LeGrand L. Baker

1 Nephi 17:18-21 

18 And thus my brethren did complain against me….
21 Behold, these many years we have suffered in the wilderness, which time we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy.

Nephi was ever the optimist. His optimism is the testimony that he threads though his entire story, assuring us again and again that he understood what he was supposed to do and that he was always disappointed when his brothers tried to change either the method or the outcome. Now their argument (which had, no doubt been an underlying motive for their earlier determination to kill their father) came to full blossom: “we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy.”

That argument would have struck Nephi to the heart. He knew that the “happiness” their property would have brought them would have been turned by the Babylonians into enslavement or death. But he also know that the happiness they were determined to exchange for their temporary satisfaction was only an ephemeral lure for emptiness, sorrow, and eternal aloneness. His knowledge that they sought such fleeting happiness probably hurt his soul as much as their refusal to assist him in building the boat.
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1 Nephi 17:15-16 

15 Wherefore, I, Nephi, did strive to keep the commandments of the Lord, and I did exhort my brethren to faithfulness and diligence.
16 And it came to pass that I did make tools of the ore which I did molten out of the rock.

Nephi did not have to ask the Lord for instructions about how to smelt ore or how to form it into the appropriate tools. It is apparent that he already understood those techniques. What he did not know was where to find the iron ore. The fact that he reports that he simply smelted “the rock” indicates that he did, in fact, simply pick up the iron ore off the ground, just as one would pick up other rocks.

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1 Nephi 18:1-2 

1 And it came to pass that they did worship the Lord, and did go forth with me; and we did work timbers of curious workmanship. And the Lord did show me from time to time after what manner I should work the timbers of the ship.
2 Now I, Nephi, did not work the timbers after the manner which was learned by men, neither did I build the ship after the manner of men; but I did build it after the manner which the Lord had shown unto me; wherefore, it was not after the manner of men.

In the premortal world when we made covenants to come to the earth to do the Father’s will, he made a reciprocating covenant that he would remove any hindrance that would actually prevent us from fulfilling that covenant. He did not promise that it will not at times seem impossible for us to do, only that it will never actually be impossible. The whole of First Nephi has given us multiple examples that God keeps his covenants. Nephi’s account has led us through impossible challenges: times of hunger, pain, and inexplicable fatigue. Now we are about to go with him on a ship where the entire outcome of the voyage depends on God’s doing what he promised he would do—not just leading the ship to the Promised Land but also sustaining Nephi and making sure it is he who is in command.

Nephi did not build his ship according to the methods he might have learned during his travels along the shore of the Red Sea. Several have wondered what those innovations might have been. Brown and members of his group have suggested that,{1}

The plank ships at this time were built in what is known as the “clinker method:’ which is to suggest that the hull is constructed before the skeleton is. The planks were put together in overlapping form and nailed together or, frequently, they were put together with mortise and tenon, one on top of the other.

What finally took Columbus’s ships across the Atlantic was a deep tall hull that had to be built skeleton first. This was not done regularly at the time of Nephi.

Building the skeleton first would have meant that Nephi’s ship could have been taller and also deeper into the water. It could also have been multidecked, thus giving far more room below decks to house people and also to store food. This also means that the vessel did not need to be as long as it would if it had been narrow and hull construction only—clinker construction.

Is this what Nephi means when he says that he did not build it after the manner of men? The manner of men was building the hull first and then adding the skeleton. That Nephi turned it around and built the skeleton first and then added the hull would be the same innovation that would ultimately take the ships across the Atlantic in the age of the sail.

