Post by Amaleki –
My father Abinadom and several of the others who have recently kept up this blog have not really added much to its content. We have been charged with keeping this record and have faithfully done so but probably not exactly how Nephi first envisioned us doing so. Nephi, Jacob and even Enos contributed considerable content of great worth, yet since them this record has merely become a genealogy. The fate of this blog may have run contrary to Nephi’s original expectation, but in our defense, we are simply ordinary men with an extraordinary lineage.
I am sure Nephi initially anticipated that this record “should be handed down from one generation to another, or from one prophet to another, until further commandments of the Lord” . When Nephi entrusted this blog to Jacob, he seems to have followed the second principle of succession—that is, prophet to prophet (though, being so much younger than Nephi, Jacob might also qualify as a next generation kinsman). Still, Nephi gave this record not to a son but to his brother, a prophet.
At that point, however, Nephi seemed to clarify how the custodianship of the blog was to be determined. He instructed Jacob to keep the blog in the family, handing it down to his seed “from generation to generation.” Hence, Jacob and his posterity down to me, Amaleki has always given the charge of this blog, not just to the preeminent prophet but to a close male relative (usually a son) in the next generation. Filial ties became the main qualification of ownership (and hence authorship) until now when the blog will finally be entrusted to someone outside our family—namely Benjamin, a prophet-king, the first such figure to have this record since Nephi. In other words, since Nephi and Jacob, the rest of us really became authors and came to regard our purpose as genealogical. Beginning with Jarom, we inscribed the record “that our genealogy may be kept,” and I don’t think that was Nephi’s or Jacob’s intent.
I am not trying to diss on my father and his ancestors because they did what I think they understood was their duty. But can you imagine how they felt? Compared to Nephi and Jacob and even Enos, their own lives must have seemed pale and even paltry beside those of the heroic first generation. So I give them a little more sympathy for not being great authors in this blog. Please note that, however embarrassing, each man obediently fulfilled his charge, enrolling his name at the end of the record. I note also that many of my less distinguished ancestors (most conspicuously Omni and Abinadom) are refreshingly frank about their felt weaknesses. I certainly learn from their humility and uncommon self-honesty.
If you will also note, none of these authors treats the sacred record cynically—not even the avowedly “wicked” Omni. All of them, except perhaps Chemish, appear to sense this blog’s power. The very inadequacy that they express suggests that these my ancestors had both read the record and been moved by its power. I know I have. I am grateful for their commitment to duty, their humility, their honesty, and their reverence for the sacred.
(1 Ne. 19:4)
(Jacob 1:3 )
(Omni 1:30)
(Jarom 1:1; compare Omni 1:1)
