Bob Caswell has posted some remarks about his desire to better understand the temple through discussion with others. As I contemplated the ensuing conversation, I had a few thoughts that I intended to post as a comment, but when I went to submit them I felt like I should post them here instead. I hope that Bob doesn’t mind.
I post my thoughts cautiously, not because I fear the wrath of Constable Evans, but because the temple ceremony is very sacred and I do not want this conversation to disintegrate into anything inappropriate.
Have you ever noticed that copies of the scriptures are available in the temple foyer and in the chapel where you wait for your session to start, and copies of the scriptures are present and alluded to during the endowment ceremony but that there are no scriptures available in the celestial room. This is not likely an oversight…
I believe that the lack of scriptures in the celestial room may be part of the symbolism: that having entered into the presence of the Lord, you are supposed to take your questions directly to Him, with the expectation that according to your faith and according to his will, the Lord himself will reveal to you what you seek to know.
Elements of the ceremony emphasize that after having received essential information from the Lord through His authorized servants there is certain key information that is only received through a personal revelatory relationship with God. Even though the servants know the information and help to put you into contact with God, they do not impart it to you; you must receive it from the Lord yourself.
I think that, in this sense, the temple ceremony is self-referential. This idea is connected in my mind to 2 Nephi 9:41-43, which I think alludes quite specifically to the temple ceremony itself:
O then, my beloved brethren, come unto the Lord, the Holy One. Remember that his paths are righteous. Behold, the way for man is narrow, but it lieth in a straight course before him, and the keeper of the gate is the Holy One of Israel; and he employeth no servant there; and there is none other way save it be by the gate; for he cannot be deceived, for the Lord God is his name.
And whoso knocketh, to him will he open; and the wise, and the learned, and they that are rich, who are puffed up because of their learning, and their wisdom, and their riches– yea, they are they whom he despiseth; and save they shall cast these things away, and consider themselves fools before God, and come down in the depths of humility, he will not open unto them.
But the things of the wise and the prudent shall be hid from them forever–yea, that happiness which is prepared for the saints.
Those whom the Lord knows will enter into his presence, and those who know him not will find that their own learning and wisdom, no mater how great, is insufficient to gain entrance because they never received that essential portion that can only be obtained from Him directly.