I know I spent a lot of time on the early battles of the war chapters, but now it's looking like those battles weren't actually part of the war of the war chapters. The war chapters' war seems to begin about two years after those battles ended, and for a completely different and even more petty reason.
At about 74 B.C., it came to a certain Nephite missionary's attention that a group of Nephites called the Zoramites had apostatized from Christianity, so that missionary got a bunch of his buddies together, and they went out to teach the Zoramites, with the hopes of bringing them back to the fold. They had some success, converting some Zoramites back to Christianity, however, the still-non-Christian Zoramites weren't too happy about that, and they kicked the Christian Zoramites out of their lands.
While preferable to genocide, exiling the Christian Zoramites made about as much sense as the Lamanites attacking the Anti-Nephi-Lehies. A difference of opinion should never escalate to violence. I can kind of understand it if the unconverted Zoramites didn't want the converted Zoramites asserting their rediscovered Christianity into local politics. I can see the concern there. But if that was the major concern, exile should have been sufficient for them, but it wasn't.
After being cast out of their lands, the converted and exiled Zoramites went over to live with the Anti-Nephi-Lehies, who were now called the people of Ammon, or the Ammonites. When the chief ruler of the unconverted Zoramites saw that the people of Ammon had accepted the converted Zoramites into their lands, he "he breathed out many threatenings against them," "desiring them that they should cast out of their land all those who came over from them into their land" (Alma 35: 9&8). When the people of Ammon refused to re-exile the exiled, Christian Zoramites, the other Zoramites became very angry, joined themselves with the Lamanites, and "began to make preparations for war against the people of Ammon, and also against the Nephites" (Alma 35:11). And the rest was history.
If disagreeing with a person's religious beliefs is a bad reason to go to war, being irritated at another person's kindness is a terrible reason to start a war. The Christian Zoramites had, as far as I could tell, done nothing to the non-Christian Zoramites. They weren't a threat to them. If one nation harbored terrorists that were attacking another country, I could understand why the second country might be upset with the first, but that certainly wasn't the case here. The non-Christian Zoramites didn't lose anything when the Ammonites welcomed the Christian Zoramites, and they weren't at any increased threat of being attacked, so starting a war with the Ammonites and Nephites doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
It reminds me of a quote form one of Elder Holland's talks, and, to use his words, I paraphrase only slightly: "Why should one person be bitter because another chooses to be kind?" So, the Ammonites were nice to the exiled Zoramites. So what? That didn't affect the other Zoramites at all until they decided that was important enough to go to war over. It's about as petty a grudge as I've ever seen. Likewise, we should try not to become bitter when other people are kind to people we don't like. It's one thing to wish ill on another person. Wishing that other people would wish ill on that person takes the animosity a bit too far. As Christians, we should try to be more forgiving than that. Besides, it's entirely possible that the kind people aren't really fond of the unliked ones, either, but are only being kind because they think it's the Christian thing to do. I don't think that's the case here, necessarily, but it may be the case elsewhere.
The enemy of one's enemy is not always one's friend, and the friend of one's enemy is not always one's enemy. We can disagree about things without disliking each other, we can dislike each other without wishing ill on one another, and we can wish ill on each other without wishing that others would wish ill as well. If the Zoramites had felt that way, that might have prevented the most recorded and read-about war in Nephite history. If we want to prevent mini wars in our own lives, we should try to let go of our grudges, too, even when others show kindness to those whom we dislike. It's not easy, but it'll bring more peace into our hearts, just as it might have brought a few more years of peace to the Nephites and the Lamanites.
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