“We Have Entered into a Covenant with Him”
Both the people of Limhi and the people of Alma made their way from the land of Nephi, through the wilderness to Zarahemla. However, they did so in two very different ways. What did the differences between these two groups have to teach us, and will we choose the path of exodus, or the path of exile?
I’m Mark Holt, and this is Gospel Talktrine.
Welcome again to Gospel Talktrine, your “Come Follow Me” podcast. Today we have a couple of questions.
The first question comes from Lisa-Maree, and she asks, “In my personal study, I’m reading the different topics relating to Jesus Christ, as outlined in the Topical Guide. Under Jesus Christ, Appearances, Antemortal , there’s a reference to Exodus 33:11, which talks about how the Lord spoke to Moses face to face. And yet, in that same chapter, in verse 20 it reads, ‘And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live.’ My question is, why would it be recorded that Moses and the Lord spoke face to face, and then suddenly, not eight verses later, the Lord seems to be saying no-one shall see him. What am I missing?”
Well Lisa-Maree, your question is actually quite a common one. And in the research that I did, it seems like there are no fewer than four explanations for the seeming contradiction that you point out. Now, the beliefs of the Christian mainstream, and of Judaism, they run the gamut, all the way from: God is solely a spirit, and the reason that no-one can see his face is because he has no face. God doesn’t exist in any corporeal way, and therefore, all of this is a metaphor.
So that would be the Orthodox Jewish belief, which is that for God to even talk about having a face is God trying to help man conceive of God in a way that he can understand, because God is utterly incomprehensible.
Now, deep down, that is really true; you and I cannot comprehend the ways of God. Yet God does have a face, we believe. And so the fact that we can’t comprehend God doesn’t mean that we can’t see him.
And then there are those in mainstream Christianity, who have said the meaning of this scripture actually has the meaning that we as Latter-day Saints, in the light of modern-day revelation, would say that it means. And what is that meaning?
Well, luckily for us, we have another version of Moses’s vision with God, in the book of Moses, in the Pearl of Great Price. And I don’t know whether this vision that’s being related here in chapter 1 is talking about the exact same vision that is related in Exodus 33, which is occurs in the Tabernacle. So it says in Moses 1 that Moses is caught up into a high mountain. Interestingly, it’s a similar description that Nephi has, when he has his amazing vision, he’s “caught up into an exceedingly high mountain,” but it seems like that is occurring spiritually, rather than physically. That may be the case with Moses as well.
So it might be that the vision we have described in Moses 1 is actually a more detailed description of the vision that Moses has in Exodus 33. It may be that this occurred at another time in the life of Moses, maybe closer to when he saw the burning bush, for example.
There’s no way for us to know, given what we have right now. But what we can say is that God said something similar to Moses. So first thing, it says in Moses 1:2, it says God and Moses spoke face to face. And then later on, God says to Moses, “I can show you the glory that I have, I can show you part of my glory. And I can show you the truth relating to the world that you live on. But I can’t show you all of the truth about me, and I can’t show you all of my glory, because no-one can behold all of my glory and afterwards remain in the flesh on the earth.” [ Moses 1:3-5 ]
Now I interpret this to mean that God was telling Moses, “If you want to completely transcend the veil, then what you have chosen to do is to leave this life.” And Moses presumably had the faith to do that. “But you can transcend the veil, in part, because of your faith, and I can show you many things.” And that’s what a prophet is, and that’s the opportunity all of us have, to feel the spirit and make the veil a little bit thinner each time we do.
And that is the answer, is that there was much that could be revealed to Moses, including seeing God face to face, and seeing part of his glory. More than any of us could possibly imagine, I would guess. But to see all of God’s glory would not be permitted unto him.
And there are those in mainstream Christianity who have guessed that that’s what this means, and there are those who don’t accept that guess. Basically, if we just have the Bible, we’re in the state that Joseph Smith described, that people cannot come to an agreement as to exactly what the Bible means, because sometimes we run into a situation like we have in Exodus 33, where verses seem to contradict each other. And thank goodness for modern-day prophets and modern-day revelation to clear that up. Thank you for your question, Lisa-Maree.
Right, we have a couple of other questions, and they both have to do with baptism. And I will just read the questions now, and then we’ll answer the questions in the course of the lesson, because this lesson has a lot to do with baptism today.
And the first one comes from Steven and Jackie, and their question is about baptism. And basically, it is, “Where is baptism among King Benjamin’s people?” Now Steven has an idea that baptism was commonly practiced among the Nephites at the time of King Benjamin, and there are many people who agree with that. So we will examine that theory as we get to that part in the lesson.
And Shana and Ismariah write, “We found it really interesting that all of a sudden, both Alma and Limhi are wanting to be baptised. Alma is, obviously, teaching and baptising people, and Limhi asks Ammon to baptise him and his people.” Now they’re wondering where all this focus about baptism is coming from, because it seems like up until that point there hadn’t been a ton of teachings about baptism, in the recent past.
So that is exactly what we’re going to be talking about today.
Thank you for those questions. If you have questions about the scriptures, or some other aspect of life that you would like answered out of the scriptures, send me an email at gt@gospletalktrine.com.
Today’s lesson is Mosiah 18 through 24, “We Have Entered into a Covenant with Him.” This lesson deals with what happens to the people of Zeniff, who have now become the people of Noah, and are soon to become the people of Limhi, theses three kings who existed in sort of a parallel people outside of Zarahemla. They’re Nephites, but they’re removed geographically.
