From this point on, Sam’s descendants are never reckoned as a tribe but are counted as part of Nephi’s seed. In the Doctrine and Covenants there are four other groups named to whom a knowledge of the Savior was to come: “the Nephites, and the Jacobites, and the Josephites, and the Zoramites” (D&C 3:17). Sam is not mentioned, making a total of seven including the three previously named above (D&C 3:16, 18). Many of the early Spanish Chroniclers refer to the seven tribes that came to Mesoamerica.
How long Lehi lived after these blessings is not stated, but it was probably just “a few more days and I go the way of all the earth” (2 Nephi 1:14), as he stated when he began giving his blessings to the people. First Nephi 1–9 are an abridgment of “the record of my father” (1 Nephi 1:17). Nephi made the abridgment before he began the record we are here considering. We should look forward to reading the unabridged record.