Old Testament

Week 4: The Fall; Adam & Eve in the world; Cain & Abel 

Genesis 3–4; Moses 4:1–6:9 

30 September 2021

• James E. Talmage, “The Earth and Man,” an address given in the Tabernacle at Temple Square, Salt Lake City, Sunday, 9 August 1931. The Church published this address several times; one version was in Instructor 100, no. 12 (December 1965): 474–77, concluded in Instructor 101, no. 1 (January 1966): 9–11, 15.

• Daniel C. Peterson, “Nephi and His Asherah,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 9, no. 2 (2000): 16–25. Peterson, a retired professor of Arabic and Near Eastern Studies at BYU, connects the tree of life in the Garden of Eden and Lehi₁’s vision to the divine feminine.

• Jolene Edmunds Rockwood, “Eve’s Role in the Creation and the Fall to Mortality,” from Women and the Power Within (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1991), 49–62. Rockwood explores the symbolism of the Fall and the unity and shared responsibility of Adam and Eve, and men and women today.

• “Race and the Priesthood,” Gospel Topics Essays. This Church-published essasy explores the origins of the ban on ordaining men of African descent to the priesthood.

• “Mormonism and the ‘curse of Cain’”, FAIR.