Chapter 43
Alma and his sons
preach the word—The Zoramites and other Nephite dissenters become Lamanites—The
Lamanites come against the Nephites in war—Moroni arms the Nephites with
defensive armor—The Lord reveals to Alma the strategy of the Lamanites—The
Nephites defend their homes, liberties, families, and religion—The armies of
Moroni and Lehi surround the Lamanites. About 74 B.C.
In Chapter 43, Mormon changes his focus. “And now I, Mormon,
proceed to finish out my record, which I take from the plates of Nephi; and I
make it according to the knowledge and the understanding which God has given me”
(Words of Mormon 1:9). To this point,
they record has been of a religious nature.
He tells us he will no longer discuss the preaching of Alma and his sons,
except to say, “they preached the word and the truth … and they preached after
the holy order of God by which they were called” (Alma 43:2). “And Helaman and the high priests did also
maintain order in the church; yea, even for the space of four years did they
have much peace and rejoicing in the church” (Alma 46:38).
He now turns to the Lamanite/Nephite wars. “And also that a knowledge of these things
must come unto the remnant of these people, and also unto the Gentiles, who the
Lord hath said should scatter this people, and this people should be counted as
naught among them—therefore I write a small abridgment, daring not to give a
full account of the things which I have seen, because of the commandment which
I have received, and also that ye might not have too great sorrow because of
the wickedness of this people” (Mormon 5:9).
“And the people of Ammon departed out of the land of
Jershon, and came over into the land of Melek, and gave place in the land of
Jershon for the armies of the Nephites, that they might contend with the armies
of the Lamanites and the armies of the Zoramites; and thus commenced a war
betwixt the Lamanites and the Nephites, in the eighteenth year of the reign of
the judges; and an account shall be given of their wars hereafter” (Alma 35:13).
Mormon begins his detailed account
of the Nephite wars with an explicit editorial shift … [T]o this point in his narrative he had
chosen not to detail even one battle. In further contrast, Mormon had just
completed a detailed account of the remarkable spiritual conversions and
relatively successful ministries of Alma the Elder, Alma the Younger, and the
sons of Mosiah among both the Nephites and Lamanites … After focusing on
patently spiritual matters for over 100 pages of text, Mormon makes an abrupt
shift in his narrative. He acknowledges that Alma and his sons continued their
missions but then explicitly states, “Now we shall say no more concerning their
preaching” (Alma 43:2). This shift in focus was not required by a lack of
ecclesiastical data; throughout the war narrative, Mormon intermittently refers
to their ongoing ministries … Mormon chooses at this point to focus his account
of the next century of Nephite history almost exclusively on military conflicts
between Lamanites and Nephites, fractious internal Nephite politics, social
disintegration, and natural catastrophes…”[1]
In verse 4, we learn how Lamanite is used. Identifying a
person or group as Lamanites has nothing to do with racial or genealogical
heritage. The designation of a group as
Nephite or Lamanite is a political designation.
We see this when Mormon tells us the Zoramites, who were at one time
Nephites, became Lamanites. “The Book of
Mormon is careful to specify that the terms Lamanite and Nephite are used in a
loose and general sense to designate not racial but political (e.g., Mormon 1:9),
military (Alma 43:4), religious (4 Nephi 1:38), and cultural (Alma 53: 10, IS;
3: 10- 11) divisions and groupings of people. The Lamanite and Nephite division
was tribal rather than racial, each of the main groups representing an
amalgamat ion of tribes that retained their identity (Alma 43: 13; 4 Nephi
1:36-37).”[2]
It is interesting to note, Alma’s missionary efforts may
have been an unintentional consequence of their success among the poor. “And
Alma, and Ammon, and their brethren, and also the two sons of Alma returned to
the land of Zarahemla, after having been instruments in the hands of God of
bringing many of the Zoramites to repentance; and as many as were brought to
repentance were driven out of their land; but they have lands for their
inheritance in the land of Jershon, and they have taken up arms to defend
themselves, and their wives, and children, and their lands” (Alma 35:14). “And
it came to pass that as he went forth among the people, yea, among a people who
had separated themselves from the Nephites and called themselves Zoramites,
being led by a man whose name was Zoram—and as he went forth amongst them,
behold, he was run upon and trodden down, even until he was dead” (Alma 30:59).
The Zoramites had defined a society
in which the position of the upper classes was dependent upon having a lower
class to rule over. Thus the preaching of the Nephite missionaries not only
altered the Zoramites’ craft and economic situation, it challenged their
carefully constructed identity. Their code had been broken, and this
necessitated policing in order to protect the identity of the group. Casting
out the believers was an act of both policing and of affirming the ruling
class’s position as elites. But instead of solving the problem and returning
the society to its norms, that action further disrupted the society and
intensified the hatred against the meddlesome Nephites, who were directly
responsible for upsetting the social order.[3]
Alma 43:4 picks up the thread of
Alma 35:10–11 by explaining that “the Zoramites became Lamanites.” The society
that had prided itself on its costly apparel and that had cast the poor from
its synagogues because of the coarseness of their clothing was now forced to
unite with and rely on a people that Mormon describes as going into battle
“naked, save it were a skin which was girded about their loins” (Alma 43:20).
Mormon clarifies, however, that the rich Zoramites did not follow the Lamanite
customs of war dress: “yea, all were naked, save it were the Zoramites and
Amalekites” (43:20). His description of the rich Zoramites running into battle
with the naked Lamanites provides a strong visual image that emphasizes the
incongruence of the new Zoramite situation.[4]
It is often the case that Nephite
dissenters or their descendants incite the Lamanites to wage war on their
former “brethren.” Most of the warfare in the century and a half before
Christ’s appearance in the promised land results from unresolved factional
conflicts within Nephite society that are escalated by personal ambition to
civil strife and sedition. The dissensions of the Amlicites, Zoramites, people
of Ammonihah, and king-men follow this model. In an ironic fulfillment of the
covenant of the promised land, it is usually Nephite dissenters who eventually
become the leaders of the Lamanite armies, often by treachery, in order to
foment their hatred of the Nephites.[5]
[1] Prophecy
and History: Structuring the Abridgment of the Nephite Records, Steven L.
Olsen, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15/1 (2006): 23.
[2] Hugh
Nibley as quoted in Review
of El Libro de Mormon ante la crítica (1992), by Josué Sánchez, Terrence L. Szink Review of Books on the Book
of Mormon 5/1 (1993): 225.
[3] The
Zoramite Separation, A Sociological Perspective, Sherrie Mills Johnson,
Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, Volume 14, Number 1, 2005:85.
[4] The
Zoramites and Costly Apparel: Symbolism and, Irony, Parrish Brady and Shon
Hopkin, Journal of the Book of Mormon and Other Restoration, Scripture 22/1
(2013): 48.
No comments:
Post a Comment