Who was this anti-Christ? He is not called an anti-Christ here, but he clearly was not accepting the doctrines that Jacob had been developing, applying them even further than did Nephi. Jacob, knowing the temple and being involved in the temple, had been emphasizing the role of Jesus as the Redeemer, as the Messiah, and as the source of salvation.
We do not know where Sherem came from, but it appears he did not come from the "temple lot." The group of people who were loyal to the temple, such as the priests who operated the temple, probably came from Jacob’s and Joseph’s own families. On the other hand, it appears that Nephi’s sons may have inherited the government, the kingship, and the palace. It could be that Sherem came from the palace side. Jacob had already upset everybody in the aristocracy by calling them strongly to repentance, especially for their excesses regarding wealth and women, things prohibited to the king by Deuteronomy 17 (Jacob 2–3).
So, there may have been a power struggle in this little city about whether the king or the high priest had ultimate authority over the other. Does that sound familiar? Congress, the Supreme Court, the President—who is going to have ultimate authority here? These power struggles are perennial.
In verse 1, though, we get an odd thing: "After some years had passed away, there came a man among the people of Nephi." That almost sounds as though Sherem was coming from outside. It is possible he was coming from the Lamanite-Lemuelite-Ishmaelite people, since the people of Nephi consisted of the Nephites, Jacobites, Josephites and Zoramites. Even if Sherem was one of the Lamanites, at this era of history he would have been a close cousin of the Nephites.
Sherem often gets lumped in with the anti-Christs like Korihor. However, Korihor was an atheist; he did not believe in religion or being under God at all. Sherem, on the other hand, at least purported to believe in the Law of Moses. To paraphrase, he said, "I just want the Law of Moses plain and simple; don’t muck it up with all this Christology stuff." Over at the palace they would have been perfectly happy to have stayed with the Law of Moses, and that’s clear and sufficient. In a way, it was similar to what Joseph Smith would encounter; people believed in the Bible, but that was all.
John W, Welch, "The Case of Sherem" in John W. Welch, The Legal Cases in the Book of Mormon (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press: 2008), chapter 5, 108. "Sherem was intelligent, eloquent, and persuasive (Jacob 7:4), abilities that link him to the educated people in the small city of Nephi and probably to the royal group controlled by the kings who succeeded Nephi in the land of Nephi. Sherem’s strident defense of the law of Moses as the source of righteousness would have appealed to royal administrators, who perhaps supported or even were the source of Sherem’s political points of view. Because Zoram had been a servant to a public official in Jerusalem, it is enticing to think that Sherem may have been a Zoramite or may have had Zoramite ties."’