This post provides Part 1 of a four-part series for Meridian Magazine (https://latterdaysaintmag.com/) on secret combinations in the Book of Mormon. The series is based on a recent post here at Arise from the Dust, “A Practical Guide to the Book of Mormon’s Most Neglected Theme, Secret Combinations: A Source of Surprising Evidence and Urgent Modern Value,” which has been been revised and expended. Part 1, “A Practical Guide to the Book of Mormon’s Most Neglected Theme: Secret Combinations,” published October 14, 2024, is provided below, with several small additions or corrections. It compares the world’s caricature of “conspiracy theories” based on secret powers controlling everything to the corruption reality and practical, nuanced teachings of highly vulnerable but often disastrous secret combinations in the Book of Mormon. It also explores why secret combinations, in spite of being one of the most emphasized themes in the Book of Mormon, is one of the least discussed Book of Mormon topics in the Church. As a practical example of a modern secret combination that can be compared to Book of Mormon teachings, the malicious Tuskegee Experiment is considered.
Part 2, published October 18, 2024, reviews and analyzes the Book of Mormon’s complex teachings on explicitly identified secret combinations, showing their variegated forms and also showing how vulnerable they can be, as well as how dangerous. Part 3 considers circumstantial evidence for other secret combinations or “secret works of darkness” in the Book of Mormon that were not explicitly identified as such, but which add further richness to the Book of Mormon’s diverse teachings on such groups and the threats they pose. Part 4, published Nov, 18, 2024, compares reliable modern sources, including careful works of scholarship on criminal gangs and conspiracies, to the Book of Mormon, finding evidence that the Book of Mormon is remarkably practical and plausible in its teachings and warnings. Indeed, when properly understood and considered, the Book of Mormon’s abundant information on secret combinations provides compelling evidence of its authenticity and plausibility, in my view. It is worthy of further investigation and of more intense application in our day. Here is Part 1 from Meridian Magazine, with a few adjustments:
A Practical Guide to the Book of Mormon’s Most Neglected Theme: Secret Combinations (Part 1)
Our Reluctance to Discuss Secret Combinations
How is it that one of the themes most emphasized in the Book of Mormon, the danger of “secret combinations,” is among the least discussed topics in the Church? Is it irrelevant for our day? Is the topic too mysterious for any practical purposes? Are we embarrassed by Book of Mormon statements on “secret combinations” and government corruption? Are we afraid that if we took the topic seriously, we might be branded as a “conspiracy theorist”?
Actually, what the Book of Mormon teaches strongly departs from the world’s caricature of crazy “conspiracy theories.” Rather than an embarrassment and an affront to the intellect, the Book of Mormon’s treatment of secret combinations supports its accuracy and its prophetic relevance for our day. In fact, it’s a remarkably practical guide.
In his Oct. 5, 2024 General Conference address, Elder Bednar drew upon teachings from President Ezra Taft Benson to remind us that the Book of Mormon was prophetically prepared for us. Its “principles, warnings, and lessons are intended for the circumstances and challenges of our day.” As we read and apply it, we should consider why Mormon was inspired to select specific accounts and teachings.
If the book is intended for our day, then surely Mormon and others had a reason for warning us repeatedly about corruption and associated “secret combinations,” “secret works,” “works of darkness,” “secret abominations,” “secret plans” and “plans of awful wickedness” (some of the terms the Book of Mormon uses). They also had a reason for also illustrating in detail the various actions taken by wicked men seeking to overthrow liberty, gain power, and destroy the Church. Surely it is time for Latter-day Saints to learn and apply the abundant teachings on these often glossed-over themes. In doing so, our knowledge and testimony of the Book of Mormon may greatly increase. More importantly, we may be able to understand more fully the intent of its authors in warning us of the threat of great evil in our days. To do this, we need to have a practical understanding of what the Book of Mormon teaches and why that matters to us now.
