Cumulative Review Of Book Of Mormon Correlations

[cksalmon]

Whoa, whoa... Just a sec. I want to weigh in on the sheum thing still. I did the research that CKS suggested I do. What I came up with was the sheum was an Akkadian word from the third millennium BCE. After that time, it was spelled and pronounced differently (Sorenson, American Setting p. 186). Sorenson therefore suggests that the term was brought over by the Jaredites. The trouble with this suggestion, of course, is that Mosiah 9:9 places the term on the lips of a Mulekite who has been instructed in the Nephite language some 2000 years later. That this word could survive 2,000 years of transmission by Jaredites-- who (if FARMS is to be believed) lived among and interacted regularly with other Mesopotamian cultures-- is frankly hard to believe. Even if it survives transmission, it must also survive the Ramah genocide and somehow pass into either Nephite or Mulekite usage. While it is remarkable to find that a Book of Mormon word that refers to an agricultural crop of some kind has a perfect parallel and a similar usage in an authentically ancient language, the means of transmission simply seems too outrageous to be believable.

Not to be a downer, but I give sheum no more than a 6. I can conceive of much better parallels than this.

-CK

You're input is highly valued by me, at least.

Dare I downgrade my rating?

The transmission issue is definitely the key issue with this proposed correlation.

I appreciate your bringing it to the fore.

maklelan?

Best.

CKS

[russianwolfe]

OK. I'll pick one that I'm nto convinced about yet. Chiasmus. I know the Book of Mormon is full of chiasmus, but some people claim the D&C and the Pearl of Great Price also contain chiasmus. I've looked at some of those claims and it seems kinda weak. A lot of them are very forced and very rudimentary. I've talked to Dr. Welch and he thinks they're not valid. I feel the chiasmus in the Book of Mormon is in a different league than the chiasmus in other purportedly revelatory texts (Book of the Law of the Lord, D&C, etc., etc.). Some think it's too complex to be Semitic. They point to Alma 36 and the entire book of I Nephi and say Hebrews didn't go to that much trouble. Irrespective, I think their presence has not been sufficiently explained by anyone who believes Joseph Smith, Martin Harris, Solomon Spaulding or anyone else concocted the Book of Mormon.

And for the comment about 'Hebrews didn't go to that much trouble', anyone believe that maybe the Nephites perfected it? Don't forget that Moroni thought the brother of Jared was a fantastic writer and was ashamed of his writing because of it. Maybe, just maybe, after almost 600 years, the Nephites actually did make a contribution to Semetic literature by perfecting the chiasmus.

Marvin

PS. Does anyone really expect any people not to improve on the good things they already have?

Whoa, whoa... Just a sec. I want to weigh in on the sheum thing still. I did the research that CKS suggested I do. What I came up with was the sheum was an Akkadian word from the third millennium BCE. After that time, it was spelled and pronounced differently (Sorenson, American Setting p. 186). Sorenson therefore suggests that the term was brought over by the Jaredites. The trouble with this suggestion, of course, is that Mosiah 9:9 places the term on the lips of a Mulekite who has been instructed in the Nephite language some 2000 years later. That this word could survive 2,000 years of transmission by Jaredites-- who (if FARMS is to be believed) lived among and interacted regularly with other Mesopotamian cultures-- is frankly hard to believe. Even if it survives transmission, it must also survive the Ramah genocide and somehow pass into either Nephite or Mulekite usage. While it is remarkable to find that a Book of Mormon word that refers to an agricultural crop of some kind has a perfect parallel and a similar usage in an authentically ancient language, the means of transmission simply seems too outrageous to be believable.

Not to be a downer, but I give sheum no more than a 6. I can conceive of much better parallels than this.

-CK

Consider this. Since Coriamtumr was still alive when the Zeniffites found him(was it them or someone else) would it not be possible that the righteous amoung the Jaredites were told to leave the Jaredite nation, a lot like Lehi, and to join with the Nephites? I have always thought that some of the Jaredite names seem to appear again amoung the Nephites. Indicating to me that there was some kind of transfer from the Jaredites to the Nephites. And where there are names, there are probably other things as well. Just a thought. The transfer of the word sheum would be simple since there are a lot of English words in other modern languages today.

