“Korihor Went Forth Among the People of Zoramites”

Brant Gardner

Redaction: Mormon’s tight construction of his story is evidenced here in this transition. He has one story to tell about Korihor, and one to tell about Zoram. He uses the death of Korihor at the hands (or, more literally, feet?) of the Zoramites as his transition from one story to another. This connection raises the question of whether Korihor’s death was recorded in his sources, or whether Mormon used some literary license to find a fitting end for Korihor and simultaneously move his story along. Of course, it is possible that the statement is accurate; but that would require that Korihor’s death was recorded in an official Zarahemla document weeks (and perhaps months) after the trial in a vassal (and increasingly rebellious) city some distance from Zarahemla. While the historicity of the statement is possible, it seems equally probable to me that Mormon did not resist the satisfaction of supplying poetic justice to Korihor’s end or, for literary reasons, placed Korihor’s death among the self-righteous and inhospitable Zoramites to introduce them, his next theme.

Second Witness: Analytical & Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Vol. 4

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