Come follow me Book of Mormon Mosiah 29-Alma 4 - A new Era

Welcome to Come Follow Me with Sam!

Judgement day has come. 

I have really gotten behind on these things and today is the day that I catch up! and get current on the AMAZING things that are happening at this time in the Book of Mormon. Honestly, it would be fun to do this more. The tricky thing is that it does take significant time, and some schedule changes that came from Corona, along with investment in effort into a come follow me discussion during Corona virus lock-down, has really cut out my normal routine of posting. Well, No More! We are going for the Gold. Thanks all, and hope you are coming out of the experience of the last 3 months better attuned to helping each other.

Okay Enough of that. Judgment day has come another way!

It is the beginning of the Reign of Judges (YES YES YES!) and the beginning of Alma the younger as high priest in the church. Mosiah showed himself to be very wise, because dissension stresses come almost immediately into the reign of judges. We will explore them below.

THE REIGN OF JUDGES!

It happened. The reign of judges finally came. So much past and present went into the meditation and counsel of King Mosiah II to reach this decision. Check out some of the reasons.

1. The reign of Judges happened anciently in Israel

Mosiah had a pattern and a knowledge of a time when judges ruled Israel and there was no King. He also undoubtedly had the scriptures talking about how the people asked for a king, and the ensuing problems with Saul, David, and Solomon. 

2. The wickedness of Kings happened recently. King Mosiah had just received the people of Limhi and Alma and heard their sad tale. In one generation, a wicked king cast out and killed the prophets, and corrupted the culture. Because of this, the men of the kingdom were slaughtered in wars, and the people were subjected to terrible bondage. Many of Mosiah's subjects had suffered under that. The others had heard the tale and it must have weighed heavily on him.

3. Mosiah had just translated the records of the Jaredites. By virtue of his power as a seer, he had translated the sad tale of the Jaredite nation, and the tale of continuous wars of son against father, and brother against brother unto the destruction of the entire kingdom must have filled his soul with warning against following the same course.

4. Mosiah's sons were gone! They had gone to preach the gospel. Mosiah must have had discussions with them beforehand and they had likely said they didn't want the kingdom. That being said, it seems like Mosiah looked into the future and feared that when his sons came back, they might ask for the throne from the incumbent, sowing dissension and war. The sons of Mosiah had been persecutors of the church for a large portion of their lives; Mosiah mentions specifically that if they went back to that way of life, it would be disastrous for the kingdom.

Mosiah really thought through this system of government he was about to propose. Mosiah 29 is really just a small excerpt from all the discussions.

A challenge by an anti-christ

I can't help but wonder if Nehor was the seed of the Gadiantons, and by consequence the seed of the entire destruction of the Nephites. The account of Nehor is pretty short in Alma 1, so we don't get a good idea of the perniciousness of his doctrine expect through later examples of them who followed Nehor. I am going to pay particular attention in the future and write to these things to explore them more. For now, lets just outline the basics

1. Nehor preached redemption without repentance

2. Nehor lifted himself up. Priestcraft is pointing to something other than Christ. It seems to be followed by worldly pursuits, especially getting money.

3. Nehors are malevolent, and it shows against anyone that knows their doctrine. They mock any that don't know it but follow anyway.

4. Nehors fear the law, but wish to overturn it. They also wish to enforce their order by law

5. It seems that caring for the poor and being 'neat and comely' is a difficult defense that followers of Christ can pursue that is difficult to overcome from the Nehors.

Amlici - the reign of judges is challenged

Amlici is the first follower of Nehor that we can examine. He wanted power, he was willing to kill for it, and he had a massive following. How did the order of the Nehors spread so fast? Was this great spread what caused Alma to give up the judgement seat? how did Amlici get thousands of people to follow?

Another question, more speculative, is to ask 'if the reign of judges were not set up, would Amlici have dared make his move?'

When you have a powerful ruler, there is more order, but that order tends toward corruption. When you have a reign of democracy, where the sovereignty is invested in the people, the people can act more freely. That in turn causes the hearts of men to play out their actions.

I am not sure that Amlici would have moved against Mosiah's chosen successor. But I think the malice in amlici's heart festered in both him and his followers, and would have fed the fire of something much worse down the road.

I believe Mosiah did the right thing, first because it seems inspired of God. Second, from my own reasoning, it seems better to work out things as quickly as possible before they grow to big to handle. Sometimes pushing a bad thing down the road instead of dealing with it frankly means that it will be too big to handle in the future. Mosiah's grandfather already led the Nephites out of almost complete destruction once, and this was not the first time. In this case, it was better to give the people freedom under law and deal with the consequences now than to rule with an iron fist and deal with consequences later.

The destruction Amlici caused by his rebellion, it seems, woke the people up with its destruction, woke the church up from slipping into trouble, and woke Alma up that his greater calling was to nourish the people with the word, and that he should invest his time in that.

For the second time in a row, the ruler of the people gave up the seat of power willingly (technically Mosiah ruled to the end of his days, but he gave up the line of rule) for the welfare of the people.