Literature: Moroni presents Zerahemnah with two choices: surrender or continue the battle. The command to surrender is phrased formally, invoking Yahweh’s power and listing several “witnesses” to guarantee his promise of safe conduct for Zerahemnah’s men should they surrender.
Moroni invokes the highest possible power by commanding the surrender in Yahweh’s name. This is the God who has won the battle. Moroni continues his pledge of safe-conduct, swearing “by our faith, by our religion, and by our rites of worship, and by our church.” These slight variations on the religious theme are a well-known literary technique among later Mesoamerican peoples. We need not search for different shades of meaning in this list; Moroni intends them to be parallel equivalences, enunciated for their cumulative effect.