While many influential voices mock those who point to apparent corruption in government as “conspiracy theorists,” there is an equally severe problem with some who take “secret combinations” seriously. This is the problem of viewing the corruption as so severe and pervasive that there is no hope of stopping it. But if that were the case, why would the Book of Mormon give us so many warnings? To make us depressed and discouraged? No. The dangers are great, but in one of the key chapters on secret combinations, Ether 8, Moroni explained that he had been commanded to write on this topic for an important reason: “I, Moroni, am commanded to write these things that evil may be done away” (v. 26).
The forces of evil want us to give up and to feel that resistance is futile. The Book of Mormon gives us tools to expose their “plans of awful wickedness” (Helaman 6:30) and resist evil. While secret combinations did lead to the destruction of two great civilizations in the ancient Americas, both the Nephites and the Lamanites, as we shall see, at times had success in resisting and even shutting down the criminal and treasonous treachery of secret combinations. Resistance is not futile. Freedom and liberty can be preserved (2 Nephi 1:7, 10:11; Mosiah 29:32). And Latter-day Saints are in a uniquely empowered position to do what was most effective in opposing secret combinations anciently: sharing the truth of the Gospel.
The Trouble with Conspiracy Theories (and Their Caricature)
Unfortunately, there’s a good reason why many faithful members of the Church are reluctant to discuss the Book of Mormon’s secret combinations. Though they were the cause for the downfall and destruction of two great civilizations in the ancient Americas (Ether 8:19-21), and are prophesied to be a dire threat in our day (Ether 8:22-26), our education and culture train us to be wary of “conspiracy theorists.” These are, after all, dangerous people who have been shunned, deplatformed, or cancelled for their harmful and surely ludicrous views, whatever they are. There are some genuinely crazy, unhinged theories out there. We may worry that if we start talking about “secret combinations,” we’ll embarrass ourselves and the Church by being associated with the lunatics. We may think it’s safer to just skip over those numerous passages in the Book of Mormon than to risk being painted as one of those people. Sadly, this may be the modern equivalent of stripping out some of the most “plain and precious” parts of the sacred record (see Nephi’s description of that ancient censorship work in 1 Nephi 13:24-34) that was written to help us in our day. There has been enough censorship of truth from the enemies of righteousness. Should we be helping them out even more?
But what is a “conspiracy theory” anyway? It’s a term used to demonize, much like the word “heresy” as it was applied long ago. That is exactly the point made by Professor David Coady in “Conspiracy theory as heresy” in Educational Philosophy and Theory, April 2023:
The bad reputation of conspiracy theories is puzzling. After all, people do conspire. That is, they engage in secretive collective behaviour which is illegal or morally questionable. Conspiracies are common in all societies throughout history, and have always been particularly common in politics. Most people conspire some of the time, and some people (e.g. spies) conspire almost all the time. Since people conspire, there can’t be anything wrong with believing they conspire, hence there can’t be anything wrong with believing conspiracy theories…. Conspiracy theories, like scientific theories, and virtually any other category of theory, are sometimes true, sometimes false, sometimes believed on rational grounds, sometimes not.
In our society, the term “conspiracy theory” is often used as a way to quickly shut down discussion on an uncomfortable topic. It may also be invoked when a corrupt politician, when caught doing something wrong, accuses the accusers of pursuing “conspiracy theories.”
The United Nations and the EU Offer Guidance
The United Nations, surely frustrated by those who question its agenda, issued guidance on this topic during the pandemic on their “Stop the Spread of Conspiracy Theories” page at UNESCO.org (the link is to the archived page — UNESCO now offers a more extensive guide for teachers, “Addressing Conspiracy Theories”). The first infographic, attributed to the Commission of the European Union (shown below), tells us that conspiracy theories are “The belief that events are secretly manipulated behind the scenes by powerful forces with negative intent” and that a key characteristic of such harmful theories is that “They falsely suggest that nothing happens by accident and that there are no coincidences; nothing is as it appears and everything is connected.” That is genuinely frightening. Who but a madman would really think that there are no coincidences in a world filled with obvious random chance?
