Alma — Chapter 55
1 When Moroni got this letter, he was more angry, because he knew that Ammoron knew very well that he (Ammoron) was lying. Ammoron did not have any good reason for making war against the Nephites.
2 So he said: “I will not trade prisoners with Ammoron unless he gives up his plans, as I said in my letter, because I don’t want to give him any more power than he already has.
3 “I know where the Lamanites are guarding our people whom they have taken prisoner. Since Ammoron will not do what I said in my letter, I will do what I said — yes, I will kill them until they beg for peace.”
4 After Moroni said this, he had people look to see if any of his men were descendants of Laman.
5 They found one named Laman. He was one of the servants of the king whom Amalickiah had murdered.
6 Moroni had Laman and a small number of men go to the Lamanites who were guarding the Nephite prisoners.
7 The Nephites were being guarded in the city of Gid, so Moroni sent Laman and a small number of men there.
8 It was night when Laman came to the Lamanites who were guarding the Nephite prisoners. When they saw him, they stopped him, but he said to them: “Don’t be afraid. I am a Lamanite. We escaped from the Nephites, and look — we took some of their wine with us.”
9 The Lamanites were very happy to welcome him when they heard this, and they said to him: “Give us some wine to drink. We are glad you took some wine with you, because we are tired.”
10 But Laman said to them: “We should wait to drink this until we go fight the Nephites.” But this made them want to drink the wine even more.
11 They said: “We are tired, so let us have some wine now. We will get wine to drink to make us stronger against the Nephites later.”
12 Then Laman said to them: “Do what you want.”
13 So they drank some wine. It tasted very good, so they drank even more of it. It was made to be very strong.
14 They drank and had fun and soon they were all very drunk.
15 When Laman and his men saw that the guards were drunk and had fallen fast asleep, they went back to Moroni and told him everything.
16 This was just what Moroni had planned. Moroni’s men were ready with weapons, and while the Lamanites were drunk and fast asleep, he sent his men to the city of Gid, and they threw in weapons to all the prisoners.
17 They gave weapons even to the women and to all the children who could use a weapon (after Moroni had given weapons to all the other prisoners). They did this very quietly.
18 If the Lamanites had woken up, the Nephites could have killed them, because they were still drunk.
19 But this is not what Moroni had planned. He did not like killing and blood, but wanted to save his people from destruction. He did not want to do anything wrong, so he did not have his people kill the Lamanites while they were drunk.
20 But he had done what he wanted. He had given the Nephite prisoners inside the city the weapons they would need to take over the parts of the city they were in.
21 Then he had the armies with him outside of the city stand back and surround the Lamanite armies.
22 This was all done at night, so when the Lamanites woke up in the morning, they saw they were surrounded outside by Nephites, and that their prisoners inside the city had weapons.
23 They saw that the Nephites had power over them, and saw that they should not try to fight them. So their leaders had their men bring them their weapons. Then they brought all the weapons and put them down at the Nephites’ feet and asked for mercy.
24 This was what Moroni wanted. He took the Lamanites prisoner, took over the city, and freed all the Nephite prisoners, who all joined Moroni’s army and made it much stronger.
25 Then Moroni made the Lamanite prisoners make the city of Gid stronger.
26 When he had made the city of Gid as strong as he wanted, he took his prisoners to the city of Bountiful, where he had a strong army guarding the city.
27 They kept all the prisoners, even though they tried to get away. They kept all the cities they had taken back and kept their strong position.
28 So the Nephites began to win again and get back their rights and freedoms.
29 The Lamanites tried to surround them at night many times, but many were taken prisoner when they tried.
30 They also tried to give wine to the Nephites to destroy them with poison or to make them drunk.
31 But the Nephites were not slow to remember the Lord their God during this time of trouble. They could not be tricked. They would not drink any wine until they had made some of their Lamanite prisoners drink it first.
32 They were very careful to make sure they would not be given poison. If wine would poison a Lamanite, it would poison a Nephite, so this is how they tested all their wines.
33 Then Moroni prepared to make war against the city of Morianton, because the Lamanites had made that city very strong.
34 The Lamanites kept bringing more and more armies and supplies into that city.
35 This was how the twenty-ninth year ended.
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