The Book of Laman

Recently, some documents came into my possession written by what appears to be the hand of Laman, son of Lehi detailing a very different story of the early Book of Mormon events. I will post some excerpts here.

The Book of Laman
Chapter 1

Day 1 500 BC

I Laman, the son of Lehi, do endeavor to give an account of the business dealings of our family in Jerusalem and later in the new world.

My father Lehi being a wise man and a good merchant had been observing the geopolitical situation in Jerusalem and had determined to relocate the business. After several speeches to members of the chamber of commerce, he along with my mother Sariah, my sisters, and my younger brothers Lemuel, Sam, and Nephi met as the board of directors and determined to relocate our business dealings to a more business friendly environment that had the natural resources to support our enterprise.

My brother Lemuel and I had been actively engaged in the business for some time and had been teaching our younger brother Sam the ropes of the business. As minority stock holders and members of the board we endeavored to make the case that with some re-branding and a new marketing initiative aimed towards the potential clientele the changing political situation might offer, that we could indeed weather the storm and come out ahead. Our youngest brother Nephi would hear nothing of our suggestions and immediately made a motion to accept our father Lehi’s relocation plan. The motion was seconded by our brother Sam who was thrilled with the idea of the new adventure. Our father Lehi, owning the majority of shares in the company, easily won the proxy fight that ensued and thus the decision was made. Nephi had been particularly troublesome at the shareholders meeting before the vote and accused my brother and me of murmuring and other unseemly behavior.

We had great concern over our youngest brother, Nephi, who had been suffering for some time from severe depression and mental illness. Relocating our business necessitated a long journey into the wilderness to look for a suitable location. Being the pragmatist and worried about Nephi’s condition as well as the advancing years of my parents did endeavor to suggest an alternative course of action but Nephi was so very excited at the prospect of leaving his home that I worried about his decision making capacity. To make matters worse, my father worrying about Nephi not doing well on the trip, had indicated to him that he would be able to make some important decisions in regards to our travels. This only seemed to make our poor younger brother even more eager to get going.

I tried telling Nephi that we needed to be realistic about how difficult it would be to relocate and that he should be prepared for the inevitable hardships we would encounter. He was such a tender hearted little fella that I just didn’t have the heart to keep making him face reality so we took our journey into the wilderness without further discussion of the hardships.

We took only the essential items we would need for exploring and starting our new business venture leaving many items behind that we could not use including our gold, silver, and fine linens that would have been difficult to carry and would not have been much use in setting up the business in the rugged environment we were traveling to. This was not an easy decision as much of the family was accustomed to the finer things in life but I knew that it would be an even more difficult journey taking these things along.

Day 2

We had been traveling in the wilderness for a little time and came to the land around the Red Sea. While sparsely populated, my brother Lemuel and I immediately saw the potential for international trade here by setting up a seaport. Nephi immediately shot down the idea. My father Lehi, worried about Nephi’s fragile mental state, told us to back off. Privately, he told us that Nephi really needed some wins to help boost his self esteem. So with some feelings of dissatisfaction we continued on another day.

Day 3

We stopped by a river today and our father made a table out of stones. We were all very impressed with his workmanship. Nephi was feeling a bit down so our father came up with a great way to boost his and everyone else’s spirits. He decided to name some of the geographic features in the area after us. Being the oldest, he naturally started with me naming the river Laman. Well Nephi broke down and started accusing father of not loving him as much as the rest of us. So to humor him, father made up a pretty lame reason for calling the river Laman and not Nephi. I love my parents but sometimes their parenting methods have me baffled.

They obviously understood Nephi though and soon he was happy again. Shortly after some stern words to Lemuel and I for not being more sensitive to Nephi’s condition, my father being tired returned to his tent and we were left to get everything else set up in camp.

That night we hear a lot of crying coming from Nephi’s tent. One minute he seemed to be talking to someone and the next sobbing uncontrollably. The next morning though, he seemed to be much worse. He started talking nonsense and it seemed to us that he had been having a real breakdown and I assumed that he had not taken his medications.

He went on and on about how he was going to be a great ruler, that our children would be cursed, and other things that I am embarrassed to write down for the poor lad’s sake. So we went and had breakfast after that and then Nephi went into our father’s tent for what we hoped was some fatherly advice to get Nephi back into reality.

Day 4

So Nephi went into the tent for a few minutes and came out and told us we are going back to Jerusalem. Lemuel and I were in shock and wanted to know why. Seems that mom and dad had left behind the family bible which had the important family records including births, deaths, and marriages. I was a little upset that something as important as this could be left behind as was my brother Lemuel. Nephi had recently been put in charge of record keeping at a meeting with my father and should have thought of this sooner. The records had been loaned to a cousin named Laban who was a very important man in Jerusalem. But to make matters worse, dad thought it would help out Nephi if we told him he was in charge and then played along. His self esteem was so low that in the off chance this strategy might help him, it was worth it.

