Comments on: God’s Favor and Human Arrogance and Contempt – Reading Nephi – 16:33-39

By: Anuj Agarwal

Anuj Agarwal — Tue, 28 Nov 2017 06:00:04 +0000

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By: Chad Curtis

Chad Curtis — Fri, 24 Nov 2017 17:03:41 +0000

Thank you James for the fair assessment of Nephi! I grew up on the Living Scriptures version of Nephi, not a flaw to be seen. Coming to terms with Nephi’s faults is a bit of a growing up experience (I just read Claudia Bushman’s “I, Nephi” essay in “Perspective on Mormon Theology: Scriptural Theology”, and I winced quite a bit). It seems increasing difficult to recognize faults while respecting strengths in a world that can’t seem to forgive the sins of the fathers.

By: Clark Goble

Clark Goble — Thu, 23 Nov 2017 19:35:33 +0000

James, my conclusion always seems influenced by Milton. Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven. That is if Laman left he’d be a nobody.

By: James Olsen

James Olsen — Thu, 23 Nov 2017 16:27:36 +0000

Jerry – it could certainly be the case that although understandably unwilling to recreate the complete argument, Nephi is indirectly acknowledging it and the genuine hardships undergone. And it makes sense that an older Nephi removed by years from the narrative would be more open on this. For me the question turns on the context of the older Nephi and how secure he felt. I find that the overall narrative hints at an insecure context; my bet is that Nephi’s acknowledgments stem from these hardships being an explicit issue in the later context.

Clark – yes this is indeed the question. I turn various possibilities over in my mind, but none of them are satisfactory. For whatever reason splitting with the family was not something Laman was willing to countenance. Ever.

By: Clark Goble

Clark Goble — Thu, 23 Nov 2017 00:02:11 +0000

The whole question of Nahom is interesting. Not because of the debate within apologetics over whether Nahom is a “hit” by Joseph Smith about Arabia but about Nahom proper. Reading the text from our more knowledgeable viewpoint it seems certain that Nephi and company would have encountered others. Maybe traders, given they were likely following a trade route. But also just because when you’re near a fertile area in a land not known for fertile areas it seems likely you’re going to meet a lot of people. This in turn suggests there’s a lot being left unsaid in this record. Was more said in the lost 116 pages? We don’t know.

The big question I have is one you allude to. Why on earth didn’t Laman and Lemuel flee?

By: Jerry Schmidt

Jerry Schmidt — Tue, 21 Nov 2017 01:35:52 +0000

I wonder if Nephi was being more straight-shooting than we might give credit, though I admit that’s a biased view. But the argument Laman is referenced bringing against Nephi is fairly conspicuous in the details of the group’s suffering. If Nephi controls the narrative, why allow Laman any kind of decent argument? I see narrator Nephi as the older man realizing what a nerve-wracking experience the exodus really was, and how, at the time, he may have been in a spiritual fugue and not fully aware of what the others were experiencing.

The narrating Nephi does not openly acknowledge this, but allows Laman the valid argument about the situation. But narrator Nephi knows that despite later regrets, young Nephi had two jobs at this point in the exodus: being defacto prophet, as Lehi may also have been stricken as Ishmael, and logistical leader as his elder brothers were likely passive-aggressively leaving the work, and thus the blame, for Nephi.