Chapter 10
A testimony of the
Book of Mormon comes by the power of the Holy Ghost—The gifts of the Spirit are
dispensed to the faithful—Spiritual gifts always accompany faith—Moroni’s words
speak from the dust—Come unto Christ, be perfected in Him, and sanctify your
souls. About A.D. 421.
Moroni begins to “write somewhat as seemeth me good” (Moroni
10:1). He states he is writing to his brethren, the Lamanites. “Yea, and this
was their faith—that my gospel, which I gave unto them that they might preach
in their days, might come unto their brethren the Lamanites, and also all that had
become Lamanites because of their dissensions” (D&C 10:48).
It says much about Moroni that, after the wars, their
committing war crimes (based on today’s standards), he still refers to them as
his brethren. Here again is another example the Book of Mormon was written for
the Lamanites.
He gives us a timeframe of when he is writing this part of
the record – 420 years since the coming of Christ.
“Were we to include
Moroni’s epistle to the Lamanites and all the ends of the earth (Moroni 10:1,
24), we might conclude that this letter at least conforms to something like a
New Testament catholic (i.e., universal) epistle,15 though it equally well
conforms to much older biblical forms in which a prophet of God delivers a
strong message of repentance.”[1]
“A correspondence that has always impressed
me involves prophecies in 400-year blocks. The Maya were obsessed with time,
and they carved precise dates on their stone monuments that began with the
count of 400 years, an interval called a baktun. Each baktun was made up of 20 katuns, an extremely important 20-year interval. If you
permit me some liberties with the text, Samuel the Lamanite warned the Nephites
that one baktun ‘shall not pass away before . . . they [would] be
smitten’ (Helaman 13:9). Nephi and Alma uttered the same baktun prophecy, and
Moroni recorded its fulfillment. Moroni bids us farewell just after the first katun of this final baktun, or 420 years
since the ‘sign was given of the coming of Christ’ (Moroni 10:1). What
are the chances of Joseph Smith guessing correctly the vigesimal system of
timekeeping and prophesying among the Maya and their neighbors over 50 years
before scholars stumbled onto it?”[2]
Moroni is getting ready to seal the records, after sharing a
few words with us. “Now these things are written unto the remnant of the house
of Jacob; and they are written after this manner, because it is known of God
that wickedness will not bring them forth unto them; and they are to be hid up
unto the Lord that they may come forth in his own due time” (Mormon 5:12).
“Therefore I will write and hide up the records in the
earth; and whither I go it mattereth not…
“Behold, I make an end of speaking concerning this people. I
am the son of Mormon, and my father was a descendant of Nephi.
“And I am the same who hideth up this record unto the Lord;
the plates thereof are of no worth, because of the commandment of the Lord. For
he truly saith that no one shall have them to get gain; but the record thereof
is of great worth; and whoso shall bring it to light, him will the Lord bless” (Mormon
8:4, 13-14).
“And it came to pass that when we had gathered in all our
people in one to the land of Cumorah, behold I, Mormon, began to be old; and
knowing it to be the last struggle of my people, and having been commanded of
the Lord that I should not suffer the records which had been handed down by our
fathers, which were sacred, to fall into the hands of the Lamanites, (for the
Lamanites would destroy them) therefore I made this record out of the plates of
Nephi, and hid up in the hill Cumorah all the records which had been entrusted
to me by the hand of the Lord, save it were these few plates which I gave unto
my son Moroni” (Mormon 6:6).
[1] Epistolary
Form in the Book of Mormon, Robert F. Smith, FARMS Review 22/2 (2010): 129-130.
[2] Archaeology,
Relics, and Book of Mormon Belief, John E. Clark, Maxwell Institute
website.
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