Abstract: This article examines Mormon’s comparison of Moroni, the Nephite military leader, to Ammon, the son of Mosiah, in Alma 48:18 and how Mormon’s use and repetition of ʾmn-related terminology (“faithful,” “firm,” “faith,” “verily [surely]”) in Alma 48:7–17 lays a foundation for this comparison. Ammon’s name, phonologically and perhaps etymologically, suggests the meaning “faithful.” Mormon goes to extraordinary lengths in the Lamanite conversion narratives to show that Ammon is not only worthy of this name, but that his faithfulness is the catalyst for the transition of many Lamanites from unbelief to covenant faithfulness. Thus, in comparing Moroni directly to Ammon, Mormon makes a most emphatic statement regarding Moroni’s covenant faithfulness. Moreover, this comparison reveals his admiration for both men.

At the conclusion of Mormon’s famed panegyric1 for Moroni (Alma 48:7–18), the first person to whom Mormon favorably compares Moroni is Ammon, the son of Mosiah (see Alma 48:18). Although Mormon’s comparison also includes the other sons of Mosiah, of them he only mentions Ammon by name, suggesting that he is the main focus of the comparison. A close examination of Mormon’s language leading up to this comparison reveals the logic of and the rhetorical preparation for it.

Mormon’s earlier account of Ammon in the Lamanite conversion narratives had emphasized “the faithfulness of Ammon” (e.g., [Page 224]Alma 18:2, 10) as a major catalyst in the conversion of numerous Lamanites to the gospel of Jesus Christ and the reversal of generations of unbelief to surpassing “faithfulness.”2 In Hebrew, concepts of being “faithful,”3 “believ[ing],”4 “steadfastness,”5 “faithfulness” (and “faith”), “trustworthiness,”6 and “firmness” were expressed with lexical forms of the Hebrew verbal root ʾmn7 (apparently cognate with Egyptian mn = “be firm, established, enduring”; “be fixed, stick fast …”; “remain”)8 which sound like and may even be cognate with the name Ammon. Indeed, the onomastic connection between Ammon and forms of ʾmn — aural or etymological — is evidenced by the profusion of ʾmn-related terminology in the Lamanite conversion narratives (Alma 17–27).9

In this study,