When the tidings of this defection reached Alma, he proceeded to the land Antionum. He was accompanied by his two younger sons, three of the sons of king Mosiah, also by Amulek and Zeezrom. To his anxiety to bring these dissenters back from the error of their ways, was added the fear that if they remained in their wickedness they would join the Lamanites and bring trouble upon their more faithful fellow citizens by urging the renewal of war.
On the arrival of Alma and his fellow-laborers at the seat of this apostasy, they at once commenced their ministrations. They taught in the synagogues and preached in the streets. They visited the people from house to house, using every possible effort to bring these misguided dissenters to an understanding of their perilous condition. Many of the poor and humble received the word of God, while the majority rejected it with contemptuous scorn. Some of the missionaries were maltreated. Shiblon, the son of Alma, was imprisoned and stoned for the truth's sake, while others fared but little better.
Having done all the good they could, the missionaries withdrew to Jershon, into which land the believing Zoramites were soon after driven by their unrepentant fellows. There they found a safe asylum among the Ammonites, who, regardless of the entreaties and afterwards the threats of those who remained in Antionum, shielded and comforted them. The Zoramites then affiliated with the Lamanites, and an army of the latter race, commanded by Zerahemnah, entered Antionum and attempted to drive the Ammonites out of Jershon. In this they were not successful, and, eventfully, after a most desperate conflict, they were forced back into their own lands. It appears that the Zoramites accompanied them, as many of the Lamanite military leaders are afterwards spoken of as belonging to that sect.
