Culture: The story of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies’ not taking up arms is enigmatic. Mormon has selected the story and specifies its “and thus we see” moral (v. 19). But Mormon’s moral is different from what the people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi identify as the purpose of their remarkable pacifist stand.
The story is clearly here because of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies’ resolute stand against taking up arms, even for self-defense; but that position contradicts all other stories of Book of Mormon conflict. These people are praised for their firm principles, but their example is never used as a model for Nephite behavior. The only others who adopt this model are other Lamanites of this same generation. Even their children will not perpetuate their parents’ covenant.
An anomaly in the story is the king’s assertion that the people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi must repent of “murders.” Murder is, by definition, an unsanctioned and intended death inflicted on another person. An accidental death is not murder, even if we were the particular instrument of the accident. War casualties are justified by all societies and are not considered murder. Furthermore, the entire people apparently accept guilt for these “murders,” even women and children. It is inconceivable that every single man, woman, and child of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies had personally committed a murder. Nevertheless, their self-condemnation for these “murders” is so great that they would rather give up their lives than fight to protect themselves. The Book of Mormon story produces more questions than answers.
However, Mesoamerican culture suggests a situation that may help illuminate this story. If we assume, as seems logical, that these former Lamanites had adopted the Preclassic Maya-like religion, which would have fit the time and the place, then they presumably also espoused the values of the Mesoamerican cult of war. Unlike European warfare, which was typically a struggle for territory, Mesoamerican warfare is a conflict between the gods. David Drew, a historian, notes: “The aim of [Maya] warfare, in part, was to capture prominent individuals from an enemy state, put them to torture and finally to sacrifice them, normally by beheading.”
For the Maya, blood was the conduit for ch’ulel, or the “inner soul or spirit.” Sacrificial bloodletting became both nourishment/worship for the gods and the substitute sacrifice that renews creation. According to anthropologist Dennis Tedlock, this principle of creation through sacrifice appears to have great antiquity in the Mesoamerican region: “Puz, all the way from its Mixe-Zoque (and possibly Olmec) sources down to modern Quiche, refers literally to the cutting of flesh with a knife, and it is the primary term for sacrifice. If it is read as a synecdoche in the present passage [of the Popol Vuh], it means that the creation was accomplished (in part) through sacrifice.” The sacrificial blood could and did come from the king and his queen but was augmented by the blood of captives taken in war. Classic Maya inscriptions glorify the personal conquests of the kings and the humiliation and sacrifice of their captives. The Bonampak mural commonly known as “the arraignment” is a graphic depiction of the torturous bloodletting inflicted upon captives.
I argue that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies had grown up with a religion that glorified warfare, bloodshed as a religious act, torture, and human sacrifice. Men, women, and children all espoused this worldview, whether or not they participated in the actual warfare or death of captives. In this context, Lamoni’s brother’s declares that they must make a supreme effort “to get God to take… away” their sins, especially “the many murders which we have committed,… for it was all we could do to repent sufficiently before God that he would take away our stain” (v. 11).
Imagine how far these people had traveled in their spiritual journey. They came from a worldview that told them that it was essential to shed the blood of sacrificial victims for the world to exist. They must now forsake that concept and believe that the only sacrifice needed would be that of the future Atoning Messiah. Their worldview had glorified warfare and human sacrifice. Now their worldview condemned both practices. No wonder they considered themselves “the most lost of all mankind.”
The riddle of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies’ pacifism is answered by their background. They resolve never to touch arms again, not because self-defense is wrong or inherently evil, but because, like alcoholics, they must be constantly vigilant against their disease. They are choosing to stay as far as possible from the feelings aroused by and supporting the cult of war and sacrifice. Rather than risk a return to their former taste for sacrificial blood, they choose to avoid even the very first step along that path—a radical step to protect their newly gained cleanliness from the “stain” of that former life.