Cover image via Gospel Media Library. 

Admit it: at some point in the past, when you read the Book of Mormon, you skipped the dreaded Isaiah chapters in 1 and 2 Nephi. You may have even said to yourself, “What is the point of these chapters? They are difficult to read, and I don’t get anything out of them.” Without getting too specific and without going verse-by-verse to explain their meaning, I hope to give you “the big picture” of what these chapters are all about.

Stated simply, these chapters are about fulfilling the Abrahamic covenant through the scattering of the house of Israel and the gathering of the righteous remnant of Israel, along with the Gentiles of the earth. We know because Christ himself explained this to us. In 3 Nephi 20:11-13, we read:

…when the words of Isaiah should be fulfilled—behold they are written, ye have them before you, therefore search them—And verily, verily, I say unto you, that when they shall be fulfilled then is the fulfilling of the covenant which the Father hath made unto his people, O house of Israel. And then shall the remnants, which shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth, be gathered in from the east and from the west, and from the south and from the north; and they shall be brought to the knowledge of the Lord their God, who hath redeemed them.

One of the two major purposes of the Book of Mormon, as stated on its title page, is to “to show unto the remnant of the house of Israel what great things the Lord hath done for their fathers; and that they may know the covenants of the Lord, that they are not cast off forever.” Note that, when speaking of the remnant of the house of Israel, Moroni, the author of the title page, like Christ, also speaks of the “covenants of the Lord.” This refers to the Abrahamic covenant. We cannot understand the “point” of the Isaiah chapters without first understanding the Abrahamic covenant.

We read about the Abrahamic covenant in Abraham 2:9-11.

And I will make of thee [Abraham] a great nation, and I will bless thee above measure, and make thy name great among all nations, and thou shalt be a blessing unto thy seed after thee, that in their hands they shall bear this ministry and Priesthood unto all nations; And I will bless them through thy name; for as many as receive this Gospel shall be called after thy name, and shall be accounted thy seed, and shall rise up and bless thee, as their father; And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee… for I give unto thee a promise that this right shall continue in thee, and in thy seed after thee … shall all the families of the earth be blessed, even with the blessings of the Gospel, which are the blessings of salvation, even of life eternal.

Through Abraham, God creates a new people that will comprise “all the families of the earth,” including Gentiles (Abraham 2:11; cf. Genesis 12:3), one that publishes peace throughout the land. Abraham’s posterity inherits this task and covenant and “they shall bear this ministry and priesthood to all nations” (Abraham 2:9). Eventually, the nation of Israel is born. But Israel, Abraham’s descendant, hardens its heart against the Holy One of Israel, misunderstands the Abrahamic covenant and seeks, like other nations, for wealth, power, and dominion. Thus, Israel gradually turns away and becomes estranged from God.

The writings of Isaiah in 1 and 2 Nephi focus mostly on three topics. First, wayward Israel hardens its heart against the Lord and gets into a lot of trouble (2 Nephi 12-15). Second, Israel is then scattered to the four corners of the earth and reduced to a remnant of a once great nation (2 Nephi 16-22). As Nephi says, “…it appears that the house of Israel, sooner or later, will be scattered upon all the face of the earth…” (1 Nephi 22:3). Finally, the remnant of scattered Israel will be gathered back in, along with the Gentiles, and its enemies will be defeated (1 Nephi 20-22; 2 Nephi 6-8 and 22-24).

Isaiah likens Israel to a once-glorious tree that has been cut down to a lifeless stump (2 Nephi 16:13; cf. Isaiah 6:13), but from which new life can spring. As I have suggested before, if you compare KJV Bible verses with other translations of the Bible, you often get a clearer understanding of what the Bible says. This is especially true for Isaiah 6:13 (2 Nephi 16:13). In the KJV, this verse reads, “But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return, and shall be eaten: as a teil tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them, when they cast their leaves: so the holy seed shall be the substance thereof.” This is hard to understand. But the Easy-to-Read Version (ERV) of the Bible renders this verse as, “A tenth of the people will be allowed to stay in the land, but it will be destroyed again. They will be like an oak tree. When the tree is chopped down, a stump is left. This stump will be a very special seed that will grow again.”

Have you ever seen a tree cut down, and yet new shoots sprout from the seemingly lifeless stump? Below is a photo of such a stump in my daughter’s backyard in Provo, Utah. That is Isaiah’s metaphor for the remnant of Israel, the stump of a once-mighty tree with new shoots growing from the stump.

       Photo credit: Newell D. Wright

So, the remnant of the once mighty Israel is scattered across the world. According to Isaiah, in the latter days, a righteous remnant will be gathered back in with the help of the Gentiles.

