. . . Nephi had a theological reason for associating his people with the isles of the sea. He quotes a prophecy of gathering from Zenos in 1 Nephi 19:16: “Yea, then will he remember the isles of the sea; yea, and all the people who are of the house of Israel, will I gather in, saith the Lord, according to the words of the prophet Zenos, from the four quarters of the earth.” Nephi interprets this scripture as applying to his own people, paralleling the promised gathering of Jerusalem’s scattered inhabitants. This promise obviously strikes a strong emotional chord for him.
We see a similar process occurring in the Dead Sea Scrolls. In 4Q177 the commentator gives a verse from Psalms, followed by his explanation (brackets and ellipses indicate lacunae in the text):
[To the master singer,] to David. In the Lord I have taken refute,] so how can You say to me, Flee [to the mountain, little bird for now the wicked are bending their bow,] and fitting arrows to [the string to shoot in the night at the honest in mind:] (Ps. 11:1-2).
[This means that] the men of [the Yahad] shall flee [. . . ] [. . . like] a bird from its place and be exiled [from their land . .. they are written about] in the book of the [prophet Micah: Rise and go, this is not the right place to stay, impurity has married it, it is completely ruined.]
Here the Qumranic commentator has recontextualized two verses to his own experience in a community self-exiled from Jerusalem. This passage supported the theological basis for the community’s existence in the desert. Nephi’s use of the “isles of the sea” makes this same correlation of text to current circumstance.
Although Nephi makes this connection, the concept never appears again in the Book of Mormon. Apparently, relocating to the New World, a psychological burden Nephi felt keenly, was unimportant to later generations. Perhaps Nephi’s correlation was intricately bound to his need to find continuity between his Old World roots and his New World life. (Brant A. Gardner, Second Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Volume 1: First Nephi [Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007], 366-67)
