According to Noel Reynolds, in Lehi’s final words to his youngest son Joseph, he depends heavily on the writings of two ancient prophets in Egypt--Joseph and Moses (see 2 Nephi 3:4-25). The text invites us to see Nephi also as a parallel figure to these two great leaders and deliverers of Israel. They both shared Nephi’s problem--having to justify their unexpected callings to authority over their brethren. Concerning the parallels to Moses, Reynolds notes that Nephi’s description of the death of Laban is preceded by a passage where Nephi exhorts his brothers to follow him without fear of Laban or his soldiers: “Let us be strong like unto Moses, for he truly spake unto the waters of the Red Sea and they divided hither and thither, and our fathers came through, out of captivity, on dry ground, and the armies of Pharaoh did follow and were drowned in the waters of the Red Sea” (1 Nephi 4:1-3). Not only does Nephi lead them successfully in that venture, but from then on he is their leader through the wilderness, over the water, to the promised land. [Noel B. Reynolds, “The Political Dimension in Nephi’s Small Plates,” FARMS, 1987, pp. 32-33]
According to Reynolds, the similarity between the ancient exodus of Israel from Egypt and the experience of Lehi and his people was explicitly recognized by Nephi at the time and by Limhi and Alma in later centuries (see 1 Nephi 17:19-44; Mosiah 7:19-20; Alma 36:28-9). Thus both Lehi and Nephi can be seen as Moses figures. This comparison has been developed by previous writers (see S. Kent Brown, “The Exodus Pattern in the Book of Mormon,” BYU Studies 30/3 (1990): 111-26; George S. Tate, “The Typology of the Exodus Pattern in the Book of Mormon,” in Literature of Belief: Sacred Scripture and Religious Experience, ed. Neal E. Lambert (Provo, Utah: BYU Religious Studies Center, 1981), 245-62).
[Noel B. Reynolds, “Nephite Kingship Reconsidered,” in Mormons, Scripture, and the Ancient World, FARMS, pp. 171-177]
1 Nephi 17:26 Ye know that by his [Moses’] word the waters of the Red Sea were divided ([Illustration] Moses Parting the Red Sea. By the power of God, Moses divided the Red Sea and saved the children of Israel. Artist: Robert T. Barrett. [Thomas R. Valletta ed., The Book of Mormon for Latter-day Saint Families, 1999, p. 52]
“Now Ye Know That Moses Was Commanded of the Lord to Do That Great Work”
According to Noel Reynolds, the similarity between the ancient exodus of Israel from Egypt and the experience of Lehi and his people was explicitly recognized by Nephi at the time and by Limhi and Alma in later centuries (see 1 Nephi 17:19-44; Mosiah 7:19-20; Alma 36:28-9). Thus both Lehi and Nephi can be seen as Moses figures. While there are enormous differences in the experiences of Moses and Nephi, the mature Nephi chose to tell his story in such a way that more than twenty explicit and implicit points of comparison stand out.
1. Both Moses and Nephi fled into the wilderness after killing a public figure who is portrayed as repressive or even criminal. Their flight prevented their being detected (see Exodus 2:11-15; 1 Nephi 4:18, 38)
2. Moses was “caught up into an exceedingly high mountain” to receive comprehensive revelation that would both ground and guide his prophetic career (Moses 1:1). Nephi, after trying to know the things his father had seen, was also “caught away … into an exceedingly high mountain” where he received this same kind of fundamental revelation (1 Nephi 11:1).
3. As a result of these great visions, both Moses and Nephi prophesied a future scattering and destruction of their own people because of wickedness. Both also prophesied a latter-day restoration of their people (see Deuteronomy 4:26-31; 1 Npehi 12:19-23; 13:30; 34-42).
4. Moses spoke with and even saw God face-to-face (see Exodus 33:11); Numbers 12:8; Moses 1:2, 31). The “Spirit of the Lord” that caught Nephi up into the mountain and narrated the first part of his vision may well have been Jesus Christ. This identification is suggested when the guide vanishes without explanation--at the very point in the narrative when Jesus Christ appears in the vision--and is replaced for the remainder by an unnamed angel as narrator … Moreover, Nephi notes that Isaiah had seen the Redeemer, “even as I have seen him” (2 Nephi 11:2).
5. It should be noted of both Moses and Nephi that their respective calls to be God’s prophet and the leaders of his people were unexpected in terms of high birth, office, or other social or natural distinction. Moses was a refugee from Egypt and a shepherd in Midian. Nephi was the fourth son of Lehi and a refugee from Jerusalem (see Moses 1:6, 26; Exodus 3:1; 1 Nephi 2:19-24).
6. In their founding visions, both Moses and Nephi were shown the future peoples of the world and the Lord’s purposes for them (see Moses 1:8, 27-30; 1 Nephi; 11-14).
7. Both Moses and Nephi were major figures in leading people out of wicked places (see Exodus 3:10; 12:51; 1 Nephi 2, 7, 17:43).
8. Moses invoked the power of God to lead his people miraculously across the Red Sea (see Exodus 14:13-22). Similarly, with divine direction and aid, Nephi led his people in building a ship and crossing the sea, during which crossing his prayers persuaded the Lord to end the typhoon and carry them safely on their journey (see 1 Nephi 17-18). The language Nephi used to describe this incident evokes Moses’ parting of the Red Sea: “There arose a great storm, yea, a great and terrible tempest, and we were driven back upon the waters for the space of three days” (1 Nephi 18:13). Moses relates, “And all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind” (Exodus 14:21 NIV).
