- This article is about the Book of Mormon prophet and angel. For other people and things with the same name, see Moroni
Moroni, according to the Book of Mormon, was the last Nephite prophet and military commander and lived in America in the late fourth and early fifth centuries. Latter-day Saint theology holds that after his death Moroni was resurrected and became an angel. In addition to the Book of Mormon account, Joseph Smith and the Three Witnesses also testified they saw the Moroni in the form of an angel.
Mortal life
Moroni was the son of Mormon, the prophet for whom the Book of Mormon is named. He was named after (and should not be confused with) Captain Moroni, a much earlier Book of Mormon figure.
Moroni served under his father, who was commander in chief, in the final war between the Nephites and the Lamanites, leading a group of 10,000 soldiers. Upon the Nephites' defeat, Moroni was forced to go into hiding and to wander from place to place to avoid being killed by the victorious Lamanites.
Moroni had been commanded by his father to complete the Nephite record which Mormon had written. Moroni wrote chapters 8 and 9 of the Book of Mormon (Mormon's record within the larger Book of Mormon), the entire Book of Moroni, and the title page of the Book of Mormon. He also wrote the Book of Ether, which is primarily an abridgment of Jaredite writings but also contains extensive commentary by Moroni, especially in chapters 4, 5, 8, and 12.
Moroni claimed that he had seen and spoken to Jesus face to face and that he had been shown extensive visions of the future. Speaking directly to modern-day readers of the Book of Mormon, Moroni writes, "Behold, I speak unto you as if ye were present, and yet ye are not. But behold, Jesus Christ hath shown you unto me, and I know your doing" (Mormon 8:35).
Upon completion of the record, written on Golden Plates, Moroni buried the plates in a stone box in a hill in what is now Ontario County, New York. A 12-meter granite and bronze monument to Moroni now stands on this hill, which is commonly called the Hill Cumorah (not all Latter-day Saints believe that it is the Cumorah mentioned in the Book of Mormon, however).
Angel
After his death, Moroni became an angel. On the night of September 21, 1823, he purportedly appeared to Joseph Smith, Jr., who would later become the founder of Mormonism, and told him about the Golden Plates buried in the hill, which was a few miles from Smith's home. Over the course of the next six years, Moroni visited Smith at least 20 times. After allegedly translating a portion of the writing on the plates (either one-third or two-thirds; accounts vary) as the Book of Mormon, Smith turned the plates back over to Moroni.
Because of his instrumentality in the restoration of the gospel, Moroni is commonly identified by Latter-day Saints with the angel mentioned in Revelation 14:6, " having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people."
The image of the angel Moroni blowing a trumpet is commonly used as an unofficial symbol of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Moroni appears on the cover of some editions of the Book of Mormon, and statues of the angel stand atop many LDS temples.
External links
- Text of the Book of Moroni
- Moroni, the Son of Mormon in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism
- Angel Moroni in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism