“They Shall Eat the Fruit of Their Doings”

Brant Gardner

Literary analysis: Verses 10 and 11 are a paired set. Each describes a type of people, and a result that will come to them. This particular pairing is one of antithesis rather than similarity. Thus there is a contrast created between the people of the first and people of the second.

Even among such destruction, the Lord comforts the righteous. The Lord understands that even as he is condemning Jerusalem and Judah as a whole that there will be in Jerusalem and Judah those individuals who remain righteous even in the face of the greater sin of the community. To those righteous the Lord speaks comfort. The reward listed is "for they shall eat the fruit of their doings." In the context of the passages of famine, the ability to "eat" and the generally positive connotation of "fruit" make this a positive blessing.

Where the righteous of the first set are contrasted with the wicked in the next verse, the "rewards" of the two groups are remarkably similar. Both phrases of "reward" indicate that each will receive what they have worked to receive. In each, the "reward" phrase is the same, but the effect is totally different, due to the nature of what each group has earned.

Thus the Lord not only highlights the difference between the righteous and the wicked, but notes that justice will supply to each the rewards of their actions.

Multidimensional Commentary on the Book of Mormon

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