Lesson Plan for Helaman 1-6
INTRODUCTION
We have finished the Book of Alma which, more so than any other book in the Book of Mormon, stretched out Nephite history across its pages. There were 63 chapters dedicated to 39 years of history. Many, if not most, of those years had warfare or dissenting Nephites causing many issues. We have anti-Christs, disaffected Mulekites pushing for a kingship, as well as an initial widespread conversion of many Lamanites; the beginning of fulfilling promises made to Father Lehi (we get a much more widespread conversion in the Book of Helaman).
On an interesting note, John W. Welch suggests that Alma as a book drags on for as long as it does because it was unknown what exactly happened to Alma. In other words, why does the record not transition into "The Book of Helaman" whenever Alma leaves the story in Alma chapter 45? It is assumed by many he might have been translated (see Alma 45:19), but his son, Helaman, takes over affairs with the slight anticipation that his father might come back. After some years and when Helaman gives the records to his son, Helaman, that is when we end the Book of Alma. The transition to the Book of Helaman occurs after the generation after Alma "the Younger" dies.
With that said, the Book of Alma ends with several, if not close to a dozen years, of nonstop war. This might account for why many of the Nephite leaders during this time appear to have died at a fairly young age. The stress of those times was great! Captain Moroni dies around the age of 38 after an early retirement. Pahoran, Helaman (the first), and Shiblon all die within a five-year (or less) period after that. The reign of the judges has already long been in a volatile state for the relatively short time it has been in place since King Mosiah ushered it in. Imagine how volatile the situation is now and how opportunists might see the Nephite situation with a large overturn of Nephite leadership!
Before we dive into the narrative of the Book of Helaman, it is worth noting that a few modern prophets have commented on how this part of the Book of Mormon should be read. President Ezra Taft Benson put it most plainly when he said:
"... In the Book of Mormon, we find a pattern for preparing for the Second Coming. A major portion of the book centers on the few decades just prior to Christ’s coming to America. By careful study of that time period, we can determine why some were destroyed in the terrible judgments that preceded His coming and what brought others to stand at the temple in the land of Bountiful and thrust their hands into the wounds of His hands and feet." (1)
The last half century before the Savior is born begins in the Book of Helaman, therefore we can really begin to see this portion of the record as the "last days" for the peoples of the Book of Mormon.
The narrative structure of the Book of Helaman can be instructive. See the diagram below from Kim Berkey:
"Helaman's comparisons are strung along a linear chain rather than a stacked two-dimensional grid [we find in the Book of Alma] ... The book of Helaman is deeply invested in comparisons... The fact that doubling (or comparisons) remains so prominent in Helaman all the same suggests that we are witnessing not simply a novel narrative technique keyed to a new era of Nephite history so much as the simultaneous failures of the same narrative techniques that had succeeded so well in previous books. Readers are meant to understand that Nephite history is no longer sufficiently stable to bear the kind of tidy structuring that had been imposed [in previous books] ... As the Nephites hurtle toward large-scale destruction in Third Nephi and (later) Mormon, so, too, the parallels that organize their narrative... pick up in tempo, leaving the structure of Helaman caught in the Nephites' breakneck gallop toward total political collapse." (2)
In other words, while Alma's book covers 39-40 years of history in 63 chapters, the Book of Helaman begins a Book of Mormon trend where MANY years are covered in much fewer chapters (aside from the pause we get in most of 3 Nephi when the Savior visits). We get 16 chapters covering 50 years in this Book. The gallop towards destruction is ratcheting up, not in the sense that time is moving quicker, but that society is increasingly becoming more volatile during this time.
We get an example of this in the oft-discussed pride cycle we find in this portion of the Book of Mormon. We have five iterations of the pride cycle starting at the beginning of the Book of Helaman until 3 Nephi 10. This mirrors the Book of Judges which has 6 such cycles (see diagram below).
