The whole army noticed the miracle that, of the thousand casualties, none had occurred among the Ammonites, who had clearly been in the thick of the fighting.
History: Helaman could have easily fielded an army of eight thousand men, given his own two thousand, the six thousand reinforcements from Zarahemla, and the remnant of Antipus’s army, who surely exceeded Helaman’s two thousand. As a rough guess, I estimate perhaps eight thousand Nephites were defending the field from the attacking Lamanites, yet there were only a thousand fatalities. Why did the Nephites believe they were losing the battle?
Ancient warfare, like modern warfare, reduced fighting forces through injury as well as death. Helaman was directing a field force in which a significant number had “fainted” (vv. 23–24). Though still alive and therefore not counted among the fatalities at the end of the battle, they were nevertheless noncombatants. Similarly, even those who may have been conscious may no longer have been able to fight. A soldier with a broken or slashed arm, for instance, could no longer raise a weapon. Battles typically included far greater numbers of wounded than dead. Thus, fatalities of a thousand did not indicate the real weakness of army, which had to be measured as well by the number of wounded.
The miracle of the Ammonites was not in their complete preservation, but in their ultimate preservation. They did not escape injury, but they escaped death. The fact that none died was miraculous, and Helaman (and the army) focused on that part of the miracle.
Scripture: The Ammonite warriors certainly teach the effectiveness of faith, but they should also teach us that ultimate salvation does not necessarily mean the absence of suffering. We, too, are promised salvation because of our faith, but we are not promised that we will not suffer, whether physically, spiritually, or both, along the way. Even though the promises to the Ammonites were explicitly fulfilled, we should not engage in reckless or romantic extrapolations. They had a specific promise, given as a corollary to the Nephite foundational promise, that they would be preserved through their righteousness. While we have the same ultimate promise, its fulfillment is often more spiritual than literal. Many worthy young men and women have lost their lives despite their righteousness. For most of us, the fulfillment of this promise comes only in eternal life.