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Alma 2

Amlici Rejected by the Voice of the People — the First Civil War of the Judges, the Self-Crowned King, and the Battle at the Sidon

Alma 2: in the fifth year of the reign of the judges (c. 87 BC) a cunning man named Amlici, of the order of Nehor, seeks to be king and to overthrow the new order. The people contend by the voice, and the voice of the people goes against him. Amlici is rejected but his followers crown him king nonetheless. The Amlicites unite with the Lamanites at the hill Amnihu and march against the Nephites. Alma — both chief judge and prophet — leads the Nephite armies. He prays and is strengthened. He slays Amlici in personal combat at the river Sidon. The bodies are cast into the river. The Lamanite host is driven westward and the war ends in deliverance.

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Witnesses on the page:Alma the Younger,Amlici

Where we are

Alma 2 is the first stress-test of the constitutional experiment Mosiah laid out four years earlier in Mosiah 29. The same political system that Mosiah II articulated is now confronted with its first attempted coup — a cunning man of the order of Nehor wants to restore the kingship and displace the judges. The chapter is therefore the moment when the constitutional language of the voice of the people (Mosiah 29:26) becomes the living discipline of the voice of the people. Word becomes practice, and the practice holds.

The chapter has five movements:

  1. Amlici's rise and the voice against him — the constitutional rejection of monarchical restoration (vv. 1–7).
  2. The self-crowning and the Amlicite alliance with the Lamanites (vv. 8–15).
  3. The battle at the hill Amnihu and the pursuit toward Sidon (vv. 16–24).
  4. The prayer of Alma and the personal combat with Amlici (vv. 28–32).
  5. The battle at the Sidon and the cleansing of the land (vv. 33–38).

Six verses carry most of the weight:

  1. v. 7 — the voice of the people came against Amlici, that he was not made king over the people. The first living test of Mosiah 29:26.
  2. v. 11 — the people of Amlici were distinguished by the name of Amlici, being called Amlicites; and the remainder were called Nephites, or the people of God. The chapter's signature naming-pattern: the rebel takes his leader's name; the faithful keep the covenant name.
  3. v. 16 — Alma, being the chief judge and the governor of the people of Nephi… went up with his people… at the head of his armies. The founding judge holding three offices at once.
  4. v. 28 — being strengthened by the Lord they did slay them, insomuch that they began to flee before them.
  5. v. 30 — O Lord, have mercy and spare my life, that I may be an instrument in thy hands to save and preserve this people. The first appearance of the instrument in thy hands prayer that will become a Nephite missionary's standing form.
  6. v. 34 — they took their dead and their wounded… and cast them into the waters of Sidon. The chapter's haunting record of the bones of the Sidon.

Amlici's rise and the voice against him (verses 1–7)

Now it came to pass in the commencement of the fifth year of their reign there began to be a contention among the people; for a certain man, being called Amlici, he being a very cunning man, yea, a wise man as to the wisdom of the world, he being after the order of the man that slew Gideon by the sword, who was executed according to the law— — Alma 2:1

Four years after Nehor's execution, his teaching has already become a recognizable order. Amlici is not a personal disciple of Nehor the man; he is a disciple of Nehor the doctrine, and the doctrine has organized itself into a religious-political movement with a name. The chapter teaches an unsettling principle: heresy can outlive the heresiarch by generations and harden into a party in only a few years.

Mormon's choice of words is precise. Amlici is a wise man as to the wisdom of the world — Paul's exact opposition (hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?, 1 Cor. 1:20; the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, 1 Cor. 3:19). The phrase establishes the chapter's contrast at its foundation. The wisdom in play is worldly, not divine, and the test is whether the new constitutional order can be defended by something other than worldly wisdom.

Now this Amlici had, by his cunning, drawn away much people after him; even so much that they began to be very powerful; and they began to endeavor to establish Amlici to be a king over the people. — Alma 2:2

The political program is a monarchical restoration. The chapter makes a quietly important observation: the order of Nehor and the party of the kings turn out to be the same party. Nehor wanted paid priests; Amlici wants a king. Both reject the egalitarian discipline of Mosiah 29's reorganization. The same doctrine that exalts the priest above the people will, given time and opportunity, want to exalt one man above all the rest. Priestcraft and monarchism share a root, and that root is the rejection of the principle that all in the covenant community stand level.

