Explanation:
Yet another example of chiasmus, in this case a report of the events
in a particular Nephite year, is found in Helaman 6:7–13. Because
the report is a fine literary unit, the account was most likely originally
written as a single entry in the Nephite annals that Mormon
copied verbatim into his record from the large plates of Nephi. The
sixty-fourth year of the reign of the judges was an unusual year,
one in which the Nephites and Lamanites cooperatively enjoyed economic
prosperity, peace, and free trade—an unprecedented occurrence.
The chiastic form of the report for this year underscores its
importance. In the chart, notice that Zedekiah and Lord are paired
together at the center of the chiasm. The -yah at the end of Zedekiah
represents the Hebrew word for “Lord”; thus the chiasm was
probably even more evident in its original language than it is today
in English.
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