Anti-Nephi-Lehi Mothers

Their Mothers Taught Them by Brent Borup, graphite with digital coloring, 2020, by permission of the artist.

When I first saw this shirt (see fig. 1), I was immediately taken with the contrast of the shirtless warriors in bodybuilder-type poses and the claim that these men with six-packs and bulging muscles were “momma’s boys.”1 I have always loved a clever juxtaposition, and this one was so delightful that I remember it from years ago. I was a student walking down the main hallway of Orem High School, and I actually stopped in the middle of the hallway to stare at it, then continued down the hall laughing to myself. What made the shirt even more wonderful was that the student wearing it was a popular athlete, who was able to wear that shirt with no social recriminations (at least none that I saw). I still think it’s wonderful that a teenage boy could see the stripling soldiers as models of men who could be strong—not in spite of but because of how much they valued their mothers.2 However, the shirt gives the wrong impression about who the stripling soldiers were and somewhat obscures their relationship to and the importance of their mothers. The assumptions made by this image and others like it can distort the story, a story which has so much more to teach us.

Figure 1. T-shirt the author saw in Orem High School, Orem, Utah. Courtesy BuyLDSproducts.com.

The only verses that specifically mention “mothers” are Alma 56:47–48 and Alma 57:21, 26–27. Based on these verses, three pieces of information can be identified about the mothers of the stripling soldiers: (1) they each had a “stripling” son (or sons) in Helaman’s army, (2) they taught their sons, and (3) they were part of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people.3 With these pieces of information, I will outline the information about what the mothers taught and then propose the likely age range of the mothers from the information about their sons. Then, I will contextualize these mothers by incorporating them into the history of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people. Finally, I will discuss their significance as possibly the largest group of women in the Book of Mormon who are credited with an important, positive contribution to their society and whose story teaches what the mothers knew about the promises of the Lord and the power of deliverance.

Mothers of the “Stripling Warriors”

Four references tell us what the sons learned from their mothers.4 A chart comparing the passages might look like this (table 1):

Table 1. Descriptions of Characteristics

Arranging the information as illustrated in table 1 shows the incredible impact that the mothers’ teachings had on their sons. What the mothers taught their sons was not simply information about religion; they taught the importance of trusting God, the courage that results from faith and obedience, and the promise of preservation. How did the mothers know what they taught to their sons? Presumably, since the mothers were able to teach their sons these ideas, the mothers would have had to learn and know them first. Looking at the Anti-Nephi-Lehi mothers’ history shows that what the mothers knew came directly from what they experienced.

Since each of the women had a son described as “stripling” when they went to war, we can extrapolate some information about the mothers from the information about their sons. Because of the nickname “stripling warriors” and much of the artwork depicting them, a mental image of the stripling warriors often looks like the shirt I saw, the famous painting by Arnold Friberg (fig. 2), or this action figure available at Deseret Book (fig. 3):

Figure 2. Helaman’s Stripling Warriors, by Arnold Friberg, 1952–55, cropped. © By Intellectual Reserve, Inc.

Figure 3. “Stripling Warrior Action Figure” at Deseret Book. Courtesy Latter Day Designs.

The difficulty with this nickname and these depictions, however, is that the term “stripling warrior” does not appear in the Book of Mormon. The word “warrior” is never used of the sons and invokes an idea that is not true to the text.5 They are called “stripling soldiers” (Alma 53:22) and “stripling Ammonites” (Alma 56:57). A more accurate attribution than “stripling warriors” would be “stripling soldiers” or “stripling sons.”6 According to Noah Webster’s 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language, a “stripling” is “a youth in the state of adolescence, or just passing from boyhood to manhood” and comes from “strip” which is “primarily a tall slender youth, one that shoots up suddenly.”7 While this definition does not give a definitive age range, it does suggest that someone described as “stripling” is closer to the beginnings of puberty than to the end of it—that is, closer to 12 than to 20.8

The stripling soldiers are also called “young men” several times.9 The one other time the Book of Mormon uses the term “very young” in terms of military service is in Mosiah 10:9, where Zeniff says that he “caused that all [the] old men that could bear arms, and also all [the] young men that were able to bear arms, should gather themselves together to go to battle.” The young men and old men here are those who were too young or too old to be expected to serve in the military; the desperate situation called for those old and young men to join the army despite being outside the normal age ranges.

