We enter a new record, the record of Zeniff. From the beginning it looks like Mormon just inserted or kept Zeniff's record completely in tact. This is Zeniff's voice, not Mormon's voice. I admit that Zeniff is not someone that have I paid much attention to in the past, but as I begin to study his record a little more carefully, I am not only fascinated and intrigued by what he has to say, but I wonder if Zeniff's record holds many oft neglected treasures of wisdom.
Why did Mormon include Zeniff's record? We already learned about Ammon's exchange with King Limhi and a brief history of Zeniff and his descendants. Why would Mormon include this entire record? Mormon excluded many other things from his abridgment of the large plates of Nephi, so why include this?
The superscription about Zeniff's record is part of the original record and it designates the time period during which the record of Zeniff was kept, namely, from the time that Zeniff and his people left Zarahemla to the time that they were finally delivered out of the hands of the Lamanites (about 200–187 B.C.) That covers the reign of three kings and many years and in the English translation of the Book of Mormon, 23 chapters. That's a significant chunk that Mormon could have easily summarized and left out. Why didn't he just summarize it and leave out the original record. Mormon obviously thought that there was something important for his later day audience contained in the record of Zeniff.
About 400 years had elapsed since Lehi first left Jerusalem. That's a lot of Nephite history under Zeniff's belt. But who was Zeniff? And who on earth could have ever come up with such a name? Zeniff? Certainly not a farm boy from New York in his early twenties who was born at the turn of the 19th century. Zeniff? Seriously. All of these "Z" names... who could have come up with that? Zarahemla, Zenock, Zenos, Zeniff... the invention of those names alone would have been quite an accomplishment for even a great scholar at a great university. But Tolkien's incredible and incredibly complex Lord of the Rings doesn't even hold a candle to the Book of Mormon. And I love Tolkien's works.
We know that Zeniff was a leader of a group that returned to the land of Nephi, or the land that Nephi first settled and built a temple after their original separation from the Lamanites. We recall that Mosiah and his people fled that land in yet another exodus, and therefore the people who stayed behind must have become Lamanites themselves. We know, therefore, that Zeniff lived in Zarahemla for a time. But remember, the people of Zarahemla combined with Mosiah's people. This caused me to wonder if Zeniff had been an original citizen of Zarahemla, and not an original descendent of Lehi. Was he a Mulekite?
One reason that I thought this is because of how Zeniff introduces himself at the beginning of his record. He informs us that he was taught in all the language of the Nephites. Why would he write that? If he had been a Nephite, wouldn't he have just written that he had been taught in the language of his fathers? He also writes that he had a knowledge of the land of Nephi, as if that had been something extra that he had to study and find out about through his travels. But then in the next phrase he mentions that the land of Nephi was also known as the land of our fathers’ first inheritance. This suggests that Zeniff was a direct descendent of Lehi and Nephi, unless he referred to "our fathers" as part of the combining of the Mulekite people of Zarahemla with the Nephites of the original King Mosiah, father of King Benjamin. May we'll figure out more about Zeniff's heritage as we move along.
In any case, in Zarahemla, Zeniff was taught in all the language of the Nephites and he had a knowledge of the land of Nephi. He had also been a spy who was sent out to the Lamanites in order to find ways to combat them. But unlike his ruthless leader, Zeniff had a good, soft heart, and he discovered much good among the Lamanites. He may have even discovered that what Jacob had taught the Nephites from the Temple, namely, that the Lamanites love each other, their wives love their husbands, their husbands love their wives, and their parents love their children and their children love their parents. Zeniff may have acknowledged that the good and the righteousness among the Lamanites exceeded their own in Zarahemla, even after King Benjamin's mighty speech and the miraculous conversion of nearly everyone among them.
In fact, Zeniff had such a soft spot for these good Lamanites that he ended up in a battle against those in his own group who just wanted to destroy the Lamanites. The ruler of Zeniff's group was an austere and bloodthirsty man who didn't approve of Zeniff's opposition to his commands, and who ordered that Zeniff be put to death. Zeniff was rescued, but only after a horrible battle in which father fought against father and brother fought against brother. Many in their group died, and the few that survived, including Zeniff, returned to Zarahemla for a time. They related the sad tale of their conflict and the deaths of many Nephites to their wives and children back in Zarahemla.
Zeniff wanted to make a treaty with the Lamanites, because he saw that which was good among them, but the ruler of their group not only rejected that proposal but considered that Zeniff was a rebel who incited mutiny or rebellion. It seems to me that Zeniff was mostly in the right, and the austere and blood-thirsty ruler was mostly in the wrong, but it also appears that Zeniff didn't quite fully understand the Lamanites as the enemies of the Nephites. Zeniff saw the good among the Lamanites, which was a good thing, but he didn't quite realize just how cunning the Lamanites were.
Zeniff himself admits that he was overzealous to inherit the land of his fathers (another reference to Lehi and Nephi that suggests that Zeniff may have been a direct descendant of Lehi and Nephi). And I understand Zeniff, in a way, because I've experienced the consequences of my own over-zealousness certain areas as well. I understand how a good person like Zeniff, with a good heart and good intentions, can be an easy target for crafty, conniving, deceptive, and cunning men. Zeniff fell right into King Laman's cunning trap.
