“Alma’s teachings about the Melchizedek Priesthood are in part a response to … unjust exercise of authority. The Lord God, Alma says ‘ordained priests, after his holy order … ’ (Alma 13:1). This order is implicitly set against the unrighteous dominion of the lawyers and judges.
“The word order appears fourteen times in Alma’s teachings about the priesthood in Alma 13; forms of ordain appear seven times; and ordinance or ordinances appears three times. The English words order, ordain, and ordinances all stem from the same root: Latin ordo, which means literally a straight row or regular series. To ordain originally meant ‘to put in order’ and still has the force of that meaning” (Rust, Feasting on the Word, 129).