And it examines what happens to these people after they kill the prophet Abinadi.
So Abinadi has just died at the end of chapter 17, killed by the king. And Alma, one of the priests of King Noah, he believes on the words of Abinadi, and makes his way out of there, even though he’s under threat of death. He hides, he writes down the words of Abinadi, and we learn later that he undergoes a profound process of personal repentance, to prepare him.
And then he becomes a great teacher. So great in fact, that people all willing to, maybe even abandon, or at the very least defy the king, the orders of King Noah. Because it’s obvious that King Noah is not pleased by true worship of God. He’s only pleased by those who are willing to follow his idea of how to worship God. Which basically is that Noah gets to do what he wants.
So they have to remove themselves. And the place they choose is a place called Mormon. Now, obviously, the Book of Mormon is named… they got their name from the same place. This may be the first place that was called Mormon. It’s certainly the first instance that we have in the Book of Mormon of the name. And it’s likely that the prophet Mormon was named after the place of Mormon. The Waters of Mormon are named after the place. The meaning of it is not as clear.
Now elsewhere in the Book of Mormon, when Mormon is going to introduce a new name, he sort of gives a little more background about why that name is used, or who the person is. If it’s a place you can know exactly why the place got that name, because he explains it.
Here he says that it got its name from the king, and the implication seems to be that it got its name because wild beasts inhabit the area from time to time.
To me, that’s not as complete an explanation as he gives elsewhere for other places that he’s introducing for the first time. That may be an indication to us that Mormon is a name that has been used elsewhere in his record. And that presumably would be part of the lost manuscript. Now that’s just an idea. There’s no evidence for it, really, except if you choose to see this as an incomplete explanation for the name of Mormon, or an incomplete introduction to that name, then it’s kind of fun to think about where that name might have shown up elsewhere.
In any case, if the name means a wild place, or a place of wilderness, remember from the book of Genesis, that’s how the world was described before God created it. It was “wild and waste” in some translations. Another way of rendering what we have in our scriptures as “formless and void.” That would be kind of interesting, that the world before God worked on it would be rendered as “Mormon” in the Book of Mormon.
And as you all know, for decades until very recently, “Mormon” was first a pejorative and then a nick-name for Latter-day Saints. And so, I think it would be sort of appropriate if that actually meant a creation in need of the hand of its creator. That would be very appropriate for a description for members of our church. Because we all need the influence of God in our lives.
So our story begins with Alma taking the people to Mormon and baptising them there. This is the first indication we have in the Book of Mormon of people actually being baptised. But it is not the first manifestation of the teachings of baptism. Lehi and Nephi both taught about this, and if you want to read more about what they’ve taught about baptism, the best place to go is 2 Nephi 31 . The whole chapter is basically about baptism.
Now before that, Nephi saw in vision the baptism of Jesus. But this is where he explicitly teaches that we follow our Saviour into the water. And here we learn a little bit more about the covenant that accompanies baptism. And by here, in mean in Mosiah 18 .
So Alma is teaching the people who have chosen to follow him – at this point his flock numbers about two hundred people – and he’s teaching them, “Look, I can see that you have a desire to serve God. In other words, in the context of what we’ve been talking about over the last few weeks, I can see that the law is now written in your hearts. And you have a desire to have the spirit poured out more abundantly. You want to be closer to God.” The way he expresses it – and now we’re in verses 8 through 10 – he expresses their desires as “a desire to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people.”
And what they’re willing to do, in order to gain these blessings, they’re “willing to bear one another’s burdens,” and “mourn with those who mourn, and comfort those who stand in need of comfort.” And in addition, be a “witness of God.” Now, remember that word, “witness.” So you are willing – because you have this desire to be closer to God – you’re willing to be witness of him, in all things, at all times, and in all places you’ll be in, to the end of your lives. You’re going to be a witness for God forever. This is what you’re willing to do. [ Mosiah 18:8-9 ]
And you want to be redeemed of God, and be among those of the first resurrection. And finally, you’re willing to do all of these things, so you can have the spirit poured out more abundantly upon you.
So he asks, “What have you against being baptised, in order to show this covenant?” And they all want this. And so Alma begins the process of baptising them. He starts with the man named Helam, who is one of his first converts, as it says. And we learn three things about baptism, as practised by the Nephites here.
First of all, baptism is done by immersion. Second of all, it’s associated – immediately – it’s associated with membership and participation in Christ’s Church. And number three, it’s accompanied by an outpouring of the spirit. In other words, there’s the baptism of water, then there’s the baptism of fire and the Holy Ghost. Exactly as Nephi taught, centuries earlier.
Now we’ll leave the topic of baptism briefly, because it comes up again in another couple of chapters. But that’s what we know about it to this point.
Well, as you can imagine, any group this size is going to attract attention. And in fact, the very idea of the group is to attract attention. So, Alma want to gain converts, but at the same time gaining converts is dangerous. Because the king might find out about it. And in fact, that is what happens.
By this time, his numbers have swelled to over four hundred and fifty. And eventually they are warned – we don’t know whether that is spiritual, or whether they have some human agency that warns them. In either case, they have to leave and, as it says, take their flocks and their tents into the wilderness. Exactly as so many people have done in the scriptures before them – the Israelites going into the Sinai, the Nephites leaving the land of Jerusalem, Nephi leaving the original settling place of himself and his brothers, and Mosiah the First, leaving the land of Nephi.