9. Both Moses and Nephi led their people safely to a promised land (see Numbers 13; Deuteronomy 1; 1 Nephi 19:25). The difference is that Moses was not permitted to enter.
10. The wilderness travels of Moses and Nephi and their peoples also are described with several general and specific similarities. For example, both entailed years of difficult desert conditions, and in both cases the people suffered and murmured against their leaders, thinking fondly of the more comfortable lives they had left behind. The children of Israel lamented, “It had been better for us to serve the Egyptians, than that we should die in the wilderness” (Exodus 14:12), whereas, Laman and Lemuel proclaimed that "it would have been better that [the women] had died before they came out of Jerusalem than to have suffered these afflictions (1 Nephi 17:20).
11. These murmurings became severe on several occasions in both exodus stories, to the point that there was an apparent attempt on Moses’ life at least once, and on Nephi’s life several times (see Exodus 17:4; Numbers 14:5-10; 1 Nephi 7:16; 16:37; 17:48; 2 Nephi 5:3).
12. The stories of murmuring often end with some form of reconciliation taking place between God and those involved after his power is manifested in a divine act (see, for example, Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 14-16; 20:1-13; 21:5-9; 23; 1 Nephi 3:28-31; 7:6-22; 17-18)
13. Both Moses and Nephi were accused of usurping leadership and being driven by thoughts of self-promoted grandeur. The rebels Korah, Dathan, and Abiram asserted the holiness of the congregation of Israel and asked Moses and Aaron, “Wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?” and accused Moses of bringing them into the wilderness to make himself “altogether a prince over” them (Numbers 16:3, 13). When attempting to stop a fight between two Hebrews, “[Moses] asked the one in the wrong, ’Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?’ The man said, ’Who made you ruler and judge over us?” (Exodus 2:13-14 NIV; emphasis added). Like the Israelites who challenged the rulership of Moses, Laman and Lemuel accused Nephi of thinking to make himself “a king and a ruler” over them (1 Nephi 16:38).
14. In each account the Lord provided divine means for guiding the people through the wilderness. For ancient Israel this was in the form of a pillar of light by night and a cloud by day (see Exodus 13;21-2). For Lehi’s party it was the Liahona (see 1 Nephi 16:10, 16, 28-31; 18:21-2).
15. Both accounts tell how starvation was averted when food was provided through divine intervention (see Exodus 16:2-16; 1 Nephi 16:30).
16. In the Exodus account, when Moses came down from Sinai with the tablets, “his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him” (Exodus 34:29-30 NIV). Similarly, when Nephi was threatened by his brothers, he was “filled with the power of God” and warned them not to touch him lest God smite them and they “wither even as a dried reed” (1 Nephi 17:48), whereupon they were afraid to touch Nephi “for the space of many days” (verse 52). This incident was resolved when the Lord told Nephi to touch his brothers that he might shock them. Being physically shaken by this touch, they acknowledged that it was “the power of the Lord” that had shaken them (see verses 53-5).
17. Moses and Nephi furnished their people with founding texts that provided religious and prophetic guidance for centuries. The five books of Moses have their parallel in Nephi’s large and small plates. These texts established the record-keeping traditions that enabled the people to benefit from centuries of recorded prophecy and religious history.
18. Moses and Nephi both built sanctuaries. The tabernacle of Moses provided the basic model for Solomon’s Temple, which in turn was the model for Nephi’s temple in the Western hemisphere (see Exodus 25-7, 36-9; 2 Nephi 5:16).
19. Moses consecrated his brother Aaron and Aaron’s sons to be priests with authority to administer religious matters for the Israelites (see Exodus 28-9; Leviticus 8; Numbers 8). Likewise, Nephi consecrated his brothers Jacob and Joseph to “be priests and teachers over the land of [his] people” (2 Nephi 5;26).
20. Moses gave Israel the Ten Commandments and the law of Moses as given to him by God on Sinai (see Exodus 20:2-17). Similarly, Nephi provided his people with a new law that was given to him by God. Nephi received the gospel or “doctrine of Christ” (2 Nephi 31:2) from the Father and the Son as they spoke to him on the mountain and explained that repentance, the baptisms of water and of fire and the Holy Ghost, faith in Jesus Christ, and enduring to the end are prerequisites to receiving eternal life (see 2 Nephi 31). Furthermore, Nephi explicitly taught his people that this new law superseded the law of Moses, which they would need to observe only until Christ came into mortality (see 2 Nephi 5:10; 11:4; 25:24-7).
21. Just as Moses “laid his hands” on Joshua to be his successor as leader of Israel (Deuteronomy 34:9), so Nephi anointed a man to be king and ruler after him (see Jacob 1:9).
[Noel B. Reynolds, “Nephite Kingship Reconsidered,” in Mormons, Scripture, and the Ancient World: Studies in Honor of John L. Sorenson, FARMS, 1998, pp. 172-177]
1 Nephi 17:26 Now ye know that Moses … ([Illustration] Chart: “1 Nephi and the Exodus.” Lehi’s group saw themselves as reenacting the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. [John W. & J. Gregory Welch, Charting the Book of Mormon: Visual Aids for Personal Study and Teaching, F.A.R.M.S., Chart #94] [See the commentary on 1 Nephi 4:2]