In the second chapter of this great book Lehi is commanded to take his family and depart into the wilderness. Wilderness themes are developed in the Bible and Book of Mormon and the symbolism centers around the Fall and Man's resultant condition of mortal life. The pillars of salvation, Creation, Fall, and Atonement are developed in both sets of scripture.
Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden of Eden as a result of the Fall. Mortal life become a probationary state as mankind struggles through this wilderness experience. This theme is repeated with the Egyptian bondage, exodus, and journey of the children of Israel in the wilderness. Perhaps the end is explained better in the Book of Mormon as our mortal life become a walk back to the presence of the Father.
In the Old Testament the journey of Israel finding their way back to God is described as a duration of 38 years. In Deuteronomy it states, "And the space in which we came from Kadesh-barnea, until we were come over the brook Zered, was thirty and eight years" (Deuteronomy 2: 14). This matches a New Testament incident where a man lay at the Pool of Bethesda for 38 years. Those stranded there are described as "impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered" and represent all of us if we are trying to make the journey without Christ. (see John 5: 3, 5).
At the end of the wilderness experience lies the Promised Land, symbolizing exaltation in God's kingdom. We are brought back into the presence of God.
There is strong similarity between the Eden departure and Lehi's Jerusalem departure.
Lehi leaves with his family and minimal provisions. Lehi "left his house, and the land of his inheritance, and his gold, and his silver, and his precious things, and took nothing with him, save it were his family, and provisions, and tents, and departed into the wilderness" (1 Nephi 2: 4).
The tents mentioned here are highlighted as a temple motif, since they would be necessary provisions already listed. Notice in the text how often Nephi speaks of returning "to the tent of my father." In the Old Testament, tent and tabernacle are the same Hebrew word. The Garden of Eden was the world's first temple, of which the Lord said, "Every precious stone was thy covering" (see Ezekiel 28: 13). Adam and Eve left Eden, the temple site, and with it the paradise of God with all its precious stones. Lehi left Jerusalem, the site of Solomon's Temple, and left behind his "precious things." The tent or tabernacle in the wilderness becomes a transitory site for temple worship.
The Lord made "coats of skins" as a covering for Adam and Eve (Genesis 3: 21). This would require an animal sacrifice to provide the skins. The foreshadowing is clear. The Hebrew word for coat or covering is kaphar, and is the same word for atonement. The Hebrew word for skins in this verse is actually singular, and has as its primary definition "the skin of a man." It makes you wonder Whose skin is actually being sacrificed. Click here for a link. When Lehi left Jerusalem he "built an altar of stones, and made an offering unto the Lord" (1 Nephi 2: 7). Adam also offered sacrifice out of sheer obedience, and later was given a reason for this commandment. "The angel spake, saying: This thing is a similitude of the sacrifice of the Only Begotten of the Father, which is full of grace and truth" (Moses 5: 7).
Many Bible scholars believe Eden was located on a mountain top, which makes sense since it's a temple site. Such scholars cite the river flowing out of Eden, which parts into four heads, as evidence that it originated on a mountain top and flowed downhill in the four cardinal directions (see Genesis 2: 10).
Lehi "pitched his tent in a valley by the side of a river of water" (1 Nephi 2: 6). He had left Jerusalem, the area of the Temple Mount) and went downhill to a valley he named after his son, Lemuel. Here he built an altar. The Hebrew name Lemuel means "for God." In Ezekiel a river of water flows from the east of the temple (see Ezekiel 47: 1-5). During the Feast of Tabernacles (think tent) the water libation poured on the altar creates a symbolic river running down the steps of the temple. In the Book of Mormon the river of water, the altar, the tent, the mountain, and a name meaning "for God" all combine to produce great temple imagery!
In Eden there was a "tree of life also in the midst of the garden" (Genesis 2: 9). Just eight chapters into the Book of Mormon, Lehi has a dream involving the tree of life, where the multitudes of the earth are on a wilderness journey in an attempt to find the tree of life and partake of its fruit, representing the love of God, and His atoning sacrifice that would ultimately bring us back into His presence and arrive in the Promised Land.
As Nephi is finishing the narration of his father's vision, which is a temple-like experience, and immediately before he begins the narration of his own temple-like experience beginning in 1 Nephi, chapter 11, he states,
"And all these things, of which I have spoken, were done as my father dwelt in a tent (think temple), in the valley of Lemuel" (1 Nephi 10: 16).
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