Alma & Helaman: Martyrs & Military Matters

Martyrs 

There are few martyrs in The Book of Mormon and even fewer (if any) of the self-sacrificing variety. Nearly all those killed for their faith go down fighting.

In many ways, martyrdom is a medieval tradition, far less popular in the ancient world (which gave more credence to honorable suicides for worldly reasons) or the modern one (which puts a higher value on living to fight another day). Martyrdom as a sacrifice for one's belief took off in the early C.E. years before Constantine when Christians could still prove their devotion by giving up their lives (rather than taking government jobs). It continued at a lesser rate throughout the Middle Ages. The Protestant Reformation almost entirely upended it.

During the Reformation in England, martyrs came about on both sides: Protestants (under Queen Mary) and Catholics (under Queen Elizabeth). Both sides perceived martyrdom as the ultimate argument: How can one argue with THAT? Consequently, both sides realized that the martyrdom of someone in the opposing religion had to somehow be called into question, especially if the martyr went down with style.

Martyrdom was used differently and similarly by Catholics and by Protestants. For Catholics, it was an indicator of saint-like behavior (and somewhat easier to prove than miracles during canonization). For Protestants, it was an indicator of confidence in one’s elected status. For both, it was an example to others.

But the problem of good people sticking to “wrong” doctrines to the point of death continued. Both sides, therefore, increasingly took the position that martyrdom was about conscience: integrity regarding one’s beliefs rather that treason against a seated monarch.

The end result was useful to the doctrinal arguers since determining whether a martyr REALLY believed what he/she said while dying is an unending (and unsolvable) debate. From a later perspective, however, this focus on conscience became an integral part of the modern age.

Nineteenth-century American readers would have perceived Gideon’s death in Alma 1—Gideon is slain by the self-aggrandizing Nehor—as less about a martyr’s final words and more, quite dramatically, about an old man’s final stand:

7 [B]ut the man withstood him, admonishing him with the words of God.

8 Now the name of the man was Gideon; and it was he who was an instrument in the hands of God in delivering the people of Limhi out of bondage.

9 Now, because Gideon withstood him with the words of God, [Nehor] was wroth with Gideon, and drew his sword and began to smite him. Now Gideon being stricken with many years, therefore he was not able to withstand his blows, therefore he was slain by the sword.

Nehor is then tried for a specific crime rather than for his overall bad behavior. In both the ancient world and the modern one, Gideon would not be a Saint but, rather, a honorable fighter whose death guaranteed the justified punishment of the offender.

Military Matters

Many early nineteenth-century readers of The Book of Mormon had direct links to the Revolutionary War. It was to them what 9/11 and COVID is to Americans in the early-twenty-first century and the Civil War was to people like Stephen Crane and builders of the Lady of Victories statue in Portland, Maine (there seems to be a thirty-to-forty year gap between events and official remembrances).

Washington and other Revolutionary leaders were famous when they were alive. In the early 1800s, a few were still living. Jefferson and Adams died on the same day in 1826. Washington had died several years earlier in 1799. Folktales immediately sprang up around him. (Weems invented his story of Washington and the Cherry Tree for his book published in 1800; it was dismissed as ahistorical almost immediately). Washington’s birthday was proposed as a holiday in 1832. Emanuel Leutz’s famous portrait of Washington Crossing the Delaware was painted in 1851. The March to Valley Forge was painted in 1883. The Prayer at Valley Forge by Arnold Friberg in the nineteenth-century tradition was painted in 1975.

Captain Moroni, as portrayed by Friberg (see above), is tough, handsome, big, muscular. I knew plenty of teenage girls at church when I was growing up who swooned over him (the seminary film from around that same time took the devastatingly gorgeous route). Hey, they could have had worse love interests! Though they seemed to ignore the part of Moroni's narrative where he was never home because he was fighting and yelling at people so much (justifiably yelling, but still…)

The point, as raised in the previous post, is that humble, self-sacrificing martyrs were not terribly popular with early-nineteenth-century readers. The self-sacrifice of Helaman’s Anti-Nephi-Lehies--often applauded by modern readers--would have seemed a justifiable thing for other people to do. Helaman's fighting “sons” (who also earned some swooning from my peers) got Friberg’s artwork rather than the seemingly pacifistic parents. (In line with Friberg, even now-a-days, the LDS Jesus is rarely as emaciated as El Greco’s Jesus: Michaelangelo won here.)

Positions regarding pacifism versus warriors-for-the-Faith go in cycles, sometimes within a few decades. And they can vary regarding the same person, depending on that person's role. Although George Washington et al. were glorified and romanticized in the nineteenth century as leaders during the Revolution, they were heavily criticized when alive, especially when they became politicians and issued opinions on other people's wars. (Not everyone favored George Washington getting a birthday since such a holiday smacked of the type of tribute paid to kings and emperors, which tribute carried a different connotation than that paid to generals and captains.)

Early nineteenth-century American culture tended to defend the fight-till-you-drop position when it came to leaders and communities, a perspective that applied not only to wars but to stands against local and Federal government bodies.