Chapter 16: A More Hardened People

It was nearly the worst day of Aaron’s life. The only exception he could think of was the day that his young wife and newborn son died. He and Himni found a small stream as they staggered away from the city they had just been banished from. Himni looked to make sure that nobody was nearby and he helped his brother bathe his face. Aaron winced at the pain. He looked at Himni, “What do you think? Does it look bad?”

Himni made a face, “Pretty bad.”

“It hurts like the devil.”

“I am sure it does.” He glanced nervously into the surrounding jungle again. “I think we need to move on, brother. It would be better if you could rest, but we are still close.”

“I know, I know. I’ll get up.” He groaned, “Just not very quickly.”

Himni smiled. “Glad to see you have some humor left.”

Aaron was on his feet now. “But not much.” He arched his back to stretch as they began walking down the path. “Is it just me, or were they really like the meanest, most contentious people you’ve ever seen?”

“They were pretty bad all right.”

“You know, it wasn’t that long ago they were Nephites. I thought that might make them more receptive, but wow. . .”

Two days before he and Himni had entered the city of Jerusalem, home to the Amulonites and the Amalekites. There was a generous sprinkling of Lamanites thrown in as well, but many times it hadn’t seemed any different than walking the streets of Zarahemla. Until they started talking to the people, of course. The first day had not been bad, but this very morning they had decided to go right to the synagogue to preach. Aaron felt like that was a nice touch; standing there he could easily explain the true purpose of the building they had erected for worship. His preaching had almost immediately turned into an ugly argument. Himni had tried to take a turn speaking, but Aaron plunged ahead, trying to prove from the scriptures the many errors of their ways. Then, after the angry crowd got tired of throwing words, they began throwing rotten fruit. It was a testament, really, to how much they hated them; Aaron knew this land had been in a drought for many years and even rotten fruit was probably scarce. Then the stones had started; that is when they fled.

Aaron glanced sideways at his brother who still had gooey stickiness in his hair. A direct hit. His face was clean now and not as bruised as Aaron’s own. It looked like most of the stones had missed his face. Still, Himni’s head was down and his normally cheerful gait was heavy. Aaron felt the same way. He hadn’t felt that deeply contentious for years—since the last time he and his brothers had been preaching against the Church. It suddenly occurred to Aaron that if he had just allowed Himni to speak, his soft-spoken brother might have won over the day with his pure, simple testimony.

Instead they had been thrown out of the city, mostly unharmed, until Aaron had tried to shout one last thing into the mocking crowd. That was when the soldier at the gate drew his sword and clubbed him with the hilt of it across his face. Aaron had fallen, but the blow had not knocked him out. The soldiers spat in his face and growled at Himni, “If your brother opens his mouth again, we’ll flay you open while he watches and then we’ll kill him.”

Foolishly, Aaron had tried to speak again, but patient Himni had covered his mouth and dragged him to his feet. He began running as more stones flew, compelling Aaron to follow. Aaron had seen one of those stones, and not a small one either, hit his brother in the small of his back. It must be causing him a serious amount of pain, but Himni was silent about it. The only reference he’d made to Aaron trying to speak one last time was, “It isn’t martyrdom if you ask them to kill us; it’s suicide.”

They walked through most of the long, hot afternoon. In the two weeks since parting from Ammon they’d had no success. And not much to eat. They had planned to meet Muloki and Ammah outside the village of Ani-Anti the next morning. It wasn’t far from Jerusalem. Omner had gone with them. The others had gone ahead to Middoni.

Ani-Anti was not a large enough city to have any type of wall, but it was after dark when they arrived on the outskirts. Not wishing to alarm anyone, they waited in the forest nearby for daybreak to come. It would be another night of sleeping on the ground. Aaron didn’t mind so much; it seemed to be the only time there was a break from the heat in this terrible land.

As agreed upon, the others joined them early the next day. Thankfully, they didn’t ask how the work in Jerusalem had gone; one look at Aaron’s face was enough to explain. Aaron asked them for a report on their activities. Ammah was blunt, “It isn’t great. Most of the people we have met seem more interested in contending with us than anything else.”

Himni shot Aaron a knowing glance as he replied, “Yeah, we know.”

Omner was more positive, “Still, I think we have a few here that might listen. We certainly haven’t been beat up or threatened. I think we need to stay here for a few more days. We aren’t supposed to meet the others over in Middoni for a while yet. I think we should keep trying.”

Himni then made his longest speech for the first time since yesterday morning, “And I think, brethren, we ought to kneel here and pray we will say the right thing, that no matter how provoked we are we will not contend. I think we should pray to know their hearts so that we might be able to say the right words. We should pray to remember our goal in coming to Lamanite lands was love for our brethren.” Here he looked at each one of them solemnly, “My prayer this day is that each of us will remember to love these people and not just try to prove something to them.”

