Helaman - Grandson of Alma the Younger

This entry is about Helaman, Nephi and Lehi’s father — or from a different perspective, Alma’s grandson.

Mormon doesn’t say much about him other than he escaped assassination because one of his servants discovered the plot in time to prevent it. He’s chief judge and high priest for ten years, which is twice as long as Alma served in that dual role. Unlike his grandfather or his son Nephi who served after him, he doesn't give up either role to deal with a religious crisis. Instead, he dies in office.

Despite all that time, not much is said about him nor is any mention made of his teachings. All we get is the rising wickedness of the people, the onset of the Gadiantons, and the many conversions which occur. None of his sermons are recorded. There are no exciting conversion experiences. All we get are 10 years of what must have been demoralizing work as he presided over his nation's turn from God to the Gadiantons.

What little Mormon does include is amazing. But we don’t read what he said while being chief judge. Instead we get some of his words in the form of counsel given to his son’s Lehi and Nephi. It’s mute testimony to just how severe Mormon was in editing the contents of the book. So, as we read, we need to keep in mind what we have is important for us to know. How much importance we attach to it is up to us.

Alma 62-63 - The End of the War

There are a lot of lessons to be drawn from the end of the war. One is an exclamation point on need for national unity. Internal strife and factions almost destroyed the Nephites. The Nephites won only after the Chief Judge Pahoran, backed by the military might of Captain Moroni, put an end to the dissension.

Another lesson is given a choice, the masses, the people who actually get sent to war to fight, don’t like fighting and won’t. The Lamanite armies not only lost the battles, but also the war in large part because their soldiers defected and joined the Ammonites. No soldiers… no army. No army… no war. You really have to stir people up emotionally to get them to go to war because by nature people are appalled and terrified by it.

We get another glimpse into the different culture of the Nephites with the end of the war. They demobilize to a certain extent, but Moroni oversees the construction of more “places of defense” or refuge throughout the country. He then retires and hands over command of the army to his son, Moronihah. (Can you imagine the Commander of the Joint Chiefs saying, “I’m retiring now, so my son is going to take over in my stead.” Not in America.) The Nephites were okay with that. It would never happen here.

Helaman resumes the role of High Priest, but soon dies. Shiblon becomes custodian of the records. But he’s old too and knows he’s going to die soon. Since Pahoran doesn’t want the records, they are given to Helaman’s oldest son Helaman. I just have to comment here for a moment. We assume the custodian of the records is THE High Priest. Like so much of the Nephite society, these high leadership positions seem to be handed down from father to son among the Nephites. The judgeship passes from father to son. The army passed from father to son. The church did with Alma the Younger getting the job after his father. And then Helaman got it from his father.

Lest you think it was coincidence that the church leaders were such good men, I think the better interpretation is this patrilineal descent from father to son is something Heavenly Father worked with. So, he made sure men worthy of the callings were born at the right time to the right family.

And so ends the Book of Alma. The stage is set for the next epoch of the Nephite saga.

Personal Note: This actually is the end of my first pass of blogging through the Book of Mormon. It was  nearly a year ago, July 5, 2015 to be exact, when I made my first post on Helaman chapter one. Rather than rehash things, After this post I'm going to spend some time consolidating these entries into book form. Surprisingly, it's 47,000 words long - about 150 pages. I plan on posting it to Amazon where you can get it for free, or $0.99 if I must charge something for it.

In the mean time, about once a week, I'll post entries consisting of my impressions of our Gospel Doctrine lessons. It'll be more Book of Mormon goodness, but I'm going to spend most of my writing time working on a new Sci-Fi novel. I had a chance to pitch the idea to a book publisher recently and they really liked the idea, so I want to work on that to see where it goes. I plan on posting chapters to another blog so you can read along if you'd like.

I love feedback. If you'd like to see the contents of the past year's blog posts in a book, please let me know. The amount of interest will tell me how much effort to put into putting it together.

Alma 56-58 - The Sons of Helaman

The tale of these 2060 young boys who went to war is another insight into the vast differences between the Nephite culture and that of Upstate New York in the early nineteenth century. No one today would think of making a 16 year old commander in chief of a nation’s army. Yet this is what the Nephites did when they made Mormon commander of their armies. Not even in 1829 would that sort of choice be made. The question is why? I don’t know if the Sons of Helaman set the precedent or whether they followed an existing tradition, but the Book of Mormon refers to them as young men. If you can be appointed commander of an army at age 16, what does “young” mean?

There’s no way to tell from what I understand of the record to say how old these young warriors were. But if someone who is 16 years old is old enough to command an army, I suspect the “expected” age to serve is younger. The “unexpected” age to serve, which is what these boys were, is younger still. It seems reasonable to me to assume it wasn’t age, but ability to wield a weapon that became the criteria for them. 