Now this was alarming to the people of the church, and also to all those who had not been drawn away after the persuasions of Amlici; for they knew that according to their law that such things must be established by the voice of the people. — Alma 2:3

The constitution is functioning. The people of the Church and the Nephites outside the order of Nehor both know the rule — such things must be established by the voice of the people — and so does Amlici. He cannot simply seize the throne; he has to work through the system to get it. Mosiah 29's rule is not yet a piece of paper that can be ignored. It is operating in the minds of the citizens as the rule by which power must be obtained. The chapter is the cleanest test the Book of Mormon offers of a constitutional rule honored even by the man it stands against.

Therefore, if it were possible that Amlici should gain the voice of the people, he, being a wicked man, would deprive them of their rights and privileges of the church; for it was his intent to destroy the church of God. — Alma 2:4

Mormon names Amlici's program plainly: it was his intent to destroy the church of God. The phrase rights and privileges echoes Mosiah 29:32's vision of a land of liberty, and every man may enjoy his rights and privileges alike. The chapter binds civic liberty and religious freedom together — the destruction of the Church and the seizure of the kingship are not two programs but one. To take the throne by force is to extinguish the ecclesiastical freedom the land of liberty exists to protect.

And it came to pass that the people assembled themselves together throughout all the land, every man according to his mind, whether it were for or against Amlici, in separate bodies, having much dispute and wonderful contentions one with another. And thus they did assemble themselves together to cast in their voices concerning the matter; and they were laid before the judges. — Alma 2:5–6

The Book of Mormon's clearest description of a Nephite civic vote. The process has four discernible stages: assembly, debate, vote, official record before the judges. The phrase every man according to his mind matters — the vote is by personal conscience, not by tribal or factional command. Paul will name the same anchor of public life — I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day (Acts 23:1); the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience (1 Tim. 1:5). The Nephite constitutional system rests on the principle that the corporate decision arises from individual consciences exercising themselves before God.

And it came to pass that the voice of the people came against Amlici, that he was not made king over the people. — Alma 2:7

The verse that vindicates Mosiah's prophecy. Mosiah 29:26 said it would generally be so: it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right; but it is common for the lesser part of the people to desire that which is not right. The corporate voice tends toward right; the minority faction tends toward iniquity. Alma 2:7 is the first time the Book of Mormon shows the doctrine working exactly as predicted. The majority chose against monarchy; the Amlicites were the lesser part desiring what was not right.

The pattern is also the inverse of 1 Samuel 8. There, when Israel asked for a king, the Lord said to Samuel, they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them. In Alma 2, the Nephites have rejected a king and so have not rejected the Lord. The Old Testament moment of judgment is here met with the Nephite moment of vindication.

The self-crowning and the Amlicite-Lamanite junction (verses 8–15)

Now when Amlici saw that the voice of the people was against him, he went forth and consecrated himself their king. And it came to pass that he commanded his people that they should take up arms against their brethren. — Alma 2:9–10

The classic mark of the tyrant: he consecrated himself. King Benjamin was anointed by the priests and acclaimed by the people. Amlici anoints himself when the people refuse to acclaim him. The pattern is biblical. Absalom proclaimed himself at Hebron (2 Sam. 15:10); Adonijah exalted himself, saying I will be king (1 Kgs. 1:5). In every case the self-anointing is followed by violence, because a kingship that cannot be received must be imposed. Amlici's order follows the same logic in less than a chapter.

Now the people of Amlici were distinguished by the name of Amlici, being called Amlicites; and the remainder were called Nephites, or the people of God. — Alma 2:11

A small verse that names a large pattern. In the Book of Mormon, the rebel faction almost always takes its leader's name. Lemuelites, Lamanites, Amalekites, Zoramites, Amulonites — and now Amlicites. The covenanted population, by contrast, retains the covenant name: Nephites, or the people of God. The chapter is the cleanest articulation in the Book of Mormon of an onomastic principle that runs through the whole record: schism names itself for its founder; faith names itself for its covenant.

The aside the people of God is itself doing work. The Nephites are not merely a genealogical line by this point — the Mulekite population was absorbed in Mosiah 25, and the people who are now called Nephites are a covenanted community. The chapter has quietly re-grounded Nephite identity in the covenant rather than in descent. To be a Nephite is to belong to the people of God.

