25. Biblical Compilation

Many plain and precious things pertaining to God's Salvation have been removed and lost from the Bible as kept by the Jews and cannonized by Traditional Christianity (1 Nephi 13:26, 32, 34, TPJS p. 9 and 327) And though we recognize and thank the hand of the Jews for preserving what they have so done in the Bible record, we also recognize that it is not all correct and many parts have been lost and/or corrupted. This was the prime consideration in Joseph Smith's work of the Inspired Version of the Bible. And even there the work of restoring all is undone and imcomplete.

Thus apart from, though partner to, the Enigma of a Jewish prepared Old Testament and the understandable skewed slant that bias would bring, is the time factor involved in human errors of the preparation of the Old Testament which does account for much that is lost. It is widely accepted that the Jewish 'Old Testament' was not begun to be compiled as we have it today until after the Babylonian captivity. Perhaps beginning with the exiled prophet Ezekiel who was commanded to write the record of the Jew by the instructions of the Lord as recorded in Ezekiel chapter 37.

What is of some interest is that this is not the first time that such a commandment was given to man. Scripture which is missing from the Jewish prepared Old Testament records that among the promises to Joseph of Egypt is found one such insrtuction. The latter-day prophet Joseph Smith is the supplier of this information from the inspired version of the Bible as follows:

Now whether the plates of brass, as kept by Laban's and Lehi's ancestors, were a part of this record of the House of Joseph may be discussed, but certainly the Book of Mormon and even the more modern latter-day scriptures do qualify as being written by the fruit of the loins of Joseph of Egypt. And the book of Ezekiel was not the first time where/when/that the Lord had stated that both the Houses of Joseph and of Judah would write their separate accounts of the history of Israel. Interesting also to note is that Moses, the writer of the first five books of the Old Testament and of the Brass Plates could well be considered to also, like the House of David, have of dual inheritence, both in Joseph and in Levi, having claim to parentage as explained in item number 8 previous. Therefore Moses could be cosidered as being of the fruit of the loins of Joseph and the first writer of the scriptural text.

Therefore, while Joseph's seed was given the promised blessing of responsibility to write beginning in the days of Joseph, as it was given directly to Joseph in his promises, the Jewish record records no such responsibility is recorded upon the Jews until it is recorded in the book of Ezekiel in the reference just given. Jeremiah the immediate prior writer of scripture was of the land of Benjamin and Benjamin Levi according to his place of birth. Joshua the writer after Moses was definately of the tribe of Ephraim. And even Samuel was recorded to be the son of an Ephrathite, though he is given in Chronicles as having a Levi family tree. And thus as discussed earlier, even Samuel the author of Judges and likely the book of Ruth was either an Ephraimite Levite or a Ephraimite dedicated to the Lord by his mother and thus assumed a Levitical ancestry from such an adoptive source, perhaps even his mother's over his father's. Even David and Solomon's writings would come under the scope of being those of the fruit of the House of Joseph as set out in these pages.

Now Lehi refers to the plates of brass of Laban as being the record of the Jews. But that was in a day when Israel as a nation had been scattered among the northern nations and even though Lehi and Laban where both of the lineage and house of Joseph, they were part of the nation of the Jews and were refered to as Jews by all others and even by themselves, calling themselves Jews or of the Jewish nation. Thus the point is that in a very real sense the Old Testament as we have it today was not compiled and written from whatever selected prior records until after the Babylonian captivity, beginning with Ezekiel.

Thus the Old Testament must be read with that understanding. The books of Moses where edited and compiled by the Jewish scribes after 600 BC, not before. Such editing took on the effect of leaving out or cutting from the record such selected texts and books as the compilers felt where no longer in effect for the remaining Jewish nation. Thus it is not surprising that such records as those of Zenos, Zenock, and Ezias who dealt primarily with the House of Israel as that of Joseph's seed and right, and the prophecies of the scattering such as the allegory of the tame and wild olive trees where not included in the Jewish compiled Old Testament dated after 600 BC.

And this is obvious in the editorial commentary which accompanies much of the compiled Old Testament writings. Such editorial commentary was certainly not part of the original texts but added in as later commentary by the compilers to make the scriptures more understandable from their limited perspectives. Such is the example about the Explanation of Ephrath and Bethlehem as compiled from the record of Moses in his first book now called Genesis.

Now Bethlehem was the later name given by the Jews to the place prior known in the days of Jacob as Ephrath. Ephrath meaning 'fruitful' and the name by which Joseph named his second son Ephraim after. Jacob would have called it Ephrath. Moses would have only known it by the name of Ephrath and it would have only been the later compilers of the Jews which would have put in such a qualifying and explanitory phrase as 'which is Bethlehem.'

And so it is throughout the Old Testament text. Whenever in the same such things as 'even unto this day,' they are not speaking a direct quote from the original author of the ancient text but as an explanitory qualifying note of explanation from the stand point of the later Jewish editor and compiler of the record written and compiled after 600 BC. Thus one needs be careful as to what the orignal author did say and what the later editor and compiler of the record did record, explain according to them, add to or delete from the orignal text.

As is obvious from the many New Testament scriptural references to the prophecies of Jesus which are no longer available in the ancient texts, one must understand that they were so later removed as they were apparently had even at the time of Christ. Thus this compilation and editing did continue even after the time of 600 BC down and until after the time of Christ. From modern scripture we know that Moses, Adam and many of the other prophets did speak many precious things concerning Christ and his gospel which never made it into the Jewish cannon of the Old Testament and the records which we have today.

Many of these can only be implied such as Philip's statement that Moses and the prophets had written that Christ was the son of Joseph. That is Joseph of Egypt, as Joseph the husband of Mary would not have understandably been known to them. Further when the Pharisees state the they 'well say that Christ was a Samaritan', it implies much greater understanding upon their part that Christ was legally the descendant of the House of Joseph and Ephraim as well as the blood of Judah through Boaz. These implied understandings must be considered as evidences and hints as to the nature of the scriptures and writings which have been lost, edited out and withheld over the belated compilation of the Old Testament text by the compilers of the Jewish Bible.