On a tangential note, I once read part of an autobiographical book whose title I’ve now forgotten, of a woman’s experiences living among the Hopi Indians. This happened around the beginning of the 20th Century. In it, she recounts how they adopted her into their society and let her see the Prophecy Stone. It has inscriptions which speak of the “Lost White Brother” who will one day return. There are other prophetic inscriptions explaining what events will happen before he does. One warns them to always seek peace because their forefathers renounced war by burying their weapons in the ground. How critics will explain that away?

On another tangential note, did you know the Navajo sing the same tune Jews do, when they recite the scriptural account of the creation? You need to watch a presentation by Michael Ballam about his thoughts on the Gospel in the 2011 BMAF conference. It’s on Youtube. Find the video and listen around the 7:30 mark of an encounter with some Navajo indians. It's thought provoking.

But, I digress. These young men’s faith and Helaman’s boldness as a commander lead to miraculous results as they defended Nephite lands. It’s a powerful lesson on faithful actions in the face of overwhelming odds. They weren’t crazy, but they did take some pretty big risks. And because of the protection earned for them by their fathers’ righteous sacrifices, they became the Nephite’s “secret weapon” which turned the tide of the war in that part of the land. You can't make this up: boys turning the tide of a war? Yet it and a myriad of other stories are there for the taking. A feast of lessons on faith, just waiting to be had.

Helaman 13-15 Samuel and the Light in the Sky

The account of Samuel the Lamanite, is unique among the stories in the Book of Mormon. It's the only one Jesus himself told the Nephites to include in the Large Plates of Nephi. Because of this importance, Mormon included it in the record he compiled.

The story of Samuel the Lamanite and his preaching to the Nephites, is well known, so I wont spend time on it here. Instead, I want to focus on the sign he predicted of the Savior's birth. He said it would be light as day the night before the day the Savior was born. The effect of that being a day, a night and another day that would appear as one day. That's pretty impressive!

I've wondered how that could happen. How did God make the sky light up without the sun around so it would shine like day? I still don't know, but there is a clue. In Chapter six, verse five, Samuel says there will be a new star, such as they've never seen before appear in the sky.

The geek in me says the two events are connected. This is how... When a star much larger than the sun runs out of fuel, it explodes becoming a "super nova." It puts out as much light energy in that dying gasp as it did over its entire life time. Some of that energy is in the form of a spherical wave of charged particles rushing away from the star.

Our sun frequently does this too, but on a much less violent scale. When the sun's particles pass the Earth, some get trapped by the magnetosphere and sent down to the poles. There they hit the upper atmosphere creating the auroras. In this instance though these particles hit the atmosphere in such a way and place, it lit up like a giant neon light. Which made the night as bright as day, even though no star could be seen.

Once the wave passed, "all" that was left was the flash of the explosion which became the star they'd never seen before. As explosions do, even super novae, the flash faded and the star disappeared from site. But while it shone, it shone with unusual brilliance. While the phenomenon is easily explained, getting it to happen at just the right time is a miracle on an astronomic scale.

Helaman 6 - Willfull Disobedience

When we hear the truism about the Book of Mormon, that is was "written for our day," I wonder how much credence we give to it? As I look  back on what I've read, I see a symmetry between the events in the book and the history of our country. It's not exact by any means, but it's close enough and follows a pattern that has repeated throughout history.

It goes something like this: a nation is founded as a conglomerate of people who share a common set of beliefs join together. At first, idealism and a strong adherence to the founding principles knits the country together through a turbulent but mostly prosperous growth period. Then as the culture matures, a rot of first pride, then greed and corruption follow. It spreads from the cities out into the general populace. As it spreads, the original principles are abandoned for "new" and "enlightened" way of thinking, then the nation fails from the inside out leading to a period of anarchy and chaos until a new society springs up in its place.

As far as I can tell this happened at least four times in the Book of Mormon, first with the Jaredites, although if I spent more time thinking about it, I could identify several more of these cycles in their history. Then with the Nephites, you have the first reign of the Nephite Kings in the Land of Nephi. Then, after the Nephites flee the Land of Nephi before it is overrun by the Lamanites, they join to form the second reign of Kings and Judges with the Mulekites. The fourth starts when Jesus Himself comes after His ascension into Heaven to visit and teach the Nephites and Lamanites who survive the great destruction. At the end of this last cycle, the Nephites cease to exist as a society and the Lamanites degenerate to what was found when Columbus came.