Marvin

[Chris Smith]

This may be a bit broad.

Is there a specific instance(s) of chiasmus in BoM that you could point us toward, against which we could attempt to measure its correlative worth?

Best.

CKS

CK Salmon,

May I suggest Alma 36 as a good starting place? That's an example on which much has lately been written.

I proffer a bibliography for your perusal, preferably in the order listed here:

https://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInf...&ProdID=884

http://byustudies.byu.edu/chiasmus/

https://www.dialoguejournal.com/excerpts/38-4b.pdf

https://www.dialoguejournal.com/excerpts/38-4b.pdf

http://www.dialoguejournal.com/excerpts/e2.pdf

There are also a number of independent bloggers and freelance apologists who have addressed this question on their websites. Google is your friend.

-CK

[Chris Smith]

Consider this. Since Coriamtumr was still alive when the Zeniffites found him(was it them or someone else) would it not be possible that the righteous amoung the Jaredites were told to leave the Jaredite nation, a lot like Lehi, and to join with the Nephites? I have always thought that some of the Jaredite names seem to appear again amoung the Nephites.

I don't know about that, but there certainly might have been survivors from the Jaredite war who joined with the Mulekites. Sharing a common religion and all, they probably would have felt more at home with the Mulekites than with other nearby cultures. I don't see any evidence in the book for a massive influx of Jaredite refugees, but it is conceivable that there were some.

A little clarification on another point would be a great help in evaluating this issue. Sorenson places the Jaredites in Assyria because that's presumably where the tower of Babel was. But the confusion of languages and all that jazz is surely nothing more than a myth; the notion that the Jaredites spoke the Adamic tongue, a fable. I'm an evangelical with a high respect for the biblical text, but even I can't justify accepting the Bible's origin-of-languages myth. So then what are we to make of Jaredite prehistory? Can we, with any reasonable amount of confidence, place them in 3rd millennium Mesopotamia?

-CK

[maklelan]

Consider this. Since Coriamtumr was still alive when the Zeniffites found him(was it them or someone else) would it not be possible that the righteous amoung the Jaredites were told to leave the Jaredite nation, a lot like Lehi, and to join with the Nephites? I have always thought that some of the Jaredite names seem to appear again amoung the Nephites.

I don't know about that, but there certainly might have been survivors from the Jaredite war who joined with the Mulekites. Sharing a common religion and all, they probably would have felt more at home with the Mulekites than with other nearby cultures. I don't see any evidence in the book for a massive influx of Jaredite refugees, but it is conceivable that there were some.

A little clarification on another point would be a great help in evaluating this issue. Sorenson places the Jaredites in Assyria because that's presumably where the tower of Babel was. But the confusion of languages and all that jazz is surely nothing more than a myth; the notion that the Jaredites spoke the Adamic tongue, a fable. I'm an evangelical with a high respect for the biblical text, but even I can't justify accepting the Bible's origin-of-languages myth. So then what are we to make of Jaredite prehistory? Can we, with any reasonable amount of confidence, place them in 3rd millennium Mesopotamia?

-CK

My only concern with your analysis is the idea that the tower of Babel is a myth that must be rejected. If you have trouble believing it then that's your prerogative, but to reject the account of the Jaredites just because you find the tower of Babel hard to believe is pushing the limits a little. If you feel it can be upheld by scholarship then show us, but I don't think it fair to throw out an argument because it's "surely nothing more than a myth."

It appears the "sheum" question remains open, so is it ok if we hold off on chiasmus until this is resolved?

[cksalmon]

Consider this. Since Coriamtumr was still alive when the Zeniffites found him(was it them or someone else) would it not be possible that the righteous amoung the Jaredites were told to leave the Jaredite nation, a lot like Lehi, and to join with the Nephites? I have always thought that some of the Jaredite names seem to appear again amoung the Nephites.