In Alma 56:39, Helaman calls them “my little sons,” which seems to suggest that the sons are more likely younger than typical military age.10 Given the other use of the term “young men” in the Book of Mormon, the nineteenth-century meaning of “stripling,” and that Helaman calls his soldiers “very young,” and “my little sons,” an age range of 12 to 16 seems most likely. Grant Hardy’s Book of Mormon commentary claims, “Since the people of Ammon had renounced violence just before the destruction of Ammonihah in –81, some fifteen years earlier, their sons who were too young to join in the covenant or were born shortly thereafter would now be teenagers.”11 Brant Gardner’s Book of Mormon commentary also concludes that the entire community would have been bound by that oath because they saw themselves guilty of murder. As such, the stripling soldiers would not have been older than 16.12

Stripling Warriors by Jody Livingston, mixed media, 2016, by permission of the artist.

Why does this information about the sons’ ages matter to understanding their mothers’ context? First, pointing out that these women were old enough to be mothers helps us recognize that they had lived long enough to experience the history of their people. A mother with a “stripling” child could be anywhere from 25 to 65 years old, but anywhere in that range means that the mothers were adults during the history of their people described in Alma 22–28 (see table 2).13 Second, establishing the age ranges suggests that the mothers had a child (or children) young enough to be still living with their parents and siblings. Third, if we consider the age ranges for the sons, we can estimate when these mothers were pregnant and when they were in the early stages of raising their sons. We can then see where the mother’s experiences with these sons fit in the history of their people. We will return to this idea and its significance after the discussion of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi history and timeline.

Table 2. Anti-Nephi-Lehi Timeline with Approximate Ages for the Mothers

The Context of the Mothers in Anti-Nephi-Lehi History

One difficulty of putting the mothers onto a timeline of Anti-Nephi-Lehi history comes from where the different pieces of the story are told in the book of Alma. Because the Anti-Nephi-Lehi story is told mainly in Alma 22–28, but the account of the stripling soldiers (and the comments about their mothers) does not appear until Alma 53, it is easy to miss the connection between the mothers and their history.14

Another difficulty is that Mormon does not give any specific “year of the judges” timestamps when he recounts the missions of Ammon, Aaron, Omner, and Himni. We have to coordinate dates from surrounding stories outside of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi narrative to establish a timeline for the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people and the mothers of the stripling sons.15 The three firm dates given in the Book of Mormon that help with this are the following: (1) Ammonihah was sacked in the eleventh year of the reign of the judges,16 (2) the Anti-Nephi-Lehies moved from Lamanite territory to Jershon around the fourteenth year of the reign of the judges and were there by the fifteenth year,17 and (3) the sons went to war in the twenty-sixth year of the reign of the judges.18 With the help of these three timestamps and the approximate ages of the sons and mothers, we can look at the events in Anti-Nephi-Lehi history to see where the mothers fit in. See table 2 for a chronological list of events in Anti-Nephi-Lehi history and the approximate ages of the mothers during each event.

The Conversion(s) of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi People and the Violence against Them

Though they came together to form one people, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies19 were a combination of four different Lamanite groups from different areas and at different times. The first group of converts, the origin of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people, were the families of King Lamoni and King Lamoni’s father (Alma 17–22).20 After being converted, King Lamoni’s father sent out a decree that the Nephite missionaries (Ammon, Aaron, Omner, and Himni) should not be persecuted but be able to preach freely (Alma 23:1–3). This resulted in the second group of converted Lamanites, who likely made up the largest group as “thousands” of Lamanites (Alma 23:5) in seven different surrounding areas were converted.21 Because this is probably the largest group of converts, many of the mothers likely came from these conversions.