In Helaman chapter six, the Nephites culture is degenerate and Nephi warns them of what is about to happen to them because they have deliberately turned away from God and what they know to be true. (v24 is particularly scathing.) I see this in our own country today. How many are abandoning their morals and values for money and the "nice things" of life? How many are ignoring their family for pornography and online gambling? How many are turning from the Gospel because they think they know better? I could go on, but this is enough to make the point: we are on the same trajectory.

The aim point identified by the Book of Mormon is not comforting.

Helaman 6 - Role Reversal

Helaman chapter six is extraordinary in the Book of Mormon because this is the first time in the history of the Lehites the Lamanites as a whole are more righteous than the Nephites. It's a powerful lesson on God's impartiality in that He blesses the righteous and witholds those blessings from the wicked.

The difference between the two is demonstrated throughout the chapter in how they individually respond to the secret combination, the Gadiantons. The now righteous Lamanites, when they discover them in their midst, do everything they can to eradicate them while the Nephites embrace them.

A geography note: before the ascendance of the Gadiantons, the Lamanites and Nephites experience several years of extraordinary prosperity because they are able to travel freely between both "nations." Here the land northward is named, the Land of Mulek and the land southward is named, the Land of Lehi.

Helaman 2 - 3

In Helaman chapters two and three, a lot of territory is covered but not to a great depth. Here is where Mormon makes another reference to being able to tell just a small fraction of the whole story. He mentions in passing the reign of Helaman 2 as Chief Judge and the entrenchment of the Gadiantons in society in the more settled parts of the land. I read that and I think of cities which fits my expectation that in cities, for whatever reason, it’s easier to get disconnected from God which gives rise to these secret combinations.

Mormon writes how there are great migrations of people away from the lands, including the Ammonites yet almost as just a footnote mentions it was wars and dissensions which are behind these. He goes into no detail about them: all they get is a single sentence.

In chapter three, he spends time on the growth of the church and how tens of thousands of people join the church. He elaborates on the astonishment of the people at the growth and how Heaven is freely open to all who want it. He then observes that because of this and the general prosperity of the people, pride enters into the church, then he clarifies… probably because you can’t undo engraving in metal plates, that what he meant was the church wasn’t proud, but people who professed membership in the church were. He goes on to explain how they begin persecuting the humble followers and as in Alma’s day, they resort to fasting and prayer that they might be blessed by God with more faith and the ability to endure the times.

This is a lesson for us today… we live in times where persecution will increase against those who sincerely strive to live Christlike lives. As it was for them, so it will be for us: to endure the time we must fast, pray and lean on God.

Helaman 1: Cultural Observations

Helaman chapter one at first glance is the rather unremarkable telling of yet another war precipitated by dissident Nephites who stir up the Lamanites and persuade them to go kill those nasty, evil Nephites. In fact, the main event in this chapter is the rise of THE secret combination which becomes the Gadiantons and one Kishkumen who murders the legally elected governor, Pahoran.

But tucked into the narrative is one of the little comments Mormon inserts which show, the Nephite and Lamanite cultures are nothing like 1820 United States. (Yes, there will be a touch of apologist in this blog: deal with it.)

In particular is a little nugget I've never noticed before which is hidden in verse 13:

"And now behold, Pacumeni was appointed, according to the voice of the people, to be chief judge and a governor over the people, to reign in the stead of his brother Pahoran; and it was according to his right...."

He had a right to be chief governor? Really? That's amazing! Back in Mosiah 26, when King Mosiah sets up judges to rule the country who are appointed by the voice of the people you get the idea these are elections like we have today where "anyone" with the money and backing can run for the office. A closer read of the scriptures, show this isn't really the case with the Nephites and this little verse, hammers the idea home that there was a ruling class, an aristocracy if you will, which controlled not only the government but the religion too.

Think about it. There was no "Quorum of Apostles" in which leadership was based upon a seniority system as we have today. Instead the role of High Priest went from father to son for many generations, right down to the coming of Christ in fact. I'm not discounting the personal righteousness of these leaders, merely making the observation that they lived in a different culture and time and God, in His matchless wisdom and grace, worked within it to lead, bless and teach His children.

But, I digress...

Can you imagine anyone in Upstate New York shortly after the War of 1812, with grandparents who fought in the War for Independence and steeped in the tradition of unalienable rights and a democratically elected Republic to come up with a culture where it's okay to have the political and religious leadership be a right belonging to an aristocracy? I can't. Nevertheless, there it is, hiding all these years in plain sight.

The point of all this is the Lamanite and Nephite cultures were far different from ours and presented with a richness of detail an uneducated farm boy would likely think of or even consider including in a story.

There's more in this chapter to talk about, but that's for another time.

Enjoy the day!