Jacob is Trusted with the Plates

In the year 545 BC, fifty-five years after Lehi’s group had left Jerusalem, my older brother Nephi gave me, Jacob, a commandment regarding the small plates, upon which these words are engraved. He told me to write only a few things on these small plates—things that I thought were most precious. He told me to include only a little history of his people, the people of Nephi. He said the history of his people should be engraved on his large plates. Nephi told me to preserve all these plates, and to hand them down from generation to generation. He told me to engrave any sacred preaching, great revelations and prophesying, and to engrave as much of this as possible for Christ, and for the sake of our people. Because of our faith in the Lord and great concern for our people, we had been shown what would happen to them. We also had many revelations and the spirit of prophecy, and we knew about Christ and His kingdom that would come.

We worked very hard among our people to persuade them to come to Christ and to enjoy God’s goodness, that they might someday enter His rest. Otherwise, God would vow in His anger that they would not enter, just as He did when the children of Israel fell into temptation in the wilderness. We hope that with God’s help we might persuade all people not to rebel against Him—not to provoke His anger, but to believe in Christ, who would suffer and die on the cross while bearing the shame of the world. Because of these desires, I, Jacob, take it upon myself to fulfill the instructions from my brother Nephi.

When Nephi was old and realized that he would soon die, he anointed a man to be king and ruler over his people as the people had desired. The people loved Nephi very much, for he had been their great protector, defending them with Laban’s sword, and he had worked for their temporal and spiritual welfare all his life. Because they loved him so much, the people wanted to remember his name. So they decided that whoever reigned from then on would be called Nephi—second Nephi, third Nephi, etc., according to the reign of the kings. Those who reigned as king from then on were known as Nephi, and not by their actual names. Then Nephi died.

All those who were not Lamanites were called Nephites, although there were also Jacobites, Josephites, Zoramites, Lamanites, Lemuelites, and Ishmaelites.

I, Jacob, will not refer to them by these names, but will refer to those who try to destroy Nephi’s people as Lamanites. And I will refer to those who are friendly to Nephi as Nephites.

The Nephites, under the reign of their second king, started the wicked practice of desiring and indulging themselves with many wives and mistresses, like David of old and his son Solomon had done. They also began to dig for great amounts of gold and silver, for they were becoming prideful. So I, Jacob, having been called by God, taught them in the temple.

Nephi had consecrated my brother Joseph and I to be the people’s priests and teachers. We increased in our commitment to serve the Lord, feeling responsible for the people’s sins if we did not teach them God’s word as best we could. We taught them with all our might so we would not have to answer for their sins.