What does Prosper actually mean in the Book of Mormon

This year I decided to host a ladies Scripture Study group from my home. I’m not really interested in the Come Follow Me timeline for the year. I wanted to do a deep dive into the Book of Mormon, and I had a hunch that at least a few other women would feel the same way. 

I decided that we’d study the book of Mosiah one chapter at a time. I wanted to go slow so that we could truly appreciate the text. I created a schedule that has meetings for 6 or 7 weeks in a row and then 2 week breaks. We’ll be working through Mosiah until the middle of October.

So far the study group is going well. I’ve had a total of 7 women attend – though not all at the same meeting. We’ve met 6 times and people keep coming back so I guess they value what they are learning. 

Because we are going slowly through the text we actually have time to examine some things that would normally be glossed over or skipped entirely in the Come Follow Me curriculum. 

One of those things is the phrase “keep the commandments of God, that ye may prosper in the land.”

This phrase pops up right away in Mosiah Chapter 1 verse 7 where King Benjamin is giving advice to his sons. It occurs again in Chapter 2 verse 22 when King Benjamin is addressing his people. 

This phrase also appears in many other places of the Book of Mormon.

At its surface this phrase reeks of the Prosperity Gospel. The idea that keeping the commandments will translate into physical wealth as a sign of God’s favor. 

I can vaguely remember reading this phrase as a teenager in my Sunday School and Seminary classes. The teachers would use this phrase to convince students to keep the commandments so that we could get good grades or get into the colleges we wanted.   

As I’ve gotten older this phrase still comes up sometimes in Sunday School, but it’s usually tempered a bit with, “well the Lord will bless you as he sees fit. It may not be with money, but he will bless you.”

I knew I wanted to address this phrase in my study group. I spent quite a bit of time digging into the phrase and the layers of its meaning. I want to share some of my findings and thoughts here. Keep in mind I’m just a budding theologian. This is my personal exploration of the theology behind this phrase. I’m not saying this is the definitive explination of what this means. It’s just another way of looking at it. 

Let’s look at the whole phrase as it appears in Mosiah:

Chapter 1:7 I would that ye should keep the commandments of God, that ye may prosper in the land according to the promises which the Lord made unto our fathers.

Chapter 2:22 And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you.

The phrasing is slightly different between the verses, but basically the phrasing is “Keep the commandments that you may prosper in the land.”

Let’s separate that phrase a bit so we can understand it. 

What does Prosper mean?

We’ll start with what does prosper mean?  I looked up the word Prosper in the dictionary and the first definition is: “succeed in material terms; be financially successful.” No wonder we equate this phrase with financial success. 

The second definition that came up was: “flourish physically; grow strong and healthy.” I also found this definition in the Thesaurus: “as in to thrive or to grow vigorously.” I think I prefer the word thrive to prosper. It connotes life and strength rather than just financial wealth. 

So we could alternatively think of the phrase as “Keep the commandments that you may thrive in the land.”

What Land?

I think it’s also important to consider the land that is being talked about. Mosiah says “that ye may prosper in the land according to the promises which the Lord made unto our fathers.”

I wanted to know what promises and which fathers he was talking about. I traced the phrase back through the Book of Mormon and found it in 1 Nephi 2:20. Lehi is talking to Nephi about what the Lord has told him regarding Nephi. He says, “And inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments, ye shall prosper, and shall be led to a land of promise; yea, even a land which I have prepared for you; yea, a land which is choice above all other lands.”

I think King Benjamin is referring to Lehi and Nephi when he talks about “our fathers.” But the phrase that Lehi is using makes me think of even older promises to older fathers. He says that they shall be led to a land of promise. When reading the Book of Mormon we always think of the land of promise as the Americas. However, the nation of Israel was led to their own land of promise years before.

Israel’s land of promise came with many stipulations and commandments in order for the people to possess it. There were also blessings promised if the people kept the commandments in that land.  

The blessings are spelled out in Leviticus 26:3-13. I’m using the ESV translation here so it’s easier to understand than the KJV.

3 “If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them, 4 then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. 5 Your threshing shall last to the time of the grape harvest, and the grape harvest shall last to the time for sowing. And you shall eat your bread to the full and dwell in your land securely. 

