Speaking of which, does anyone know why they removed “Pay Lay Ale” from the endowment? Joseph Smith claimed to have received this phrase in the Adamic language by revelation. I can understand taking out offensive things like the throat-slitting and disembowelment, but what was wrong with the “Pay Lay Ale” routine (besides being really silly)?
Paul
The Tanner’s research and publication of that research is this (warning to mormons, your temple rituals are being talked about in detail) From the
UTLM website:
Another important change has been made in the sign for the Second Token of the Melchizedek Priesthood. In the 1984 version of the endowment ceremony, as printed in Appendix A of
Evolution of the Mormon Temple Ceremony, page 94, we find this: “The sign is made by raising both hands high above the head (Officiator demonstrates.), and while lowering the hands repeating aloud the words:
Pay Lay Ale
Pay Lay Ale
Pay Lay Ale”
As early as 1969 we pointed out a problem with this: "…there seems to have been a change made in this part of the ceremony, for the
Salt Lake Tribune, Feb. 12, 1906, gave the words as ‘Pale, Ale, Ale,’ and
Temple Mormonism used the words ‘Pale, Hale, Hale.’ " (
The Mormon Kingdom, vol. 1, p. 138)
However this may be, in another portion of the temple ceremony, it is explained that “Pay Lay Ale” means “Oh God, hear the words of my mouth!”
A number of years ago a Mormon intellectual informed us that it was his understanding that one of the top scholars in the church had pointed out to church authorities that the words
pay lay ale or
pe le el could be translated from the Hebrew language as “mouth to God.” This, of course, could be considered to be a condensed version of “Oh God, hear the words of my mouth!” That this translation is plausible can be confirmed by consulting
Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Hebrew and Chaldee Dictionary, word #6310—“
peh… the
mouth.” The Hebrew letter
Lamed (transliterated in English as
l) is often added on the front of words and means “to, at, for” (
Hebrew Primer and Grammar, by C. P. Fagnani and A. B. Davidson, page 50). Word #410 in
Strong’s Concordance is “
ale… God (god).” Kyle D. Williams has also pointed out to us that the Biblical name “Lael,” found in Numbers 3:24, is translated by Strong (#3815) as “(belonging) to God.” At any rate, we were told that the Mormon scholar was so convincing in his presentation to the leaders of the church that they changed the wording of the temple ceremony to “Pay Lay Ale.”
In the early 1980’s some critics of the church began to proclaim that in Hebrew these words really meant, “Wonderful Lucifer.” If this were true, this would mean that the Mormons were praying to the Devil in this part of the ceremony. We took very strong exception to this claim and pointed out that there was no way that these words could be translated “Wonderful Lucifer” (see
The Lucifer-God Doctrine, p. 11-15, 85-86).
In any case, many Mormons must have been bothered when they had to raise and lower their hands repeating the strange words “Pay Lay Ale” three times during the ritual. The Mormon leaders have now replaced the mysterious words with the English words which were mentioned earlier in the ceremony: “Oh God, hear the words of my mouth!” In the 1990 revision of the ritual (Appendix B of
Evolution of the Mormon Temple Ceremony, pages 133-34), we read:
“The sign is made by raising both hands high above the head (The Officiator demonstrates.), and while lowering the hands repeating aloud the words: ‘
Oh God, hear the words of my mouth!’ repeated three times.”
