Amalickiah’s Plan to Seize Power
Now let’s go back to Amalickiah and the men who fled with him into the wilderness. He led his followers north into Lamanite territory and began stirring up anger against the Nephites. His incitement worked so well that the Lamanite king sent a proclamation throughout his entire kingdom, ordering all his people to gather for war against the Nephites.
When the proclamation went out, the people were terrified. They feared displeasing their king, but they also feared going to battle against the Nephites—they didn’t want to die. Most of them refused to obey the king’s command.
The king was furious at their disobedience. So he gave Amalickiah command of the loyal portion of his army and ordered him to march out and force the others into service.
This was exactly what Amalickiah wanted. He was a cunning man skilled at evil, and he’d already laid plans to overthrow the Lamanite king.
Now he commanded the king’s loyalists, and he intended to win over those who’d disobeyed. He marched toward a place called Onidah, where all the reluctant soldiers had fled. They’d seen the army coming and assumed it meant to destroy them, so they’d retreated to their stronghold.
They appointed their own king and leader, absolutely resolved not to fight the Nephites.
They gathered on top of Mount Antipas and prepared for battle.
Amalickiah had no intention of actually attacking them—despite the king’s orders. His real plan was to win over the Lamanite armies so he could take command, overthrow the king, and seize the kingdom for himself.
He had his army set up camp in the valley near Mount Antipas.
The Poisoning of Lehonti
That night, he sent a secret messenger up the mountain to their leader, Lehonti, asking him to come down to the base of the mountain for a conversation.
When Lehonti got the message, he refused to come down. Amalickiah sent a second request. Lehonti still wouldn’t come. Then a third time.
When Amalickiah realized he couldn’t get Lehonti to come down, he climbed partway up the mountain himself, stopping near Lehonti’s camp. He sent a fourth message, this time asking Lehonti to come down with his guards.
When Lehonti finally came down with his guards, Amalickiah made his proposal: “Bring your army down tonight and surround the men the king put under my command. I’ll hand them over to you. In exchange, make me your second-in-command over the entire army.”
Lehonti brought his forces down that night and surrounded Amalickiah’s men. By dawn, they were completely encircled. When Amalickiah’s soldiers woke and realized they were surrounded, they begged him to let them join their fellow Lamanites rather than be killed. This was exactly what Amalickiah wanted. He handed his men over—directly defying the king’s command. But that’s precisely what he needed to accomplish his scheme.
Now it was Lamanite custom that when a chief leader died, the second-in-command automatically became the new leader.
Amalickiah had one of his servants slowly poison Lehonti until he died.
When Lehonti was dead, the Lamanites appointed Amalickiah as their leader and chief commander.
The Murder of the King
With his goal achieved, Amalickiah marched his armies to the city of Nephi, the Lamanite capital.
The king came out with his guards to meet him, assuming Amalickiah had fulfilled his orders and assembled this massive army to attack the Nephites.
But as the king approached, Amalickiah sent his servants forward to meet him. They bowed low before the king, as though showing respect for his greatness. The king reached out his hand to raise them up—a Lamanite custom adopted from the Nephites as a sign of peace. As he lifted the first man from the ground, the servant stabbed him in the heart. The king collapsed.
The king’s own servants fled in terror. Amalickiah’s men immediately raised a cry: “The king’s servants have murdered him! He’s fallen, and they’ve run away! Come see for yourselves!”
Amalickiah ordered his armies to march to the scene. When they arrived and found the king lying in his blood, Amalickiah acted outraged and shouted, “Anyone who loved the king—go after his servants and kill them!”
Everyone who’d loved the king took off after the fleeing servants.
When the king’s servants saw an army chasing them, they panicked and fled into the wilderness, eventually crossing into Zarahemla territory and joining the people of Ammon.
The pursuing army finally gave up and returned. Through his deception, Amalickiah had won the people’s loyalty.
The next day, he entered the city of Nephi with his armies and took control.
Amalickiah Becomes King
When the queen heard the king had been killed—Amalickiah had sent messengers telling her the king’s own servants murdered him, and that he’d chased them but they’d escaped—
she sent word to Amalickiah asking him to spare the people of the city. She also requested that he come to her and bring witnesses who could testify about the king’s death.
Amalickiah brought the very servant who’d killed the king, along with the others who’d been there, and they went to the queen. They all testified that the king had been murdered by his own servants, and they added, “Those servants have fled. Doesn’t their flight prove their guilt?” This satisfied the queen about how the king died.
Then Amalickiah won the queen’s favor and married her. Through his fraud and the help of his scheming servants, he gained the kingdom. He was acknowledged as king throughout all the Lamanite lands—over the Lamanites, the Lemuelites, the Ishmaelites, and all the Nephite dissenters from Nephi’s time down to the present.
These dissenters had received the same teaching and knowledge as the Nephites. They’d been instructed about the Lord. Yet strangely, not long after abandoning their people, they became harder-hearted and more unrepentant than the Lamanites themselves. They became wilder, more wicked, and more brutal—absorbing Lamanite traditions, giving themselves over to laziness and every kind of indulgence, completely forgetting the Lord their God.