1st Nephi Chapter 5
1 Nephi 5:1-9 “My mother complained against my father”
We have no record that Sariah complained when her husband, Lehi, told her that he had dreamed a dream and they needed to leave their lovely home with its gold, silver and precious things or that she complained as they trekked through the desert and camped in the valley of Lemuel. She was tough and she could handle those things.
By the way, how old were Lehi and Sariah when they left Jerusalem with their family? We don’t know for sure, but we can make a reasonable estimate. Nephi was “exceedingly young” but of “large stature.” It sounds like he was young but had gone through puberty when they left Jerusalem. He was probably about 16 years old, give or take a year or two. He had 3 older brothers. If those brothers were spaced at two year intervals, then Sam was about 18, Lemuel about 20 and Laman about 22. It also appears that there were at least two older married daughters in the family, let’s say about 24 and 26 years of age respectively. If Lehi married at age 25, an age estimated by some because he appears to be relatively wealthy, he may have been about 26 when his first child was born, meaning that Lehi was about 52 +/- 1-5 years when they left Jerusalem. Sariah may have been 1- 10 years younger, i.e. probably in her 40’s. But Sariah has two children while traveling through the desert during the next 8 years. By today’s experience, that would suggest that she may have been younger than this estimate. Maybe her children were closer together than we have estimated. On the other hand, if she’s like Sarah, wife of Abraham, or Elizabeth, wife of Zacharias, then she still has potential for childbearing for a few more decades. (The pregnancies of Sarah and Elizabeth involved the intervention of the Lord in each case, so all bets are off for them.)
Estimating the average life expectancy of adults in 600 BC, Lehi and Sariah may have been nearing the end of their lives. This becomes apparent when they both nearly die while crossing the ocean. Lehi dies not long after they arrive in the Promised Land. We don’t know when Sariah died, probably sometime soon after Lehi died, because Nephi makes no mention in 2nd Nephi chapter 5 of taking his mother with him when he leaves the Land of their First Inheritance to escape from the threats of Laman and Lemuel. Anyhow, we can be confident that Lehi and Sariah were no “spring chickens” at the time of their exodus from Jerusalem and their 8 year trek through the desert. Good for them!
We all have our breaking point. Sariah reaches hers while her sons are gone to Jerusalem and she is afraid that she has lost her sons. She complains against Lehi calling him a “visionary man.” (Is that the worse thing she could think to call him?) In the Book of Mormon, we read the real stories of real people. This is the real story of Lehi, Sariah and Nephi, who were real people, and the real challenges they faced. They didn’t have a script. They hadn’t read the book. They were doing their best to figure it out as they lived their lives, just like the rest of us. These stories have been preserved to help us in our lives and with our challenges. Sariah, tough as she is, has her breaking point. And her breaking point, typical of most women who are mothers, is when someone or something threatens the safety and well-being of one or more of her children.
In Sariah’s case, she thinks that her sons are lost and may have been captured and even killed in Jerusalem or somewhere along the treacherous trail. How long have her boys been gone? Well, it’s 3 days back to Jerusalem, a few days there trying to get the plates and 3 days back. So her sons have been gone at least a week and more likely 10 days or more. That’s a long time to sit around camp in the desert with your husband worrying about your sons. She is like the mother bear when her cubs are threatened. “My sons are no more, and we perish in the wilderness.” This is her greatest test!
I suspect some of the mothers reading this blog can think of something worse to call their husband than “a visionary man.” To his credit, Lehi used this as a chance to strengthen Sariah by telling her what he knows (bear his testimony to her). He tells her that he knows he is a visionary man because he has seen a vision and knows the goodness of God; that they would have been destroyed if they had stayed in Jerusalem; that they will obtain a land of promise: and that the Lord will deliver their sons out of the hands of Laban. Hopefully, what Lehi knows is comforting to Sariah. Sometimes when those we love are struggling, the best way to strengthen them is to tell them what we know to be true, what we feel in our hearts, to give them hope and comfort.
After a long wait and undoubtedly many tears, her sons return with the plates, the sword of Laban and with Zoram. The Lord has heard their prayers and her sons are safe. She is comforted and their joy is full! Life is good! They rejoice, offer sacrifices and give thanks unto the God of Israel. Sariah now “bears her testimony.” (Notice that Nephi records this in the first person, in his mother’s own words.)
Now I know of a surety that the Lord hath commanded my husband to flee into the wilderness; yea, and I also know of a surety that the Lord hath protected my sons, and delivered them out of the hands of Laban, and given them power whereby they could accomplish the thing which the Lord hath commanded them.
