But of course it's not just about a Mountain

Follow-up to: Brother, Have You Seen the Mountain?

In his last great address, one of the greatest mountaineers of our age said, “I don't blame anyone for not believing my history. If I had not experienced what I have, I could not have believed it myself.”

There are two mistakes that can be made about the testimony of the mountaineers. The first, that can be made be believers, is that men are fools for not believing. If Joseph Smith, a man that I regard as a prophet of God, could admit that he could have only believed his account by being an eyewitness of it, then can we expect any better of the rest of God's children? Those of us that have believed on the mountaineers' words can easily forget that, until we make the journey, there is nothing but their word that can inform us that there are, indeed, mountains, and not all of us are agreed on whether a man fits the criteria of an ideal witness. Some have not yet even decided that criteria for themselves, or even thought upon the matter. This is a difficult world, and some are too troubled by Destruction to concern themselves with such matters. When it is hard enough to live from day to day, not all feel it reasonable to be bothered about mountains.

But those that do not believe can similarly make the mistake of calling “fool” he who does believe. When a man is respectable, when in all other respects he appears sane and rational, is it mad to believe this account as well as every other that he gives? When he says “I have seen it,” he is a madman, a liar, or a genuine witness. If we judge him sane, if we judge him to be no deceiver, then we have but one option remaining to us, and we must take it or else reject the matter entirely out of hand. And if I have, after believing on their words, seen the Mountain itself, then to reject the matter is to lie to myself, which lie would be the most unforgivable one of all. I may not have walked its slope nor reached its peak as others have, but if I have seen it then still I know that it is there, and the words are etched as deeply in my mind as they are in the Mountain, which say THE MOUNTAIN OF THE LORD. HOLINESS TO THE LORD.