Social: Mormon catalogues the social problems he sees in the Gadianton takeover. Since all of these things are part of the rejection of the traditional Nephite religion, the gospel that Mormon believes, it is no surprise that he speaks poorly of the rule of the Gadiantons. However, it is important to reconstruct Mormon’s social catalogue in the perspective of a Mesoamerican culture to note that it is quite probable that all of this catalogue of evils were part of the cultural package adopted by the Gadiantons from the surrounding city-states.
First, we have the distinction Mormon makes between the treatment of the righteous and the wealthy. The definition of righteousness is, of course, those who continue to believe in the gospel. We saw in Helaman 6:39 that those who followed the gospel were considered to be poor, and that they were discriminated against because they were poor, or more specifically because they were not of the same class as the wealthy. While Mormon uses righteousness as the distinguishing marker here, the real differentiation is social status, and as a lower class (where classes were defined by visible goods, and the egalitarian believers did not accumulate such goods for purposes of social distinction) the believers did not receive the same privileges as the elite class. Mormon indicates that this is because of their “money.”
This is certainly a translation error because money was not the medium of exchange anywhere in the New World. Nevertheless, the intent is correct. The deciding factor was certainly economic position, something that is defined by “money” in modern society, but by the visible accumulation of elite goods in Mesoamerica. Mormon is describing the precise conditions that would have happened in this society in a Mesoamerican community, with the exception of Joseph’s anachronistic translations of “money.”
The next “problem” is that these Gadiantons desired to be: “held in office at the head of government, to rule and do according to their wills, that they might get gain and glory of the world.” Those who were in power were those who controlled the access to the elite goods, and were at the apex of the social hierarchy. Mormon’s link between political office and “gain and glory” is precisely descriptive of the conditions in Mesoamerica at this time period.
The next item in the catalogue is: “that they might the more easily commit adultery.” This one has less direct supporting evidence, but the probability is that this is related to the Mesoamerican social acceptance of multiple wives and concubinage. This was the issue we say in Jacob, where the multiple wives were related to whoredoms. Here they are adultery, which signifies a sexual relationship outside of the accepted legal definition of marriage. If the tradition Nephite definition were to have one wife, and the new social order allowed for multiple wives in the Mesoamerican tradition, then Mormon’s description of that practice as adultery would be accurate, as Mormon would not recognize those additional marriages.
The last item sin the catalog are stealing and killing, items that we have already discussed as plausibly related to the Mesoamerican practice of waging war to create tribute relationships with other cities. That situation provides ample plausible social context for both the killing and the stealing, where Mormon would consider it theft because it was not earned goods through trade, but rather extracted tribute that was imposed on a people.