As noted already, Pahoran dies which opens up a three-way race for chief judge between three of his sons. The names of these sons are noteworthy, as Hugh Nibley and others have noted their Egyptian origin and how there would be no way Joseph Smith knew of such things in his day. For example, the wicked son who sought power, Paanchi (see Helaman 1:3) is an Egyptian bullseye which literally means "the living one" and can have a secondary meaning "to swear an oath". There is a fantastic story about how a prominent biblical scholar at John Hopkins University, Dr. William F. Albright, in 1966 wrote of this finding (Dr. Albright was not a member of the Church). He was unable to explain it and called Joseph Smith some kind of "religious genius". (3)
With that said, there is, even more, brilliance as there is irony and wordplay throughout these first two chapters dealing with the name Paanchi: see Helaman 1:8-11 especially. It culminates in a note Mormon adds at the end of Helaman chapter 2. Matthew Bowen summarizes:
"The oath (cf. ʿnh) first sworn in support of Paanchi (‘the living one’) by his supporters, invoking the life of ‘their everlasting maker’ culminated in the eventual death of the Nephites as a society." (4)
THE BIRTH OF SECRET COMBINATIONS AND THE GADIANTON BAND
To make a long story short here, Pahoran wins the voice of the people to become chief judge and is killed by Kishkumen shortly thereafter. This Kishkumen has a group that swears unto each other that they would not reveal the deed. Paanchi for his rebellion was put to death and then the other brother, the one who righteously conceded the initial coronation of his brother, Pacumeni, was made chief judge. Pacumeni dies shortly thereafter in battle and Helaman is made chief judge over the people. Kishkuman unites with a man named Gadianton because of his expertise in "many words". Gadianton becomes the leader. Kishkuman is killed in his attempt to slay Helaman on the throne which leads to the rest of the secret band fleeing into the wilderness. It is at this point Mormon inserts some striking commentary in the narrative.
READ HELAMAN 2:13-14
"13 And behold, in the end of this book ye shall see that this Gadianton did prove the overthrow, yea, almost the entire destruction of the people of Nephi.
14 Behold I do not mean the end of the book of Helaman, but I mean the end of the book of Nephi, from which I have taken all the account which I have written."
In many instances in the Book of Mormon hereafter, Secret Combinations is directly tethered to the sin of pride. President Ezra Taft Benson has made the connection:
"Pride results in secret combinations which are built up to get power, gain, and glory of the world. (See Hel. 7:5; Ether 8:9, 16, 22–23; Moses 5:31.) This fruit of the sin of pride, namely secret combinations, brought down both the Jaredite and the Nephite civilizations and has been and will yet be the cause of the fall of many nations. (See Ether 8:18–25.)" (5)
On top of this, we learn a harrowing truth later on in what we read this week in Helaman 6:21 & 38, which says that this band "had seduced the more part of the righteous until they had come down to believe in their works and partake of their spoils, and to join with them in their secret murders and combinations".
QUESTION: If secret combinations are the result of pride, what does that mean for us? What can we learn from this to help us guard against it in our day? How might we be seduced into attitudes of pride that might even appeal to "the righteous"?
Kim Berkey comments:
"The questions Helaman poses about these topics are not the questions readers tend to ask when they come to the book. What's important is not that secret combinations emerge but how; not that there are corrupt plots at the highest levels of government but how the Nephites overlook their role in nurturing that corruption; not that their society collapses but how they blind themselves to the process... The lesson of Helaman is not that we must ramp up our sense of threat in the political arena but rather that we are lousy at recognizing what truly threatens us in the first place. ... The crucial thing about the secret combinations that I think readers constantly miss, is that the secret combinations are not the enemy of the Nephites, the secret combinations are the Nephites. Nephites are secret combinations, the people who join these bands are Nephites, these bands overtake the people until they’ve completely saturated the government. There is no difference between the Nephites at large and the secret combinations by the end of the book." (Helaman: a brief theological introduction, p. 4-9, see also Maxwell Institute Podcast - Briefly Helaman, with Kimberly Matheson Berkey)
Another note on how we need to be careful of how we read about secret combinations, but, at the same time, be aware of what Mormon and Moroni are trying to point out to us: an exhaustive study in BYU's Religious Educator on this topic from Nicholas J. Fredrick concludes the following.