So what Alma and his people want is the freedom to engage in their beliefs about God, and worship God according to their conscience, and they’re willing to leave home to do it. And so this is a time-honoured tradition of exodus, as they go out into the wilderness, and they follow the spirit in where they will go.
And for now, the narrative stays with the people of King Noah. So, at this point, Noah is still the king, but that doesn’t last for very long. As you may imagine, Noah is not the kind of king to inspire great loyalty among his people. He seems to rule mostly by fear. And eventually they get sick of that, to the point where there’s a man of action, I’ll call him, a man named Gideon.
And Gideon, you may remember is the name of one of the judges of Israel. The book of Judges. And Gideon it was who took three hundred Israelites against ten thousand of the Midianites. And they were victorious by means of lighting their lamps and blowing their trumpets in the middle of the sleeping army, and they arose and killed each other. [ Judges 9 ]
And it was God’s intent at that point to show the Israelites that he would fight their battles. And I don’t know if that’s intentional on the part of Mormon, to bring that story into our minds, but that is one of the themes of today’s lesson, which is that God can fight our battles, if we allow him.
So Gideon is willing to kill King Noah, because he knows how wicked he is. And so he seems to have overcome already any sort of armed resistance, and it’s just Gideon and Noah battling to the death. And Gideon proves the stronger, so Noah is running before him. And he runs up the tower that he’s created - it’s mentioned in an earlier chapter – as a last resort, and he looks out over the land of Shemlon – we’ll talk about geography in just a second here – he looks out over the land of Shemlon, which is where the Lamanites live, and he sees an approaching army.
And he says, “Gideon, Gideon, wait! Don’t kill me, look! You need me, because the Lamanites are coming, and only I can unite the people.” [ Mosiah19:6-8 ]
Now we are about to see one of the first contrasts of the lesson, because what does Noah do? Gideon spares his life, and Noah says, “Ok, lets all run into the wilderness, let’s get out of here.”
Now if you remember, under King Zeniff, when the Lamanites approached, he described the Nephites, he described his people as “Fighting in the strength of the Lord.” And what we discussed at the time was, the strength of the Lord was more than just the faith they had when they went into battle. It had a lot to do with their preparation. First of all, they were prepared. Second of all, they had a plan. And third of all, what Zeniff did, was he put the women and children in the wilderness, and the men stayed behind to protect them.
And what Noah does is exactly the opposite. So, he doesn’t have a plan. He doesn’t have any preparation. There is no advance notice. And when they are running away, they’re fleeing before the Lamanites. Then at one point, Noah says, “Leave your wives and children behind, and lets us, the men, keep running. We’ll run faster than them, so we should escape.”
So in all of those ways, Noah is the exact opposite of King Zeniff. And he’s the exact opposite of what it means to fight “in the strength of the Lord.”
So right now is our first contrast of this lesson today, which is: the strength of the Lord, versus the weakness of the Devil. And Noah is displaying perfectly the weakness of the Devil. If you remember, Abinadi has given Noah a prophesy: “However you treat me, this is going to be a type and shadow of how you will be treated.”
So Noah flees, and the cowardly men in his retinue, and maybe a few others, they follow him. But many men remain behind, and they’re not willing to leave their wives and children. And so now there are three groups. There is Alma’s group, who had departed and gone into the wilderness. There is the bulk of the people of Noah, who remain behind. And then there are the people – only men, presumably – who are willing to follow Noah into the wilderness.
So this group who remain behind, they now become the people of Limhi. He’s one of the sons of Noah; he becomes the king. And the Lamanites have killed a certain number of them, but then they have their women go and beg for their lives, and because the women are pleasing to look upon, and because a man with a sword in his hand is less likely to strike down a woman, thankfully, then the Lamanites extend some measure of mercy upon the people of Limhi. They return to their lands, but now, at this point, they’re basically slaves. They are a tribute people. They have to give up half of their goods, and then they have to give up, in the future, half of their increase.
Now, what happens to Noah and his people in the wilderness? Most of the men come to themselves, and realise, “What have I done? I’ve left my wife and children behind. I’m not willing to do that for this man. Who is he? He doesn’t have a plan, he’s a terrible man, everyone hates him anyway. Why am I here?”
And they’re so mad at Noah for bringing out the worst in them, that they actually burn him to death, which is exactly what Abinadi prophesied would happen. He dies in the most horrible of ways.
Unfortunately, as we’ll discover in many later chapters, the priests of Noah see what happened to Noah – they’re about to take the priests and put them to death as well – but the priests of Noah escape.
Now Limhi sends some people into the wilderness to find out what happened to King Noah, because it’s part of his deal with the Lamanites to have peace that he delivers his father to them. Then he learns what has happened, that they’ve put him to death.
What is interesting is that this group that Limhi sends into the wilderness, and the men of Noah, when they meet up, it says, “After the ceremony, they returned to the land of Shilom, where they lived.” So there was some sort of ceremony in the wilderness. And I couldn’t find anything on that, but I wonder if there is some sort of Jewish antecedent for when two groups of people meet up, and one of them has something terrible to confess, then they have some sort of ceremony. Maybe it was a religious, or maybe it was a civil ceremony, but that’s a question for another time.
So, they return back, and then the people of Limhi, now they have a life that they really hate. It’s one of misery, and it’s one of privation, and it’s one of bondage.