The Commission of the European Union provides the same information on their current page warning against conspiracy theories. This spin on those who doubt official government narratives is not a foreign innovation, but has been part of the mainstream narrative for a long time in the U.S.
The Source of Conspiracy Theories: A Lack of Faith in Government?
What is the cause of dreadful conspiracy theories? As the UNESCO infographic explains, “Conspiracy theories often start as a suspicion. They ask who is benefiting from the event or situation and thus identify the conspirators.” So you are a lunatic if something government does seems suspicious to you. Shame on you if you think there’s a chance that someone might profit from trillions about to be spent based on a 3,000-page spending bill passed without time for Congress to even read it, or from massive piles of weapons being sold to allies or handed over to enemies, or from specific brands of medical products being mandated for everyone to use even before normal testing for safety and efficacy has been completed, or from medical treatment being deliberately withheld (as in the Tuskegee Experiment). As Jimmy Carter taught us in 1979, the great crisis America faces is above all a lack of confidence, including a lack of faith in government. The message seems to be, “Please, always trust your government. That’s how we save our democracy.”
In 2009, Time magazine highlighted the silliness of conspiracy theories with a series of 10 short posts on various ridiculous conspiracy theories, where #5, “Secret Societies Control the World,” promoted the standard caricature of conspiracy theorists:
If you were really a member of the global élite, you’d know this already: the world is ruled by a powerful, secretive few. Many of the rest of us peons have heard that in 2004 both candidates for the White House were members of Yale University’s secretive Skull and Bones society, many of whose members have risen to powerful positions. But Skull and Bones is small potatoes compared with the mysterious cabals that occupy virtually every seat of power, from the corridors of government to the boardrooms of Wall Street.
Time goes on to cite several bogeymen of fringe conspiracy theorists: the Illuminati, the Freemasons, and the intellectuals of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a small but public group of highly influential people (but quite unlike Gadianton’s band, the public CFR publishes a roster of its elite members). Apparently critics who question the actions and motives of the CFR or any government group all are paranoid people who see the shadow of secret all-powerful cabals pulling all the strings and occupying “virtually every seat of power” in a hopeless world. (Ironically, this was the same Time magazine that published a surprising article in Feb. 2021 that admitted to and even rejoiced in the existence of “a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information” to achieve a certain political result. Some powerful cabals are more praiseworthy than others, it seems. But note that cabals and apparent corruption are not the province of any one party – these problems transcend party lines.)
The official caricature of conspiracy theorists seems rather extreme, perhaps more suitable for influencing emotions than describing major movements. I’ve met a lot of people with crazy ideas over the years, and some very sane people with good reasons to doubt some official narratives, but I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone whose views were so dark that they really believed everything or nearly everything was being controlled by one all-powerful secret group.
A Wake-up Call from History: Lust for Power and Wealth Is Real
Somewhat contrary to the warnings of the United Nations and the EU, sometimes there are dangerous schemers in the world, far more than just Hitler. This is not a conspiracy theory delusion, but a basic lesson from world history. For those who don’t believe conspiracies are common, are important, or even exist at all, can you name a single kingdom, empire, or country where there have not been secret plots or murders to obtain power? Or a nation free of organized crime and cartels, free of companies seeking to make profit illicitly, a nation where nothing was ever achieved by bribery or corruption, or where crooks never got into public office? Please let me know, for I’d love to move there. Unfortunately, the idea that there are no real conspiracies is the most crazy theory of all.
Megalomaniacs, however rare, still regularly storm onto local, national, or world stages, trying to gain power or wealth, while often seeking to destroy their personal enemies. They rarely start by being open about their agenda. Murderous would-be emperors and kings, corrupt generals and businessmen, cartel bosses, war lords, human traffickers, petty gangsters, and many others have followed well-worn, selfish patterns for worldly success. They scheme, they lie, they bribe, they gain influence, they gather henchmen, they eliminate enemies and barriers, and then, in some cases they finally succeed and take the throne or the helm of an army, corporation, political party, or whatever target they have been lusting for, often bringing great loss and sorrow. Competitors may arise with their own gangs and corrupt tactics, sometimes resulting in more chaos and even bloodshed. The terrain of world history abounds in ugly landscapes where greedy plots lead to disaster. It’s the history of Europe, the Ottoman Empire, the empires of China, the peoples of Mesoamerica, and it’s also what we see repeatedly in the surprisingly instructive Book of Mormon.
