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Tobin wrote:
Megatherium wrote:Joseph didn’t actually use the plates in the translation process. There are numerous accounts of him translating with the plates in another room or otherwise not present, by means of a seer stone, but not a single one of him translating directly from the plates. If he didn’t need them to translate them, why we’re they even given to him at all?
Yes, that is very strange. So, either he made it up, or him having plates he couldn’t show anyone is rather pointless and cries out that God was testing him.
Exactly. This gets at the heart of why I can’t accept the traditional excuses for the plates’ absence. I can never accept a God who “tests” me by trying to fool me like that.
It’s like the kid in our deacons quorum who says that his mom told him God put dinosaur bones on earth “to fool the scientists”. WTF. That is a messed up way to think of God.
[ Personal comment:] The idea of Moroni taking back the plates and God putting dinosaur bones in the earth as a test are very, very different things, conceptually. There are perfectly valid reasons for not having the plates, while the dinosaur bones issue is one of the stupidest ideas ever concocted in the name of religion. I’m not saying Moroni taking back the plates has no weakness, but there is no
logicalweakness in it (assuming one is willing to accept the existence and appearance of post-mortal beings as logical) – and there is no “fooling” that has to be involved. Seriously, once angels, resurrected beings, etc. are accepted, classical logic becomes a dicey thing about which to argue. Its no different than non-Mormon Christians dismissing the Book of Mormon because of the way Joseph claimed to have discovered and translated it. If someone accepts the Bible as legitimate scripture from God, accepting or rejecting the Book of Mormon comes down to personal view, not logic.
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Admin note:] Now, let’s end this threadjack– since it’s not the intent of the post. The post is about geographic possibilities and a particular book, and mackay11 said he’s not interested in discussing anything in this post but that topic.Let’s honor that request and keep the discussion focused on the topic it was intended to discuss. Old-Timer wrote:[
Admin note:] Now, let’s end this threadjack– since it’s not the intent of the post. The post is about geographic possibilities and a particular book, and mackay11 said he’s not interested in discussing anything in this post but that topic.Let’s honor that request and keep the discussion focused on the topic it was intended to discuss. Thanks Ray. To Tobin and Megatherium: I’ll happily discuss the problem with the plates and what they are for as I also see several unanswered questions. But I’d quite like to keep this thread on the internal geography/politics etc of the Book of Mormon text (whatever its origin) and whether it fits and ‘real world’ model.
If you want to start (or resurrect) a thread on Gold Plates I’ll happily join the discussion, just not on this thread. Thanks.
Sorry, I didn’t realize from the thread title or the OP that the thread was limited to geographical and political evidence. I’ll drop it. @Old-Timer, in the future, I think it’s better if you don’t comment on a topic immediately before closing it to discussion, as it sends a mixed message. Commenting on it or closing it is fine, but doing both in the same post is a bit irksome, particularly from a site admin. Just my opinion.
Tobin wrote:Oh, I think JS and others were very mistaken on that point (among others). Not only that, but IF the BofM has a basis in fact, the Jaredite/Lehite civilizations had to have been very minor players on the American continent. Otherwise, I think we would have found them by now and indications of their civilization and technology.
Kind of… there are several problems – firstly, the Spanish went and destroyed a lot, and I mean a lot in the Americas, especially manuscripts. Many relics and buildings have ended up under modern cities. Secondly, in tropical climates, stockades and relics made of wood don’t last long.
SamBee wrote:Kind of… there are several problems – firstly, the Spanish went and destroyed a lot, and I mean a lot in the Americas, especially manuscripts. Many relics and buildings have ended up under modern cities. Secondly, in tropical climates, stockades and relics made of wood don’t last long.
The Lehites destroyed themselves, so the Spanish had nothing to do with the decline and disappearance of their civilization. And I really don’t like the idea of postulating where the Lehites were (in the jungle, on a mountain, in the sea, etc.) until we have actual archeological evidence they existed in the first place.
I have a book on pre-Columbian art, and it’s really shocking how little we know of pre-European America and how little remains of it. Some survived in the remote jungles and the high hills, but the bulk has been destroyed. People forget that even within the current United States, there were permanent towns and cities of natives, almost entirely gone.