This might mean that Nephi made the ship round, which you can do using the skeleton construction first. That roundness might have meant that he could have shortened the ship considerably. And noting that he only had one large sail, as was conventional at the time, he would have needed to make a shorter vessel because a long ship can simply not be propelled by a single long sail. If this ship was built round and wide, it need not have been longer than 35 or 40 feet. We know that later on the Viking vessels are estimated to have had one foot per warrior designated on that vessel. That meant that for 40 people, you would need a vessel that was 20 feet long. That’s a pretty cramped style. And perhaps Nephi and his family would not have wanted to be this cramped. On the other hand, space is a modern luxury. We know that premodern peoples did not have the concerns about space that we do. And so we cannot imagine that they would have needed a very large vessel to take this utilitarian mission of traveling from one place to the next. ….{2}

There were several different ancient techniques for holding a ship together. Plank vessels were often sewn with ropes. The entire vessel itself would be waterproofed. That’s always the most difficult thing, but we have good evidence that in the Arabian Peninsula shipbuilders used a bitumen substance to create the water sealing that needed to cover all of the hull. And it was very effective. Bitumen could be found locally and in abundance in that region. It was mixed together with sap and other substances to create the glue. This would make the vessel quite seaworthy.{3}

The Hiltons suggested a different method. They wrote,

The earliest ships of record were put together by the sewing method. For example, the sun boat of Pharaoh Cheops, who built one of the great pyramids in Egypt, was a sewed boat. It recently has been discovered and reassembled at Giza just outside Cairo (see Figure 12-2). If sewed ships were “after the manner of men,” it is possible and we advance the theory that Nephi perhaps discovered how to build a nailed ship by direct revelation. We know he had ore and a smelter and tools, so why not hammer out some nails to fasten the planks to the ribs and make his craft truly sea-worthy.

While nails had been known and used at least 400 years before Nephi’s day, there is no indication they were used in ship-building. King David, about 1000 B.C., prepared among other supplies iron “nails” in abundance for Solomon to use in building the First Jerusalem Temple; specifically they were to be used “for the doors of the gates and for the joinings” of the temple (1 Ch. 22:3). But we do not know who got the inspiration to use them in a ship-building application. Perhaps Nephi?

Tim Serevin, who recently built a sewed-ocean-going dhow under Omani sponsorship, reports that the stitched vessel took three times as long to build as would have been required had he built a nailed ship. He had to go to the Laccadive Islands of India to find the only men left in the world who knew how to sew a boat. He also notes that the earliest texts make it abundantly clear that early ships were sewed.{4}
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FOOTNOTES

{1} For their discussion of ways Nephi might have built his ship see S. Kent Brown and Peter Johnson, Journey of Faith, from Jerusalem to the Promised Land (Provo, Utah, The Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, BYU, 2006), 77-95

{2} Kelly DeVries in S. Kent Brown and Peter Johnson, Journey of Faith, from Jerusalem to the Promised Land, 80-82.

{3} Kelly DeVries in S. Kent Brown and Peter Johnson, Journey of Faith, from Jerusalem to the Promised Land, 84.

{4} Lynn M. Hilton and Hope A. Hilton, Discovering Lehi (Springville, Ut., Cedar Fort, Incorporated, 1969), 114.
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1 Nephi 17:53

53 And it came to pass that the Lord said unto me: Stretch forth thine hand again unto thy brethren, and they shall not wither before thee, but I will shock them, saith the Lord, and this will I do, that they may know that I am the Lord their God.

It is often too easy for us to let the picturesque excitement of Nephi’s stories obscure the intent of his telling them. This is an excellent example. It would make a wonderful movie scene, and the movie would probably obscure its message even more. Nephi has been telling us all along that his purpose was to show that God has the power to clear the way so that his servants can accomplish their covenantal responsibilities. That principle is a major premise on which the entire book of First Nephi has been built. While Nephi demonstrates it perfectly, he does not stop to explain why it is so. To learn that, we have to recall Paul’s explanation of our premortal covenants with our Heavenly Father in the first chapter of Ephesians and other scriptures. The promise of invulnerability does not preclude our being subject to suffering in this world, but it does preclude the possibility that any external power will prevent us from fulfilling the covenants we made while we were in the Council in Heaven.