To make matters worse, the priests of Noah, not only did they survive, they make their way to where some of the women of the Lamanites are vulnerable, and they kidnap several of them. The Lamanites, naturally, assume that the Nephites have done this, so they come in and without warning, and without any sort of talk beforehand, they fall upon the people of Limhi and begin killing them.
So this is the second time that the people of Limhi have suffered an armed attack. Now, luckily for them, they’re able to capture the king of the Lamanites in the first attack. But the second attack, which would have wiped them out, by that time they’re able to convince the king, “Look, we didn’t do this. But there are some of us who have left us, we would have killed them, they have left into the wilderness, and they’re the ones who probably stole your daughters. It’s not us.”
Well the king believes them, so there is once a gain peace. But it’s the kind of peace where they’re still miserable, they’re being oppressed. They’re being oppressed to the point of armed rebellion. It’s not too long, maybe a couple of years, before the people of Limhi are so angry and so fed up with their circumstances that they rebel against the Lamanites.
They’re beaten back. They rebel again. They’re beaten back, and the sufferings and the death of these two battles are such that it makes them so angry that they’re willing to go up again. And the third time when they’re beaten back, they know that there is no hope for armed resistance. Too many of them have died, and the Lamanites are just too numerous.
And at this point, what happens in the book of Mosiah is, it describes them as humbling themselves to the very dust. [ Mosiah 21:13 ] Now later on in the Book of Mormon, Alma the Younger will actually teach this lesson, but I’m going to give you a little bit of a spoiler, and talk about humility – and I believe Alma the Younger would have gotten this lesson from his father, and so I think this is the roots of the lesson that Alma will teach.
But he talks about the two sources of humility. He implies that God can force you to be humble, but you can also humble yourself because of the word. And we have two examples, we have one example of each of those two kinds of humility in today’s lesson.
The people of Alma the Elder, the people that Alma has been teaching and baptising in the wilderness, the people who went to the place of Mormon, and departed already into the wilderness, they humbled themselves because of the word. They heard the words of Abinadi – Alma especially. He was in a privileged place in his society, and enjoyed a lot of perks of his position, and was willing to give all that up, just because he heard the truth and recognised it.
Now that is a perfect example of somebody humbling themself because of the word. We have plenty of evidence that Limhi was willing to humble himself, but the humility that is now coming, is not because of the word, but because of how much they’ve suffered. They’ve basically been forced to be humble. They can no longer count on their own strength, they can see that there is nothing, absolutely nothing that they can do to get themselves out of their problems. And only now do they turn to God with any sort of real feeling in their hearts.
It is at this time that Ammon, the messenger that King Mosiah sent to look for the lost people of Zeniff, he encounters Limhi. So this expedition has been successful. And what I said a couple of weeks ago is not correct. What I said then was that it was obvious that Limhi assumed Ammon was a Lamanite, and here we learn exactly why Limhi is so willing to kill Ammon. It’s because he thought he was one of these missing priests that caused them so much trouble. So he thought he was a Nephite, but he thought he was one of these priests that had proven themselves to be worse enemies even than the Lamanites. [ Mosiah 21:23 ]
So I made a mistake there; it’s interesting how you can read the Book of Mormon several times, but when you haven’t read a particular passage for a little while, then you forget some of the details. So that’s what happened with me, anyway. That was a mistake on my part.
But that was the belief of King Limhi, that was why he was so willing to kill Ammon; because he thought he was one of these wicked priests.
And these priests had become terrorists. They’ll fall upon anyone who is unprotected, and kill them and take their goods. They survive like parasites in the wilderness on the people of Limhi. They’re the worst sort of people, the priests of Noah, and it only gets worse from here. This is just the beginning of all the problems they will cause.
Now as we remember from an earlier chapter, Ammon explains to all the people of Limhi that King Benjamin was a wise and holy king, and he gave a talk at the end of his life, he gave an address, in which people covenanted to follow God.
Now we’re going to talk a little bit more about baptism here, because at this point, Limhi desires to be baptised. And he asks Ammon if he’ll do it, and Ammon says, “I feel like I’m an unworthy servant, to either organise a church or even to baptise you people, because that’s just not my calling.” He seems to be a righteous man, but he doesn’t consider himself worthy of this particular honour, or at least it’s not appropriate for him to do this.
Now that brings up the question: why would King Limhi ask to be baptised?
So I hope this will answer both of the questions we had about this, this week. And I think a number of you might be wondering about it. Obviously for him to ask to be baptised, he would have had to learn about this at some point. Did he learn about it from Abinadi? Did some of the teachings of Alma – and maybe there are some people who were taught by Alma, but they didn’t believe him, and they remained behind, and they learned about baptism from Alma, but then didn’t follow Alma into the wilderness. That’s another option. Or has baptism been present among the Nephites all along?
Now, unfortunately we don’t have a lot of evidence in either direction. What we do have is evidence that Mosiah the First – the father of King Benjamin – he departed the land of Nephi, and we know that from the book of Jacob, from the book of Nephi, that the kings after Nephi were all named Nephi. And yet, here’s a king who is named Mosiah. So we can presume, that much like Alma, he took into the wilderness and left, and then made a journey. And they had to establish a civilisation separated from their initial place of departure. Mosiah had to do that same thing that Alma has done.
