Alma’s greeting praises the people of Gideon by comparing them positively with those he has just left behind in Zarahemla in their “awful dilemma.” This strong language highlights the importance of the developing contentions and, therefore, the great significance of Alma’s mission. Obviously, he did not undertake it lightly but out of what he perceived as a necessity.
Culture: The text does not identify the Gideonites, except that their city was named for Gideon, captain of Noah’s and Limhi’s guard in Lehi-Nephi. Alma 2:20 comments that Alma’s army, when it stopped pursuing the Amlicites, “pitch[ed] their tents in the valley of Gideon, the valley being called after that Gideon who was slain by the hand of Nehor.” It is safe to assume that the city of Gideon lay in the valley of Gideon and that both were named for the slain hero.
It is also a speculation, though a reasonable one, that the land of Gideon was settled by the emigrant Limhites. If this is the case, then it suggests why they may have been relatively free from the Zarahemlaite contentions. Zarahemla was then adopting foreign concepts from the larger culture resembling those that Noah had adopted and which the Limhites would remember well, including how Yahweh had delivered them from the Lamanites. Many in the land of Gideon knew firsthand the disastrous effects of the “things of the world.” Their divine deliverance would still be clear in their minds, and they would be correspondingly more resistant to similar cultural incursions, unlike the Zarahemlaites who had not (as yet) fought the same battle.