Ether 10-11

(December 23, 2013)
These chapters seem to me to be more like our day than some other parts of the Book of Mormon.  In many parts of the Book of Mormon, the people seem to go through the pride cycle (righteousness leads to prosperity which leads to pride which leads to wickedness which leads to punishment which leads to humility which leads to righteousness and the cycle starts over) in a matter of a couple of years.  That does not match the experience that I am seeing around me.  The pride cycle, as I see it, is really happening over the space of decades rather than years – still clearly visible, but not as quick.

I can understand it happening that quickly, however, as I have seen when a society seems to be in the grips of what can best be called a fever, and things speed up at an incredible pace.  It appears that the Nephites and Lamanites were undergoing just such a condition in their day.  In our day, however, our pride cycle takes about three decades to run its course.