And the Amlicites came upon the hill Amnihu, which was east of the river Sidon, which ran by the land of Zarahemla, and there they began to make war with the Nephites. — Alma 2:15

The chapter's first detailed Nephite geography. The river Sidon runs by Zarahemla; the hill Amnihu is east of the river. These three features — Sidon, Amnihu, Zarahemla — will recur all through Alma's military narratives. The name Sidon is itself worth a moment. In the Hebrew Bible, Sidon (Tzidon) is the great Phoenician port — Canaan's firstborn (Gen. 10:15), the trading city Solomon dealt with for cedar (1 Kgs. 5:6), the western refuge from which Jonah tried to escape his commission (Jonah 1). A Phoenician toponym attached to a river in the New World is one of the quiet hints that the Mulekite stream of the Nephite population brought Phoenician cultural memory with it across the sea.

The battle at Amnihu and the pursuit toward Sidon (verses 16–24)

Now Alma, being the chief judge and the governor of the people of Nephi, therefore he went up with his people, yea, with his captains, and chief captains, yea, at the head of his armies, against the Amlicites to battle. — Alma 2:16

Alma now holds three offices at once. He is chief judge (the judicial office), governor of the people of Nephi (the executive office), and commander-in-chief of the armies. He has also been carrying the office of high priest since Mosiah 29:42. The combination is unique, and it will not last. By Alma 4 he will hand the judgment-seat to Nephihah so he can devote himself wholly to the priesthood. Alma 2 shows what the founding moment looked like before the offices parted — one man bearing every weight while the new order found its feet.

And they began to slay the Amlicites upon the hill east of Sidon. And the Amlicites did contend with the Nephites with great strength, insomuch that many of the Nephites did fall before the Amlicites. — Alma 2:17

The Book of Mormon does not promise costless victory to the righteous. Many of the Nephites fall before the Amlicites in this first engagement. The Lord strengthens, but He does not spare. The chapter is honest about the cost of defending the new order — and the honesty is itself part of the doctrine. The just war is not a war without grief.

Nevertheless the Nephites were inspired by a better cause, for they were not fighting for monarchy nor power but they were fighting for their homes and their liberties, their wives and their children, and their all, yea, for their rites of worship and their church. — Alma 2:24 (also paralleled in 3:7)

The Book of Mormon's foundational text on the doctrine of the defensive war, and the seed of the language Captain Moroni will canonize fifteen chapters later in the Title of Liberty (in memory of our God, our religion, and freedom, and our peace, our wives, and our children, Alma 46:12). Five elements compose the better cause: homes, liberties, families, all, and rites of worship. Together they constitute the Nephite manifesto of just-war defense. Nehemiah's call to Jerusalem's defenders is in the same key — fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses (Neh. 4:14) — and the Latter-day Saint just-war tradition will draw from both streams.

The prayer of Alma and the personal combat with Amlici (verses 28–32)

And it came to pass that the Nephites being strengthened by the hand of the Lord, having prayed mightily to him that he would deliver them out of the hands of their enemies, therefore the Lord did hear their cries, and did strengthen them. — Alma 2:28

Corporate prayer produces corporate strengthening. The Hebrew phrase behind strengthened by the hand of the Lord is be-koach Yahweh — by the power of the Lord — and it recurs in every great Nephite deliverance: Nephi recovering the plates (1 Ne. 4:1), Limhi's people escaping (Mosiah 9:17), Ammon's mission (Alma 26:11–12), Helaman's stripling warriors (Hel. 3:35). Alma 2 is one of the earliest installments in that pattern. The army prays; the army is strengthened; the Lord hears.

And it came to pass that Alma fought with Amlici with the sword, face to face; and they did contend mightily, one with another. And it came to pass that Alma, being a man of God, being exercised with much faith, cried, saying: O Lord, have mercy and spare my life, that I may be an instrument in thy hands to save and preserve this people. — Alma 2:29–30

One of the most important prayers in the Book of Mormon, and the first appearance of the instrument in thy hands formula. Alma is not asking for victory; he is asking for instrumentality — for his life to be spared so the Lord may go on using it to save the people. The prayer becomes a Nephite missionary's standing form. Ammon will pray it (Alma 17:9; 26:3); Aaron will pray it (Alma 22:18). It is the prayer the Nephite warriors and missionaries pray when they are at the end of their own strength, and it is the prayer that makes the difference between worldly heroism and the kind of strength the Lord gives to those who serve His ends rather than their own.

