With the close of Lehi’s blessings, Nephi has completed laying out the divine mandate behind the creation of the people who will be named Nephites. In the Old World, there was a promise that Nephi would be a ruler and a teacher over his brethren. In the Old World he was mostly a teacher. In the New World, he is a ruler, and the blessings Lehi gave lay out the relationships among the various descendants of those who came with Lehi.
From this point on, Nephi originally intended that his story might continue with a more historical view, explaining the spiritual events relevant to his people. That purpose will change. Nephi gives us only one chapter of what might have been his original intent. That shift will be discussed when we move to 2 Nephi 6.
At this point, the important historical point is the division of the spiritual and political world into what would come to be called Lamanites and Nephites. As Laman and Lemuel had done before, they seek Nephi’s life. Now that they are in the New World, Jehovah does not intervene to keep the family together, but this time tells Nephi to flee. The tensions with his brothers that Nephi had traced throughout their journey from Jerusalem to the New World have continued, and without Lehi to hold the family together, it will separate.
In one sense, when Laman and Lemuel say that they “will not have [Nephi] to be our ruler,” they get their desire. Nephi will become a ruler, but not over Laman and Lemuel.