However, not all secret combinations involve megalomaniacs leading a massive movement to overthrow nations. They happen regularly at a much smaller scale, but can still have an insidious effect of many. Corrupt collusions can even involve good people who feel pressured to go along with something wrong. No Satanic ceremonies are needed. Secret combinations and corrupt collusion happens at many levels in diverse ways. They are real threats. Indications of such problems should not be casually dismissed as just “conspiracy theories.”
It’s especially disappointing to see fellow Christians sometimes mocking the very idea of conspiracies, especially murderous ones, since the New Testament very plainly reveals that wicked religious leaders conspired to slay an innocent man (Matthew 12:14, 26:4), even the Son of God, employing classic tools of secret combinations: secret meetings to develop and implement a plot (Matthew 26:3–5; John 11:47–53), twisting or corrupting the law, bribery, false witnesses, a weaponized judicial system, stirring up public anger (Matthew 27:20–24), colluding with foreign enemies (the Romans), and ultimately slaying the innocent to protect their power. They also then bribed others to create false reports to cover the evidence of the Resurrection (Matthew 28:11–15). The planned murder of Jesus Christ, contrary to Jewish and Roman law, was clearly a conspiracy, not someone’s “conspiracy theory.” If trusted authorities could pervert law and justice so extremely for their own gain in that era, can we safely assume that rulers today must surely be noble and trustworthy?
The Simple Logic of Conflict of Interest: A Key to Understanding Corruption and Secret Combinations
While “conspiracy theories” are framed as illogical delusions, the practical reality of corruption and real conspiracy is rooted in something everyone can understand: conflict of interest. Conflicts of interest are real and common. In both the business and political worlds, leaders can sometimes be tempted to make a decision that may not be best for their organization but good for them personally. The decision, for example, might increase the value of property or stock they own or give advantage to a friend or family member. Good leaders should disclose the conflict, be transparent, recuse themselves if possible, seek counsel, carefully document the process, and make sure that the conflict does not influence the decision.
When I lived in Asia, I visited a large city that was spending many millions on a large international expo. It was reportedly common knowledge in the city that the contract for much of the work for the expo went to a company that was owned by the mayor’s wife. If so, there was an obvious conflict of interest. Perhaps it was managed in good faith, but perhaps it followed a common pattern and was the fruit of greed. Such conflicts of interest are at the heart of corruption and secret combinations. It doesn’t mean someone is allegedly trying to control the world with an all-powerful network. It just means someone was greedy and acted in self-interest, typically colluding with at least one other player.
If, for example, a large company gives or promises a politician a large donation, and then that politician makes a decision that directly helps the company, is it crazy to suspect that there was a connection between the gift and the decision? Frequently such situations are accompanied with further symptoms that something “fishy” is going on. For example, if the politician awarded the company with a “no-bid contract” – meaning he or she just made the decision on their own without the normal, healthy process of evaluating competitive proposals impartially – then that’s a clue of potential bad faith action. It would be an even bigger clue if the company actually had no experience or expertise related to the no-bid contract. That would definitely seem suspect, as the Los Angeles Times duly noted in their April 2020 story about the $1 billion grant given by a governor to BYD, the Chinese electric vehicle company, to manufacture – can you guess what? – facemasks. Of course, there were swift repercussions, as reported by a Chinese news source three months later: another deal with BYD for over $300 million for more facemasks at a higher price per item. Details of how BYD donated to the politician “indirectly” through a green-card holder, Ke Li, the president of BYD Americas, were revealed later and might have made the LA Times article even more sensational had that been known at the time. I don’t know if anything corrupt actually happened, but the “coincidence theory” disputing any connections between the political donations and the no-bid grant seems less plausible than the “combination theory.” (Again, incidents with such apparent conflicts of interest happen across party lines.)