This massive conversion and formation of a people who no longer wanted to be called “Lamanites” and intentionally chose a new name to distinguish themselves from other Lamanites (Alma 23:16–17) did not go unnoticed.22 Lamanites in surrounding areas took up arms against the Anti-Nephi-Lehies (Alma 24:2).23 This group included those “in all the land round about, who had not converted,” (Alma 24:1) telling us that not everyone in the seven converted areas listed was converted.24 Those people who were not converted were likely still part of the kingdom of King Lamoni’s father because they are described as rebelling “against their king” and wanting to depose him (Alma 24:2). This suggests that the conflict was within the same kingdom. Some of those who took up arms against the Anti-Nephi-Lehies could have been Lamanites from the same lands and possibly from the same families as the Anti-Nephi-Lehies. Many of the mothers of the stripling sons were likely part of these converted families who faced difficult tension and even violence because of the missionary work and conversions of their people.25

Anti-Nephi-Lehi Mother and Her Stripling Warrior by Sierra Newbold; ink, watercolor, and markers; 2021; by permission of the artist.

It was in response to the attacks from these fellow Lamanites that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies decided not to defend themselves. King Lamoni’s father left the kingship to his son, Lamoni’s brother, who was named Anti-Nephi-Lehi, and then King Lamoni’s father passed away in the same year (Alma 24:4). Seeing that violence was inevitable, Lamoni, Anti-Nephi-Lehi, and Ammon and his brethren counseled together to decide how to respond. Among the Anti-Nephi-Lehies, “there was not one soul among all the people who had been converted unto the Lord that would take up arms against their brethren” (Alma 24:6). King Anti-Nephi-Lehi gave an impassioned speech to his people, recorded in Alma 24:7–16, praising God for their conversion. He and his people buried their swords and made a covenant that they would not shed blood (Alma 24:17–18).26

Some of these same Lamanites who slaughtered the Anti-Nephi-Lehies constitute the third group of Lamanites who joined the Anti-Nephi-Lehies. When these Lamanites saw the refusal of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies to retaliate or even defend themselves, more than a thousand of the Lamanites stopped killing and joined the Anti-Nephi-Lehies (Alma 24:24–26).

Later, a fourth group of converts originated from the same group who had been slaughtering the Anti-Nephi-Lehies. After the slaughter, the Lamanites who remained unconverted went to Ammonihah. While in the wilderness, some of them were converted and joined the Anti-Nephi-Lehies.27 Each mother of a stripling soldier would have been part of one of these four groups.28 All of them would have been the daughters, sisters, wives, mothers, and extended families of those who were slaughtered by the unconverted Lamanites or those who had been slaughtering before their own conversion.

Continued Violence and Exodus of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies

The unconverted Lamanites who had returned home from Ammonihah came against the Anti-Nephi-Lehies again. Specifically, the Amalekites “began to stir up the people in anger against their brethren, the people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi; therefore they began again to destroy them” (Alma 27:2). According to their covenant, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies refused to fight, and more slaughter ensued (Alma 27:3).

Families from any of the four Anti-Nephi-Lehi groups would have been subject to this slaughter. For many of the mothers of the stripling sons, this would have been the second time their families refused to defend themselves. For others, they would now be on the receiving end of the killing that their groups had previously initiated. Although the text only gives us a few verses about this time, the fear, animosity, and perhaps violence could have lasted years. The persecution began before the sacking of Ammonihah in the eleventh year of the reign of the judges, and Ammon and his brethren reunited with Alma in the fourteenth year of the reign of the judges, meaning there were up to five years of undefended, continual aggression against the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people.

Because the persecution was so severe, Ammon and his brethren suggested to the Anti-Nephi-Lehi king that the people move into Nephite territory. The king protested that “the Nephites will destroy us, because of the many murders and sins we have committed against them” (Alma 27:6). His fear shows the incredibly precarious situation of these people. If they stayed in their homeland, they would continue to be persecuted and perhaps slaughtered by the unconverted Lamanites. But if they tried to relocate, they anticipated being destroyed by the Nephites. When Ammon inquired of the Lord, the Lord told Ammon to “get this people out of this land” (Alma 27:12). Then the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people received an incredible promise from the Lord, who told Ammon, “Blessed are this people in this generation, for I will preserve them” (Alma 27:12).29

Our Mothers Knew It by Megan Rieker, oil on canvas, 2017, by permission of the artist.