And what that would tell us is, that just like the people of King Noah, there has been some sort of apostasy among the original Nephites, the original group of people that called themselves the Nephites. They have not all remained true to the teachings that were on the brass plates, and the teachings from their great grandfathers Nephi and Lehi; they fell away. And only the people of Mosiah the First remained true. And they had to remove themselves physically.
Does that mean that Mosiah started a church at that time? We don’t know.
In Mosiah 25, which is just after the scriptures for this week’s lesson, we learn that when Alma and Limhi are finally reunited in the land of Zarahemla, it is only Limhi’s people that request baptism. And that would seem to indicate that the people in Zarahemla have either already been baptised, or they have a covenant that they consider to be the equivalent of baptism.
It’s interesting because here in Mosiah 21, it doesn’t say that Ammon has already been baptised. It says that he has already made a covenant to follow God’s commandments, and call himself his people. [ Mosiah 21:31 ]
So, to me what that says, there may have been two different covenants among the Nephites. One: which is the covenant of baptism, that is tokenised, or solemnised by being immersed in water. And another, which is fundamentally the same covenant, but is not actually solemnised by the act of baptism as we know it today.
Here is something that we know for sure. Jesus Christ, when he appeared to the Nephites in 3 Nephi 11:22 , he says, “This is how you shall baptise,” I’ll quote from it:
“On this wise shall ye baptize; and there shall be no disputations among you.”
Now later on he says, “There have been disputations among you in the past.” In other words, there’s been a lot of disagreement, as to the form that baptism should take. So that is something that we know, among the Nephites they weren’t all doing it perfectly. So Jesus Christ has to come, and one of his first teachings is, “This is the right way to baptise.”
Now why he wouldn’t have told one of his prophets that, is a good question, worth pondering. What it tells me is, prophets aren’t always given everything right up front. They’re allowed to struggle, even with something as important as baptism. And it may be that the prophets got it right and the people didn’t believe them, or it may be that some of them taught it right, and some of them did not.
But in any case, that’s the state of our knowledge about baptism among the Nephites, it’s been taught since the time of Nephi; there was likely some sort of apostasy; it’s possible that King Benjamin’s people were performing baptism. At the very least they had a covenant that was functionally the same, and it appears that from the time of Alma returning from Zarahemla – Alma the Elder – that baptism is not only commonly practised among the all the Nephites, but that it is a symbol of membership in the Church of God, which seems to have been founded for the first time by Alma.
And this parallels Israelite history, by the way. Because, before their exile into Babylon, the Israelites didn’t have an established church, as we would know it today. What they had were prophets. And not prophets governed, not by hierarchy, but by reputation. So a prophet would be considered a mighty prophet if he miracles and teachings and followers to his name. And then people would be more likely to follow him. It was almost like a rabbi of today in Judaism.
But, before being conquered by the Babylonians, it may surprise you to know that the Israelites didn’t meet weekly to go to synagogue. They kept the sabbath day holy, but they didn’t go to synagogue weekly, they didn’t have a church, they didn’t have a religious structure in their culture. And that seems to have been the case among the Nephites as well, until Alma came along. And it does appear that part of living this new covenant, as prophesied by Jeremiah, is having a religion dedicated to Christ.
Not least because, one of the fundamental duties of someone who takes upon himself that name, is to “mourn with those who mourn.” They have to support each other. There has to some sort of organisation, there has to be an association where people can become aware of each other’s needs. And so now they finally realise, as soon as we have the desire to serve God with all of our hearts, we have to band together as believers, so we can support each other.
And this is when the Church of God, the Church of Christ, is first established in the Book of Mormon.
Now you could make the argument that Lehi established this church among his family. But it was a little bit different situation, because of the patriarchal order. And once their society became large enough to have any sort of complexity, then that patriarchal order could no longer govern.
So the arrival of Ammon gave the people of Limhi increased hope, and Gideon, the man of action who had wanted to kill King Noah earlier, he comes up with an idea: “Now that we know the way back to Zarahemla, let’s take the back pass, let’s take the secret way out of town, and we will pay our tribute in wine to the Lamanites, and we’ll give them strong wine, we’ll make our escape by night when they’re asleep from the effects of the wine, and we’ll go to Zarahemla.” So that’s what they do. [ Mosiah 22:5-8 ]
And that’s sort of the end, for this week, of the story of the people of Limhi. We have a little bit more about them, when they return to Zarahemla, but the entire book of Mosiah now, if you look back you can realise there are basically only a couple of stories. There’s the story of Mosiah’s escape from the land of Nephi, most of which… that story is in the first couple of chapters of the original book of Mosiah, which has been lost. We have accounts of it from people who saw the manuscript. We know that there were a couple of chapters, and they were larger chapters than we have in today’s Book of Mormon. And so we would have had a longer account.
And what I want to do by asking these questions is prompt us to think about – you know, we’ve grown up with the Book of Mormon, or maybe if you’re a convert, you have read the Book of Mormon, but you’ve probably never questioned: why is the book of Mormon the way it is?
Now Mormon, as he was writing this history, as he was abridging it, he says many times, “I couldn’t include the hundredth part of the doings, of the actions of my people. I couldn’t put the hundredth part of it into my record.” So it’s worth asking the question: why did he include what he included?
So what I wanted to do, was take a look at the book of Mosiah as a whole, and understand what Mormon’s goal was, what the Lord was trying to prompt him to do, and did he accomplish that goal? And I think we’ll get closer to an answer to that question in today’s lesson.