I don't know about that, but there certainly might have been survivors from the Jaredite war who joined with the Mulekites. Sharing a common religion and all, they probably would have felt more at home with the Mulekites than with other nearby cultures. I don't see any evidence in the book for a massive influx of Jaredite refugees, but it is conceivable that there were some.

A little clarification on another point would be a great help in evaluating this issue. Sorenson places the Jaredites in Assyria because that's presumably where the tower of Babel was. But the confusion of languages and all that jazz is surely nothing more than a myth; the notion that the Jaredites spoke the Adamic tongue, a fable. I'm an evangelical with a high respect for the biblical text, but even I can't justify accepting the Bible's origin-of-languages myth. So then what are we to make of Jaredite prehistory? Can we, with any reasonable amount of confidence, place them in 3rd millennium Mesopotamia?

-CK

My only concern with your analysis is the idea that the tower of Babel is a myth that must be rejected. If you have trouble believing it then that's your prerogative, but to reject the account of the Jaredites just because you find the tower of Babel hard to believe is pushing the limits a little. If you feel it can be upheld by scholarship then show us, but I don't think it fair to throw out an argument because it's "surely nothing more than a myth."

It appears the "sheum" question remains open, so is it ok if we hold off on chiasmus until this is resolved?

Sounds good to me.

I certainly respect CK's opinion, but, personally, I'm not comfortable tying a provenance-based rejection of sheum to a rejection of the historicity of the Babel story. Not at this time, anyway.

You've both inspired me to delve more deeply into the subject, though.

I guess we're stuck with sheum for the next bit.

Best.

CKS

[Uncle Dale]

I know the Book of Mormon is full of chiasmus...

If it is not too much trouble, would you mind listing the locations of a couple of dozen

of the most strikings examples of this in the BoM.

UD

[Chris Smith]

maklelan,

My rejection of the Babel story comes quite simply from the fact that there's no evidence for a sudden transition from a unified language to diverse languages. Languages evolved and diversified gradually over time. There may well have been a real tower of Babel (the Babylonian ziggurat is a solid candidate, even though it survived through 500 BC and reached its greatest height under Nebuchadnezzar), but I don't think we can place the origin of all language there.

In any case, if we accept the Babel legend, then the Jaredites were in the right time and place, but spoke the wrong language. Their language would have been Adamic, not Akkadian. I suppose Akkadian might be Adamic, but then again, Akkadian was preceded in Mesopotamia by Sumerian. If Adam spoke a known language, it would probably be Sumerian.

Sorenson proposes that the Jaredites borrow this word from Akkadian. But this just adds an additional layer of complexity. Even if we grant that the Jaredites were in the right time and place, that they borrowed an Akkadian word, that they transported this word across the ocean and it survived two thousand years, that it survived the genocide of Ramah and was absorbed by the Mulekites into their language, and that even when writing in Nephite Zeniff chose to use a Mulekite/Jaredite word, what are the odds that of all the words in the Mulekite language he would choose the one with an untainted Akkadian provenance to remain untranslated?

It all just seems highly improbable. If I bump my rating up to a 7, can we reach an agreement?

-CK

I know the Book of Mormon is full of chiasmus...

If it is not too much trouble, would you mind listing the locations of a couple of dozen

of the most strikings examples of this in the BoM.

UD

Unk,

If you go here (https://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=884) and order the PDF (it's free), they'll send you an email where you can download Welch's article. Then just scroll down. Welch parses about 10 examples of complex chiastic structures in the BoM.

-CK

[cdowis]

>The trouble with this suggestion, of course, is that Mosiah 9:9 places the term on the lips of a Mulekite who has been instructed in the Nephite language some 2000 years later. That this word could survive 2,000 years of transmission by Jaredites-- who (if FARMS is to be believed) lived among and interacted regularly with other Mesoamerican cultures-- is frankly hard to believe.

Latin has not been spoken for thousands of years (except for Catholic mass), yet we have many loan words from that language.