We have no record that Sariah ever complained or doubted again. Eight years in the desert including two pregnancies and births, a tough ocean voyage in which she nearly died, two rebellious older sons who want to kill her son and her husband and finally the death of her husband and we have no record that she complained or doubted again. Good for Sariah! What a great example for all of us! We shouldn’t need to be continually reassured by the Lord. We can rely on the things we know and the times when the Lord has answered our prayers and keep going forward. I think that’s what faith is about. The Lord gives us enough to go on and then asks us to continue forward walking by faith. And that’s what Sariah does. She is one of my heroes, even though I will never be a mother. Thanks, Sariah!
1 Nephi 5:10-13 Lehi searches the plates
With the Plates of Brass in hand, Lehi begins to search them from the beginning. We know from this that Lehi was literate, that he could read the plates. We learned in the first verse of this book that he taught his children, at least his son Nephi, to read. Good parents teach their children! And Lehi doesn’t judge scan through or even just read the plates, but “he did search them from the beginning.” Searching the scriptures is more than just reading them.
It is one thing to read the scriptures; this is commendable and indeed a profitable exercise. It is quite another to search them, to search and look for the true meanings of the passages contained therein; to delve and inquire and ponder upon the particular verses and events under consideration; and to search that Spirit of truth for mastery and understanding, for wisdom in being able to liken the scriptural insights unto oneself. (Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon)
Lehi found that the plates contained the 5 Books of Moses. Reference is made to the creation of the earth and Adam and Eve, our first parents. It is fashionable these days, even among some in our church, to consider the stories of the Creation, the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve, the flood, etc. as allegorical but not as actual events that occurred and actual people that lived. In D&C 20:11 we read that one of the purposes of the Book of Mormon is “Proving to the world that the holy scriptures are true.” As we come to know that the Book of Mormon is true, i.e. the word of ancient prophets translated by the gift and power of God, then we also come to know that the Bible is true, not every word but “as far as it is translated correctly.” We can then know that the stories of the Creation, Garden, Adam & Eve and the Fall and that they must be important for us. These stories are told to us in the Bible, in two books of the Pearl of Great Price and in sacred temple text. Though there are some differences in details and sequence of events among these accounts, it is clear (at least to me) that our Father, who plays a central role in each of these accounts, wants us to know these stories and learn from them. Here we learn that these stories were contained in the Plates of Brass. The Book of Mormon is not only “Another Witness of Jesus Christ” but it is another witness of the Creation and of our first parents, Adam and Eve.
1 Nephi 5:14-16 Lehi learns that he is a descendant of Joseph
Searching the plates of brass, Lehi learns that he is a descendant of Joseph who was sold into Egypt and who was preserved by the hand of the Lord. By the Spirit of Elijah, the heart of the child (Lehi) is being turned to his father (Joseph) (see Malachi 4:5-6). Lehi must have taken comfort knowing that Joseph was preserved by the hand of the Lord. This must have given him confidence that the Lord will preserve him and his family as they travel to the Promised Land. When we face difficult things, it can be helpful for us to look to our ancestors who also dealt with difficult things. They don’t have to have been perfect to inspire us, as Joseph inspired Lehi. In response, Lehi breaks into prophecy about the plates and says that they would never perish. I presume that means they are still in existence today. Someday we will see them.
Lehi also learns, if he didn’t know already, that “Laban was also a descendant of Joseph” so they are kinsmen. I wonder how that made him feel knowing that Laban had to die for the benefit of Lehi’s posterity. I suspect there was an element of sadness involved, but, like Nephi, he knew that “It is better that one man should perish than that a nation should dwindle and perish in unbelief.” (1 Nephi 4:13)
1 Nephi 5:20 Nephi and Lehi have kept the commandments – so should we!
Nephi brings this part of the story to a close by saying “And it came to pass that thus far I and my father had kept the commandments wherewith the Lord had commanded us.” Remember, Nephi is the “poster child” of obedience. It is important for him to let us know that both he and his father have been obedient to the commandments they had received. In 1 Samuel 15:22, the prophet Samuel tells the king Saul, who has not been obedient, “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice.” In some ways, obedience is “the first law of heaven”, at least for Nephi and his father Lehi, it certainly is. And obedience is a good place for us to start. For sure, if we’re not obedient, we won’t get far down the covenant path of which Pres. Nelson is fond to speak. In his first news conference after being sustained as President of the Church, he said (as later published in the Ensign, April 2018, “As We Go Forward Together.”)
Now, to each member of the Church I say, keep on the covenant path. Your commitment to follow the Savior by making covenants with Him and then keeping those covenants will open the door to every spiritual blessing and privilege available to men, women, and children everywhere.
