1 Nephi 1:1 I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents, therefore I was taught somewhat in all the learning of my father; and having seen many afflictions in the course of my days, nevertheless, having been highly favored of the Lord in all my days; yea, having had a great knowledge of the goodness and the mysteries of God, therefore I make a record of my proceedings in my days.
Nephi is writing this account sometime after the events describe took place, maybe 30 years or so. I assume it is not long before his death. Don’t know if he was writing from a journal, or other records, but this is definitely a summing up of his life and the miracles he witnessed.
Nephi praises God even though he has had some rather difficult experiences while staying faithful. One might think that God should shield him as he is doing the Lord’s bidding, but in fact life seems to become even more difficult. It seems like it gets harder as he continues trying to be faithful instead of easier.
This has lead me to believe that those who do not wish to live the Gospel do have an easier life because they don’t feel the need to live up to anything and can do as they please. I’m not saying they are totally without morals because they do have the Light of Christ, but as far as living up to covenants or ordinances, they have no concern for these things. In any case, Nephi has to deal with some very difficult circumstances which mainly revolve around his family.
I think what Nephi is trying to say is that Jehovah is giving him assignments which are for the benefit of himself, his family and will require his best efforts and complete faithfulness.
The effect on him will be the build up of his personal confidence, growth in knowledge and strength of character. His is going to school now and it is always a struggle to learn the material from books, take notes from the instructor and prepare to be tested on your knowledge. Nephi understands he is learning about the correct way to do things, but has a complete understanding that it is hard because learning is hard for mortals.
Mortality wants to take the easy way. But Jehovah wants to make great people and that takes greater effort and stamina than just going with the flow.
Anyway, Nephi understands the program and does not curse Jehovah for what he has gone through. In fact he is taken back by how Jehovah got him through the difficult trials. How, what seemed impossible situations to get out of, Jehovah produced a miracle to accomplish his desires. It is like being given two large numbers to multiply together and then be given a calculator to make the next problem easier because it has even more even more digits in it.
Nephi sums up his life by saying that it has been for him learning about the “goodness and mysteries of God.” These things we are in need of knowing and experiencing if we are to become Gods ourselves.
1 Nephi 1:2 Yea, I make a record in the language of my father, which consists of the learning of the Jews and the language of the Egyptians.
What Nephi is chronicling will be in the language that his father Lehi could read and speak, namely Egyptian. His father was a Jew and naturally spoke Hebrew, but because of his business dealing and other connections in Egypt, he could also read and speak Egyptian.
In other parts of the Book of Mormon, it tells us that one could express thoughts using fewer characters in Egpytian. To tell his story in Hebrew would require more plates to record. Egyptian was a kind of shorthand compared to Hebrew and therefore Nephi chose to record his record in Egpytian.
1 Nephi 1:3 And I know that the record which I make is true; and I make it with mine own hand; and I make it according to my knowledge.
Nephi writes his account many years after his family's departure from Jerusalem. His account will be his interpretation of the events he witnessed and he himself engraves the text with own hand on the gold plates. I assume that he did not dictate it to a scribe or had someone else engrave the account it for him.
1 Nephi 1:4 For it came to pass in the commencement of the first year of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah, (my father, Lehi, having dwelt at Jerusalem in all his days); and in that same year there came many prophets, prophesying unto the people that they must repent, or the great city Jerusalem must be destroyed.
Nephi sets the scene by telling us that it all starts at the beginning of the reign of King Zedekiah of Judea. This is about 598 BC.
Lehi has lived in the Jerusalem area all his life. In the year there began to be many prophets coming forth telling the people that they have to start living up to the Law of Moses or they would be destroyed.
It seems that Judea was caught in the middle of a fight for regional dominance between three super powers, Babylon, Syria and Egypt. Jeremiah as well as other prophets were telling the people to repent of their sins. In addition Jeremiah was telling the king to align with Babylon.
If they did not they would be invaded and destroyed by the Babylonians. Now it may seem strange that a man of God would be telling the government how to conduct foreign policy, but Jeremiah knew what would happen to Jerusalem if they did not comply with Babylonians demand of alliance.
Babylon had already made a move against Judea and in fact Zedekiah was put in placed as a puppet king by Nebuchadnezzar in that year. But the Jews were more involved by trade and culture with the Egyptians and wanted to align with them. And the Egyptians had in fact said they would help them against the Babylonians if they were attached again.
Anyway Jeremiah warned them against aligning with the Egyptians and more especially to repent of their sins. God would protect them if they did as Jeremiah said, but would let them be destroyed if they did not.
This shows that God was their protection against all aggressors and had been over all the years of its existence. It was not on the strength of their own powers. The Jews either did not understand that or had ignored the fact but still counted on divine intervention. They wanted to do whatever they wanted, but did not understand completely or not at all that that protection only could be counted on by the personal righteousness of its people. It was not guaranteed protection in spite of whatever the people’s life style was. It depended completely on how well the people kept the commandments of God.
This is a lesson for our day as well. If we as a people don't start living the commandments and stopped the personal wickedness such as we see in abortions, family breakdown and secret combinations, we will also be in this same condition as Lehi's Jerusalem and subject to the same fate.
1 Nephi 1:5 Wherefore it came to pass that my father, Lehi, as he went forth prayed unto the Lord, yea, even with all his heart, in behalf of his people.
These prophets (Jeremiah being one of them) were prophesying about the possible invasion of the Babylonians and the destruction of Jerusalem. He knew in his heart that the condemnation of the people by these prophets was justified. Since Lehi actually believed them, he greatly feared for his friends, neighbors and any of his relations living in the area.
And being a religious man he found a quiet place to pray to God to know what he could possibly do to stop this. He was hoping to learn from God what he could do to try to mitigate this situation.
For additional insights to these opening verses of the Book of Mormon see: Nephi the Good: A Commentary on 1 Nephi 1:1–3
