The Cloud of Witnesses

LDS

The Brother of Jared

Leader of the Jaredites, from the great tower, ~2200 BC

The leader who, with his brother Jared, brought a people from the great tower when the Lord confounded the languages. For his exceeding faith he saw the finger of the Lord upon sixteen stones he had molten for light, and then the whole premortal Christ.

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LDS

Lehi

~600 BC, Jerusalem → the wilderness

Patriarch. Contemporary of Jeremiah. Warned of Jerusalem’s destruction, fled with his family at the Lord’s command. Saw the vision of the tree of life — the love of God. Father of Laman, Lemuel, Sam, Nephi, Jacob, and Joseph; husband of Sariah.

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LDS

Sariah

Jerusalem to the wilderness, ~600 BC

Wife of Lehi, mother of Laman, Lemuel, Sam, Nephi, and — born in the wilderness — Jacob and Joseph. Left her home and her wealth at Jerusalem to follow her husband into the desert at the Lord's command. Mourned when her sons did not return, then bore witness when they did.

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LDS

Nephi

~600 BC, Jerusalem → the promised land

Son of Lehi, builder, prophet. Left Jerusalem at the Lord’s command before its destruction. Returned for the brass plates of Laban. Saw the vision of the tree of life. Built a ship under divine instruction. Wrote the books that bear his name.

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LDS

Jacob, son of Lehi

In the wilderness and the new land, ~544 BC

Younger son of Lehi and Sariah, born in the wilderness in the days of affliction; brother of Nephi, who consecrated him a priest and teacher. He beheld the Redeemer in his youth, preached the Atonement and resurrection, rebuked his people for pride and for the wronging of their wives, gave the allegory of the olive trees from the prophet Zenos, and withstood the anti-Christ Sherem.

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LDS

Enos

Son of Jacob, grandson of Lehi, ~515 BC

Son of Jacob and grandson of Lehi, who went to hunt and instead wrestled all day and night before God in prayer until his sins were forgiven. He then prayed for his own people, and afterward for his enemies, the Lamanites.

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LDS

Abinadi

~150 BC, land of Lehi-Nephi (Book of Mormon)

Prophet sent to wicked king Noah. Hidden by the Spirit two years between his first and second prophecies. Tried, mocked, bound. Burned alive after preaching Isaiah 53 to Noah’s court. The young priest Alma believed him.

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LDS

Alma the Elder

A priest in the court of king Noah, ~148 BC. Converted by Abinadi.

A young priest in the court of wicked king Noah who alone believed the prophet Abinadi, pleaded for his life, and was cast out. He baptized the believing at the Waters of Mormon, established the church, and prayed for his wayward son.

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LDS

King Benjamin

~120 BC, Zarahemla (Book of Mormon)

Righteous Nephite king. Labored with his own hands so he would not burden his people. Gave his great farewell sermon from a tower at the temple in Zarahemla — "when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God."

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LDS

Ammon, son of Mosiah

Nephite missionary to the Lamanites, ~90 BC

Son of King Mosiah who refused the throne to preach among the Lamanites for fourteen years. Once a vile persecutor of the church, stopped by an angel. Became servant to King Lamoni, defended the king's flocks at the waters of Sebus, and saw a people who buried their weapons rather than shed blood again.

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LDS

Abish

Lamanite woman, servant to the queen of Lamoni, ~90 BC

A Lamanite woman, servant to the queen of King Lamoni, converted to the Lord years before by a remarkable vision of her father, though she kept her faith secret among an unbelieving people. When the king's whole household fell to the earth overcome by the Spirit, she ran from house to house to gather the people, and raised the queen by the hand. One of the few women named in the record, known by what she did.

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Alma the Younger

~90 BC, Zarahemla and the Nephite mission field

Son of Alma the priest. Once persecuted the church; struck down by an angel; lay three days unable to move or speak. Born of God. Served as chief judge, then gave it up to preach. Author of Alma 5, Alma 36 (the chiastic sermon to Helaman). Father to Helaman, Shiblon, and Corianton.

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LDS

Captain Moroni

~73–56 BC, the Nephite wars against the Lamanites

Chief captain of the Nephite armies. Raised the Title of Liberty, tearing his coat to rally a covenant people. Defended the land against Amalickiah and Ammoron, fortified cities rather than conquered, and exchanged hard letters with the chief judge Pahoran. Mormon wrote that if all men were like him, the powers of hell would be shaken forever.

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LDS

Helaman, son of Alma

~66–63 BC, the wars of the stripling warriors

Son of Alma the Younger; high priest and keeper of the sacred records. Commander of the two thousand young Ammonite men — the stripling warriors — sons of a people who had covenanted never to take up arms. Though every one of them was wounded, not one perished, which he ascribed to their unshaken faith and the teaching of their mothers.

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Samuel the Lamanite

Lamanite prophet to the Nephites at Zarahemla, ~6 BC

A Lamanite prophet sent to preach repentance to the apostate Nephites of Zarahemla. Cast out, he returned at the Lord's command and prophesied from atop the city wall — foretelling the signs of Christ's birth and death — while stones and arrows could not touch him. Some believed and were baptized; he cast himself down and fled, never seen among the Nephites again.

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Mormon

~AD 311–385, the last days of the Nephites

Prophet, military commander, and abridger of the thousand-year record onto the plates that bear his name. Visited by the Lord at fifteen, given command of the whole Nephite army at sixteen. He led a people he could not turn back to God, witnessed their final destruction at Cumorah, and buried all the records save the few he gave his son Moroni.

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Moroni

~5th century AD, last Nephite prophet → angel of the latter days

Last of the Nephites. Wandered alone after the destruction of his people at Cumorah. Finished his father Mormon’s record. Sealed the plates and hid them. Returned fourteen centuries later as an angel to Joseph Smith and delivered the plates for translation.

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LDS

Joseph Smith, Jr.

1805–1844, Vermont → New York → Ohio → Missouri → Illinois

Founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Translator of the Book of Mormon. Recipient of the revelations gathered as the Doctrine and Covenants. Husband of Emma Hale. Practitioner of plural marriage. Mayor of Nauvoo, candidate for U.S. President, martyred at Carthage Jail in 1844 at age thirty-eight.

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Heard by 1 soul, in 1 conversation.

LDS

Emma Smith

Pennsylvania to Nauvoo, 1804–1879

Wife of the prophet Joseph Smith, called "an elect lady" by revelation. Scribe for part of the Book of Mormon translation, compiler of the Church's first hymnal (1835), and first president of the Nauvoo Female Relief Society (1842). She buried several children, endured persecution and displacement, and lost her husband to murder at Carthage in 1844. She did not go west; her son later led the Reorganized Church.

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LDS

Brigham Young

Vermont to the Great Basin, 1801–1877

Second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A Vermont carpenter and glazier who joined the Church in 1832; after Joseph Smith's martyrdom he led the Saints west out of Nauvoo to the Salt Lake Valley in 1847 and colonized the Great Basin — the "American Moses." Blunt, practical, and plain-spoken.

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