The Book of Mormon presents itself as the sacred history of several groups said to have crossed the ocean to the Americas. The largest thread follows a family led by the prophet Lehi, who leaves Jerusalem about 600 BC; his descendants divide into the Nephites and the Lamanites, whose long, often warring history the book recounts.
A second, older people, the Jaredites, are traced to the confusion of tongues at Babel. Running through the whole is an insistently Christian message: prophets across the centuries are said to have foreseen and testified of Jesus Christ, and the book's culminating episode is the appearance of the risen Christ to the Nephites, to whom he preaches, whom he heals, and among whom he establishes his church.
Doctrinally the book teaches faith in Christ, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and endurance to the end, and it dwells at length on the Atonement and the resurrection. It closes with an exhortation, known as Moroni's promise, inviting readers to ask God whether the book is true. Within Latter-day Saint life it is read devotionally, quoted constantly, given to prospective converts, and treated as tangible evidence of Joseph Smith's prophetic mission; it has been translated, in whole or part, into more than a hundred languages.