Utah Places: Rochester Panel

I have featured this image in posts her before. What do the strange pictures say?

I haven't a clue.

This panel is one of the largest and most magnificent specimens of its kind that I know of. Yet, asking learned men of the meaning gains me no insight, only confusion. They alway end up blaming me for not understanding their too-technical esoterica. Perhaps I am naive. I am as sophisticated as a comic book, perhaps. And maybe, just maybe, the creator of this particular presentation had something similar on his mind when he drew it

We'll never really know, for sure, will we.

Today, I stand back and let the experts conjecture and argue. I am just bemused by the mystery. And entranced by the shades of the so-long dead men, who so painstakingly crafted these images.

Nearby there is an excellent museum, for those who enjoy cultural antropology to accompany the field work. Thre is also a nice market and other accomodations in town for those requiring such things.

Write it down

In the opening chapter of Mosiah, one of the striking ideas raised is that even Lehi would have forgotten to instruct his people about many important truths, if they had not been written down.

Book of Mormon, Mosiah 1:1-5

Last spring I had some time to wander through several areas of Utah's remote deserts. Several times I stopped to look at petroglyphs and rock paintings left by some unknown people ages ago. Some of the figures are suggestive of the familiar, but most of them are only vaguely recognizable at best. It takes a bit of imagination to try to project meaning into these images. Who can guess what the artist was trying to communicate?

Our translations of the scriptures are testimony of King Benjamin's prophetic wisdom. I think it is no coincidence that the publication of scriptures corresponds exactly with the advent of the greatest epochs of expanding human knowledge over the course of history. If it isn't written down and available for study, it will all too soon be forgotten.