Zeniff’s recognition of good among the Lamanites (v. 1) indicates that he was a man of moral character. The evil character of the first ruler of the group is shown (v. 2). The ferocious internal fighting of the group is evidence of the Spirit of the Lord having been withdrawn “and the devil [had] power over his own dominion” (D&C 1:35). Joseph Smith saw in vision the same conditions prior to the Second Coming:
I saw men hunting the lives of their own sons, and brothers murdering brother, women killing their own daughters, and daughters seeking the lives of their mothers. I saw armies arrayed against armies. I saw blood, desolation, fires. The Son of man has said that the mother shall be against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother. These things are at our doors. They will follow the Saints of God from city to city. Satan will rage, and the spirit of the devil is now enraged. I know not how soon these things will take place; but with a view of them, shall I cry peace? No! I will lift up my voice and testify of them. How long you will have good crops, and the famine be kept off, I do not know; when the fig tree leaves, know then that the summer is nigh at hand. [ TPJS, 161]
The leader of the first group was apparently killed since Zeniff organized a second group to search for the land of Nephi (v. 3). His being over-zealous to inherit the land was apparently passed on to his people. Limhi, two generations later, gives it as a reason for their being in bondage to the Lamanites (Mosiah 7:21). We learn from modern revelation that when a group of people are “slow to hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God; therefore, the Lord their God is slow to hearken unto their prayer, to answer them in the day of their trouble” (D&C 101:7).