1st Nephi Chapter 6
1 Nephi 6:1-6 Explanatory Comments by Nephi
Nephi departs from the story he is telling of his parents and family and obtaining the plates for a few verses with some explanatory comments.
First he tells us that he is not going to give a full genealogy of his father in this record. These are the Small Plates, so there isn’t a lot of room to write. And Nephi has also been keeping the Large Plates which contain a lot more of the history of his family. He also tells us that his father has been writing a record and has recorded his genealogy there. Perhaps Mormon used the record that Lehi wrote to abridge the Book of Lehi and place it first in the Book of Mormon when he wrote it hundreds of years later. Joseph Smith must have translated the Book of Lehi first since it was in the “front” of the plates. Unfortunately, the translation of the Book of Lehi was in the 116 pages of lost manuscript that disappeared after Martin Harris took it from Harmony, where Joseph was living with Emma, to Palmyra. It has not been seen since. But Joseph knows what is in those 116 pages and will teach some of those things to early church members. I’ll share an example in commenting on Chapter 7 and the family of Ishmael. See below.
Nephi goes on to tell us that “the fulness of mine intent is that I may persuade men to come unto the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, and be saved.” (1 Nephi 6:4) Remember, the Book of Mormon is Another Testament of Jesus Christ and the most important purpose of the Book of Mormon is “the convincing of the Jew and Gentile that Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God, manifesting himself unto all nations.” (Title Page) Nephi is faithful to that purpose so he tells us that he will write the things that are pleasing to God, but not necessarily pleasing to man. And he commands his descendants who write on the Small Plates to do the same and not occupy them with things that are not important or of worth to those who will read their words.
It is interesting to look at the content of the Small Plates, i.e. 1 Nephi through Omni. There is very little discussion of history and of wars, especially compared to the extensive accounts of missionary labors, wars, intrigues of secret societies, etc. which are found in Mormon’s abridgment of the Large Plates from Mosiah to Mormon. Nephi reserves his Small Plates “that I may write of the things of God.” (1 Nephi 6:3) It appears that his posterity are faithful to his desires for the Small Plates.
We might ask ourselves what we have chosen to preserve in our journals and histories (that is, if we are writing at all.) Are they more like the Large Plates or like the Small Plates? I’ll have more to say about this next week.
1st Nephi Chapter 7
1 Nephi 7:1-5 Go get Ishmael and his family!
Lehi receives another revelation. Nephi doesn’t tell us how it came – a dream or some other way. He is told that his sons need wives to take into the wilderness, so he should go back to Jerusalem for the family of Ishmael. Lehi doesn’t get any complaints from Laman or Lemuel about this revelation. They are more than happy to go back to Jerusalem on this errand!
We have to believe that the families of Lehi and Ishmael are already connected. Otherwise, how are these sons of Lehi going to convince Ishmael and his family to go with them into the wilderness? And think of the risk they take in going back to Jerusalem where they are wanted criminals for killing Laban and stealing the plates. They must already trust Ishmael and his family to protect them and not turn them in.
Elder Erastus Snow explained in a sermon delivered in May 1882:
The Prophet Joseph informed us that the record of Lehi was contained on the 116 pages that were first translated and subsequently stolen, and of which an abridgment is given us in the first Book of Nephi, which is the record of Nephi individually, he himself being of the lineage of Manasseh; but that Ishmael was of the lineage of Ephraim, and that his sons married into Lehi’s family, and Lehi’s sons married Ishmael’s daughters. (JD 23:184)
From this statement, we learn that at least two of Lehi and Sariah’s daughters, presumably older than Laman and Lemuel, had already married into Ishmael’s family, so these two families were related. This is taken farther in this statement by noted Book of Mormon scholar of a previous generation, Hugh Nibley, who also suggests that Lehi and Ishmael were related.
Lehi, faced with the prospect of a long journey in the wilderness, sent back for Ishmael…The interesting thing is that Nephi takes Ishmael (unlike Zoram) completely for granted, never explaining who he is or how he fits into the picture—the act of sending for him seems to be the most natural thing in the world, as does the marriage of his daughters with Lehi’s sons. Since it has ever been the custom among the desert people for a man to marry the daughter of his paternal uncle…, it is hard to avoid the impression that Lehi and Ishmael were related. Nibley, Hugh. Lehi in the Desert/The World of the Jaredites/There Were Jaredites. Vol. 5. The Collected Words of Hugh Nibley. Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 1988. 40.