"It is valuable to understand that groups have been labeled as modern secret combinations by different people living in different circumstances. Given important historical contexts, prophets, apostles, leaders, and scholars have identified many places we can see modern secret combinations. That is part of the danger of secret combinations—they morph and change, manifesting themselves one way here and another way there. Once identified, they may recede into the background, only to be ignored once more. While it may be helpful to understand the differing interpretations of secret combinations, we should be cognizant of the multiplicity of possible interpretations as well as be considerate of the potential damage of labeling any given group, people, or approach as a modern-day secret combination without proper authority... My students struggle to grasp why communism, the Mafia, or even street gangs are such a serious threat to the Church that the Lord has issued a command to modern-day Gentiles to identify them and eradicate them. They tend to presume that, as long as they avoid certain forms of government or shun illegal organizations, they are exempt from Moroni’s “awful situation.” But as they start to recognize shared traits and common elements among the various possibilities, the dangers posed by secret combinations become more of a reality for them—something that they have perhaps encountered (or even unknowingly engaged in) on a regular basis without even recognizing it. " (6)
HELAMAN 3: THE CYCLES OF PRIDE BEGIN
Helaman chapter 3 begins with dissensions among the Nephites and how there was a large exodus of people moving to "the land northward" (see verse 3). One wonders, as some latter-day apostles and scholars have speculated, if these people were inspired by God to flee the land just like how Lehi and Nephi were commanded to flee Jerusalem. Evidence for this is how even "many of the people of Ammon... did also go forth into this land" (see verse 12). The people of Ammon are always noted for their stalwart faith in the Lord in the Book of Mormon. For about a decade, starting back in Alma chapter 63, we have people fleeing the land into the north. There have been many apostles in our dispensation give their inspired opinion about how these people are among the ancestors of modern-day Pacific islanders (Polynesians). See here for a great list of quotes.
We get a very interesting verse in verse 14 which notes, among a list of so many things, that the Nephites built many temples. It is a detail we don't highlight often enough in the Book of Mormon. Namely, that the Nephites probably had many temples in their various cities. It is a parallel to our day. They had temples dot their land while the pride cycle went around and around among them.
As Helaman (the son of Helaman) fills the seat of chief judge the record notes he has two sons, Nephi and Lehi. They play really big parts in the coming chapter. We read that the Church begins to prosper with tens of thousands of baptisms unto repentance. The success is so great "that even the high priests and the teachers were themselves astonished beyond measure." (see verse 25) Mormon adds a beautiful commentary to this moment in history in verses 27-30. We will return to it later, but I will preview it as a very strong intertextual connection with Father Lehi's and Nephi's vision of The Tree of Life back in 1 Nephi chapters 8 & 11.
Mormon continues to go through years of history at lightning speed and notes that a few years after this that pride enters into the hearts of many in the Church. They would even persecute their own brethren, which suggests relationships inside the Church membership were hurting. Despite this, Mormon (or Helaman) note that many followers of Christ remained humbled. He notes that despite the heaps of inter-persecution their hearts and faith grew stronger and stronger in Christ "unto the filling their souls with joy and consolation, yea, even to the purifying and the sanctification of their hearts." (see verse 35)
QUESTION: In practice, what choices or actions lead to one growing stronger in their Faith and Joy in Christ despite heavy pointing fingers all around?
Verse 35, as already noted, sounds a lot like "Spiritual Momentum". President Nelson has recently taught:
"We have never needed positive spiritual momentum more than we do now, to counteract the speed with which evil and the darker signs of the times are intensifying. Positive spiritual momentum will keep us moving forward amid the fear and uncertainty created by pandemics, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and armed hostilities. Spiritual momentum can help us withstand the relentless, wicked attacks of the adversary and thwart his efforts to erode our personal spiritual foundation. ... I would like to suggest five specific actions we can take to help us maintain positive spiritual momentum.1. Get on the covenant path and stay there.2. Discover the joy of daily repentance.3. Learn about God and how He works.4. Seek and expect miracles.5. End conflict in your personal life.... As you act on these pursuits, I promise you the ability to move forward on the covenant path with increased momentum, despite whatever obstacles you face. And I promise you greater strength to resist temptation, more peace of mind, freedom from fear, and greater unity in your families." (7)
Chapter 3 ends with Helaman dying and passing on the judgment seat to his son, Nephi. Chapter 4 has some harrowing details as we learn that Nephite dissenters and Lamanites finally gain control of the Nephite capital city, Zarahemla. The narrator of the record puts the blame squarely on "those who professed to belong to the church of God" (see verses 11-12). Almost immediately, Nephi, Lehi, and Moronihah preach, and the people begin to prosper again. They take back at least half of what was taken from them by the Lamanites, but Zarahemla remained under Lamanite and dissenter control. The chapter ends with a harrowing note that all these events transpired "in the space of not many years", showing us that the pride cycle on a societal scale can move rather quickly.