When something looks like a bad-faith decision driven by a conflict of interest through an illicit agreement of some kind, it is rarely possible to prove that collusion or conspiracy occurred. In such cases, circumstantial evidence is highly relevant and can be used successfully in legal cases. Such evidence may often include efforts to cover up the details of the agreement or possible plot, such as destroying rather than preserving records and evidence, claiming that technical glitches or accidents wiped out data, destroying hard drives, erasing cell phones, or causing video cameras to malfunction. Having a judge seal what should be public information for decades can also be a clue that something illicit is going on. Hiding, destroying, or censoring information in a questionable way can be an important clue pointing to corruption, whether it involves assassinations or secret murders, the alleged suicide of a well-connected inmate, the marketing of a potentially unsafe but lucrative products, or a mere no-grant bid. Such censorship or cover-up activity is a hallmark of secret combinations, large and small.
An Instructive Example: The Tuskegee Experiment
Among many possible examples that could be considered as background information on secret combinations, I’ve selected one well-documented example of corrupt collusion that should not be controversial today and is not closely tied to any particular political party. My intent is to illustrate how easily secret combinations can grow to involve many people, even those we might consider as good, ordinary people who became influenced by conflicts of interest or peer pressure. Let’s briefly recall the “secret combination” aspects of the infamous Tuskegee Experiment.
As a young professor early in my career, my work once took me to the campus of Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, Alabama. There I stopped and pondered sadly at a memorial to the victims of a painful “work of darkness” in American history. This unethical and racist project, officially known as the Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male, involved some of America’s leading health experts and many health workers, plus over 400 Black men with syphilis who thought they were receiving medical treatment, when they were receiving no medical treatment at all. They were part of a cruel experiment to get data on how syphilis progresses and what it does to Black men when left untreated. This tragedy went on for decades, from 1932 to 1972, continuing long after effective treatments for syphilis such as penicillin had been developed. Those men were denied treatment by the government they trusted and that pretended to be giving them care. The details of the study are documented by James H. Jones, Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Arkansas, in Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, revised edition (New York: The Free Press, 1993).
The Experiment might have started with seemingly good intentions. Dr. Taliaferro Clark, the esteemed head of the United States Public Health Service (PHS), initially wanted to do a short-term study to gain useful information on an important disease rather than withhold treatment for decades (Jones, p. 95), but the project would morph and gain increasing momentum, and do increasing harm that required increasing deception. The PHS spawned our modern Center for Disease Control (CDC) in 1946 while continuing the Experiment. The CDC would oversee the study and even defend it in the 1970s when people became aware of what was happening and began to speak out against it (Jones, pp. 5, 8–9).
The CDC’s website acknowledges the existence of the tragic study but does not yet mention their historical role (just the role of the PHS), speaking only positively of “CDC’s on-going role in addressing health equity.” But CDC’s involvement is well known. For example, Wikipedia notes that the study was “conducted … by the United States Public Health Service (PHS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”
Key to the existence and persistence of the study was a tacit agreement among government officials and the many doctors involved that they would deliberately and secretly withhold treatment, with secrecy and obfuscation being a key feature of the plan as developed by the government officials (pp. 100, 106, 123). Victims were deliberately deceived and lured into joining the study in ways that “exploited their ignorance and need” such as the use of an official-looking U.S. government document that was “a masterpiece of guileful deceit” (p. 126).
What is surprising is that in meetings with local physicians, “no one questioned whether the experiment was ethical; no one even came close to doing so” (Jones, p. 144). In fact, “none of the health officers connected with the Tuskegee Study expressed any ethical concern until critics started asking questions” (p. 190). With such an institutional mindset, there were no whistleblowers for decades.