And yes, there is a LOT hiding under the Caribbean.
I agree that we know so little of early South and Central American history that it is impossible to say at this point that no evidence exists. There are actually tribes that we know nothing of other than that they exist, and it’s believed there are still tribes out there we don’t even know exist. Likewise, there is much archaeological evidence that has been destroyed due to the ravages of time and weather/climate. There are even remote places in the North America where so few men have been that we have no actual record of it – including places in Yellowstone. I’m not ready to jump on any bandwagons on whether the BoM people existed or not, nor am I ready to adopt anyone’s idea of a map of their lands, but I do think the possibility exists that they were real. Quote:@Old Timer, in the future, I think it’s better if you don’t comment on a topic immediately before closing it to discussion, as it sends a mixed message. Commenting on it or closing it is fine, but doing both in the same post is a bit irksome, particularly from a site admin. Just my opinion.
I appreciate the opinion, seriously. We welcome input into how we do things.
For everyone’s information, we try hard not to do anything completely “behind the scenes” without any explanation. For that reason, we try never to close threads without an explanation, so when a thread is closed, an admin comment generally is the last one in it. More often than not, that comment ends up being mine. That won’t change. It’s part of our philosophy of openness and transparency, so we want everyone to know why a thread is being closed.
If anyone wants more information or to provide input, please send me and/or other admins a private message.
/Back to the regular post discussion
I’ve only read a little way in, but one of the things I’ve noticed is a need to make assumptions. There are naturally going to be big gaps in his evidence. Given his position of belief in the Book of Mormon the assumptions are, understandably, in favour of the book. The Lehites, for example, brought no animals with them and so the animals they describe in the new world are, he assumes, native animals to which the Lehites applied old world names.
He also says that the grains and seeds they brought with them from Jerusalem “did grow exceedingly” (1 Nep 18:24) but that they must have soon died out. He points out that other colonizing parties around the world often are able to grow their seeds they brought with them for a few seasons but soon adapt and start growing the native plants for food because it’s simply easier and more suitable for the local climate. (p.35)
He doesn’t draw the obvious conclusion, but this would be one way of explaining why some of the non-American plants are mentioned in the Book of Mormon. They were either brought and died out or the flora and fawna was actually indigenous but they called them names they brought from the old world.
The other point made, which I’d never noticed, is that ‘corn’ (possibly maize, a very american crop) is not initially mentioned in the early Nephite settlements. It’s first mentioned in Mosiah 7:22 and 9:9. In other words, once the Nephites migrate north and meet up with the Mulekites they mention corn for the first time. The Mulekites are considered more likely by Sorenson to have mingled quickly with the locals and adopted their culture and farming practices. He suggests the speed of the corruption of their language is another evidence of this.
Sorenson (in chapter 2) goes out of his way to make a pre-populated continent viable. I’m expecting the whole premise of the mesoamerican model to be based on the willingness of the reader to accept that both the Lamanites and Nephites quickly mixed with different groups and soon followed and adopted local practices and cultures.
Quote:I’m expecting the whole premise of the mesoamerican model to be based on the willingness of the reader to accept that both the Lamanites and Nephites quickly mixed with different groups and soon followed and adopted local practices and cultures.
I’ve said this in other threads, but that’s flat-out the only way the population numbers in the Book of Mormon make sense – and those numbers make perfect sense with that base assumption. Seriously, the numbers make perfect sense with that foundation.
Thanks for the update Mackay. I enjoy discovering what an informed belief in the historicity of the BOM might look like.
It is important to realize that we all make assumptions. So If Mackay were to give me intructions on how to get to a “Mormon’s Codex” worldview – I imagine him as saying, “Go back 7 assumptions and make a left instead of a right. Follow the road signs from there.
Thanks Roy n Ray. I’ll keep the updates going. It’ll be a little slow going as it’s a lot to get through.
Having read most of chapter 3 I’m really enjoying reading a summary of the Book of Mormon history and culture. So much of the book is sermons it’s easy to miss the (sometimes implied) minor details.
For example:
The size of Zarahemla and lands at different stages.
King Benjamin’s era was likely little more than a small settlement. All of his subjects are able to get there with a day’s notice and gather around the temple, but big enough that the people at the back couldn’t hear. A few thousand maybe.
