Enos

Enos 1

 

Verse 13:

“And now behold, this was the desire which I desired of him – that if it should so be, that my people, the Nephites, should fall into transgression, and the Lamanites should not be destroyed, that the Lord God would preserve a record of my people, the Nephites; even if it so be by the power of his holy arm, that it might be brought forth at some future day unto the Lamanites, that, perhaps they might be brought unto salvation-” - Enos 1:13

 

                This verse expresses the main concern of Enos along with everyone who revers the plates as holy word of God, that the plates should survive no matter what happens to the rest of the world. That they would be survive to be available and help people in the future, whoever it may be. This concern is first explicitly expressed in the Book of Mormon through this passage.

                When I first read this verse, I was very confused because of the overuse of commas made me read that Enos was asking God for the Nephites to fall into transgression and the Lamanites should not be destroyed… “if it should be” (or if God would allow it). But no, “that if it should be, that my people the Nephites, should fall into transgression, and the Lamanites should not be destroyed,” is all part of the conditional. Enos is asking that even if it were the case that: the Nephites should be destroyed and the Lamanites survive, that the plates of the Naphites would survive with them.

                In this verse Enos is asking God for the plates to survive over anything else. Enos is addressing the worst case scenario when he says that the Nephites may be destroyed and the Lamanites not, this is the case that each of the two societies is turned upside down. Enos’s first priority is the word of God, even above his own people. One could say that the word of God is the only thing with importance, because without the word of God, the Nephites would be reduced to nothing. The people of Zarahemla are an example of this. As in Omni 1:17, Amaleki describes the people of Zarahemla as a people with a corrupted language and without a record; that they denied the Creator.

                People are fallible and corruptible; Enos knows that the word of God is not and wishes for it to survive above anything else.

 

Written 9-9-14

 

Verse 20:

 

“And I bear record that the people of Nephi did seek diligently to restore that Lamanites unto the true faith in God. But our labors were vain; their hatred was fixed, and they were led by their evil nature that they became wild, and ferocious, and a blood-thirsty people, full of idolatry and filthiness; feeding upon beasts of prey; dwelling in tents, and wandering about in the wilderness with a short skin girdle about their loins and their heads shaven; and their skill was in the bow, and in the cimeter, and the ax. And many of them did eat nothing save it was raw meat; and they were continually seeking to destroy us.

Verse 21:

And it came to pass that the people of Nephi did till the land, and raise all manner of grain, and of fruit, and flocks of herds, and flocks of all manner of cattle of every kind, and goats, and wild goats, and also many horses.”

 

                Verses 20 and 21 draw a cultural distinction between the Lamanites and the Nephites. The Lamanites are hunters, savage tent dwellers, and the Nephites seem a little more humane and organized. The Nephites grow and raise their nutritional resources, and are apparently appalled by the Lamanites short skin girdles. The Bible also has a similar distinction between two types of culture. In Genesis 4:2 we find that “Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil.” This becomes a cultural distinction when their descendants come forth. The descendants of Cain are settlers that work the soil and the descendants of Seth are keepers of flocks, and tent dwellers. Moses and the Israelites go through a transition from being nomads, keepers of flocks, and wanderers in the dessert, to people that become settled in the promise land. But in Enos, though the Nephites are settlers, they keep flocks and work the soil, while the Lamanites are hunters that live in tents. But the outstanding cultural distinction between the two is that the Lamanites are described more like savages.

 

Written 9-9-14