The study was worse than just withholding treatment. Its subjects were periodically pressured to have spinal taps to obtain spinal fluid for analysis, an excruciating procedure that often had adverse effects (pp. 128–9). However, physicians trusted the government medical authorities pushing the study and simply believed their claims that it had scientific merit. Honored to be invited by high authorities to participate in an important study, they were willing to ignore their fundamental duties as physicians at the expense of their patients. Likewise, various medical groups fully cooperated (p. 145). Participants and supporters of the study would be promoted and have great careers. The study had support from the very top of the PHS.
Control of data and silencing of objections was a part of the scheme. Key to this was the monopoly that the medical establishment had in setting standards, controlling medical education and licensing, and in publishing through the peer-review process (pp. 94–6). External lay oversight was resisted, making the medical establishment “the sole arbiters of medical affairs” (p. 95), just as they served as the only authority over peer-reviewed medical publications (p. 96), claiming that alone they had the skills to evaluate medical research. Meanwhile, physicians were reluctant to criticize their peers and rarely questioned conduct (pp. 96-97). Without meaningful oversight from outsiders or peers, there were few corrective measures to constrain the medical establishment.
This harmful study was surely a secret combination, though dressed up in white gowns rather than black robes, adorned with a “scientific” goal of obtaining medical data, and fortified with ordinary people who thought they were just doing their job and even doing something for the collective good of society. Rather than political assassinations made with a swift dagger, their lethal crime of withholding treatment killed slowly. Rather than gaining thrones, those running the study gained seats of influence, praise from superiors and peers, a little cash, and certainly elevated careers. All of these are minor forms of personal gain compared to the great harm they selfishly caused. Not only were several hundred men denied help they needed in this ugly, racist project, but many women would also be infected and children born with syphilis that could have been avoided. The tragedy that unfolded is both deeply sobering and profoundly disturbing. It’s even more sobering to realize that this was not a unique crime. For example, the related but less well known Guatemala syphilis experiments could also be considered, which may have been even worse.
While there is wide consent that the Tuskegee Experiment was an outrage, it would be wrong to believe that we’ve fully revised our system so that we could never again risk the same kind of abuses and deceit—disregarding human rights, racism, promoting failed treatments, deliberately withholding effective treatments, denying informed consent, hiding the truth about a medical issue, and outright lying to citizens.
After decades of harm, one worker within the PHS, Dr. Peter Buxtun, a social worker and epidemiologist who had fled Nazi Germany, learned about the study in 1965 and began fighting it internally in 1966 after learning more details. I suspect that his awareness of the evil that took over the government in his civilized native land increased his sensitivity to the omens he saw in the PHS. His detailed complaints and reports to superiors were largely ignored and he was treated as if his concerns were crazy (pp. 190-2). He resigned from the PHS in 1967 but continued writing letters to them warning of the need to stop the study and give proper treatment to the subjects. He was ignored, but a group of PHS officials did gather in 1969 in response to the P.R. concerns they might face. While one physician called for considering the moral implications, the others agreed to continue the study and continue denying treatment (pp. 192-96). In fact, PHS would then go even further and ask physicians not to give antibiotics for any reason, including infections unrelated to syphilis, to the subjects of the study lest that accidentally help treat syphilis, and nobody involved questioned the morality of that decision (p. 199).
Buxtun was haunted by what he had learned while at PHS and felt he had to do something more than try to work with them. In 1972, he finally became a whistleblower by reaching out to a friend at the Associated Press. The story stirred interest and was turned over to reporter Jean Heller. With the news about to break, to their credit, officials at the CDC openly shared helpful information. Heller’s story of the scandalous Tuskegee Experiment broke on July 25, 1972 (p. 204). Public outcry arose, the study was soon stopped, and the CDC made efforts to help former subjects, but officials in the PHS who were directly involved offered no apologies nor admitted to any wrongdoing (p. 219). “Despite the serious questions the Tuskegee Study raised … the medical establishment in the United States made little effort to come to grips with the Tuskegee Study. No medical association conducted a symposium on the experiment; no medical journal devoted an issue to exploring what might be learned” from it (p. 238).
