Textual: There are no simple markers to tell us in how many sittings Zeniff wrote this history. It appears to be holographic (written by Zeniff) and copied directly to Mormon’s plates. When Zeniff wrote, he clearly wrote after the fact, and the question to be asked is how long after the fact. The nature of Zeniff’s record indicates that there were at most two sittings, and possibly only one.
It might be suggested that a breaking point could have occurred after verses 8 and 9. Those two verses describe building and planting, and would be a reasonable place to stop and pass time before the next writing. This is not likely, however, because of the structural parallel between Mosiah 9:8-12 and Mosiah 10:4-6 (as will be noted in the next chapter). The structural parallel suggests that rather than verse 8 and 9 being closing statements, they are rather introductory to the next story of the conflict with the Lamanites. Therefore, if there were two different sittings, they would fall in the current chapter break, that is between chapters 9 and 10. It is equally possible, however, that the entire record was written in a single sitting. I prefer this second hypothesis since the structure of the entire writing appears to tie the two conflicts together, and there is so much else of important history left out of a first person narrative. Zeniff’s record has the feel of an end-of-life statement that justifies his reign and actions.
Historical: The spiritual point of this story is that the Zeniffites are able to defeat superior numbers, and that they are able to do so because they remembered their God, and called upon him. While that is a true principle, the historical situation may have been somewhat different. To understand this particular conflict, we need to review the information we have available to us.
First, the cause of the conflict is a “numerous host” (Mosiah 9:14) of Lamanites who fell upon Zeniffites in their fields and killed them. As was noted, this is not the action of conquest, but a raid for immediate gain. The Lamanites who had attacked took the goods, and presumably left, since the area they attacked was not a city to be occupied, but farmlands which they would not be able to defend, just as those lands were not defended against the Lamanites.
When the survivors flee to the city of Nephi and to their king, an army is amassed which goes out to do battle against the Lamanites (Mosiah 9:16). This was not a defensive battle where the city of Nephi was attacked, but rather an attack by the Zeniffites on Lamanites.
There is no mention of meeting an enemy army, only of the fighting and the numbers of dead. The numbers of dead are widely disparate between Lamanite and Zeniffite losses, with the Lamanites having very close to 11 casualties for every 1 Zeniffite casualty. All of this killing occurs in “one day and a night” (verse 18). This suggests a fairly rapid order of battle. The 3,043 dead of the Lamanites might suggest that there were at least 3,000 Zeniffites in the attack, but that number would be extremely high for the Zeniffites. It is very unlikely that 3,000 able bodied men left Zarahemla, and that such a number would be treated as non-threatening in the original treaty. Three thousand fighting men would have at least a population of 6,000 assuming that the original group had few children or very old men, but approximately one woman per man.
Sorenson’s reading of these verses suggests to him that the marauding army was still in the fields, and were caught as they were taking their spoils (Sorenson, John L. The Geography of Book of Mormon Events: A Source Book FARMS 1990, p. 237-8). This presumes both that Shilom and Lehi-Nephi were close (his stated conclusion) but also that those who fled from the Lamanite armies were able to get to Lehi-Nephi, raise the alarm, raise the retaliatory army, and return to find the Lamanites still in the fields, presumably taking their spoils. While the distance information would seem to be accurate, the presence of the Lamanite army in the field would seem more difficult to imagine. If it were an attacking army, it should have pressed the attack. If it were marauders, they should have retreated. That some army simply waited around for a counter-attack does not seem likely.
Putting this information together gives a couple of possibilities. The first is that which is typically expected because the Zeniffites are “good guys,” and that is (as Sorenson has suggested) that they met a standing army and defeated that army. However, the second possibility would appear to fit the facts more closely. The Zeniffites attacked hamlets occupied by Lamanites, and killed them before they could raise much defense. Here is how the information fits that hypothesis:
This scenario is not unusual in the ancient world. Blood feuds are between peoples, not individuals. If Lamanites kill Zeniffites, then Lamanites are killed in retribution – and the ancient world did not typically worry about whether or not it was the Lamanites who actually did the killing. While not behavior we prefer to see in the Zeniffite “good guys,” it is very typical behavior for an ancient population.
