm going to say on this is

this is we've heard perhaps the

idea of salt being part of a covenant

because it's used with sacrifices on an

altar all true but I would I would add

to that that we're talking about the

altar at the temple in the temple so

again it's another it's another

reference to the temple and then

fourteen ye are verse fourteen ye are

the light of the world this would be

tied directly to the menorah or even the

tree of life that we would have there or

the light that comes in at the very

beginning of the creation story so this

is that this is another temple reference

that we have