Sheum is probably a loan word, not a Mulekite actually speaking Akkadian. And "sh" was an acceptable pronounciation of the word. Anyway, as a loan word, the pronunciation itself may have been slightly changed from the original.

It really is hard for me to believe that a list of grains would, **by coincidence**, include a word from an ancient Middle Eastern language. Now, that IS hard to believe.

I guess what we find hard to believe is based on our belief system.

[cksalmon]

maklelan,

My rejection of the Babel story comes quite simply from the fact that there's no evidence for a sudden transition from a unified language to diverse languages. Languages evolved and diversified gradually over time. There may well have been a real tower of Babel (the Babylonian ziggurat is a solid candidate, even though it survived through 500 BC and reached its greatest height under Nebuchadnezzar), but I don't think we can place the origin of all language there.

A bit off-topic.

While I'm comfortable rejecting a literal reading of the Creation account, and assume Job is didactic rather than historical, etc., I haven't studied the Tower of Babel story in depth. I'd never thought of reading it as mythical. From what I remember (I'll have to read it through again), it seems to have read like a fairly straight-forward historical account. (Perhaps I should have read it before I began this post!)

This is not the case with the Creation account, and it is certainly not the case with Job. I know Solomon didn't write Ecclesiastes. Etc.

I'm wondering what textual clues or structures help lead you in the direction of reading it mythically. As this is off-topic, feel free to PM me with your take, if you're interested. Would you reject its historicity merely because historical evidence is lacking?

Curious.

Best to you, friend.

CKS

Oh, and everyone knows Adam spoketh Hebrew, punks.

Best to all.

CKS

[maklelan]

maklelan,

My rejection of the Babel story comes quite simply from the fact that there's no evidence for a sudden transition from a unified language to diverse languages. Languages evolved and diversified gradually over time. There may well have been a real tower of Babel (the Babylonian ziggurat is a solid candidate, even though it survived through 500 BC and reached its greatest height under Nebuchadnezzar), but I don't think we can place the origin of all language there.

In any case, if we accept the Babel legend, then the Jaredites were in the right time and place, but spoke the wrong language. Their language would have been Adamic, not Akkadian. I suppose Akkadian might be Adamic, but then again, Akkadian was preceded in Mesopotamia by Sumerian. If Adam spoke a known language, it would probably be Sumerian.

I appreciate the elucidation. While I agree that it's difficult to find a spot in time where the language pericope fits, we don't have to throw out the baby with the bath water. There can be a dozen different ways to explain how it worked, and a Jaredite culture can fit in. The mere presence of this word testifies that something is going on that is beyond our current perception. I do not believe that the presence of this word is a mere coincidence. David Bokovoy mentions another Akkadianism in Helaman 7. Something is at work here. The causality of the historical method is not an exact science, it's an art. Philosophers have speculated that going from cause to effect is not difficult, but to go from effect to cause is utterly impossible. History tries to do just that. To reject the whole narrative because one element of it is not plausible goes beyond what I believe history can do at this point. I will propose an 8 in light of your argument, but it is not my call. We need a consensus.

[cksalmon]

maklelan,

My rejection of the Babel story comes quite simply from the fact that there's no evidence for a sudden transition from a unified language to diverse languages. Languages evolved and diversified gradually over time. There may well have been a real tower of Babel (the Babylonian ziggurat is a solid candidate, even though it survived through 500 BC and reached its greatest height under Nebuchadnezzar), but I don't think we can place the origin of all language there.

In any case, if we accept the Babel legend, then the Jaredites were in the right time and place, but spoke the wrong language. Their language would have been Adamic, not Akkadian. I suppose Akkadian might be Adamic, but then again, Akkadian was preceded in Mesopotamia by Sumerian. If Adam spoke a known language, it would probably be Sumerian.