Geographic: Understanding the nature of both this conflict and the one in the next chapter depend heavily upon understanding some of the possible geographic lay of the land. We need to know the general physical relationships between Shemlon (Lamanite), Lehi-Nephi (Zeniffite) and Shilom (Zeniffite). After examining several verses, Sorenson provides the following overview of the comparative geography of these three cities:
“From the top of Noah’s ”very high tower“ near the temple in the city, he could ”overlook“ the lands of Shilom and Shemlon and ”even look over all the land round about…“ So the distance implied from the viewing tower to, or even across, Shemlon could not be great. About twenty miles fits both this criterion and previous ones about Shilom and Shemlon. The order of elevation is: Shemlon lowest, Shilom higher, Lehi-Nephi higher still, and north of the land Shilom highest. A sound inference is that Shemlon was nearest the coast, from whence Nephi had originally come.” (Sorenson, John L. The Geography of Book of Mormon Events: A Source Book FARMS 1990, p. 238-9).
In addition to gross elevation, the relative positioning of the cities is important. Both Sorenson and Hauck place Lehi-Nephi to the north of Shilom (Sorenson, John L. An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon. FARMS 1985, p. 170; Hauck, F. Richard. Deciphering the Geography of the Book of Mormon. Deseret Book Company. 1988, p. 72-3). However, each places Shemlon in a different position in relationship to Lehi-Nephi and Shilom, with Sorenson’s conception having Shemlon to the Southwest, and Hauck more generally East. In keeping with the general parameters of this commentary, I am using Sorenson’s construction:
“Shemlon was clearly the Lamanite base in the times of Zeniff, Noah, and Limhi; attacks on the Zeniffites ruled by those men always came from or through Shemlon. When the Lamanite king first welcomed Zeniff and his people, who had come up from Zarahemla, the ruler was willing to pull his own settlers out of Nephi and Shilom back to Shemlon in hopes of exploiting the Nephite returnees (Mosiah 9:6-7, 10, 12); but conflict proved inevitable. The first skirmish between the two groups came when Lamanites attacked some of Zeniff’s people ”watering and feeding their flocks, and tilling their lands …on the south of the land of Shilom“ (verse 14). The Lamanite attack came ”up“ (Mosiah 10:6) from Shemlon. Thereafter Zeniff put a watch on the Shemlon-Shilom frontier, anticipating a renewed attack. In time the Lamanites did return, but this time they did not try to cut through Shilom on their way toward Nephi. Instead they came from Shemlon ”up upon the north of the land of Shilom“ (verse 8), hoping to bypass Shilom on the west and attempting to outflank the Zeniffite watch and hit Nephi without warning. Zeniff and his men knew something was brewing, having been alerted by the lookouts they had posted overlooking Shemlon. When they located the advancing enemy, they ”went up" onto the bills and fought the Lamanites north of Shilom before the attackers could come around and down into Nephi proper (Mosiah 10:10).
Supposing that the city of Lehi-Nephi was Kaminaljuyu, at present-day Guatemala City, the physical details of this entire event fit perfectly. Shemlon would be the lake-side gateway to the Valley of Guatemala through which forces from the lush piedmont area would approach the city. Shemlon’s attractiveness to the Lamanite elite would have included its climate, significantly warmer than at Kaminaljuyu (1,600 feet higher), yet not so oppressively hot as the adjacent lowlands, the old Lamanite base. The border between Shilom and Shemlon would obviously be the sharp bluff overlooking the lake and the curving Villalobos River. Near the river the Lamanite poachers could conveniently have got at the Nephite flocks, while the bluff would have been an ideal spot for Zeniff’s watchmen. The hilly terrain on “the north of Shilom,” where the Lamanite force tried to outflank the Nephite defenders, is exactly what the story calls for" (Sorenson, John L. An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon FARMS 1985, p. 169-71).
The difference in the way Sorenson and I are interpreting the evidence is in the nature of the intruding army on the south of Shilom. These marauders had their victory and their spoils, and were close to their return. That they would have waited around for retaliation when shelter was so close seems implausible. However, the presence of Lamanites in hamlets in the “land” is completely understandable in the Mesoamerican context.
Textual: The 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon does not break a chapter in this location. Verse 1 of chapter 10 should be read as directly following this verse as part of the same story.