Thoughts on Ether 14 and 15

While I read Ether 14 and 15 this morning I was struck by the incongruity of the story of the Jaredite destruction.

In verse 2 of chapter 14 we read of the, apparently polygamous participants in the aggression that would prove the nation’s complete downfall. “Wherefore every man did cleave unto that which was his own, with his hands, and would not borrow neither would he lend; and every man kept the hilt of his sword in his right hand, in the defence Sic. of his property and his own life and of his wives and children.” This was just 7 years, more or less from the bitter end that only two would remain alive to witness, Ether and Coriantumr. Ether, whose name the book bears wrote down his tale of the destruction for us to read and the latter simply bore verbal witness to the late-comer Nephites.

It struck me that despite the doomsday nature of this text and the nearness of oblivion, Jared’s descendants were still concerned with being good family men and women. They cared for their belongings and their loved ones right up to the total anarchy and barbarous annihilation of their race. Indeed, they doubtless thought themselves righteous and they were pious in their defense of their freedoms and security but in the end the Lord kept his promise to sweep them off the continent and destroyed them for their wickedness and failure to comply with His teachings.

Are we so far from them?