I thoroughly enjoyed all of Jared Halverson’s podcast/YouTube video commentary on Jacob 5-7 in The Book of Mormon Another Testament of Jesus Christ this past week.

Jacob 5 is all about the Allegory of the Olive Tree, which is all so interesting as a sweeping history/prophecy of the world. You can see a great diagram of it all below. See video above to hear all of his commentary.

Even though that is all so good, I especially loved even more what Jared had to say about the story of Sherem and Jacob in Jacob 7. Jared points out how prideful that Sherem was in saying that he knew that there could be no Christ, and then how he also told Jacob that there was no way Jacob could know that there is a God. Jared explains how prideful that is, to say, I can know that there is no God, but you can’t know that there is a God. So, he’s claiming that his epistemology, his method of gaining knowledge, is superior to Jacob’s epistemology. Jared says that at least with agnosticism, there’s humility, but atheism is full of pride. It reminds me of an old Trim Healthy Mama podcast where Danny says basically the same thing. Watch the video below around the 48 minute mark to hear those comments from Jared. I can’t remember which THM podcast it was where I heard Danny say the same thing. If I eventually find it I will put it here. It’s interesting how Jared quotes the Catholic writer Flannery O’Connor who said that for someone to be an atheist they have to know everything there is to know, which is impossible.