6 I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid. And I will remove harmful beasts from the land, and the sword shall not go through your land. 

7 You shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword. 8 Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand, and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. 

9 I will turn to you and make you fruitful and multiply you and will confirm my covenant with you. 10 You shall eat old store long kept, and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new. 

11 I will make my dwelling among you, and my soul shall not abhor you. 12 And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people. 13 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.

In many ways, what is described here is a type of new Garden of Eden. The land will grow food easily. There will not be harmful animals. And most importantly, God will dwell with people and walk among them again. That sounds like a beautiful land of promise to me. 

Perhaps we could define prosper as having God dwelling among us. That sounds way better than material wealth. So the phrase could be thought of as “Keep the commandments that God may dwell with you in the land of promise.”

Lehi and Nephi would have been familiar with these promises because the promises were part of the Law of Moses. After they had the brass plates they would have been able to read these promises and remember them through their journey to their promised land.. 

They also would have been familiar with what follows these verses in Leviticus 26. There the Lord spells out the destruction that will come to the people if they do not follow His commandments. This would have been especially applicable to Lehi and Nephi because they were living in Jerusalem as many of the destructions were being fulfilled. The Northern kingdom had already been carried away into exile and Lehi had received visions that the Southern kingdom – including Jerusalem – was about to be destroyed as well.

Clearly Lehi and Nephi had an incentive to want to keep the commandments so they could prosper (live) in their own land of promise rather than suffer destruction for not keeping the commandments. They would undoubtedly teach that to their children.

Which Commandments?

Now we come to an important question, What commandments does this phrase refer to? 

Is this referring to the 10 commandments? The 613 commandments spelled out in the Law of Moses? The teachings of Jesus? The temple covenants? Things your bishop says are important? Things General Authorities tell you to do during General Conference? 

Just saying, “the commandments” is a pretty broad phrase. 

I think this broadness is where the phrase has the most potential to be weaponized. Maybe you’ve heard things like, “Reading your scriptures is a commandment. So if you aren’t reading your scriptures you won’t prosper.” Or “you have been commanded to pay your tithing. If you pay your tithing the Lord will reward you with blessings.”

We see this thought pattern carried out when people leave the church. It seems that some people are just waiting for their family member’s lives to fall apart when they leave the church because it will reinforce the idea of “They stopped keeping the commandments so of course they stopped prospering.”

So what do we do with this part of the phrase? 

Frankly, I’m struggling with this part. I don’t want to say that certain commandments aren’t important. But I also don’t want to be guilty of making this overly broad either. 

I’m feeling like this part will need more research and study to further understand it. In the meantime, I’m going to punt and say that following the teachings of Jesus is a good place to start when trying to understand what commandments we should be keeping. 

Final Thoughts

I want to conclude with something I noticed while preparing to teach Mosiah Chapter 2 to my study group. As far as I can tell, Mormon as the narrator of the Book of Mormon doesn’t use the keep the commandments/prosper in the land phrase himself. The phrase is usually a direct quote of someone in the narrative.

Mormon does use a slightly different phrase in his narration at the beginning of Mosiah Chapter 2. He is talking about the people of King Benjamin coming to the temple to hear King Benjamin’s speech. He says that they brought animals to sacrifice as a way to give thanks to the Lord. 

At the end of Mosiah 2:4 Mormon says that one of the things they were thankful for was King Benjamin “who had taught them to keep the commandments of God, that they might rejoice and be filled with love towards God and all men.”

Mormon is making a connection between keeping the commandments and being filled with love towards God and all men. 

Perhaps “love towards God and all men” is Mormon’s definition of prosper. Considering he was living in a time of war and destruction between two nations I think he would have longed for the peace of King Benjamin’s time. He wasn’t interested in material wealth. 

So maybe we could think of the phrase as “Keep the commandments that you may be filled with love towards God and all people in the land.”

* * *

I hope I’ve given you a different perspective on the meaning of this common phrase from the Book of Mormon. It’s easy to look at this phrase with our 21st century, western thinking and assume that it’s talking about material wealth. However, the deeper meaning has more to do with our relationship with God and with other people.

I’m curious about your thoughts. How do you interpret this phrase.

Photo by Jonny Gios on Unsplash