“And again, they were wroth”

Yesterday, during Sunday school, we read these words from Mosiah 10:12-17 (among many others):

The Lamanites, we’re told, held to “the tradition of their fathers, which is this—Believing that they were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers, and that they were wronged in the wilderness by their brethren, and they were also wronged while crossing the sea; and again, that they were wronged while in the land of their first inheritance, after they had crossed the sea. . . .  And his brethren were wroth with [Nephi] because they understood not the dealings of the Lord; they were also wroth with him upon the waters because they hardened their hearts against the Lord.  And again, they were wroth with him when they had arrived in the promised land, because they said that he had taken the ruling of the people out of their hands; and they sought to kill him.  And again, they were wroth with him because he departed into the wilderness as the Lord had commanded him, and took the records which were engraven on the plates of brass, for they said that he robbed them.  And thus they have taught their children that they should hate them, and that they should murder them, and that they should rob and plunder them, and do all they could to destroy them; therefore they have an eternal hatred towards the children of Nephi.”

That’s a whole lot of resentment and anger.

And, as we read the verses, I couldn’t help thinking of the “victim culture” that sometimes seems so characteristic of our time.  Everybody is aggrieved, and there are some that seem perpetually “wroth” and enraged.

It’s not healthy.

It’s deeply divisive.

Lamanite culture was dysfunctional, and so, in some important ways, is ours.

Posted from Richmond, Virginia