So the people of Limhi make their way off into the night, eventually making their way back to Zarahemla. That’s the end of chapter 22, and that’s the end of the story of the people of Limhi.
Now, in chapters 23 and 24, we have the story of what happened to Alma, after he escaped. What’s interesting is, unless you’re doing some math, you won’t realise how much time is passing here. A lot of time is just elided over, and Alma’s group travels not that far away. They only go eight days into the wilderness.
So now I want to stop for a quick break, and talk a little about geography. So what was alternatively called the land of Nephi, the land of Lehi-Nephi, but also the land of Shilom, was where the Nephites lived. Shilom included two cities: Shilom and Lehi-Nephi.
So Shilom is this land of their first inheritance that they wanted to recover. Presumably that was also the city that included the original temple, built by Nephi, the one where Jacob would have taught. So, this temple would have had a ton of history for them. They rebuilt the walls of the city, but it doesn’t say they rebuilt the temple. So, the temple was probably still there.
Of course, this would have meant a lot to them, and when Zeniff originally returned, it was only one or two generations since his people had left it. So, it was no wonder they wanted to go back. If you want to understand the drive that took Zeniff and his people back to the land of Lehi-Nephi, incidentally, I can mention one place to you, and you will understand. And that place is Independence, Missouri, right?
Early in our history, the history of the Latter-day Saints, they tried to establish a place of their inheritance in Jackson County, Missouri, and were prevented by circumstance from doing that. And that place has had a special spot in the hearts of Latter-day Saints ever since. But you can imagine how fierce that yearning would have been only one or two generations after being expelled from it.
Now, north of the land of Shilom is the land of Shemlon. So Shilom and Shemlon . Shemlon is where the Lamanites live. And we can guess that it’s further north than Zarahemla is. And the reason we can guess that is, when Limhi and his people escape, they have to go around the land of Shemlon, to the north.
So, it’s interesting to know, now we understand, that the people of Limhi, the people of Noah, the people of Zeniff, they have been separated from Zarahemla by a huge population of Lamanites. That is why they couldn’t make their way home in the past. That’s why they lost their way, because they can’t just send one or two people out and try to find their way home. They probably will be captured and slain by the Lamanites.
And so, when Limhi sends an expedition, he sends forty three people into the wilderness to find Zarahemla. They end up finding the Jaredite records, but what they were looking for was Zarahemla. And they tried their best, but because they were separated from Zarahemla by a huge population, a huge civilisation, of Lamanites, they couldn’t find it. It had to be the right time. They had to have the help of God to find their way back home.
So Alma has made this journey around the land of Shemlon, and now Limhi makes this journey around the land of Shemlon. So its interesting, because they only travel eight days. Now if you’re walking, and you’re bringing your family, and your wife and children, and you’re bringing all your flocks, and maybe you have to stop to find water, and to find food, I cannot imagine a large group of people walking more than twenty miles a day. Even that would be a huge amount to sustain over eight days, but I can’t imagine it being more than that.
So really, it’s about 150 miles, 160 miles, that Alma and his people have travelled.
Now that doesn’t seem like that far, until you take that distance and draw a circle. And if you draw a circle with that radius, then you realise you can include a huge amount of land in a 160-mile radius, if you don’t know, at all, which direction to head.
As we’ll learn in another chapter, when they finally do travel to Zarahemla, they walk another twelve days. So, the people of Ammon, they spent forty days – the expedition to find the people of Zeniff – they spent forty days looking, but then for Alma and his people to return, they walk eight days, then twelve days.
So if you know what direction, and you head straight there, it’s sort of twenty days journey.
In between Shemlon, the land of the Lamanites, and Zarahemla where the Nephites live, is the place where Alma and his people settle. Now it seems clear that they don’t intend to keep looking for Zarahemla, they intend to make a new home. And they call this place Helam, after the first person to be baptised by Alma.
And they create a whole civilisation there. They build buildings, they plant crops – maybe at some future date they plan to find Zarahemla, maybe not. But it seems clear that for now, they’re happy where they are. And they don’t want to involve anyone else in their lives. All they’ve received is persecution for their beliefs, so they prefer their isolation. That’s my read of their attitude.
Now the desire of Alma’s people is the same as the desire of Nephi’s people which was: “We have this wonderful leader, he’s a prophet, and he’s gotten us out of trouble. We would like him to be our king.” And in the case of Nephi, he accepted their invitation. And maybe that is why Alma refuses the invitation. He says, “Look, if you could always have a just man to be your king, that would be fine. But you have seen, we have had personal experience with what can happen when a just man is succeeded by an unjust man. Then everyone is led into apostasy. So King Noah has dragged us all down, and that’s why we’re in this situation we’re in.”
And he says those wonderful words – I think if it was a shorter quote, this would be the title of today’s lesson – he says, “I desire that ye should stand fast in this liberty wherewith ye have been made free.” [ Mosiah 23:13 ] And that’s just a wonderful quote, because it has both a political and a personal, a spiritual interpretation. And that’s his advice for them. And they seem to have followed it.
