Lehi’s Manifest Destiny

According to many historical writers, Manifest Destiny is a term that was used in the 19th century to designate the belief that the United States was destined, even divinely ordained, to expand across the North American continent, from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. Sometimes Manifest Destiny was interpreted so broadly as to include the eventual absorption of all North America: Canada, Mexico, Cuba and Central America. Advocates of Manifest Destiny believed that expansion was not only ethical but that it was readily apparent ("manifest") and inevitable ("destiny"). Although initially used as a catch phrase to inspire the United States' expansion across the North American continent, the 19th century phrase eventually became a standard historical term.

Interestingly enough, the idea of a divinely inspired beginning to the United States is certainly found in Nephi’s writing (1 Nephi 13:12-20). One might also suggest that the humble beginnings of the Lehi Colony of a small number of people who started a nation in Chile, South America, in the land of First Inheritance, that grew and expanded across a land, moving northward from one end to the other, as having a Manifest Destiny. This destiny moved them to migrate northward, into Central America, and eventually to spread across all of North America.

By the time the United States had its humble beginnings, the posterity of Lehi had spread throughout the Western Hemisphere. Nephi was promised that a mixture of his seed and the seed of his brethren would not entirely be destroyed (1 Nephi 13:30-31) by this new wave of people (gentiles) that appeared in Nephi’s vision, which eventually would become “one” people (1 Nephi 13:3435; 41).

The belief that Mesoamerican Theorists have of Lehi’s posterity being mostly in Central America, and the Great Lakes Theorists have of his posterity being mostly in northeast United States, or the other theories of limited expanse (Baja California, Malay Peninsula, Australia, Caribbean, etc.), miss the point of the establishment of the Western Hemisphere. Whether one wants to use the term Manifest Destiny, the point is the Lord foresaw this development and expansion and the eventual settlement of all the Western Hemisphere. This expanded, chosen land was reserved by Him for the use of his people who lived righteously and obeyed Him as the God of this Land (Ether 13:2). One could certainly call it a Manifest Destiny, much larger in scope than the United States alone, but the Manifest Destiny of the entire Western Hemisphere.

Painting Of U.S. Manifest Destiny by John Gast