With this promise of preservation, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies began their exodus from their homes and into Nephite territory. They “did gather together all their flocks and herds, and departed out of the land” (Alma 27:14). However, the unconverted Lamanites were not content to let those people go, and “the armies of the Lamanites . . . followed their brethren into the wilderness” (Alma 28:1). The Book of Mormon preserves few details about the experience of this migration, but it may have taken several months and possibly a full year because their exodus happened sometime in the fourteenth year of the reign of the judges (Alma 16:12) and the Anti-Nephi-Lehies did not settle in Jershon until the fifteenth year (Alma 28:7).

When they first “came into the wilderness which divided the land of Nephi from the land of Zarahemla” (Alma 27:14), they remained there and waited until Ammon could go into Zarahemla, contact the chief judge, and wait for the results from “the voice of the people concerning the admitting their brethren, who were the people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi” (Alma 27:15, 20–21).30 Since Lamanite armies followed them there and those armies fought a battle with the Nephites after the Anti-Nephi-Lehies arrived, the armies were following the Anti-Nephi-Lehies during their migration and waiting.

The promise of preservation must have been a great source of comfort during this time. While we may assume that the promised preservation was individual—that is, each one of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies was protected and not harmed by the army pursuing them—it is also possible, perhaps more likely, that the promise was corporate. The promise may have meant that the people as a whole would be preserved and able to enter Nephite territory, but some of the individuals may have been attacked, wounded, or killed by the pursuing army. While traveling to Jershon, the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people would have continued to keep their covenant of nonviolence, which means they would not have defended themselves if small groups from the Lamanite army attacked or raided them. The Lamanite army knew that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies would not defend themselves, so it would not be surprising if they attempted to steal from and raid the Anti-Nephi-Lehies.31 Perhaps it is significant that at the end of this chapter chronicling their migration, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies are described as people who “would suffer death in the most aggravating and distressing manner which could be inflicted by their brethren, before they would take the sword or cimeter to smite them” (Alma 27:29). Their experience in the wilderness might have been more than grueling travel; it may have been very dangerous as well.

The Anti-Nephi-Lehies in Nephite Territory

By “the voice of the people,” the Nephites agreed to give the Anti-Nephi-Lehies the land of Jershon and to “guard them from their enemies with our armies, on condition that they will give us a portion of their substance to assist us that we may maintain our armies” (Alma 27:22–24). This was not a minor commitment by the Nephites. The Anti-Nephi-Lehi defection and their arrival in Jershon precipitated a huge battle between the Nephites protecting the Anti-Nephi-Lehies and the Lamanites pursuing them. Sometimes called the War of Ammonite Secession,32 Mormon described this as a battle “as never had been known among all the people in the land from the time Lehi left Jerusalem” (Alma 28:2). The Nephites paid a high price in blood to protect the new converts.

After this battle, there was peace in the sixteenth year of the reign of the judges (Alma 30:4) and at the beginning of the seventeenth year (Alma 30:5, Alma 35:12). In the seventeenth year, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies accepted the Zoramite refugees (Alma 35:6). These people were the poor who converted through the preachings of Alma and Amulek (see Alma 32–34). Because they believed the words of Alma and Amulek, they were cast out of their own land and joined Alma and Amulek, who had already relocated to Jershon with the Anti-Nephi-Lehies (Alma 35:1). Although the chief ruler of the Zoramites “breathed out many threatenings against” the Anti-Nephi-Lehies, they refused to reject the refugees, “but they did receive all the poor of the Zoramites that came over unto them; and they did nourish them, and did clothe them, and did give unto them lands for their inheritance; and they did administer unto them according to their wants” (Alma 35:9). The Anti-Nephi-Lehi people, including the mothers of the stripling soldiers, likely would have borne the responsibility for feeding, clothing, and (at least temporarily) housing the refugees.

The additional hostility over the Zoramite converts caused the unconverted Zoramites to collude with the Lamanites and come against the Nephites to war again in the eighteenth year of the reign of the judges. So much of the war was on the border territory around Jershon that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies had to leave Jershon after being in their new home for only three years so that the Nephite army could use that area (Alma 35:12–13). Once resettled in Melek, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies continued to supply the Nephite army while the Nephite army protected and preserved them through years of war (Alma 27:22, 43:13).

