The text in Alma 23:1 picks up where Alma 22:27 had left off, with the remarkable extension of royal privileges to the sons of Mosiah granted by King Lamoni’s father. It is not surprising that he would extend this political, diplomatic privilege. Ambassadors and envoys were typically granted regal immunities and protections in the ancient world, since otherwise international communication and diplomacy would have been impossible. But more than that, Lamoni’s father had a special interest in protecting his missionary, Aaron, and also the other three sons, since he had made a special personal appearance in Middoni to free the four brothers from prison.
When Ammon and Lamoni returned to his land of Ishmael, Lamoni declared that his people “were free” and independent from his father’s rule (21:21), and Lamoni granted them “the liberty of worshiping the Lord their God according to their desires” (21:22).
Meanwhile, Lamoni’s father was converted by Aaron, with Omner and Himni and their companions, who accompanied him back to the land of Nephi (22:1). But recognizing “the hardness of the hearts of the people” and even the queen, who were ready to kill Aaron (22:21–22), Lamoni’s father “sent a proclamation “throughout all the land, amongst all his people who were in all his land, who were in all the regions round about” (22:27), which was a grant of absolute safe conduct for these four sons of Mosiah and their brethren. Freedom of religion was not granted by this decree, as it had been by King Lamoni in the land of Ishmael, but at least the missionaries were absolutely protected and granted free access into homes, temples, and holy spaces (23:2–3).
Apparently, the lands of Amulon, Helam, and Jerusalem, were outside the jurisdiction of King Lamoni, and so, even though the converts of Ammon (the Anti-Nephi-Lehis) will be butchered in those lands, Ammon himself and his brothers were protected there by this proclamation of Lamoni’s father. The four sons were never threatened or harmed. Indeed, when they finally meet up again with Alma, Ammon rejoices that they had been able to travel from “house to house” and also to teach in “their temples and their synagogues” (26:28–29). Although they had been spit upon, smitten on the cheeks, had stones thrown at them, and were cast into prison (26:29), they were apparently protected to a certain degree by this king’s royal proclamation.
All of this explains why the geographical explanation in Alma 22:27–34 was included in this text. While people studying the geography of the lands of the Book of Mormon rightly see this geographical aside as the best roadmap we have been given for the lands around Zarahemla, it is clear that its purpose here is to explain just one thing, namely the extent of the territory covered by the royal edict of Lamoni’s father, who controlled only “the land of Nephi and the wilderness round about” (22:34). But beyond that, except to some extent in the east (22:29), the Lamanites were “hemmed in” and had “no more possession on the north” (22:33), neither “on the west” (22:28), nor in “all the northern parts” (22:29–32).
The purpose of this geographical information was not to connect Alma with the Sons of Mosiah. None of Alma’s Nephite lands, such as Gideon, Melek, Sidom, Ammonihah, Jershon, or Antionum are mentioned here. Nor are the interior regions of the land of Nephi mentioned that were controlled by the king of the Lamanites. If this geographical statement had been made by Ammon or Aaron, one would have expected places such as the lands of Ishmael, Jerusalem, Ani-Anti, Middoni, Midian, Amulon, and Helam to have been mentioned. Mormon’s interests, however, were much more focused on the separation between the greater land northward and the political configuration of the land southward (22:30–32), and thus it makes sense that he would have included only this information, exclusively from his perspective, for the general benefit of his ultimate readers many years to come.
John L. Sorenson, The Geography of Book of Mormon Events: A Source Book, Revised Edition (Provo: FARMS, 1992), 242–248.
Joseph L. Allen and Blake J. Allen, Exploring the Lands of the Book of Mormon, Revised Edition (American Fork: Covenant, 2011), 402–416; new edition, with Sheryl Lee Wilson, Promised Place—Precious People (2020), 79.
Joe V. Andersen, F. Richard Hauck, Stanford Stoddard Smith, Ted Dee Stoddard, Lenard C. Brunsdale, A Compelling Geograpnhic Model of the Book of Mormon (Mesa, AZ: JVA Publishing, 2018), Appendix 7, 231–242.