Now, we don’t know how much time passes, and that’s an interesting question, because Amulon is the name of the leader of the priests of King Noah. And when Limhi and his people escape, the Lamanites pursue them. And eventually – I suspect that the reason they didn’t find them, because you can’t take a big city’s worth of people and get lost in the wilderness from a pursuing army, especially if you’re bringing animals with you. They just leave too much evidence behind. So, I suspect the reason they weren’t caught is because the Lamanite army eventually came upon these priests of King Noah, and they found a civilisation, they found all these former daughters of theirs, who had been kidnapped. And there was enough to deal with, there was enough to process in that encounter, that they forgot all about their pursuit of Limhi.
So in the timeframe of this week’s lesson, we have the time between when Alma departed, and when Noah was overthrown; then we have the time between when Limhi took the throne and when they made their escape. And now it seems there is another period of time we have to account for, which is: Amulon and his people gain favour with the Lamanites, become teachers among them, and eventually leaders.
And these people are lost, they’re lost to the point where they can’t find their way back to any of the lands that they knew. So it’s hard for us to know exactly how much time this took. It might have been quick, or it might have taken years. So if you put all three of those timeframes together, it was definitely years that Alma and his people lived in the land of Helam.
And now we have an additional timeframe, which is: they are brought under bondage by the people of Amulon, ruling over the Lamanites [in the land of Helam: Mosiah 23:39], governing them. And what they force Alma to do, is to show them the way back to the land of Nephi. But then, rather than letting them depart in peace, what the Lamanites do is they send for reinforcements, and then they continue to exercise dominion over the people of Alma. And they live in this terrible state of bondage, where they’re being humiliated, and they’re being threatened to the point of death, for simply worshipping God.
Now, if you can contrast that to the situation of the people of Limhi, they didn’t seem to have Lamanites living among them. Limhi was able to call meetings and plan their escape without the Lamanites really being aware of it. Which meant that they were left to their own devices.
But Alma and his people are much more interfered with. And part of the reason is because Amulon already knew Alma. He had an intense hatred for him. He had to know that God had shown himself to be behind the words of Abinadi. And he had to resent the fact that Alma had stood up for what was right when it really mattered.
Now on some level he knew that was true. I’m sure he wouldn’t have been willing to admit it consciously. But there is a great deal of animosity from Amulon towards Alma. [ Mosiah 24:8-9 ]
In chapter 24 , we learn what happens to the people of Alma. They have an interesting experience. It’s different from the experience of the people of Limhi. They too are in bondage to the Lamanites, but it appears that the Lord miraculously intervenes, and they can’t even pray visibly, or they will be killed. It’s almost like, if you remember the story of Daniel and the lion’s den, it’s almost like the edict of Cyrus, that no-one can worship but in the way that we say, and if you do, you’ll be killed. It appears to be a similar situation where they’re watching over them, and if anyone bows to pray, then they’ll kill them. But the people continue to pray in their hearts, and God lets them know, “I’m going to make your burdens light.”
And at that point, their strength is changed. A physical change comes upon the people of Alma, and they’re able to bear their burdens with ease, to the point where they almost don’t notice that they’re carrying anything. That’s a quick side-note, but something important to remember, that this is the nature of miracle, that later on is totally deniable.
And I think it’s important to think about that. Because you and I – I have no doubt – that you and I have experienced this type of miracle in our lives. Where it’s only us being willing to look for the hand of God in our lives, then make some physical remembrance, whether it’s a journal entry, or a picture, or some sort of story, or a recording, that preserves the memory of that miracle, because later on, I guarantee it’s going to be forgettable.
So the people of Alma are told, “You are being subjected to these burdens, so that you can be witnesses for me hereafter. I need you to remember this miracle, because it’s the kind of thing people can deny ever happened, right?”
“Oh, yeah, I gained more strength, I guess.” Ten years from now, if you choose to fall away rom the truth, you can look back upon having borne burdens with ease, and you could say, “Was that God? Or did I just feel strong that day? Did I have a lot of extra energy?”
So we can look at it, and we can know, that they experienced a miracle. That is at least what Mormon is trying to tell. That is Mormon’s interpretation. And yet, that miracle would have had no outward manifestations. And the Lamanites would have had no evidence that the Nephites were experiencing a miracle.
And then they have another miracle happen to them. At one point, God says, “You’ve suffered enough, Alma. Gather the people. I’m going to put the Lamanites to sleep tonight, and you’re going to make your way into the wilderness, you’re going to escape, and I’m going to lead you back to Zarahemla.”
And that’s what happens. On a certain night, the Lamanites just go to sleep, and the Nephites are able to make their way into the wilderness. They travel for twelve days, and they’re back in the land of Zarahemla. Everyone is reunited.
So that’s the closing of this extended schism of the people of Zeniff. Their travels into the wilderness, their establishment of a remote civilisation, and their return.
So what does that teach us about the book of Mosiah? What does it teach us about the purposes of Mormon?
Mormon wrote the book of Mosiah, as I mentioned, to include the account of Mosiah the First, who led his people out of the land of Nephi – presumably their king was wicked. This account almost certainly contained a recounting of that wickedness, and that apostasy. They travelled through the wilderness, met up with another group, the Mulekites, a group who had undergone a journey from the same origin as their people – which was Jerusalem – generations before. But still, they came out of the same past. The Nephites and the Mulekites were finally reunited.
But this people that they encountered, they’d suffered a lot more along the way. They’d arrived without their relationship to God intact. They had left unwillingly, and in a circumstance of conquering and exile, of destruction.
