More on food/drink metaphors appearing together with judgment

I admit it's a strange connection that I posted about before, but there seems to be more examples than what can be brushed off as coincidence. I gave four in the last post. There are more. But first, let's recap:

• Book of Mormon prophets talk about standing before God to be judged according to our works
• The concept of the two ways (joy and misery) is used to explain different outcomes of that judgment
• This is frequently somehow associated with food and drink!

Lord Wilmore just posted about Alma 36, and I realized it's another example of this pattern. In that posts, there are some quotes with subtle hints to Lehi's dream with fruit and water. This connection is strengthened by the fact that Lehi uses the word, "taste" about the joy he experienced (see Alma 36:24). Since these metaphors were involved again, I was curious to see if this was another case of the identified pattern. Sure enough, we read in Alma 36:15

be brought to stand in the presence of my God, to be judged of my deeds.

The chiastic pattern of Alma 36 highlights the two ways where his torment turns into joy, and as already mentioned, Alma seems to connect them to the fruit and water in Lehi's dream.

Other examples that I found include 2 Nephi 9

22 And he suffereth this that the resurrection might pass upon all men, that all might stand before him at the great and judgment day...

44 O, my beloved brethren, remember my words. Behold, I take off my garments, and I shake them before you; I pray the God of my salvation that he view me with his all-searching eye; wherefore, ye shall know at the last day, when all men shall be judged of their works, that the God of Israel did witness that I shook your iniquities from my soul, and that I stand with brightness before him, and am rid of your blood.

45 O, my beloved brethren, turn away from your sins; shake off the chains of him that would bind you fast; come unto that God who is the rock of your salvation.

46 Prepare your souls for that glorious day when justice shall be administered unto the righteous, even the day of judgment, that ye may not shrink with awful fear; that ye may not remember your awful guilt in perfectness, and be constrained to exclaim: Holy, holy are thy judgments, O Lord God Almighty—but I know my guilt; I transgressed thy law, and my transgressions are mine; and the devil hath obtained me, that I am a prey to his awful misery.

47 But behold, my brethren, is it expedient that I should awake you to an awful reality of these things? Would I harrow up your souls if your minds were pure? Would I be plain unto you according to the plainness of the truth if ye were freed from sin?

48 Behold, if ye were holy I would speak unto you of holiness; but as ye are not holy, and ye look upon me as a teacher, it must needs be expedient that I teach you the consequences of sin.

49 Behold, my soul abhorreth sin, and my heart delighteth in righteousness; and I will praise the holy name of my God.

50 Come, my brethren, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters; and he that hath no money, come buy and eat; yea, come buy wine and milk without money and without price.

51 Wherefore, do not spend money for that which is of no worth, nor your labor for that which cannot satisfy. Hearken diligently unto me, and remember the words which I have spoken; and come unto the Holy One of Israel, and feast upon that which perisheth not, neither can be corrupted, and let your soul delight in fatness.

and Alma 12

12 And Amulek hath spoken plainly concerning death, and being raised from this mortality to a state of immortality, and being brought before the bar of God, to be judged according to our works.

13 Then if our hearts have been hardened, yea, if we have hardened our hearts against the word, insomuch that it has not been found in us, then will our state be awful, for then we shall be condemned.

14 For our words will condemn us, yea, all our works will condemn us; we shall not be found spotless; and our thoughts will also condemn us; and in this awful state we shall not dare to look up to our God; and we would fain be glad if we could command the rocks and the mountains to fall upon us to hide us from his presence.

15 But this cannot be; we must come forth and stand before him in his glory, and in his power, and in his might, majesty, and dominion, and acknowledge to our everlasting shame that all his judgments are just; that he is just in all his works, and that he is merciful unto the children of men, and that he has all power to save every man that believeth on his name and bringeth forth fruit meet for repentance.

16 And now behold, I say unto you then cometh a death, even a second death, which is a spiritual death; then is a time that whosoever dieth in his sins, as to a temporal death, shall also die a spiritual death; yea, he shall die as to things pertaining unto righteousness.

17 Then is the time when their torments shall be as a lake of fire and brimstone, whose flame ascendeth up forever and ever; and then is the time that they shall be chained down to an everlasting destruction, according to the power and captivity of Satan, he having subjected them according to his will.

18 Then, I say unto you, they shall be as though there had been no redemption made; for they cannot be redeemed according to God’s justice; and they cannot die, seeing there is no more corruption.

19 Now it came to pass that when Alma had made an end of speaking these words, the people began to be more astonished;

20 But there was one Antionah, who was a chief ruler among them, came forth and said unto him: What is this that thou hast said, that man should rise from the dead and be changed from this mortal to an immortal state, that the soul can never die?

21 What does the scripture mean, which saith that God placed cherubim and a flaming sword on the east of the garden of Eden, lest our first parents should enter and partake of the fruit of the tree of life, and live forever? And thus we see that there was no possible chance that they should live forever.

22 Now Alma said unto him: This is the thing which I was about to explain. Now we see that Adam did fall by the partaking of the forbidden fruit, according to the word of God; and thus we see, that by his fall, all mankind became a lost and fallen people.

23 And now behold, I say unto you that if it had been possible for Adam to have partaken of the fruit of the tree of life at that time, there would have been no death, and the word would have been void, making God a liar, for he said: If thou eat thou shalt surely die.

Note that verses 16-19 deal with the misery part of the two ways and later in the chapter the "joy" part is described several times as "enter into his rest".

While studying this concept, I came across this article. It's a good read but it doesn't talk about the connection with judgment that appears frequently. It does show that eating and drinking metaphors are very common in the Book of Mormon so it might be a coincidence that they appear in all these "stand before God to be judged" passages that I have shared so far. Still I think this particular connection and pattern is too frequent to be coincidental. If so, what is the explanation?

Could it simply be that Lehi's dream was considered so pivotal that other Book of Mormon prophets (Alma in particular) naturally thought of the gulf in the dream, representing God's justice, when talking about judgment day, and connected it to the tree and water metaphors that are central parts of the dream? As I mentioned in the previous post, I find it more likely that this connection has deeper and older origins, perhaps from portions of the brass plates not found in our current Bible. An interesting passage that we do have in our current Bible, but may have existed in an expanded version on the brass plates, is in the Garden of Eden. Here these two concepts of justice and food are found together: The flaming sword, representing God's justice, guards the tree of life with its fruit. Alma talks about this both in Alma 12 and 42, two of the chapters I have shared as examples of this pattern.

The idea of returning to the Garden of Eden is central in Judaism. Perhaps the Book of Mormon prophets imagined judgment day as the point where we symbolically stand by the gate of the way leading to the tree of life and God, according to his justice, determines if we get to partake or not? But there is probably more to it. Many of the food/drink metaphors seem to refer to things we should do in this life to prepare for that judgment, as well as rewards or punishment after the judgment.

I don't know if I will ever get quite to the bottom of this, but that's what I like about the Book of Mormon. There's always a reason to study further.