Later the lands of Zarahemla extends into many sprawling cities several days journey from each other.
Ammon’s king Lamoni is a sub-king. His father the super-king has a palace but Lamoni doesn’t, his is always simply called a house. “Lamanite” kings were perhaps not all related. Lamoni refers to one of the other sub-kings as one of his friends, not a brother. The super-king was possibly not even his biological father, they are given different lineage. So “Lamanite” groups were perhaps political alliances of different origins. There are many examples of Nephite defectors mixing with Lamanites. The term Lamanite is perhaps simply the nephite term for “other.”
Quote:The term Lamanite is perhaps simply the nephite term for “other.”
Yes – and I believe it happened quite early.
I’ll just add a few things to this discussion. First: Quote:I assume that if there were compelling reasons to ground the BOM in archeology and anthropology, then it would have been done already.
That sounds logical, and yet, for many reasons pointed out in other comments, it’s not rational either. The city of Troy (Trojan horse) from Greek mythology was considered by most to be fictional until it was discovered in modern day Turkey in 1865. How could it go undiscovered for thousands of years (many dated Troy to 12th century BC) in an area of the world that has been continuously populated and traversed since then? Well, it did. The legend of Troy was recited for thousands of years. The Book of Mormon has only been around for two hundred years.
I do think the most thorny problems with historicity are the absence of metal weapons, horses and elephants, but all of these disappear if the Book of Mormon actually took place in Malaysia, which also fits the geography:
http://www.wheatandtares.org/5314/the-legend-of-the-lost-book-of-gold-part-1-of-4/ http://www.wheatandtares.org/5317/the-legend-of-the-lost-book-of-gold-part-2-of-4/ http://www.wheatandtares.org/5318/the-legend-of-the-lost-book-of-gold-part-3-of-4/ The only other plausible alternative to it being historical is that Joseph Smith wrote it, and yet there are many issues with that as well:
1 – He didn’t seem too familiar with it if he authored it. His assumptions about it being all over the continent and about Native Americans being Lamanites are not endemic to the text. They seem like cultural assumptions of his day, not what it actually written. If he (as author) had those assumptions, why not state them explicitly?
2 – It’s bad in a whole different way. I’m with Mark Twain in considering the Book of Mormon bad prose. It’s not well written. But it IS intricately written, from multiple viewpoints, referring to complex source material that would be hard for an author to keep straight unless he had some serious notes. Mormon inserts his own commentary into the accounts he is transcribing, for example, and his moralizing inserts don’t match the original text. Again, that’s hard to make up on the fly. When I say it’s bad in a whole different way, I mean, the narrators of the Book of Mormon write like it’s their journal. They are preachy and didactic. They are repetitive. They use clunky phrases like “and it came to pass.” But the underlying complexity of the text exists even if they are beating you over the head with their bad literature.
3 – The theology of the BOM is not consistent with the later revelations JS received, most notably polygamy is decried. So are secret combinations (hello, temple! and worse, Danites!). The BOM also doesn’t reference things like theosis directly or God’s purposes in creating man; his tangible body is referenced, though. IOW, the BOM theology is a unique subset of things that are Mormon doctrine and Christian doctrine, but in a unique combination like any culture creates.
4 – What’s in the box? Gwyneth Paltrow’s head? I have a hard time seeing JS as someone who would create a prop and carry it around in a box. Maybe. He nearly got killed for it if so because it was “golden” so people were trying to filch it.
5 – Scribes Emma and Oliver Cowdery would have had to be complicit if JS was the author. After his death (before in the case of Oliver), both had means and motive to come clean if they had been involved in a fabrication, but neither did.
6 – My own BOM experience. I didn’t ask “Is it true?” which seemed too ambiguous, but instead, “Did this happen? Are these events historical?”
Beyond that, you’ve got some cranks and kooks who promote the Spalding-Rigdon manuscript theory, which no reputable historian gives any credence. I own a copy of the book Futility: The Wreck of the Titan (about the wreck of a great ocean liner that sank, resulting in the loss of half her crew and passengers). It was written in 1898, 14 years before the Titanic sank. That doesn’t mean author Morgan Robertson sank it.
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