HELAMAN 5: THE LAMANITES AND THE TREE OF LIFE
Helaman chapter 5 begins with Nephi (the son of Helaman the 2nd) stepping down from the judgment seat to preach full-time, a move that he copies from his great-grandfather Alma back in Alma chapter 4. As the record begins to recount Nephi and Lehi's full-time ministry, we get an insert from something their father, Helaman, had written them before he died. In this letter, he asks Lehi and Nephi to remember their namesakes. He desires them to be men like Father Lehi and Father Nephi. Helaman names them after these ancient holy patriarchs for a reason, which will become evident as we move along in Chapter 5.
Scholars call Helaman chapter 5 the greatest intertextual chapter within the Book of Mormon and it begins in these verses that Helaman wrote his sons. He quotes King Benjamin, Amulek, Lehi, Nephi, and others. Helaman ends the letter with one of the more popular verses in the Book of Mormon.
READ HELAMAN 5:12
"12 And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall."
This verse has echoes of the end of the Savior's Sermon on the Mount when he speaks about the wise man building his house upon the rock. Elder Bednar has recently commented on this verse:
"The symbolism of Christ as the “rock” upon whom we should build the foundation of our lives is most instructive. Please note in this verse that the Savior is not the foundation. Rather, we are admonished to build our personal spiritual foundation upon Him." (8)
QUESTION: If Christ is the rock, what should our personal spiritual foundation look like? What can we learn from this distinction between our personal spiritual foundation and Jesus Christ as the rock?
The Rock would cause the ancient reader to think about the rock Moses struck in Numbers 20:8-11. Out of this rock came forth water, lots of water according to Psalms 78:16 & Psalms 105:41. In Matthew 7:24-27 and in Helaman 5:12 the water has taken on a posture of chaos which suggests a pure covenant has become corrupted. It might suggest, like what we are seeing in these Book of Mormon chapters, a people who continue to defile the waters that flow out of the fruits of the Church. Water only flows downward which suggests this rock was upon a mountain (see Psalms 27:5). This, in turn, might suggest a temple motif in the verse we just read. Even further, it can be read as a call to stand in Holy Places, but also a warning of the corrupted waters that have engulfed the Church membership at this time in Book of Mormon history. It is interesting to note that the Jewish Midrash tradition has the ancient Temple of Soloman with a large Rock called the "Foundation Stone" within its ancient Holy of Holies. Upon this rock sat the Ark of the Covenant, a symbol of Israel's literal covenant with Jehovah. Underneath this stone was a well of water called "the well of souls" which was understood as the origin of the creation where the powers of chaos were tamed by Jehovah. (9)
The moral of the verse is to simply build ourselves up upon the Savior Jesus Christ. Ancient symbols suggest this takes place as we personally live up to covenants made with the Savior in His House. Our covenant-keeping, perhaps, has a purifying effect upon once-corrupted waters. This is an example we have seen in the chapters we just read, and we will see it at its apex in the rest of Helaman chapters 5-6.
Nephi and Lehi will go out and preach with resounding success. He converts "many of those dissenters" (see verse 17) and eight thousand Lamanites. They have a baptismal yield that rivaled what Ammon and his brothers had with the people of Ammon. Note also that this mass conversion takes place within Zarahemla, which was in Lamanite control previously. In short, they take back the capital city using the sword of spirit instead of weapons of war. How miraculous is that?
They then head to the Land of Nephi, the original land the Nephites inhabited after they separated from their Lamanite brethren in 2 Nephi 5 (it is also the place where the story of Abinadi, King Noah, and Alma the Elder takes place). It is in this land that Lehi and Nephi are thrown into prison. They are there for "many days", which in other places in the Book of Mormon means several months, at least.
READ HELAMAN 5:23-28 & 43-44
"23 And it came to pass that Nephi and Lehi were encircled about as if by fire, even insomuch that they durst not lay their hands upon them for fear lest they should be burned. Nevertheless, Nephi and Lehi were not burned; and they were as standing in the midst of fire and were not burned.
