Lehi contrasts his anguish over with Laman and Lemuel with his joy in Nephi’s righteousness. As their patriarch, he commands Laman and Lemuel to stop rebelling against Nephi, whose spiritual steadfastness has saved the family from many dangers and brought them to the promised land.
Lehi would have been painfully aware that Yahweh’s promise to Nephi reversed all cultural expectations. As the eldest sons, Laman and Lemuel had every right to expect to be the family’s leaders, heirs of its most valuable artifacts. Instead, their father rejects their claims by telling them to submit to their younger brother. Laman and Lemuel already feel personal animosity toward Nephi, animosity they have manifested in murderous ways before now. At this point, Lehi is removing their last hope that they will lead the family once he is dead.
Furthermore, if they accepted the Deuteronomic reforms, as I conjecture they did (see1 Nephi, Part 1: Context, Chapter 1, “The Historical Setting of 1 Nephi”), they also saw his commandment as an effort to impose a false religion on them. Laman and Lemuel did not accept the prophetic authority of either Lehi or Nephi. How, then, could they be expected to violate what they perceived as the natural order of things? Undoubtedly, Lehi was aware of these complex issues and attempted to force a reconciliation by his authority and by his logic.
Text: The phrase “whose views have been glorious” is somewhat awkward. Perhaps it could be emended to read “whose visions have been glorious.” That is certainly the intent of the phrase, even though the manuscript supports the word views.