This war (sometimes called the Zoramite war)33 started in the eighteenth year of the reign of the judges and continued for years. When the stripling sons joined the army in the twenty-sixth year of the reign of the judges (Alma 56:9), there had been approximately eight years of ongoing war. The situation had become so serious that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies considered breaking their oath and taking up arms to help the Nephite army (Alma 53:13–14). Instead, the two thousand “stripling sons” chose Helaman to lead them and left to support the Nephite armies (Alma 53:17–19).34 Reviewing the trials and suffering throughout the history of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people demonstrates the strength of their conversion since Mormon says that “as the Lord liveth, as many of the Lamanites as believed . . . and were converted unto the Lord, never did fall away” (Alma 23:6).

Helaman’s Army Preparing for Battle by Jorge Cocco Santángelo, oil on canvas, 2023, by permission of the artist.

The Significance of the Stripling Soldiers’ Mothers

Because we know that there were two thousand (and sixty) stripling sons, we know these mothers were a large group of women. The highest number of mothers possible would be two thousand if all of the mothers had only one son in the army. However, some of the mothers may have had more than one son in the army. With the age range of 12 to 14 but up to age 16 for the sons, there could be up to five years between the oldest and youngest of the stripling sons. Theoretically, one woman could have four children in five years, though it would be very unusual and even more unusual for all four to be sons. If all the women had four sons in the army, the total number of women would be five hundred, which we can take as the very lowest and most unlikely number. If we estimate that most of the mothers had one son, some or many had two, and a few had three or four sons in the army, a likely total number of mothers would be between twelve hundred and eighteen hundred. This estimation gives an idea of how substantial a group of women this was. With somewhere between twelve and eighteen hundred women, this group of mothers is the largest group of women in the Book of Mormon whose teachings and contribution are specified.

For each of these women to have a “stripling” son in the twenty-sixth year of the reign of the judges, most or all the mothers would have lived through the conversion, persecution, slaughter, exodus, and resettlements of their people. Placing them within the context of their people shows how extraordinary the story of these mothers is, and their history offers insight into what preservation and deliverance meant to them.

When They Became Mothers to the Stripling Soldiers

When putting the stripling soldiers on the timeline of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people,35 we might expect them to have been born before the severe violence against their people (before the eleventh year) or after the people were safely settled in Jershon (in the fifteenth year). A bumper crop of children in the year after the safety of the people was established seems reasonable. However, if the stripling sons were between 12 and 16 years old when they went to war in the twenty-sixth year, they would have been born sometime between the tenth and the fourteenth year of the reign of the judges.

Stripling Warrior Mothers by Kathleen Peterson, oil, 2015, by permission of the artist.

Those years were significant and correlate with two of the very important years in the people’s history—namely, the eleventh and fifteenth years. The first slaughter of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies was before the sacking of Ammonihah in the eleventh year of the reign of the judges, and the Anti-Nephi-Lehies had settled in Jershon by the fifteenth year. If any mothers were pregnant between the ninth and thirteenth years, then all those mothers had their sons during these incredibly difficult years. They would have been pregnant, nursing, or raising toddlers when their people were converted, when they made the covenant not to shed blood, when they were then slaughtered by the other Lamanites, and when they were moving from their homelands into Nephite territory while being followed by a Lamanite army.

Perhaps the timing of the conversion and trial of their people with the mothers carrying, bearing, and raising the stripling sons is more causal than coincidental to what the mothers taught their sons. The mothers of the stripling sons learned the realities of faith, preservation, and deliverance while carrying their sons in their wombs and in their arms. The mothers raised these sons to the stage of “stripling” while they lived in Jershon and then in Melek. The wars between the Nephites who had welcomed them and the Lamanites who had rejected them were being waged around them as their sons grew from infants and toddlers and into the “stripling” young men who were taught by their mothers to keep the commandments and trust in God continually.