So we began our journey three days back to Jerusalem to cousin Laban’s house. When we were on the outskirts of the city, for some reason, Nephi took out his set of Lots he had picked up on a weekend trip to Jerusalem. I personally did not approve of Lots as I considered their use a form of gambling. He played with them for a minute and said that I was the one to go to see Laban. This was odd because we had already decided that since I was the oldest and had known cousin Laban longer, that I should be the one to go there.

So we all went into the city and I left the rest of my brothers, Sam and Lemuel, to watch after Nephi in the market area. I went to Laban’s house and was received most warmly. After a few minutes of chit chat I broached the subject of the family Bible. Laban immediately remembered the bible and said I could have it. He indicated that he couldn’t exactly remember where he had left it in his house but that he would have his servant find it for us.

Remembering that cousin Laban had been in some financial trouble as of late, I offered to bring him some of our treasure that we had left at home as we were probably not coming back anytime soon and felt obligated to help out a family member. Laban refused but after some persuasion said that he would be willing to take it as long as he could invest part of it and donate the rest to a local charity on our behalf.

As my father had given me a durable power of attorney to make such a decision on his behalf, I accepted Laban’s offer and told him I would return with the treasure and pick up the bible then. We shook hands and parted.

When I got back to my brothers in the market, Nephi started running and screaming that I was being chased. Afraid we would lose him and that he might injure himself, we ran after him. We caught up to him and got him settled down and I told everyone what the plan was. We went to our house and picked up our gold, silver, and precious things to give to Laban.

Day 5

Today we took our treasure to Laban for him to invest and donate to the poor. He was very excited to see so much treasure and suggested setting up some sort of endowment to offer scholarships to less fortunate children in the city. We thought it was a wonderful idea. Nephi, though, seemed distracted and started acting oddly.

Laban told us that he had found the bible but had not expected us so soon. He had sent it into town with his man servant Zoram for cleaning and repairs. He was certain that it would be ready later that evening. Suddenly Nephi began yelling and bolted out the door. I hastily offered our apologies to Laban and ran after our brother who began screaming about men trying to kill him. We caught up with him in a cave and found him lying on the ground with a large spider on his back. It was the biggest, nastiest looking spider I had ever seen. I was certain it was poisonous and Lemuel and I picked up a couple of scrolls and started wacking the spider to kill it.

Nephi went nuts and accused us of trying to hurt him. He was completely out of control of his faculties and just curled up in a little ball on the floor. So here we were with our brother in a completely useless state with our task only half completed and three days journey from home. I was desperate and formulated a plan that as you will probably agree was not a good idea especially when the long term ramifications are observed.

I told Sam to run out to our stuff and get on his white dress robes that he wore to special occasions. Then Lemuel and I got some really bright torches we had purchased with a special pitch to allow for brighter burning. So same came into the room, we lit the torches, and before he had said a word Nephi perked right up and started talking to “his angel”. These new torches were extremely hot so we dropped them and leaned back, shielding our eyes from their brightness. Nephi talked on and on in what appeared to be a one way conversation with “Sam the Angel”.

Soon the torches burned out and when our eyes were re-adjusted to the dark we could tell that Nephi was in much better spirits. He seemed much more alert than he had ever been and insisted that he go back alone and make things right with cousin Laban and bring back the bible. He had tears in his eyes and I felt very bad for him so I reluctantly agreed to allow him to go as long as he went strait to Laban’s and strait back. I also insisted that he apologize to Laban for his rude behavior earlier.

So we waited outside the gates of the city for Nephi’s return. The next thing I know I see two guys coming out of the city and neither one looks like Nephi. We start running worried about the bandits that sometimes roam the city at night. Then I hear Nephi’s voice calling me and realize it is him wearing some strange clothes. With him, is a very terrified looking Zoram, the servant of Laban! To make matters worse, Nephi had blood on his new clothes.

I asked him what the heck had happened! He told us how he went into the city, found Laban asleep and killed him! A cold chill went down my spine. How could I have been so stupid. Now our brother had killed a man and would certainly be wanted by the authorities! The thought of poor, delusional Nephi going through a trial and possibly prison or execution was just too much especially considering the punitive system of justice in place in Jerusalem.

I tried explaining the situation to Nephi but he kept babbling about angels and messages. He was obviously having an episode and it was all my fault! To compound matters, he had taken a hostage and leaving him behind would mean poor Nephi being found out. I had to protect my brother!

Nephi was really not taking this very seriously and thought he could just swear Zoram to secrecy. Poor naïve Nephi. So we did the only thing we could do. We left and took Zoram with us. We knew we could not return due to the criminal investigation. We had been seen with Laban the previous couple of days and now he was dead and we had left the country. At least Nephi had gotten the family bible. So we began the return journey with Nephi continuing to babble along the way about visions and angels. What have I done?