In a vision, Nephi sees the Bible, which “contains the covenants of the Lord which he hath made unto the house of Israel… wherefore they are of great worth unto the Gentiles” (1 Nephi 13:21 and 23). The Bible originally contained he Abrahamic covenant and its purpose is to make that covenant known unto the Gentiles. The Bible goes “from the Jews in purity unto the Gentiles, according to the truth which is in God.” (1 Nephi 13:25). Then the great and abominable church strips the Bible of many truths: “…behold, they have taken away from the gospel of the Lamb many parts which are plain and most precious; and also many covenants of the Lord have they taken away” (1 Nephi 13:26; see also verses 27-29). The result: “because of the things which are taken away out of the gospel of the Lamb, an exceeding great many do stumble…” (1 Nephi 13:29).

The Bible is supposed to go to the Gentiles, to help them gather scattered Israel in the last days and be adopted into Israel themselves. But the Bible is corrupted by the great and abominable church. To right this wrong to the Gentiles, the Lord brings forth the Book of Mormon to restore both Jew and Gentile to a knowledge of these covenants. Shortly after Joseph Smith had his first vision, the angel Moroni visited him, and, among other messages, “quoted the eleventh chapter of Isaiah, saying that it was about to be fulfilled” (JS-H 1:40). What in Isaiah 11 (2 Nephi 21) is about to be fulfilled?

While the complete answer to that question is beyond the scope of this article, verse 11 partially answers this question. “And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people …” (Isaiah 11:11; cf. 2 Nephi 21:11).

But what, specifically, does the Lord mean when he says that “he shall set his hand again the second time?” That refers to the coming forth of the Book of Mormon among the Gentiles.

In 2 Nephi 25:17, we read: “And the Lord will set his hand again the second time to restore his people from their lost and fallen state. Wherefore, he will proceed to do a marvelous work and a wonder among the children of men.” Any time the phrase “a marvelous work and a wonder” or “a marvelous work” is used in the Book of Mormon, it’s a direct reference to the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and the restoration of the Gospel.

Nephi ties it all together in 2 Nephi 29:1: “… [A]t that day when I shall proceed to do a marvelous work among them, that I may remember my covenants which I have made unto the children of men, that I may set my hand again the second time to recover my people, which are of the house of Israel.” Here the setting of his hand the second time to recover his “people which are of the house of Israel” is mentioned in conjunction with his marvelous work. But this time, he explains why: “That I may remember my covenants which I have made unto the children of men,” the Jews and the Gentiles.

So, in the Last Days, when the Lord sets forth his hand a second time, when the Gospel is restored and the Book of Mormon comes forth, the Lord will remember the covenants which he made with all of humankind, which were stripped out of the Bible along with other plain and precious truths.

Isaiah makes several other prophecies of the future, with the Gentiles helping to gather in scattered Israel and, with the Jews, become partakers of salvation. In 1 Nephi 21-22, Nephi himself reads Isaiah 49, then specifically comments on verses 22-23. Later, Jacob also preaches about these same two verses (2 Nephi 6-8). After fleeing from Jerusalem, Lehi’s household was a part of those scattered to the four corners of the earth and this is probably why Nephi included so much Isaiah in his writings. It was directly pertinent to his situation. And gathering the scattered remnant would have been particularly interesting to him, as that remnant would include Lehi’s posterity.

Let’s read what these verses from Isaiah 49 say about the gathering.

22 Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people; and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders.

23 And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers; they shall bow down to thee with their face towards the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord; for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me.

Nephi, in commenting on these two verses, says the following.

8 And after our seed is scattered the Lord God will proceed to do a marvelous work among the Gentiles, which shall be of great worth unto our seed; wherefore, it is likened unto their being nourished by the Gentiles and being carried in their arms and upon their shoulders. 

9 And it shall also be of worth unto the Gentiles; and not only unto the Gentiles but unto all the house of Israel, unto the making known of the covenants of the Father of heaven unto Abraham, saying: In thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed.

To summarize, God makes a covenant with Abraham, but Israel misunderstands this covenant, hardens its heart against God, and gets into a lot of trouble. God then causes Israel to be scattered among all the nations of the earth. In the latter days, God sets forth his hand the second time, brings forth the Book of Mormon, and restores the gospel, which will “sweep the earth as with a flood, to gather out mine elect from the four quarters of the earth” (Moses 7:62). He does this so that “all the families of the earth be blessed, even with the blessings of the Gospel, which are the blessings of salvation, even of life eternal” (Abraham 2:11).

That is the point of those (perhaps not so) dreaded Isaiah chapters in 1 and 2 Nephi. The gathering of Israel has repeatedly been talked about by church leaders, especially President Nelson, which should be an indication of the importance of those Isaiah chapters. Perhaps we ought to take them more seriously.

For further reading on this topic, I recommend John W. Welch’s “Getting through Isaiah with the Help of the Nephite Prophetic View,” in Isaiah in the Book of Mormon, ed. Donald W. Parry and John W. Welch (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1998), 19–45. I also highly recommend Joseph M. Spencer’s The Vision of All: Twenty-five Lectures on Isaiah in Nephi’s Record (2016, Greg Kofford Books).

Newell D. Wright is a professor of marketing and international business at North Dakota State University in Fargo, ND, USA. He is also a lifelong student of the Book of Mormon.