“Life and Death, Blessing and Cursing”: New Context for “Skin of Blackness” in the Book of Mormon

For many readers of the Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 5 can prove rather challenging. Not only does this chapter contain the actualization of a curse and the apparent genesis of an outgroup, but it also states that “the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon” this group because of their iniquity (2 Ne. 5:21). Given the prevalence of racial thought in society today, this passage has been interpreted as a hurtful reference to a phenotypic change in skin color brought on by a divine curse, leading many researchers to propose alternatives to a purely racialized understanding of the text. In support of this approach, senior leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have rejected any racialized reading of the passage but at the same time have given no formal interpretation. In this paper, I will present a new context with which to interpret the phrase “skin of blackness” that builds on apparent intertextuality between Nephi’s writings, those attributed to Moses, and an example of a similar curse found in a prominent treaty from the ancient Near East.