The Fathers of the Stripling Soldiers

Considering the slaughters of their people, which likely killed many men, and the emphasis on the mothers of the stripling soldiers, we might assume that the mothers were so influential because many were widows. If the mothers were raising their children without their fathers, this significant emphasis on the mothers in the role of teaching the children would be more expected. However, the fathers of these sons are mentioned in the record too, so it seems that at least some, perhaps many, were still alive when the sons were at war. In Alma 56:27, Helaman mentions that “there was brought unto us many provisions from the fathers of those my two thousand sons.”36 Since the Anti-Nephi-Lehies provided provisions for the Nephite army, it makes sense that the stripling sons’ fathers contributed to provisions (Alma 27:22, 43:13). The mention of fathers providing provisions along with the mothers teaching the sons gives us a picture of mothers, fathers, and children all contributing to their community.37 The mothers contributed spiritual instruction, the fathers contributed provisions, and the children contributed to the safety and security of their people.

Preservation and Deliverance

The significance of the stripling soldiers to the Nephite war was substantial. The addition of the sons, though small in number, tipped the scale of at least two battles (Alma 56:43–56; 57:7–26) and provided “great hopes and much joy” to the other Nephites (Alma 56:17). The contribution of the sons, made possible by the teachings of their mothers, arguably changed the outcome of the war.

Because we know that the Nephites win the war and that all the sons survive the battles they fight, we might assume that the outcome was as obvious to those who fought the battles as it is to us now. It might be easy to assume that the mothers taught their sons that their lives would not be at risk if their sons remained faithful. However, especially if the promise of preservation given to the parents was corporate rather than individual and given the amount of slaughter and suffering the mothers experienced, perhaps there is something more to the idea of preservation and deliverance in this story than simple survival.

In Alma 56, Helaman told of a time when his army of stripling soldiers were in a precarious position, one that could accurately be called a death trap. Helaman’s army had coaxed a Lamanite army to pursue them and leave the Lamanite stronghold of Antiparah. The Lamanite army pursuing them was larger and much more experienced than Helaman’s army (Alma 56:34, 36). Because Helaman had no confirmation that their Nephite allies had been able to follow as planned, Helaman realized that if they engaged the pursuing army, his army would be defeated (Alma 56:39). After days of marching, Helaman asked the stripling soldiers if they were willing to fight an army that they could not defeat. Facing this life-threatening danger, they responded, “our God is with us, and he will not suffer that we should fall; then let us go forth” (Alma 56:46). The sons had this confidence because “they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them. And they rehearsed unto [Helaman] the words of their mothers, saying: We do not doubt our mothers knew it” (Alma 56:47–48).38 It is easy to assume that this deliverance was specifically about survival since the context of the chapter is the stripling soldiers engaging the much larger and more experienced army from Antiparah. However, after the battle, Helaman “numbered those young men who had fought, . . . fearing lest there were many of them slain” (Alma 56:55). Despite the sons’ confidence that God would not let them fall, Helaman did not expect all of his army to survive.

Mothers of the Stripling Warriors by Kathleen Peterson, oil, 2015, by permission of the artist.

In Alma 57, sixty more Ammonite sons joined Helaman’s army, and Helaman related the extraordinary efforts of the stripling soldiers during another battle (Alma 57:19–21). After the battle, he found that all of his sons had been wounded and two hundred of his 2,060 had fainted from the loss of blood, but “to our great astonishment, and also the joy of our whole army, there was not one soul of them who did perish . . . and we [did] justly ascribe it to the miraculous power of God” (Alma 57:25–26). Helaman’s astonishment that none of the stripling soldiers had died shows that, once again, he did not expect them all to survive.

