Why Did the Nephites Have Temples? – Part I

Sometimes it seems we do not ask questions of things we read in the scriptural record when we should. As an example, when reading that Jacob said the Nephites were on an island (2 Nephi 10:20), or when Nephite’s ship was “driven forth before the wind towards the promised land” (1 Nephi 18:8,9), or that “some who died with fevers,” which fevers were treated by “many plants and roots which God had prepared” (Alma 46:40), etc., how often do we stop and ask questions of these things as to their deeper meanings?
    Unfortunately, these phrases just roll off the tongue or through the mind without further contemplation. This may be from familiarity because of numerous readings, or perhaps disinterest, but either way, we do not stop to ask ourselves, why was this written in the extremely condensed abridgement of the ancient record? Often, we just keep reading with the meaning and purpose of so many phrases and statements seldom considered, let alone researched to know their meaning and value, and to better understand their full import.

Solomon’s Temple, known as the First Temple, which was over 300 years old during Lehi's time

Another example is Nephi’s building of a temple like unto Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem. He stated in some detail, “And I, Nephi, did build a temple; and I did construct it after the manner of the temple of Solomon save it were not built of so many precious things; for they were not to be found upon the land, wherefore, it could not be built like unto Solomon's temple. But the manner of the construction was like unto the temple of Solomon; and the workmanship thereof was exceedingly fine” (2 Nephi 5:16).
    In all of these, certain questions ought to be asked and answers sought, such as with the first examples: “Why were the Nephites on an island and not a continent?” or “Why are we told the ship was driven forth before the wind on two repetitive verses?” or “What is the cure for fevers that occur frequently during some seasons of the year, and where are such cures (plants or herbs) found?”
    In the case of Nephi building a temple like Solomon’s, the question should be “Why did the Nephites have temples? Was it so they could render sacrifices like the Old Testament Hebrews? In such a case, there would be a tendency to see the people of the Book of Mormon like the people of the Old Testament, thinking that the temple for them was just about sacrifices. After all, the Nephites did live the law of Moses (Jacob 4:5), which points to temple sacrifice.
    However, in reality, the temple served a far greater, or at least as great a, purpose in another way than just one of sacrifice. The next question then would be, “What purpose might have existed beyond performing sacrifices?”
    The answer to this may be found in a book written that compiled documents of early Mormon history and was licensed from the Joseph Smith Papers Project, by Intellectual Reserve, Inc., in which the story told by Joseph Smith, Sr., is recounted. According to the story line of the book, this event involving a man named Fayette Lapham, may well be a key to learning the answer to the question (Larry E. Morris, A Documentary History of the Book of Mormon, Oxford University Press, New York, 2019).

It might be of interested to know that Apostle Franklin D. Richards (left) once overheard the Prophet Joseph relate information from the first 116 pages translated (Book of Lehi) and were subsequently lost by Martin Harris. Not surprisingly, the Prophet also shared such information with his father, Joseph Smith, Sr. In turn, Joseph Sr. evidently shared some of that information in an 1830 interview with 36-year-old Palmyra resident Fayette Lapham.
    Lapham was born in Coxsacki, New York, in 1794, and married Lucy Ramsdell, dying in 1872, in Egypt, New York. His  published interview gives information about the coming forth of the Book of Mormon (like the correct translation order of the small plates and Mormon’s abridgment) that it took scholars another century to discover. Joseph, Sr. also gave Lapham details of the stories of Lehi, Nephi, and Mosiah I that cannot be found in the available Book of Mormon text but have the marks of genuineness. These new details fit those stories hand-in-glove and answer questions raised by the available Book of Mormon text.
    Lapham’s article "Interview with the Father of Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet,” which he wrote forty years after the event, including his account of “the Finding of the Sacred Plates,” was given in 2017 to Mark Ashurst-McGee, a scholar with the Joseph Smith Papers Project, to review. Ashurst-McGee, who has given Lapham’s interview account the closest analysis, identifies some errors in Lapham’s account but concludes from his accurate reporting of many other confidential details that Lapham must have made use of contemporaneous interview notes.
    In the 1870 article, Lapham wrote: “I think it was in the year 1830, when I heard that some ancient records had been discovered that would throw some new light upon the subject of religion; being deeply interested in the matter, I concluded to go to the place with my brother-in-law, Jacob Ramsdell, and learn for myself the truth of the matter” (Fayette Lapham, The Historical Magazine and Notes and Queries concerning the Antiquities, History, and Biography of America, vol.7, no.5, May 1870, pp305-309; Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol.1, Signature Books, Salt Lake City, 1996, pp456-466).

They then traveled to the Smith family home along the border of Palmyra and Manchester, in Wayne County, New York. Not finding Joseph at home, they inquired of his father Joseph Smith, Sr. (eft) the information they sought.
    Of this meeting, Lapham wrote: “In reply to our question, concerning the ancient records that had been found, he [Joseph Smith Sr.,] remarked that they had suffered a great deal of persecution on account of them; that many had been there for that purpose, and had made evil reports of them, intimating that perhaps we had come for a like purpose; but, becoming satisfied of our good intentions and that we only sought correct information, he gave us the following history, as near as I can repeat his words.”
    After recounting to Lapham the coming forth of the Book of Mormon Joseph, Sr. then described Lehi’s journey to the New World and related several of the book’s other narratives. According to Lapham, an occurrence took place prior to Mosiah leaving the city of Nephi (Omni 1:12-13), which was referred to by Amulek, the man that befriended Alma and ended up teaching with the prophet (Alma 8:29-30;9:1).

Amulek (left) began his preaching with Alma, saying “I am Amulek; I am the son of Giddonah, who was the son of Ishmael, who was a descendant of Aminadi; and it was the same Aminadi who interpreted the writing which was upon the wall of the temple, which was written by the finger of God” (Alma 10:2). In this incident, Amulek assumed his audience knew the name of Aminadi, and Mormon also must have assume the ancient prophet was so well-known as to be include him in his abridgement of Lehi’s record without adding any explanation of who Aminadi was for his audience, the latter-day reader.
    Evidently, Mormon could assume his audience, the latter-day reader, would know the story only if he had told it in a portion of his abridgment not currently available to us—in other words, the lost 116 pages Joseph referred to as the Book of Lehi. Obviously, Mormon did not know that those pages would be lost, nor why he found the Small Plates with a repeat of abridgement of Lehi’s record, but assumed it was “for a wise purpose” (Words of Mormon 1:6-7), which, of course, it turned out to be when Martin Harris lost the record of Lehi.
    Thus, this event, which is described as happening at least three generations, and likely more than that, by an aged Amulek, prior to 80 BC, making its occurrence prior to the time Mosiah left the city of Nephi and, evidently, sometime before that.
    The only way Mormon could assume that his future readers would be knowledgable of Aminadi was because he had written of the incident in his earlier abridgement—and that would have been in the lost 116 pages. So let us take a look at what Amulek says about the “writing on the wall” incident and what it tells us about the Nephite temple.
(See the next post, “Why Did the Nephites Have Temples? – Part II, for more on the purpose of the Nephite temple beyond offering sacrifices)