24 And when they saw that they were encircled about with a pillar of fire, and that it burned them not, their hearts did take courage.
25 For they saw that the Lamanites durst not lay their hands upon them; neither durst they come near unto them, but stood as if they were struck dumb with amazement.
26 And it came to pass that Nephi and Lehi did stand forth and began to speak unto them, saying: Fear not, for behold, it is God that has shown unto you this marvelous thing, in the which is shown unto you that ye cannot lay your hands on us to slay us.
27 And behold, when they had said these words, the earth shook exceedingly, and the walls of the prison did shake as if they were about to tumble to the earth; but behold, they did not fall. And behold, they that were in the prison were Lamanites and Nephites who were dissenters.
28 And it came to pass that they were overshadowed with a cloud of darkness, and an awful solemn fear came upon them.
... AFTER CALLING UPON THE LORD...
43 And it came to pass that when they cast their eyes about, and saw that the cloud of darkness was dispersed from overshadowing them, behold, they saw that they were encircled about, yea every soul, by a pillar of fire.
44 And Nephi and Lehi were in the midst of them; yea, they were encircled about; yea, they were as if in the midst of a flaming fire, yet it did harm them not, neither did it take hold upon the walls of the prison; and they were filled with that joy which is unspeakable and full of glory."
The result of this vision is that the hundreds of Lamanites present become converted because of "the greatness of the evidences". In turn, those converted Lamanites are then sent out to preach and tell it all to the rest of their Lamanite brethren. As a result, the Lamanites become mostly converted and become much more righteous than the Nephites for a very long period. This sets the stage for Samuel the Lamanite later who is the only Lamanite prophet we know of in the Book of Mormon.
QUESTIONS: What can we learn from this miraculous experience to notice the "greatness of the evidences" more in our lives? What can we learn about waiting on the timing of the Lord here considering we are over 500 years from when Father Lehi and Nephi received promises that the seed of Laman and Lemuel would be remembered? What can we learn about the power of the gospel considering that all the Nephite lands were taken back peacefully after decades of warfare and Nephite dissent?
Some scholars note that the motif in this vision is meant to suggest that the heavenly holy of holies has exploded into the world at this moment within the prison in the Land of Nephi. Even further, there is literary mastercrafting at play in this chapter. With help from the scholarship of Grant Hardy and Kim Berkey, the chart below highlights the literary brilliance and emphasis on the miraculous event here in Helaman chapter 5 and how it takes us, figuratively and literarily, through Nephite history up to this point and is a strong recapitulation of The Vision of the Tree of Life.
"While [Father] Lehi's original vision was tainted by the sting of Laman and Lemuel's rejection of the fruit, a happier version occurs some five hundred years later when their descendants gather at the root of the tree, beckoned through history by characters named Nephi and Lehi. Sad stories can have happy endings, we learn. Old dreams ending in domestic tragedy are still available for joyful conclusions, and history is not resigned simply to citation but is also available for miraculous revision. The whole world is ripe for God to break in at any moment because lives and texts and histories are not rigid and they are not fixed - even after five hundred years of evidence to the contrary." - Kim Berkey (Helaman: a brief theological introduction, p. 44)
This chapter beautifully highlights what Joseph Smith, Elder David A. Bednar, President James E. Faust, and Elder Orson F. Whitney call "the tentacles of Divine Providence":
"The Prophet Joseph Smith declared—and he never taught more comforting doctrine—that the eternal sealings of faithful parents and the divine promises made to them for valiant service in the Cause of Truth, would save not only themselves, but likewise their posterity. Though some of the sheep may wander, the eye of the Shepherd is upon them, and sooner or later they will feel the tentacles of Divine Providence reaching out after them and drawing them back to the fold. Either in this life or the life to come, they will return. They will have to pay their debt to justice; they will suffer for their sins; and may tread a thorny path; but if it leads them at last, like the penitent Prodigal, to a loving and forgiving father’s heart and home, the painful experience will not have been in vain. Pray for your careless and disobedient children; hold on to them with your faith. Hope on, trust on, till you see the salvation of God." (10)
QUESTION: What can this teach us about waiting upon the Lord? Other than wayward children, can this apply to other long-awaited blessings to come to us?
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland has observed:
"Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come." (11)
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