Also included in the book of Mosiah, the story of Zeniff and Alma. Understand, everything I said about Mosiah, can also be said about Alma. Mosiah led his people out of the land of Nephi to have the freedom of their beliefs. Alma did the exact same thing. They met up with a group that had stayed behind when they left. So the Mulekites were descended from King Zedekiah; they all followed Mulek, who was a son of Zedekiah. They’d stayed behind when the Nephites left, they’d remained in Jerusalem, and they had remained until the point when Jerusalem was destroyed.
So Alma left, and the people of Limhi had stayed behind until they were destroyed. So Alma did the exact same thing.
When Mosiah’s people met up with the group that came from the same origin, they shared with them their knowledge of God, that they’d lost. And Alma did the exact same thing.
So the point of the book of Mosiah, the entire story of the book of Mosiah, has really been dealing with the two journeys, the two exoduses, of the people of God, from the land of Nephi to the land of Zarahemla. The point of this book is to highlight the difference between the two ways that God’s people have dealt with apostasy. Exodus and exile.
Limhi’s people, they were not just destroyed three times, they were actually destroyed – if you read, a couple of chapters before – they were destroyed five times. They were enslaved to the point where they lost most of their men in battle.
Alma’s people were also enslaved and oppressed, yes. But their misery was of much shorter duration, and their oppressors were of a different quality. We’ll talk about that in a minute.
But we also have an indication in the Book of Mormon that their suffering had a meaning. As burdens are placed upon them, God says, “You’re going to go through this so you can be witnesses unto me, hereafter.”
And as I mentioned, they have miracles attending their escape.
So in both case these people had to deal with problems, they both had to deal with a foreign army invading them, and bringing them into bondage. And so, bondage here is the metaphor for universal human suffering.
As I mentioned, the oppressors of Alma were of a different quality. In the case of Amulon, he specifically hated Alma for believing in God. King Laman, the King of the Lamanites who exercised dominion of Limhi’s people, he wanted dominion and power, of course. But only Amulon was truly evil.
So, as we’ve discussed several times and in various episodes, and especially when we discussed the six antecedents of Isaiah, any time you see a pattern that shows itself among the people of God in the scriptures, it has a personal application in your own spiritual journey. Both in an eternal sense, and in a day-to-day sense.
This is the point of scripture, really. This is what separates scripture from the other things you might read. The message here appears to be that there are two ways you can walk through the oppressions of life.
So the first one is what Limhi and his people chose, which is the path of exile. In other words, you don’t allow the word to humble you. You are left behind by the people of God; you are left at the mercy of your troubles, the mercy of circumstance, to be tossed about by the winds of pain and destruction that come upon you. And at some point, you’ll be forced to humble yourself. “Even to the dust,” as it describes the people of Limhi.
Rescue, when it does come, involves painful loss, and might possibly depend on the spiritual guidance of someone who remained faithful in their trials.
The second path is the path of exodus. And this is undertaken willingly. You humble yourself because of the word alone. God walks through your trials with you. And miracles attend you. Your loss, which is symbolised by the necessity to leave your home – in the case of the Israelites it was Egypt, in the case of the people of Alma it was Helam, in the case of the Latter-day Saints it was Nauvoo, et cetera. But your loss is borne willingly. And it’s borne at the beginning of your journey.
And it’s made all the more bearable by the fact that it has a meaning. God lets you know, “I’m helping you through this, so you can be a witness of me, hereafter.”
Alma says to the people that he baptises in the place of Mormon, he says, “You have desires to serve God. You are being called upon to be a witness of him in all things, in all time, in all places you’ll be in. Even to the end of your lives.
So it’s important to remember, either way, whichever of these two paths you choose, you will meet with oppression. You’ll meet with bondage of some sort. That’s the message of the scripture at least. I can’t say that your life will be hard. But I can say the following the commandments, that committing to follow Christ, is no guarantee of a life free of troubles.
Indeed, as Alma discovered, this oppression can be worse for faithful people, people who decide that they’re going to follow God all of their days. The recommendation of God for how to follow the path of exodus rather than exile can be summed up in the words of Alma: “Stand fast in this liberty, wherewith you have been made free.”
Now what’s true of societies is also true of people: that Christ is the source of all of our freedom. The very plan of God is freedom. We fought a battle in our premortal existence for freedom.
So we, today, and every day, we have a choice. We can slowly abandon freedom, we can rely on others to witness to us, we can wait for circumstance to force us into humility, which is the path of exile. Or we can stand fast in our liberty, we can choose humility before it is forced on us, we can receive the guidance and miracles of God, we can heed the words of the prophet, we can prepare ourselves to be witnesses of God, hereafter. Which is the path of exodus.
In either case, troubles will find us. In either case God is constantly watching out for us, bringing us the experiences we need to turn us to him. In fact, I think most of us could testify, we switch back and forth several times during our lives. But I would say that, first of all the nature of mortality, but second of all the lateness of the hour in which we find ourselves, in the timeline of God’s vineyard, you might say, makes it harder and harder to go back and forth. And more and more important to be where God has asked us to be.
God is – right now – acting in your life, to make you a witness hereafter, of his miracles and of his rescue. Believe in Christ, humble yourself because of the word alone, prepare yourself for the day when someone will need to rely on your strength and your faithfulness.
By telling us the two parallel stories of Mosiah the First and Alma, with the contrasting story of Limhi, what Mormon is trying to do with the book of Mosiah is teach us the difference between exodus and exile. That’s the powerful message of the book of Mosiah: that we will be witnesses of God hereafter. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.