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Source:Nibley:CW06:Ch19:3
"...Have Place With Us"
"...Have Place With Us"
- Nephi's invitation to Zoram was: "If thou wilt go down into the wilderness to my father thou shalt have place with us (1 Nephi 4:34; italics added). Accordingly, after an exchange of oaths, "We . . . departed into the wilderness, and journeyed unto the tent of our father" (1 Nephi 4:38)—with their own tents, of course (1 Nephi 3:9). The first thing a suppliant does seeking "place" with a tribe is to "put up his tent near that of his protector, take a woolen string from his head and lay it around the neck of his new patron, saying, 'I seek protection with thee, O So-and-so.'" To this the answer is: "Be welcome to my authority! We receive all of you but what is bad. Our place is now your place."35 From that moment the newcomer is under the full protection of the sheikh and "has place" with the tribe. The immemorial greeting of welcome to those accepted as guests in any tent is Ahlan wa-Sahlan wa-Marḥaban: in which ahlan means either a family or (as in Hebrew) a tent, sahlan a smooth place to sit down, and marḥaban the courteous moving aside of the people in the tent so as to make room for one more. The emphasis is all on "having place with us."[1]
Notes
- ↑ Hugh W. Nibley, An Approach to the Book of Mormon, 3rd edition, (Vol. 6 of the Collected Works of Hugh Nibley), edited by John W. Welch, (Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Company ; Provo, Utah : Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1988), Chapter 19, references silently removed—consult original for citations.