Circle Squared
A Textual Analysis of the Book of Mormon
Chapter 4: "License to Kill"
Chapter Summary:
"Nephi slays Laban at the Lord’s command and then secures the plates of brass by stratagem—Zoram chooses to join Lehi’s family in the wilderness. About 600–592 B.C."
Lacking a concrete plan, the resolutely faithful Nephi goes back to the city. As he reaffirms repeatedly in these first few chapters that god will not, as they say, give him more than he can handle. This is an assertion often made about god's character by believers, but given how many people have died victims of nature or other people, this hardly seems supported by the evidence. Still, Nephi embarks cheerfully on a path which will lead him to what I consider to be one of the most immoral stories in scripture: divinely-mandated murder.
Guided by the spirit of god, Nephi wanders around a bit until he comes across a drunken man. And wouldn't you know it, it's Laban! Here he is, drunk to a stupor and without any of his 50 guards. What luck? Nephi then hears a voice in his head, which he identifies as the spirit of god for reasons that go unexplained, which tells him to kill Laban.
Nephi wrestles with the voice inside his head, that is, until the voice inside his head says to him: "Behold the Lord hath delivered him into thy hands."
Nephi adds further justification: "Yea, and I also knew that he had sought to take away mine own life; yea, and he would not hearken unto the commandments of the Lord; and he also had taken away our property."
The voice inside Nephi's head continues: "Slay him, for the Lord hath delivered him into thy hands; Behold the Lord slayeth the wicked to bring forth his righteous purposes. It is better that one man should perish than that a nation should dwindle and perish in unbelief."
It is tempting for me to address why each of these reasons offered to be justification for killing a man, however much of a douche-canoe he may have been, are not very compelling reasons--especially when he is passed out drunk on a side walk. I will gladly grant that all of these reasons may be sufficient to warrant murder. However, I am compelled to point out, yet again, that this all comes from a voice inside Nephi's head which he believes to be the spirit of god!!!
After chopping off Laban's head with the man's own "steel" sword (sure it was...), Nephi puts on Laban's clothes which miraculously fit Nephi's "large stature", and which should be soaked through with Laban's blood. He continues in search of the brass plates and comes across Laban's servant, Zoram, who is fool by the get-up and leads Nephi straight to the plates. Zoram even opens the locked door for Nephi.
Having possessed the plates (finally), Nephi returns to his brothers outside the city... with Zoram... Naturally, since the costume worked so swimmingly on Laban's servant, it also tricks his brothers who promptly begin to run for their lives. Nephi unveils himself to get them to stop running away, and in turn, scares the bejesus out of Zoram, who starts running back to the city. Remember, Nephi is "large in stature", so he easily tackles and pins down Zoram and gives him the following offer (not to be refused):
"And it came to pass that I spake with him, that if he would hearken unto my words, as the Lord liveth, and as I live, even so that if he would hearken unto our words, we would spare his life. And I spake unto him, even with an oath, that he need not fear; that he should be a free man like unto us if he would go down in the wilderness with us." [emphasis added]
In other words: "Come and be a willing hostage, or we will kill you." It is not specified here, but such a threat may well have come from the same voice inside Nephi's head which convinced him that god wanted him to kill a man just before. And without much thought (or choice) Zoram goes with them back to Lehi with the brass plates.
Moral of the story: If you believe god talks to you with a voice inside your head, and that voice tells you to do something which ordinarily you would consider immoral, just remember that anything god tells you to do is by definition moral and you should do it--even if it means killing someone.