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Book of Mormon Commentary
Helaman Chapter 4
A FAMINE LEADS TO REPENTANCE, VER. 1-19
Hel 4:1 And now it came to pass in the seventy and second year of the reign of the Judges, that the
contentions did increase, insomuch that there were wars throughout all the land among all the people of
Nephi.
Primarily the destruction and bloodshed were caused by the Gadianton secret band. However, the
trouble spread among the people so that all the Nephites were at war, and this continued over a
three-year period (3).
Then Nephi asked the Lord to "send a famine so that the people might be stirred to remembrance
and repentance (4).
The Lord had promised Nephi power specifically to "smite the earth with famine" (3:119), and he
had the faith to accomplish this.
Hel 4:8 For the earth was smitten, that it was dry, and did not yield forth grain in the season of grain;
and the whole earth was smitten, even among the Lamanites as well as among the Nephites, so that they
were smitten that they did perish by thousands, in the more wicked parts of the land.
People perished by thousands among both the Lamanites and Nephites "in the more wicked parts
of the land" (8). When the survivors saw they were about to perish, they pleaded with "their chief
judges and their leaders, that they would say unto Nephi ., .Cry unto the Lord our God, that he turn
away from us this famine" (10). "When Nephi saw that the people had repented, and did humble
themselves in sackcloth," he asked the Lord to grant that the famine cease. In his prayer he
mentioned that the Gadianton band had been swept away and become extinct (13).
THE GADIANTONS GAIN CONTROL OF THE LAND, VER. 20-47
Hel 4:20 And it came to pass that in the seventy and sixth year, the Lord did turn away his anger from
the people, and caused that rain should fall upon the earth, insomuch that it did bring forth her fruit in
the season of her fruit.
The people rejoiced and glorified God when this happened, and "they did esteem Nephi as a great
prophet." "Lehi, his brother, was not a whit behind him as to things pertaining to righteousness"
(22, 23). The Nephites began to prosper and multiply until they covered the land "both on the
northward and on the southward, from the sea west, to the sea east" (24).
The church spread among the Nephites and Lamanites until it included most of both nations. A
few doctrinal disputes arose in the seventy-eighth year, but Nephi, Lehi, and their brethren, "who
knew concerning the true points of doctrine, having many revelations daily. ..put an end to their
strife in that same year" (29).
In the eightieth year some dissenters and real Lamanites stirred up a war. They would murder and
plunder and then would hide in the secret places of the mountains. There their numbers were
augmented daily (32).