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1 Nephi 17:49-51 

49 And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto them that they should murmur no more against their father; neither should they withhold their labor from me, for God had commanded me that I should build a ship.
50 And I said unto them: If God had commanded me to do all things I could do them. If he should command me that I should say unto this water, be thou earth, it should be earth; and if I should say it, it would be done.
51 And now, if the Lord has such great power, and has wrought so many miracles among the children of men, how is it that he cannot instruct me, that I should build a ship?

Once again, Nephi finds occasion to reiterate his central theme. This time it is by telling us how his brothers tried to prevent him from building a ship. He writes that he said many things to them, but the only thing he tells us he said is that, “God had commanded me that I should build a ship. And…If God had commanded me to do all things I could do them.”

In Nephi’s narrative, this is high adventure. However, in the pattern of the cosmic sacred narrative and Feast of Tabernacles temple drama, this is the final struggle before ultimate success. There is always a final struggle, but the sure promise of triumph alleviates neither the difficulty nor the dangers of that final struggle.
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1 Nephi 18:8-10  

8 And it came to pass after we had all gone down into the ship, and had taken with us our provisions and things which had been commanded us, we did put forth into the sea and were driven forth before the wind towards the promised land.
9 And after we had been driven forth before the wind for the space of many days, behold, my brethren and the sons of Ishmael and also their wives began to make themselves merry, insomuch that they began to dance, and to sing, and to speak with much rudeness, yea, even that they did forget by what power they had been brought thither; yea, they were lifted up unto exceeding rudeness.
10 And I, Nephi, began to fear exceedingly lest the Lord should be angry with us, and smite us because of our iniquity, that we should be swallowed up in the depths of the sea; wherefore, I, Nephi, began to speak to them with much soberness; but behold they were angry with me, saying: We will not that our younger brother shall be a ruler over us.

Singing and dancing were part of ancient ceremonial rejoicing rituals. While such activities may not have been a problem at first, they soon got out of hand. Nephi seems to be saying that it got progressively worse, as he reports, “and to speak with much rudeness…yea, they were lifted up unto exceeding rudeness.” Ricks quotes Sjodahl to suggest that at least some of the dancing may have been legitimate. He wrote,

There is a French translation by Brasseur de Bourbourg of a Mexican tradition that runs as follows: “Here is the beginning of the accounts of the arrival of the Mexicans from the place named Aztlan. It was through the midst of the water that they made their way to this locality, being four tribes. And in coming they were rowing in their ships.” Bourbourg, who records this tradition in his Ancient Monuments of Mexico, explains that the word in the original language that he translated “rowing” actually is the native word for “dancing.” But because he could make no sense out of “dancing” in reference to ships he had translated it “rowing.”{1}

However the dancing aboard ship may have begun, its eventual rudeness convinced Nephi that it had to be stopped, and he stepped in with his usual determination to stop it.

Ricks suggests that their anger was more than frustration over their younger brother’s trying to ruin their party. But it was a deepseated, pent up resentment and a reminder that the angel had once told them, “Know ye not that the Lord hath chosen him to be a ruler over you, and this because of your iniquities?” (1 Nephi 3:29) Ricks wrote,

Nephi had meant no offense, but the more clearly Laman and Lemuel realized that they were really headed for a new land the more they resented any reminder of the prophecy that their younger brother would one day rule over them (See also 2:22; 3:29; 16:37.)”{2}

The brothers did not simply toss him into the water, but rather they tied him up and exercised complete dominance over him. Probably they taunted him as they made him watch the frolics of their rudeness.

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FOOTNOTES

{1} Eldin Ricks, Book of Mormon Commentary, Volume 1, Comprising the Complete Text of The First Book of Nephi with Explanatory Notes (Salt Lake City, Deseret News Press, 1953), 218-19. His quote is from,
Janne M. Sjodahl, “Commentary on the First Book of Nephi” (unpublished manuscript), 430.
Italics in original.

{2} Eldin Ricks, Book of Mormon Commentary, Volume 1, Comprising the Complete Text of The First Book of Nephi with Explanatory Notes (Salt Lake City, Deseret News Press, 1953), 219.
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