Aaron could see the flush creep across his face. It was hard for Himni to be so bold. He had little wish to offend anybody. Indeed, he had only persecuted the church in Zarahemla because he had no wish to disappoint his brothers. But even then, hardly more than a boy, he had stood up to the others, particularly if their ranting turned hateful. As Himni spoke, he did not look at anyone directly, but Aaron imagined for a moment that his eyes focused a moment longer on himself. It was a bit disconcerting, really. Himni’s eyes weren’t quite the same color and the slight difference was uncanny when the light caught his face just right.

Omner spoke up first, “Well put, brother. Would you lead us in prayer?”

Himni glanced at Omner, the flush creeping further across his face, but he nodded. For the first time since his last conversation with Ammon, Aaron felt the peace of the Lord move in his heart as Himni prayed. Aaron prayed in his own heart that he would humble himself and love the people.

The next several days of preaching were mostly futile, but Aaron felt the spirit in his missionary work for the first time since coming to the Land of Nephi. He concentrated on listening to the people and bit his tongue every time he felt compelled to argue. Despite their lack of success, he actually began to enjoy their work.

While they weren’t officially run out, it was safe to say that they had worn out their welcome. They had talked to everyone who would talk back and nobody wanted anything to do with them. At least, that was what they said. As Aaron became more sensitive to the whispering of the Spirit he could see that some wanted to listen, but were fearful. Discouraged, the turned their faces toward Middoni.


Aaron wasn’t in Middoni more than a few days before he began to feel that the Amulonites and Amalekites in Jerusalem had been hospitable. In Middoni there were strict rules about who was allowed in an out of the gates. They had actually stayed at an inn in the city of Jerusalem, but there was no such accommodation here. They had to leave the city wall every evening by sundown or face arrest. Still, even with this precaution, Aaron had little hope of avoiding arrest. To avoid notice from King Antiomno, they had stayed in the housing end of the city, away from the temple, palace and crowded marketplace. Often times, he and his brethren would split up for the day into at least two groups, but regardless of how they divided, he insisted that Himni stay with him.

Aaron knew that Himni was taking this parental supervision in stride, but he didn’t think it would last much longer without some comment. One evening after they had done some hunting in the forest and were walking together, Himni cleared his throat in a way that indicated he wanted to talk about something. Aaron waited.

“You know, Aaron, you were married at my age.”

Aaron smiled at Himni’s round-about way of approaching what was on his mind. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

His little brother gave a lopsided grin that reminded him of Ammon. They both looked a lot like their mother, whom Himni had never known. She had died giving birth to him; he had almost died too. The three of them had felt protective toward him from the minute he took his first breath. He tried to put these thoughts into words now. “I promised my father and my older brother that I would look after you; I don’t take these promises lightly.”

“We are under the Lord’s protection, brother. He will look after us.”

Aaron smiled, “I know you aren’t a child, Himni. And I have faith that the Lord is watching out for us. Maybe an extra set of eyes is just helping him along.”

“A man could not ask for better older brothers.”

“But?”

“You have a way of getting to the heart of things, don’t you?” Aaron nodded, encouraging him to continue. “I feel impressed to travel with Omner’s group tomorrow.”

Aaron said nothing for a moment, praying in his heart for some kind of answer. The only impression he had was to let go—to trust his youngest brother. “I will travel with Ammah, Muloki and Shem tomorrow. You and Omner will go with the others.”

“Thank you for trusting me, Aaron.”

“I would trust any of my brothers with my very life; it is others I do not trust.”

“Then we must trust in the Lord.”


Not having Himni with him the next day made him bold. As the other three were agreeable to it, they decided they would try to preach in near the temple, in the markets. The area was crowded and they spent the morning talking to many people, a few of whom seemed interested. All seemed to be going very well, actually, and then the trouble arose out of nowhere.

When the sun was nearly at its zenith, Muloki was preaching and he had gathered quite a crowd. He was too concentrated on his sermon to notice, but Aaron had been standing off to one side and began to see shoving in the crowd. Then the noise began. Muloki finally stopped orating as he saw several large Lamanite soldiers and priests yelling and pointing. Aaron strode over to them, and was going to ask what the problem was when he was seized and clubbed over the head. Pandemonium broke out. Aaron and his brethren had agreed that if arrested they would attempt to resist, so that at least one of them might have a chance of getting away to warn the other group. He fought back as well as he could, but even in the chaos and the press of bodies he could easily see that they were outnumbered.

He was clubbed again, the force of the blow knocked him to his knees and his last thought was a hasty prayer that Omner and Himni would somehow learn what had happened to them and flee the city.