Family Ties...

I read the stuff Paul sent on Great-Grandpa Alfred Kern – awesome! It was cool to be able to learn more about the guy I heard about years ago when I did my family history class. It got me thinking about families and where we all came from – according to a science book I read we’re all genetic accidents that just “happened” to come together by chance to form human life or the current modern theory is that half our DNA is floating all around us and the other half is floating out in space somewhere and when the two meet BAM-O! human life emerges. Science aside, if you look at our genealogical line we’re related to some pretty cool people – kings, queens, conquerors, the conquered, big-name important people, as well as seemingly-unimportant small people.

This is all pertinent because I’m in Ether right now reading about dysfunctional families in chapters eight and nine. To set the scene, the Jaredites have been in the Promised Land for many generations, they’ve gone through the righteousness and pride cycle multiple times and they’re being bad again, Omer is the king and his son is Jared – Jared rebels, the kingdom is divided and Omer is carried away captive by his son where, he serves in captivity – I’m thinking something along the lines of King Limhi and the Lamanite king roughly 130 B.C. Jared’s younger brothers rebel and restore their father, Omer, to the throne once more. Jared’s daughter sees that this makes him sad and suggests that he talk to Akish, the neighborhood bad boy, and have him dig up the secret combinations that got Cain in trouble in the first place and bring Jared his father’s/Omer’s/the king/her grandfather’s, head in exchange for her hand in marriage. One has to pause and think about that a minute – moving right along. There’s a party, Akish is invited, he sees the daughter doing the sexy dance and requests her hand in marriage – Jared agrees on one condition, his father’s head. Now what gets me about this story is that instead of acting alone, Akish enlisted the help of his cronies and together they all swear by everything you shouldn’t swear by to be naughty and to not rat each other out – which by the way is never a good idea. The Lord warns Omer to leave, which he does, the kingdom is divided, again, Jared is made king, again, over his portion of the kingdom and even though Akish didn’t fulfill his end of the bargain Jared gives Akish and his daughter his blessing and they get married. But wait! The soap opera continues – Akish decides to kill his father-in-law the king as well as his son, his other son, Nimrah, decides his dad/the king has lost his marbles and leaves town with his friends and lives with Omer, his mother’s grandfather whom she previously wanted dead – reminded me of the children of Amulon and the other priests of Noah how they refused to be called by their fathers names and joined the Nephites. Jared’s portion of the kingdom self-destructs and the 30 people who are left rejoin Omer and the kingdom is united again. Peace is restored, Omer dies and his son Emer reigns in righteousness.

Several thoughts – I’m not trying to be flippant I’m trying to understand what they were thinking, as Dad would say, they weren’t; seriously though, what was the daughter thinking? Her son and her father were both killed by her husband, the kingdom was divided and ultimately destroyed and almost everyone died, while I realize we all have to die at some point, some ways are definitely ranked higher than others. That is one family reunion I would not like to go too and makes me realize my family is all right.