Paul names the same posture: he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles (Acts 9:15); a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use (2 Tim. 2:21). The instrument is the willing vessel; the strength comes through it, not from it.

Now when Alma had said these words he contended again with Amlici; and he was strengthened, insomuch that he slew Amlici with the sword. And he also contended with the king of the Lamanites; but the king of the Lamanites fled back from before Alma and sent his guards to contend with Alma. — Alma 2:31–32

The prayer is answered by strengthening, and the strengthened arm prevails. Alma slays Amlici and then meets the king of the Lamanites in the next combat, and the king himself flees. The chapter is one of the Book of Mormon's clearest pictures of a leader fighting from the front. The pattern is biblical — David against Goliath (1 Sam. 17), Judas Maccabeus at Emmaus (1 Macc. 4:6–25). The leader who asks his people to fight must be the first into the fight.

The battle at the Sidon and the cleansing of the land (verses 33–38)

But Alma, with his guards, contended with the guards of the king of the Lamanites until he slew and drove them back. — Alma 2:33

And he also cleared the ground, or rather the bank, which was on the west of the river Sidon, throwing the bodies of the Lamanites who had been slain into the waters of Sidon, that thereby his people might have room to cross and contend with the Lamanites and the Amlicites on the west side of the river Sidon. — Alma 2:34

A grim and matter-of-fact verse. The dead are cast into the river so the living can cross. The Sidon becomes a mass grave in the first major battle of the new era. The phrase room to cross is the chapter's quiet tactical explanation — armies cannot advance through their own dead — but the long-term effect is the one Mormon notices: the bones are still there. The Nephite reader who knew the country could see the place. The chapter does not pretend the war was bloodless, and the river itself carries the memory.

And it came to pass that the Lamanites and the Amlicites… did flee much faster from before them than they could pursue them; for they did flee even into the wilderness of Hermounts; and it was that part of the wilderness which was infested by wild and ravenous beasts. — Alma 2:37

The fleeing host runs into a wilderness named Hermounts — a name that may echo Mt. Hermon, the wild northern frontier of biblical Israel — and the wilderness is infested by wild and ravenous beasts. The image is straight out of the covenant curses: I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your children (Lev. 26:22); I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps (Hos. 13:8). The rebels do not escape; they flee into the kind of place the Lord's covenant warnings put rebellious peoples.

And it came to pass that many died in the wilderness of their wounds, and were devoured by those beasts and also the vultures of the air; and their bones have been found, and have been heaped up on the earth. — Alma 2:38

The chapter ends in stark physical evidence. The bones of the Amlicites and the Lamanites have been found, heaped on the earth, unburied. Ezekiel saw a valley of dry bones and was told they would live (Ezek. 37); here the dry bones are left as a witness to judgment. The unburied dead of Amlici's rebellion remain a Nephite memorial: this is what comes of trying to undo the Lord's appointed order by force.

The chapter's architecture

The chapter has five panels. Verses 1–7 stage Amlici's rise and the vote that rejects him. Verses 8–15 record the self-crowning and the alliance with the Lamanites. Verses 16–24 record the battle at the hill Amnihu. Verses 28–32 record Alma's prayer and his combat with Amlici. Verses 33–38 record the battle at the Sidon and the flight into the wilderness of Hermounts.

The theological center sits in v. 7. The voice of the people came against Amlici. Mosiah 29:26 had said it would generally be so, and now it has been. The chapter is the Book of Mormon's first proof-text of its own constitutional prophecy.

The chapter also stands as the Book of Mormon's clearest portrait of the founding judge as three-fold officer. Alma is chief judge, governor, and commander-in-chief, and he is high priest as well. The combination works in this founding crisis because the man bearing the offices is the right kind of man, but the chapter quietly foreshadows the problem. No one but a prophet could hold four offices at once and discharge them well; Alma 4 will record the separation that comes the moment a prophet recognizes his own limit.

Finally, Alma 2 is the Book of Mormon's foundational text for the doctrine of the defensive war. The five elements of the better cause — homes, liberties, families, all, rites of worship — will become a Nephite refrain, canonized in the Title of Liberty fifteen chapters later, and the seed of the Latter-day Saint just-war tradition is planted here. The Nephites do not fight for monarchy or power; they fight for the things a free people is obligated to defend. That distinction, kept clear, is what makes the difference between a defense and a conquest.