A Book and A Lot of Hands

Omni

Omni 1:1-2 Behold, it came to pass that I, Omni, being commanded by my father, Jarom, that I should write somewhat upon these plates, to preserve our genealogy. But behold, I of myself am a wicked man, and I have not kept the statutes and the commandments of the Lord as I ought to have done.

This story is about a man named Omni and his father and his son and his son’s brother and his son’s brother’s son and his son’s brother’s son’s son.

We know very little about all these fathers and brothers and sons. Some were righteous and content and others, like Omni, were not. We don’t know much about Omni, only that he was displeased with himself. He wrote, “I am not a very good person.” But that is remarkable because even though he didn’t think he was a very good person, he still took the time to write it down in the book. And that must have been hard or awkward or embarrassing. But he did it because it was something his father asked him to do.

You see, his father had been the prophet. And before Omni’s father died, he called Omni into his room. When Omni came, his father was holding a big metal book. You might recognize it. Remember how prophets wrote on precious metal because precious metal was the most eternal thing they knew and they wanted their writings to last a long time. Well, it turns out, just because the book hasn’t broken or shredded or decomposed, that doesn’t mean the book is still alive. Because for a book to come alive, it doesn’t just need to have words and intact pages and a functioning spine. It also needs a reader. And this book was not just in need of a reader, it was still in need of a writer. Because the book wasn’t finished yet.

“Son,” Omni’s father said, “take this book and keep writing miracles, revelations, and adventures until you arrive at the ending. And if you don’t arrive at the ending before you die, give it to your son and tell him to keep writing. And if he doesn’t come to the end, he must pass it on. And we must keep writing and writing until the book is all filled up. Hopefully, by then we will have arrived at a proper ending.”

But Omni didn’t know what to write. His father and his grandfather and his great-grandfather had lived such remarkable lives, full of adventure, miracles, travel, revelation, progress and discovery. Compared to them, Omni’s life had been uneventful, unremarkable, and even a little depressing. And at the end of his life, he decided he must not have been much of a righteous man to have so little to add to such a righteous book. And so he passed it to his son. “Keep writing until you come to a better ending,” he said. And that son would grow old and write in the book and then give it to his brother and say the same thing.

This soon became a problem because the book that all these fathers and sons and brothers were writing in was made of metal. And while metal is strong, it is not as thin or as light as paper, like the book you are reading. Compared to metal, paper is thin and light and you can fit a lot of pages between two covers. Paper is also nice because when you are done reading, you can fold the corner over to mark your place. But you should know that some people don’t like folded corners. “Why did you not use a bookmark?” they will say. “Soon the corners will fall off. Then it will be much harder to turn the page.”

So there are at least two downsides to paper. It is thin enough to give you a paper cut. And it is very tear-able. You could tear it right now if you wanted. But please don’t. That would prove the point but this page would never be the same because while paper is convenient, it is also perishable.

While metal is much less perishable, it also has a downside: you cannot fit as many pages between the covers without it becoming so heavy that no one can lift it.

And so the fathers and sons and brothers who kept writing in the metal book started to write less and less so that there would still be room for their sons to write. Nobody wanted to be the person who used the last page. Or the last part of the last page. And definitely not the last corner of the last part of the last page. Because no one thought their life was good enough, or grand enough, or satisfactory enough to be the ending.

They just lived plain, mediocre lives: people working, parents raising kids, electing presidents, finding friends, moving to new homes, doing dishes. There were good times and bad times. People fought. People played. Some notable things happened, but nothing big enough to end the big, heavy, important book. But eventually, even the last corner and the last part of the last page were filled and the book ended.

And while all these sons and all these fathers and brothers kept waiting for a better ending, they were writing it. And God has preserved their words just like he preserved Abraham’s and Moses’ and Lehi’s and Nephi’s. And thousands of years later we can shout back across time and say, “Omni, God remembered you and your children too. And we will remember you.”

And perhaps Omni and his children were not as bad as they supposed. Because they were just the sort of ending their fathers and mothers and grandfathers and grandmothers and great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers had and lived and died for: so that their children could live normal, plain, imperfect, beautifully boring lives. Because a life lived, is a life lived.

Joshua is an award-winning writer and director. His recent book, Ali the Iraqi, was published by BCC press. Sarah is a literature and theology doctoral student studying the Book of Job in the twentieth century.

Artwork by Maddie Baker.