Text: Mormon compares the destruction of his people to the destruction of the Jaredites. This is not surprising, for he has developed that theme in the latter part of his writing of the Book of Mormon. Interestingly, although he makes the conceptual link between the two destructions, he ascribes a different cause to the two conflicts. As we have seen, from the book of Helaman on, Mormon created a complex model in which secret combinations operated to destroy both peoples. (See Helaman, Part 1: Context, Chapter 3, “The Gadianton Robbers in Mormon’s Theological History: Their Structural Role and Plausible Identification.”) In this verse, he suggests that they shared a common motivation: “the willfulness of their hearts, seeking for blood and revenge.” Mormon is completely accurate in describing the desire of “blood and revenge” as motivations for both peoples. It was certainly an immediate cause for both destructions, but it simply isn’t the cause that he emphasized in his formal writing.
That fact tells us that the secret combination theme is primarily a literary one that Mormon extracted and developed in his writing. It was not the only cause, for Mormon himself understands other causes and other motivations. It was, however, the one that Mormon elected to use for his own purposes. Because that theme is a literary construction, we cannot tell from Mormon’s discussion of motives here whether he had written that explanation in the Book of Mormon before writing this letter. Possibly this idea is an earlier understanding and Gadiantons’ role came later—after Mormon had written this letter.
However, it is also possible that the difference between the formal and informal makes the difference in the explanations. Mormon’s abridgment had a particular purpose and the secret combination theme fit that narrative purpose. This is a letter to his son, not intended to be public. Therefore, there is no need for the letter to contain the formal argument and he was simply sharing with a reader whom he knew would be sympathetic his observations on the more obvious similarities. It would be satisfying if this information allowed us to reconstruct some of the timeline for Mormon’s writing of the book, but it does not.