Zeezrom and Nephite Money
Like I’m sure many others, I’ve
often wondered what the purpose of including verses 5-19 in Alma 11. One reason is clearly to show that the six
onties of silver offered to Amulek by Zeezrom was a large sum of money, but
that fact could have been stated without the drawn out description of all the different
values of gold and silver. I think a
common reaction to these verses giving the details about Nephite money is,
“This has no spiritual value—I’ll skip over this part.” Perhaps that’s actually the whole point. Alma 11:20 tells us that these lawyers’ “sole
purpose” was “to get gain” and that they stirred up wickedness in order “that
they might have more employ, that they might get more money.” They were constantly focused on money, just
like so many of us in our day, and perhaps the reason Mormon included these
comments about the fine details of the Nephite monetary system was to emphasize
just how obsessed they had become with money.
And so if we do say to ourselves, “This has no spiritual value,” then we
might also pause for a second and say, “Wait, but I’m just as focused on money
and the pursuit of things in my own life—and that too has no spiritual value.” Amulek accuses Zeezrom, “Thou knowest that
there is a God, but thou lovest that lucre more than him” and we might question
whether the same holds true in our own life (Alma 11:24). To his credit, Zeezrom was able to put behind
him the things of the world, repent of his sins, and “he began from that time
forth to preach unto the people” (Alma 15:12).
The record doesn’t tell us specifically, but given that Ammonihah was
destroyed it’s almost certain that he lost all of his worldly wealth as he
focused on preaching the gospel. This
then leaves us to wonder whether we could and would do the same for the gospel’s
sake.
Looked at it another way, money represents the labor we have done, only in a form that makes it more easy to exchange with others. Therefore, what we spend our money on is essentially what we are working for.
ReplyDeleteZeezrom's bribe of Amulek that he would give him 6 ontis to deny God shows first that he thought Amulek's testimony wouldn't stand up to the prospect of a large gain to deny God. But it also gives the appearance that Zeezrom preferred to work for people to deny God. And then Amulek's reveal that Zeezrom meant to withhold the money anyway shows that Zeezrom hoped to cheat in his purchase of denial.
Crazy.
Also, here's another thought. Maybe Mormon put the stuff about money in there because the money system had changed again multiple times between Alma's time and his and he had to figure out for himself just how much of a bribe Zeezrom made. If he had already known how much it was, he might have just said it with the expectation that his readers would automatically know.