At this point Moroni begins a discussion of the world into which the Book of Mormon would come. It is a world that he has seen in vision (verse 35 below). It is tempting to assume that because it is a vision in which Moroni has been very specific about a single person that he would be as accurate about the rest of the details. However, it is not only not clear that each of his statements has a reference specific to Joseph Smith’s time, many of them are generic scriptural markers of the last days. It would seem that much of what Moroni saw was the prophetic vision of the last days, and the descriptions are simply intended to show that the Book of Mormon would come forth in the last days.
Nevertheless, there would have been some recognition in Joseph’s day of some of these, even though they also pertain to times after Joseph Smith. For instance, it is quite probable that Joseph and his contemporaries would see prophetic fulfillment of Moroni’s declaration that there would be “secret combinations and works of darkness” in the last days in the issues that were being discussed concerning the Masons. The term “secret combinations” was applied to the Masons, and Joseph Smith’s time period was particularly vocal about a particular work of darkness in the murder of William Morgan who was a former Mason who was threatening to expose secrets.
The popular assumption was that he was murdered by Masons to preserve those secrets. This type of connection is what has led many critics of the Book of Mormon to see in the statements about secret combinations a reflection of Joseph Smith’s contemporary anti-Masonic feelings (several of these critics are discussed in Daniel C. Peterson, “Notes on Gadianton Masonry.” Warfare in the Book of Mormon. Eds. Stephen D. Ricks and William J. Hamblin. FARMS 1990, pp174-224.).
We have noted that the Gadianton robbers as a secret combination have a very specific symbolic role to play in the Book of Mormon, so it is difficult to see the “secret combinations” as anything but linguistic artifacts (a point that is made by Mark D. Thomas. Digging in Cumorah. Signature Books, Salt Lake City, 1999, p. 204). However, it is just as certain that many who read this prophecy of Moroni’s would see in that prophecy the events that had made such a stir in the years just before the arrival of the Book of Mormon (Dan Vogel gives some examples of relatively contemporaneous statements that saw a connection between the Book of Mormon and the anti-Masonic feelings of the time. See Dan Vogel. “Echoes of Anti-Masonry: A Rejoinder to Critics of theAnti-Masonic Thesis.” American Apocrypha. Signature Books, Salt Lake City, 2002, pp. 275-320).