These verses end the section of baptismal instructions to settle the unrecorded earlier disagreements. What the Savior adds here is that “contention is not of me, but is of the devil.”
It is probably reading too much into this statement to interpret it as meaning that interpersonal squabbles are “of the devil.” However, all such contentious disagreements are part of the continuum leading to the type of contentions about which the Savior is speaking. Doctrinal contentions have always been divisive in Nephite society. The Nephite problem exceeded differences of opinions, for these were opinions that defined social and religious reality and therefore easily led to dangerous schisms. The contentions that are of the devil are those that divide society. For the Nephites, such divisions were political as well as religious. However, any contention that rends the social fabric is dangerous to that society. Contentions about Christian religion have torn that fabric into thousands of fragments that continue to emphasize the contentious divisions.