There are many lessons from the Tuskegee Experiment to consider for the future. It was a relatively “minor” secret combination involving hundreds, not millions of people, with petty but still greedy goals. Sadly, its ugliness lasted for decades before good people finally exposed it and stamped it out. Like all secret combinations, it was vulnerable. In this case, all it took was one dose of truth from one whistleblower amplified by one journalist to stop that abomination. But it took forty years for that dose of truth to be delivered to the public. May good men and women, including professionals feeling pressure from above to keep quiet and go along, dare to speak out sooner when combined evil is brewing.
All Powerful Groups Controlling Everything: Not What the Book of Mormon Teaches
Contrary to the common “conspiracy theory” stereotype of a world under total control by sinister powers, the secret combinations and related movements among the Nephites and the Jaredites in the Book of Mormon are much more realistic. They are much more like the brutal but often clumsy thugs and con artists that afflict numerous societies in our day. The Book of Mormon’s pragmatic guide to corruption shows that these “combinations” come in many forms with a range of tactics and business models, with diverse features including smooth-talking megalomaniacs, secretive circles of elites infiltrating the upper ranks of government, secret political assassinations, brutal gangs and robbers in the streets, corrupt religious and political officials seeking to kill prophets, and external militias including guerrilla armies. When they gain power over a nation or some part of a government or people, the result is not total, intricate control by brilliant masterminds, but decay and corruption that often leads to chaos, poverty, and bloodshed driven by moronic rage and gargantuan pettiness. Devoted supporters of the combinations are disposable and even the leaders at the top often end up facing a violent death, with the only winner being the ultimate loser, Satan.
Fueled by their unquenchable thirst for power and lust for gain, the dysfunctional secret combinations in the Book of Mormon bring the same kind of poverty and disorder that we see in our era from corruption in government across the world, large-scale fraud in business, the violence and greed of organized crime, and the horror of bloodthirsty, tyrannical movements seeking ever more power at all costs. They are rarely brilliant in ruling, but always ruthless in seeking and seizing more power.
People combining to hide a dirty secret for their benefit is the essence of secret combinations or “secret works of darkness” in the Book of Mormon. All that is needed is just a few greedy people, sometimes including a megalomaniac or two, who want cover and mutual aid for something unseemly or illegal. Nor do secret combinations always require murder, but the classic secret combinations of the Book of Mormon and the Book of Moses are grounded in murder (especially political assassinations or assassination attempts) and greed or lust for power. If unchecked, they have a corrupting influence on society that can spread like cancer.
The lessons of the Book of Mormon on secret combinations and “secret works of darkness,” which we explore in more detail in Part 2, provide a master class in the dangers of corruption in the modern world. Indeed, when compared to modern scholarship related to secret societies and conspiracies, Book of Mormon teachings appear surprisingly reasonable, accurate, and even prophetic. Rather than an embarrassing digression based on overwrought concerns over Masonry in Joseph’s day, we may find that the Book of Mormon’s teachings on secret combinations go far beyond Joseph’s experience in giving us realistic and valuable insights into very real dangers in our day.
King Mosiah’s Overview of the Danger of Tyranny
King Mosiah, the last Nephite king, gained precious information when the remnants of a Nephite colony returned from the city of Nephi in Lamanite territory, bringing with them the record of Zeniff and Limhi, describing the disastrous reign of King Noah. They also brought the mysterious record of the Jaredites engraved on metal plates by Ether that some of their men had found. King Mosiah, a seer, translated the ancient record of the Jaredites. He learned about their rise and destruction due to secret combinations that involved secret plots, murders, and even civil war as wicked men conspired to become king. From the Nephite colony he also saw how much corruption of society and oppression of the people could be caused by one wicked man and his gang of supporters. When faced with a potential succession crisis (none of his sons wanted the throne), he made the inspired decision to do away with the monarchy and institute a new system of greater political and economic liberty, with a system of judges responsive to the voice of the people provided with checks and balances to make it possible to easily remove corrupt officials.