Helaman also knew the history of the Anti-Nephi-Lehi people. He knew of the parent’s covenant and convinced them not to break it (Alma 53:14–15; 56:7–8), and he was present when the sons made their promise (Alma 53:16–19). His surprise at seeing all the sons alive after each of the battles suggests that no one expected individual survival, including the mothers. Their expectations may have been corporate rather than individual. Like the promise of preservation given to their parents, it is possible that the sons could have had complete confidence that God would deliver their army from their enemy, without expecting that each individually would survive the battle. When the sons chose to go to war, they “entered into a covenant to fight for the liberty of the Nephites, yea, to protect the land unto the laying down of their lives” (Alma 53:17). Their willingness to fight to the death indicates that they saw death as a very real possibility.39

Helaman says that the sons “did think more upon the liberty of their fathers than they did upon their lives” (Alma 56:47). This mention of liberty (instead of death) as the focus of their thoughts also relates to the promise of deliverance and preservation. Helaman contrasts their thoughts of death with their thoughts of the freedom to live according to their religious conversion. In addition to being willing to lay down their lives, when the stripling sons chose to go to war, they “covenanted that they never would give up their liberty, but they would fight in all cases to protect the Nephites and themselves from bondage” (Alma 53:17). The bondage they were avoiding presumably would have included being taken captive by the Lamanites, which just as likely included the bondage of not being able to worship Christ. Like their parents, the stripling sons did not fear death (see Alma 27:28–29 for parents and 56:47–48 for sons), or more likely, they feared Lamanite victory more than death because they were fighting for their families’ religious freedom. Helaman described them as sons who “stand fast in that liberty wherewith God has made them free” (Alma 58:39–40). The sons knew their own lives were at risk, but their courage to “stand fast” came from caring more about the liberty of their fathers—a liberty the Anti-Nephi-Lehies enjoyed because of their conversion and migration, even at the cost of individual deaths.

When the original promise of preservation was made to the Anti-Nephi-Lehies, it certainly was in the context of being preserved from death—that is, an assurance that the Nephites would not kill them if the Anti-Nephi-Lehies moved into Nephite territory. However, the need to move was not only to preserve their lives but also to preserve their religious liberty. They needed a place to live where they could worship according to their new beliefs. Though the Nephite’s physical protection from the Lamanite army was crucial to the Anti-Nephi-Lehies’ survival, the idea of the liberty to live according to their conversion was more important to them. The sons’ deliverance and preservation was likely about preserving their people’s right to religious freedom—not about escaping death.

During the first slaughter of their people, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies “praised God even in the very act of perishing under the sword” (Alma 24:23). They had come to see death as a part of their covenant not to fight. The heritage of these people was that death was not something to avoid at all costs but was a testament to their covenant. In fact, Mormon said that the Anti-Nephi-Lehies “never did look upon death with any degree of terror, for their hope and views of Christ and the resurrection; therefore, death was swallowed up to them by the victory of Christ over it” (Alma 27:28).40 This verse suggests that, rather than fearing death, the Anti-Nephi-Lehies focused on Christ’s victory over death and their own future resurrection. Because the mothers taught their sons that “there was a just God” (Alma 57:26–27) who “would deliver them” (Alma 56:47–48), and they could “be preserved by his marvelous power” (Alma 57:26–27), they certainly believed in God’s ability to preserve and deliver the army of their sons from an enemy army. However, based on what we can extrapolate about the mothers’ experience during the history of the Anti-Nephi-Lehies, they would not have believed that their sons would each be protected from death in battle. The had seen that the possibility of death was real, even likely. But their mothers taught them that they could trust in God’s deliverance, even when deliverance did not mean safety. For these mothers and stripling sons, deliverance and preservation meant that their families could remain in a land with religious freedom and that they would be “raised to dwell at the right hand of God, in a state of never-ending happiness” (Alma 28:12).41

Mother Knew, generated using MidJourney by Ethan Smith, 2023, by permission of the artist.

Conclusion

With somewhere between twelve hundred and eighteen hundred women, the mothers of the stripling soldiers constitute the largest group of women in the Book of Mormon who influence the narrative in a positive and important way. They are depicted as knowing that God is trustworthy, that God’s deliverance is real, and that the privilege to worship God was worth dying for. The mothers’ testimony and resilience in the face of death taught their sons that courage comes from faith in Christ. Their ability to teach these lessons to their sons significantly impacted the Nephite wars. Instead of clever, but misleading art like the t-shirt in the introduction, we might be better served with more art like what we see in this article, which, while less amusing, better represent the lives and experiences of the mothers and their sons. When understood in the context of their history, the mothers of the stripling soldiers are exemplars of women who learned from experience what it means to be converted and stay faithful through trials.42