The brass plates are a fascinating and important part of Latter-day Saint scriptural heritage. The Book of Mormon was contained on a set of plates that had the appearance of gold. We know that at least some of the content of the brass plates ended up on the plates that would eventually become the Book of Mormon.

At the beginning of the Book of Mormon, the prophet Lehi and his traveling company had left Jerusalem after Lehi prophesied that it would be destroyed. A few days after departing from Jerusalem, Lehi had told his sons that they needed to go back and get the brass plates. The attempts of Lehi’s sons to retrieve them and their ultimate success in obtaining them is recorded in 1 Nephi 3-4.

The Book of Mormon gives us descriptions and even quotations of much of the material that was on the brass plates. We are told that it contained the five books of Moses including an account of the Creation of the world (2 Nephi 2:15), of Adam and Eve (2 Nephi 2:18–19), and a record of the law of Moses (2 Nephi 5:10). It is said that they contained a record of the jews to the reign of king Zedekiah (Jacob 2:23). It contained prophecies from the prophets Isaiah (1 Nephi 19:10, 1 Nephi 20, 1 Nephi 21, 2 Nephi 19:1-8, 11-21), Joseph, and Jeremiah, as well as three prophets unknown to the Bible including Zenos (Jacob 5; Alma 33:4-11), Zenock (1 Nephi 19:10), and Neum (See #20 ZENOS, ZENOCK, AND NEUM). Finally, we are told that it contained a genealogy of Lehi’s fathers (Alma 10:3).

The brass plates were integral in the Nephites’ attempts to keep the law of Moses with exactness (2 Nephi 5:10).

That we have the plates of brass today is a fulfillment of a prophecy of the prophet Lehi. Nephi recalls:

And now, when my father saw all these things, he was filled with the Spirit, and began to prophesy concerning his seed—that these planets of brass should go forth unto all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people who were of his seed. Wherefore, he said that these plates of brass should never perish; neither should they be dimmed any more by time.

Millions of missionaries today now fulfill this prophecy made by Lehi and provide us with the extraordinary gift of the contents of the brass plates.