“And If They Repented Not and Confessed Not, Their Names Were Blotted Out”

Brant Gardner

The blotting out of the name was a serious consequence for those who believed that their association with that name was essential to their salvation. Remember that:

Acts 4:12

12 Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.

Without the name the person is damned. This terrible consequence of blotting out the name required that every opportunity for sincere repentance be recognized. This is the reason that both before the statement of the penalty, and after it, we have the statement that repentance was allowed and recognized. The intent was to maintain the faithful community rather than to cut one off from it. All of us fall short of perfection, or even of expectations. Repentance is one of the most marvelous of all of the principles of the gospel, and we must all take full advantage of sincere repentance. Of course, there is the recognition that repentance might be a form, and not an impulse of the heart. For that reason the repentance is qualified as “with real intent.”

Multidimensional Commentary on the Book of Mormon

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