In any event, the sons go to Jerusalem; the Lord softens Ishmael’s heart and they seem to have no trouble convincing Ishmael and his family to join them in the wilderness.
1 Nephi 7:6 The two families are a perfect match!
This verse suggests that the families of Lehi and Ishmael are a perfect match. Ishmael has five daughters, just right for the four sons of Lehi and his “adopted son” Zoram. And Ishmael has two sons, presumably married already (or soon will be) to Lehi’s daughters. It’s hard to believe that it is an accident.
1 Nephi 7:6-16 Trouble on the way back to camp
Laman and Lemuel just can’t keep it together! On the way back to camp, they recruit two of the daughters of Ishmael (possibly their future wives) and the two sons of Ishmael (possibly their present or future brothers-in-law) and rebel against Nephi and Sam. (Notice that Sam is loyal to Nephi.) And they also rebel against Ishmael and his wife (whose name we never know) and the other three daughters of Ishmael, who we presume will become the wives of Zoram, Sam and Nephi. They want to go back to Jerusalem. Nephi has to remind them that they have seen an angel and have forgotten the great things the Lord has done for them. He promises them that they will obtain a land of promise and prophesies that Jerusalem will be destroyed and they will perish with it if they go back.
Not convinced and in their anger, the rebels tie Nephi with cords and plan to leave him to be devoured by wild beasts. (Sounds a lot like how Joseph’s brothers treated him!)
1 Nephi 7:17-19 Nephi strengthened
Exerting his faith in the Lord, Nephi prays and asks that he be given strength to burst the bands with which he has been tied. The Lord grants his prayer and the bands are loosed. Elder Bednar used this episode to teach an important understanding of the atonement in a BYU Devotional Speech, “In the Strength of the Lord” in 2001. https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/david-a-bednar/strength-lord/
Brothers and sisters, do you know what I likely would have prayed for if I had been tied up by my brothers? My prayer would have included a request for something bad to happen to my brothers and ended with the phrase “wilt thou deliver me from the hands of my brethren” or, in other words, “Please get me out of this mess, now!” It is especially interesting to me that Nephi did not pray, as I probably would have prayed, to have his circumstances changed. Rather, he prayed for the strength to change his circumstances. And may I suggest that he prayed in this manner precisely because he knew and understood and had experienced the enabling power of the Atonement of the Savior.
I personally do not believe the bands with which Nephi was bound just magically fell from his hands and wrists. Rather, I suspect that he was blessed with both persistence and personal strength beyond his natural capacity, that he then “in the strength of the Lord” (Mosiah 9:17) worked and twisted and tugged on the cords and ultimately and literally was enabled to break the bands.
Brothers and sisters, the implication of this episode for each of us is quite straightforward. As you and I come to understand and employ the enabling power of the Atonement in our personal lives, we will pray and seek for strength to change our circumstances rather than praying for our circumstances to be changed. We will become agents who “act” rather than objects that are “acted upon” (2 Nephi 2:14).
But the brothers aren’t convinced and want to tie Nephi up again. At this point, one of the daughters of Ishmael (Nephi’s future wife?), one of the sons of Ishmael and their mother (where was Ishmael in all this?) plead with the rebels. Their hearts are touched and they become sorrowful and even bow down and ask Nephi for forgiveness. In a great show of humility, love and forgiveness, Nephi humble tells us “I did frankly forgive them all that they had done.”
You’ve got to love Nephi! He is so strong! And yet he is forgiving and humble. It takes a strong person to “frankly forgive” others who have tried to hurt them. And Nephi does it over and over again. Peter once asked the Savior how often he needed to forgive someone who offends him. He wonders if seven times would be sufficient. But the Savior replies “I say not unto thee, until seven times: but, until seventy times seven.” (Matthew 18:22) The number 70 is another of those “magical” numbers in the Bible. It often means a very large number, without limit or too many to count. The Savior is not saying to Peter that he should forgive 490 times but not 491. He is telling Peter that he should forgive an unlimited number of times. This is consistent with the word of the Lord to Alma when He said, “As often as my people repent will I forgive them their trespasses against me.” (Alma 26:30). The Lord places no limit on the number of times He will forgive us, if we truly repent.
1 Nephi 7:22 Safely back in camp
The crisis is over (for now) and the group makes it safely back to the camp of Lehi in the valley of Lemuel. They offer sacrifices and offerings to the Lord. Life is good (for now).
Nephi now leaves the story line of their travels to relate a marvelous dream of his father and the incredible revelation which he, Nephi, subsequently received. This will take 8 chapters to tell in the Book of Mormon and the next two weeks in Come, Follow Me to study. This is really good stuff, so keep reading!
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