When he explained to his people the reasons for this great change, he summarized lessons he had learned from the experiences of Zeniff’s colony and the Jaredite nation. He had seen what can happy when people are striving for political power, and worried that such contention might arise among his sons if the people insisted on making one of his sons king:
I fear there would rise contentions among you. And who knoweth but what my son, to whom the kingdom doth belong, should turn to be angry and draw away a part of this people after him, which would cause wars and contentions among you, which would be the cause of shedding much blood and perverting the way of the Lord, yea, and destroy the souls of many people. (Mosiah 29:7)
He then explained that a king is a good form of government when the king is righteous, but “because all men are not just it is not expedient that ye should have a king or kings to rule over you” (v. 16).
For behold, how much iniquity doth one wicked king cause to be committed, yea, and what great destruction!
Yea, remember king Noah, his wickedness and his abominations, and also the wickedness and abominations of his people. Behold what great destruction did come upon them; and also because of their iniquities they were brought into bondage. (vv. 17–18)
A particular problem with kings, he explained, is the great difficulty in dethroning a wicked king (or, by extension, any autocrat). Here he explains some of the mechanisms that the wicked use to stay in power:
And behold, now I say unto you, ye cannot dethrone an iniquitous king save it be through much contention, and the shedding of much blood.
For behold, he has his friends in iniquity, and he keepeth his guards about him; and he teareth up the laws of those who have reigned in righteousness before him; and he trampleth under his feet the commandments of God;
And he enacteth laws, and sendeth them forth among his people, yea, laws after the manner of his own wickedness; and whosoever doth not obey his laws he causeth to be destroyed; and whosoever doth rebel against him he will send his armies against them to war, and if he can he will destroy them; and thus an unrighteous king doth pervert the ways of all righteousness.
And now behold I say unto you, it is not expedient that such abominations should come upon you. (vv. 21–24)
In other words, once in power, the wicked may (1) form networks of supporters to stay in power; (2) employ military or other policing powers to protect their position; (3) tear up righteous law; (4) live in wickedness; (5) create new laws based on corrupt or wicked concepts; (6) weaponize government to threaten or even destroy political enemies among the people to further secure their power; and thereby (7) pervert the ways of righteousness, implying a corrupting effect on the moral fabric of society. That’s a remarkably concentrated distillation of the accounts of corrupt government and secret combinations that King Mosiah could access. Much more would come in later Nephite history after his death, but that summary remains valuable and consistent with the any following accounts.
Summary
Secret combinations in the Book of Mormon have no relationship to the caricature of “conspiracy theories” that the world treats as irrational and delusional. Rather, the Book of Mormon offer much more nuanced and realistic depictions of the danger of corruption, conflicts of interest, and the more severe but realistic dangers of megalomaniacs seeking power at all costs. The Book of Mormon presents a painful landscape of treachery and deceit that destroyed two nations, but does so in ways that accord well with the painful terrain of world history. There is no need to be embarrassed or bashful about the teachings of the Book of Mormon on these important themes, and many reasons to see evidence of plausibility if not prophetic accuracy in its accounts and warnings.
In Part 2 we will examine details of the Book of Mormon’s teachings on secret combinations, examining groups clearly identified as such. In Part 3, we will consider further case studies from the Book of Mormon pertaining to group and movements that were not explicitly painted as secret combinations, but have circumstantial evidence suggesting that forms of secret combinations were at play. Finally in Part 4, we consider modern scholarship on secret societies or related forms of corruption that may help us understand just how accurate and relevant the pragmatic and prophetic Book of Mormon may be.
As we study the issues of freedom vs. tyranny, righteous vs. corrupt government, and religious freedom vs. censorship and state control, we will see that the Book of Mormon gives us previous tools to understand what must be done to preserve liberty and foil the plans of the Adversary so that “evil may be done away.” Perhaps it is time that we begin thinking more, talking more, and doing more about some neglected but pervasive Book of Mormon themes. Those themes are there for divinely inspired reasons. We need not be afraid to study and discuss these themes and to apply their lessons to our day.
