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Book of Mormon Commentary
Helaman Chapter 3
SOME WANTED TO DESTROY NEPHI, BUT FEARED REACTION, VER. 32-66
Hel 3:34 Why seest thou this man and hearest him revile against this people and against our law?
The wicked judges of the Gadianton band were angry and tried to incite the people to violence.
They had forsaken the laws of Mosiah and Alma, and Nephi had spoken against this and also
against their secret works 0£ darkness. They boasted that their great cities could never betaken
(36-38).
Some of the people cried out, "Let this man alone, for he is a good man, and those things which he
saith will surely Come to pass except we repent" (39). "Behold if he had not been a prophet he
could not have testified concerning those things" (41).
Hel 3:44 Therefore he was constrained to speak more unto them, saying, Behold my brethren, have ye
not read that God gave power unto one man, even Moses, to smite upon the waters of the Red Sea, and
they parted hither and thither, insomuch that the Israelites, who were our fathers, came through upon dry
ground, and the waters closed upon the armies of the Egyptians, and swallowed them up?
When Nephi saw that he had gained favor with some and that the rest feared him, he began to
preach to them again. He reminded them that Moses had spoken concerning the Messiah and that
the Son of God should come. He mentioned the brazen serpent as a symbol of the Messiah who
should come (43-47). Abraham knew this and "many before the days of Abraham who were called
by the order of God; yea, even after the order of his Son" (51). Then he adds that "many thousand
years before his coming [should be shown], that even redemption should Come unto them" (52).
(See Comments on Mos. 2:3.)
Hel 3:56 And now will ye dispute that Jerusalem was destroyed? Will ye say that the sons of Zedekiah
were not slain, all except it were Mulek?
History records that Jerusalem fell to King Nebuchadnezzar in 586 B.C. His sons were put to
death before Zedekiah's eyes, and then the king's eyes were blinded (II Kings 25:7; II Chron.
36:11; lsa. 37:31, 32). Doubtless Mulek was a younger son whose life was spared. He came with
the colony which left Jerusalem a few years after Lehi's departure. Ornni 1: 26 refers to this
colony as "the people 0£ Zarahemla."
Hel 3:63 But behold, ye have rejected the truth, and rebelled against your holy God; and even at this
time, instead of laying up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where nothing doth corrupt, and where
nothing can come which is unclean, ye are heaping up for yourselves wrath against the day of judgment;
This reference to Deity likely refers to Christ (see 59, 60; also Mos: 8:13). These people had a
knowledge of the prophecies in the scriptures and the beliefs of their forefathers. In their present
state as dissenters in disbelief, they were in rebellion against this light and this Christ. They also
were setting their hearts on the corruptible things of this world and the lusts of the flesh (64).
Then Nephi told them some shocking news by the spirit of prophecy: "Your judge is murdered,
and he lieth in his blood." He even named the judge's brother, a member of the secret band, who
aspired to the judgment seat, as the murderer (65, 66).