Why was Zeniff so over-zealous to inherit the land of their fathers? Why couldn't they just relax in Zerahemla? I don't know. But for whatever the reason, Zeniff collected as many as wanted to possess the land of their inheritance, and he led them on a pioneering journey through the wilderness. It was a very difficult journey for Zeniff and his company. They were smitten with famine and sore afflictions because they were slow to remember the Lord their God.
As I read this account and thought of Mormon's reasons for including it in his record, I wondered about many people who choose to migrate to different regions of the earth. Some are refugees who have no choice. Others are pioneers seeking a better life. But I wonder if Zeniff serves as a kind of warning for anyone who might be over-zealous to do anything, especially colonize a territory. Who knows? Whatever the case, Zeniff and his group of settlers paused for a time in the same place where the previous battle had raged and where many Nephites were slain. This place was close to the land of Lehi-Nephi.
The intrepid Zeniff took four of his men with him to discuss their prospects with the King of the Lamanites. This was a very daring expedition, it seems to me, because King Laman could have just imprisoned them or put them to death. But King Laman was very cunning, and he came up with a better plan. He came up with a plan to use Zeniff's over-zealous endeavor against him and to take advantage of the Lamanites. King Laman's cunning reminds me of many experiences that I have had in the modern world of work. Sadly, there are a lot of cunning men out there, cunning like King Laman, who have no qualms about taking advantage of innocent people in their quest for riches and the praise of men.
Instead of sending them away empty-handed, King Laman feigned friendship with Zeniff and his four men, and he even covenanted with Zeniff that he and his group could possess the land of Lehi-Nephi and the land of Shilom. King Laman even commanded his people to leave those territories so that Zeniff and his people could inhabit them. Zeniff, a good man who knew and loved that which was good among the Lamanites, fell prey to the craftiness of their cunning leader.
Thus Zeniff and his people began to repair the walls of the cities and to build and plant and farm. They were such great farmers that they even planted and grew things that we have never heard of, or that we might call by other names. They planted seeds of corn, wheat, and barley. But they also planted neas and sheum. Yes, that's right. Neas and sheum. Never heard of neas and sheum? You think that Joseph Smith came up with that? I don't think so. Even to concoct a tale about a guy named Zeniff boggles the imagination, but then to think that this same guy with a name that starts with "Z" planted seeds of something called neas and sheum... please. Here is some interesting information on neas and sheum (although I think that these plants, whatever they were, grew in North America:
https://onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php/NEAS
https://onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php/SHEUM
After 12 years, when King Laman saw that Zeniff and his people were beginning to prosper, he became uneasy. If Zeniff's people became too powerful, they could overpower the Lamanites, and King Laman did not want that to happen. In fact, King Laman and his people designed to live off of the Nephites labor and to reduce them to servitude. How's that for a treaty or a covenant of peace? Zeniff's previous austere and bloodthirsty ruler, even though he was largely in the wrong, also may have better understood some things about the Lamanites.
After 13 years of his reign, Zeniff was compelled to organize troops to defend themselves against the attack of King Laman's Lamanites. King Zeniff armed his men with all kinds of weapons, and, in the strength of the Lord, he and his people resisted the Lamanite onslaught. Zeniff and his people prayed fervently for God's help. They prayed fervently for deliverance, and they were awakened to a remembrance of the deliverance of their fathers.
When Zeniff writes about the deliverance of their fathers, he could refer to the deliverance of Mosiah and his people, or the deliverance of Nephi and his people, or the deliverance of Lehi and his people, or even the deliverance of Moses and the children of Israel. The Lord's deliverance could easily refer to each of these exoduses or all of them together.
The Lord heard the prayers of Zeniff and his people, and He answered their prayers. Zeniff records the specific number of Lamanites that were slain in the battle (3,043) and the specific number of Nephites that were slain in the same contest (279). Zeniff and his people were victorious, but their victory came at a great cost.
Another thing to keep in mind is that this is Zeniff's record, written with his own peculiar style and vocabulary. Zeniff had been taught in the language of the Nephites, but his style and vocabulary are uniquely his own, and therefore different from the style and vocabulary of Nephi, Jacob, Mormon, and others. The word "over-zealous," for example, only occurs one other time in the Book of Mormon, as far as I am aware. (Mosiah 7:21) This second usage of the term appears to be a direct quotation from King Limhi, the grandson of King Zeniff, a direct quotation that Mormon included in his abridgment. Zeniff confessed that he had been over-zealous, and Zeniff's grandson Limhi acknowledged that his grandfather had indeed been over-zealous. Whatever the word was in the original reformed Egyptian must have been a unique and interesting word.
It is interesting to consider the weapons that the Zenephites used to defend themselves as well: bows, arrows, swords, cimeters, clubs, slings, etc.
There is so much more in this record of Zeniff.
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