This post is not directly related to the Book of Mormon, but I wanted to share my thoughts nonetheless. Incidentally I noticed that both Adam and Abram entered into a "deep sleep" at one point.
And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam (Genesis 2:15)
And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram (Genesis 15:12)
This might be a coincidence. In a long text such as the Old Testament, it is natural that certain phrases will repeat. But I think that this is an intentional example of scriptural repetition. It seems that the account of Abram (who was later renamed and now better known as Abraham) refers to Adam in the Garden of Eden. My reason for this conclusion is that there is a relationship between these two events that I will try to explain in this post and that is more obvious in a Latter-Day Saint context.
When Adam wakes up there is a woman brought to him. A "help meet". This is the first marriage in the scriptures and symbolic for the marriage covenant in my view. There is a subtle clue in the original Hebrew in the form of "ha'adam". "ha" is the definite article in Hebrew, so God caused a deep sleep to fall upon "the Adam", which seems strange. But Adam means "man or "mankind" in Hebrew. A deep sleep fell upon the man or mankind. This is not just a story about Adam. The symbolism and relation to each of us is made clear in the temple. Eve, the mother of all living (which is more or less the literal translation from Hebrew), is brought to man and joined together to become one flesh.
From the deep sleep of Adam and the marriage covenant, we move on to the deep sleep of Abram and the Abrahamic covenant. Abraham's deep sleep has a covenant theme that is easily missed when we don't get the cultural context. In Hebrew, you don't enter into a covenant, you cut a covenant. That is a weird expression and naturally it is not translated like that into English. But the literal Hebrew term is cut a covenant. This has been described in a previous post:
In Old Testament tradition, a covenant agreement was formally made by cutting animals in half and walking between the carcasses. It symbolized "what happened to these animals will happen to me if I break this treaty". In a time when literacy was rare, this act was the (dramatic and a through a modern lens a bit grotesque) signature. This article elaborates on it.But the Abrahamic covenant is a special case. In Genesis 15, we read that Abraham chopped up the animals but instead of walking between them he fell asleep. Later, there was a fire passing between them instead. We have previously written about fire signifying God's presence on this blog. It was actually God signing the treaty saying that he should be cut in half if he didn't keep the covenant! This cannot happen of course, so Abraham had a sure promise that God would fulfill his covenant. God makes a lot of promises to Abraham and we learn that they apply to all those who are of his seed.
Abram means "exalted father". Later, as a consequence of the covenant he had made, God gave Abram the new name, Abraham, which means "father of a multitude". By coupling these two stories and covenants with the deep sleep, we move from "man" to "exalted father" to "father of a multitude". We move from a man and woman united by a covenant in marriage to a people and their God united in a covenant between heaven and earth. So there is a covenant context in both of these deep sleeps. But we read about covenants in the scriptures all the time so that alone is perhaps not enough to convince the reader that these two instances of deep sleep are related. There are no other apparent links between Adam and Abraham or the marriage covenant and Abraham's covenant in the Old Testament, at least not that I know of. In fact, there is not much about marriage as a covenant at all.
The marriage covenant and the idea of eternal marriage may have been one of the plain and precious truths that were eventually lost at some point before the Bible as we have it today was compiled. D&C 132 suggests so. It is about the new and everlasting covenant of marriage and states twice (in verses 40 and 45) that Joseph Smith has been appointed to "restore all things". In this chapter, Abraham is mentioned 20 times! Why would Abraham be discussed so much in relation to eternal marriage in the new and everlasting covenant? A closer look reveals several reasons.
- The plurality of wives is discussed in this chapter along with the principle of eternal marriage and the covenant in general. Abraham was one of the Old Testament prophets practicing plural marriage and is mentioned in that regard (see D&C 132:1, 34-37)
- Another reason why Abraham is brought up is that the sacrifices made to enter into the covenant (in this case especially related to plural marriage) are compared to the sacrifice required of Abraham, where he paradoxically was asked to offer up his own son, the heir of his promises (see verses 50-51).
- "Abraham received promises concerning his seed" (L&P 132:30). The intended way for God's children to have seed has always been through a marriage union. But there is more to that statement. Much more. As Abraham's seed, we also have access to the same covenants and promises. Reading on in verse 30, we see that his seed was not limited to mortality. Seed "innumerable as the stars" is a promise also to us who enter into the new and everlasting covenant (see verse 31). It is a promise about "a continuation of the forever and ever." (verse 19)
Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God. Behold, they were in the midst of darkness; nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word (Alma 5:7)
Alma talks about his fathers who awakened from a deep sleep and were illuminated by the everlasting word. Abraham woke up from a deep sleep to a covenant received by God's word
received all things, whatsoever he received, by revelation and commandment, by my word, saith the Lord, and hath entered into his exaltation and sitteth upon his throne. (D&C 132:29)