How wealthy was Lehi?

It has been assumed that Lehi was quite wealthy because of textual clues, including him having a land of inheritance (1 Nephi 3:16), having gold and silver, and knowing the Egyptian language (was he involved in trading as some kind of businessman?). There are a couple of other interesting aspects that might suggest that Lehi was even more wealthy than we might think.

In 1st Nephi 3:13, when Laman first tries to ask Laban for the plates, Laban says he is a robber. That seems a bit odd since he only asked. But we know from 1st Nephi 5:16 that Lehi and Laban were related. Perhaps they knew or believed this already. The same verse also says that the brass plates contained the genealogy of their fathers. According to the Law of Moses, every 7 years the land returned to the families they originally belonged to by birthright. Genealogical records were really important for the more prominent and wealthy Jews because those were proof of their ancestry and hence their rights of property. Without the genealogical records, Laban would be risking his wealth. The fact that Lehi wanted the records could be interpreted by Laban not as merely losing a valuable artifact but that Lehi intented to take away his possession when the year of remission came and the genealogy records were consulted to verify each one's birthright.

Later, Nephi suggests they go to the land of Lehi's inheritance to get all their silver and gold and try to purchase the plates. The reason Nephi was persuaded that he could convince Laban was because their gold and silver would exceed any property Laban would lose for not having the proper records. In other words, if this theory is correct, Lehi was more wealthy than Laban.

1 Nephi 3:25 describes Lehi's property as "exceedingly great"

And it came to pass that when Laban saw our property, and that it was exceedingly great, he did lust after it,

Another, less obvious clue is given in 1 Nephi 6:1

And now I, Nephi, do not give the genealogy of my fathers in this part of my record; neither at any time shall I give it after upon these plates which I am writing; for it is given in the record which has been kept by my father; wherefore, I do not write it in this work.

A Jewish rabbi has the following comment to this passage;

It is crucial for the reader to understand that in Hebrew there are two different expressions for genealogy. One of them is תולדות (toledot) which literally means “sequels” and is usually translated as “generations”. This appears for example in Genesis 5:1: “This is the book of the generations of Adam.” Whenever the term “generations” appears it is simply meant to give a line of descendants.

However, the word that would literally be translated as “genealogy” in Hebrew is the ancient form יחש (yachash) which is found in Nehemiah 7:5 “And my God put into my heart to gather together the nobles, and the rulers, and the people, that they might be reckoned by genealogy.”

This particular word is used to indicate a royal dynasty. As we had already seen there is plenty of evidence that Nephi was of a ruling family in his own tribe so this fits the big picture.

It’s important to understand that an average Israelite would not bother to give a full account of all his descendants until their days. You don’t see this pattern for example in the writings of the prophets. However if one was a ruler it would be crucial to present such information.

When Nephi does not give this information in his records, it is more than simply saving space. He wants his words to be believed because of the message they contain and not because of his own royal background. For a man to consider his own royal bloodline to be nothing compared to what G-d had prepared for him would have required an enormous leap of faith from his part

Based on all this, it seems that Lehi as a descendent of Joseph was perhaps a 2nd or 3rd generation immigrant to Jerusalem from the conquered Northern Kingdom, with a noble bloodline and a large inheritance. Nephi does not focus at all on this aspect in the small plates, so we only have to pick up certain small clues.

This makes me wonder: If Lehi really was that wealthy, did he have a large household with many servants, and if so, did he bring any of them into the wilderness and to the promised land? They are never mentioned, but neither are Nephi's sisters until the last chapter he writes that has any narrative (2 Nephi 5).

So when Laman as the oldest brother keeps complaining to Nephi that he has the right to rule, it may be more to it than just claiming the regular Jewish privileges that being the oldest of 5 brothers would entail.

Anyway, that's probably enough speculation for today:)