I appreciate the elucidation. While I agree that it's difficult to find a spot in time where the language pericope fits, we don't have to throw out the baby with the bath water. There can be a dozen different ways to explain how it worked, and a Jaredite culture can fit in. The mere presence of this word testifies that something is going on that is beyond our current perception. I do not believe that the presence of this word is a mere coincidence. David Bokovoy mentions another Akkadianism in Helaman 7. Something is at work here. The causality of the historical method is not an exact science, it's an art. Philosophers have speculated that going from cause to effect is not difficult, but to go from effect to cause is utterly impossible. History tries to do just that. To reject the whole narrative because one element of it is not plausible goes beyond what I believe history can do at this point. I will propose an 8 in light of your argument, but it is not my call. We need a consensus.

The proposed Bokovoy Akkadianism in Helaman 7 is more than a bit of a reach, to my mind. It is absolutely not word based, as in the case of sheum. I'd give it no more than a 2. Actually, it's not so much an Akkadianism as it is an associational chain of possible Akkadian influence. I don't think we should confuse the two.

Sheum remains a far more sustainable Akkadianism than the, to my mind, convoluted associational chain cited by Bokovoy. (No offense meant to him, by the way.)

I think we may have discovered a new way to interact on FAIRboards.org: polite consensus against the backdrop of conflicting worldviews. It seems quite civil.

I'm willing to go 7.5...?

Best.

CKS

[Chris Smith]

CK Salmon, I took the "myth" question to a different thread. I didn't talk specifically about Babel, because I haven't studied it much. But its explanatory power + the contradictory historical evidence, in my mind, puts it into the same category as the other fairly dubious stories related in the first few chapters of Genesis.

I'm willing to go 7.5 on sheum. I don't want to minimize the poignancy of the parallel, but I do think we have to mark it down for being the wrong time and place. It's a little like BoM parallels to Swedenborg; they're good parallels, but we don't really have any reason to believe that Smith had read Swedenborg during his formative years.

-CK

[Not quite me]

whats a 9.5?

The correlation rating maklelan and I have agreed upon for BoM "sheum" (9.5/10).

maklelanâ??

Looks like we're the only interested parties (along wth Her Amun). But I'm ready to move on if you are. You pick next.

Best to you.

CKS

I'm reserving judgment on sheum. I've seen exactly 1 reference to it in a 1956 journal article. I was able to see the first page of the article, but not the rest. The only other references to sheum are Mormons pointing gleefully to said 1956 article. I'd like some corroboration.

[David Bokovoy]

I did the research that CKS suggested I do. What I came up with was the sheum was an Akkadian word from the third millennium BCE. After that time, it was spelled and pronounced differently (Sorenson, American Setting p. 186).

Do we know that the pronunciation of sheum changed. Weâ??re dealing with a dead language, so the issue of pronunciation is a mute issue. We donâ??t know how Mesopotamians pronounced the word, but by 600 BC, the form appears without a final â??m.â? In Akkadian, the phenomenon known as mimmation disappeared after the Old Babylonian period, i.e., 1500 BC.

Technically, the Akkadian word for barley is â??sheâ? The â??uâ? vowel is the nominative case ending. If the word appeared as a direct object, i.e., accusative form, it would contain an â??aâ? vowel, As a genitival form, the word would appear with a final â??i.â?

If anyone cares to look up the Akkadian word for barley, you will find it listed in the CAD or the Concise Akkadian Ditionary under sheu(m).

The proposed Bokovoy Akkadianism in Helaman 7 is more than a bit of a reach, to my mind. It is absolutely not word based, as in the case of sheum

It was word based. Helaman 7 contains the word â??gate,â? i.e. bab as in the tower of â??babel

[Chris Smith]

Do we know that the pronunciation of sheum changed. Weâ??re dealing with a dead language, so the issue of pronunciation is a mute issue. We donâ??t know how Mesopotamians pronounced the word, but by 600 BC, the form appears without a final â??m.â? In Akkadian, the phenomenon known as mimmation disappeared after the Old Babylonian period, i.e., 1500 BC.

Technically, the Akkadian word for barley is â??sheâ? The â??uâ? vowel is the nominative case ending. If the word appeared as a direct object, i.e., accusative form, it would contain an â??aâ? vowel, As a genitival form, the word would appear with a final â??i.â?

If anyone cares to look up the Akkadian word for barley, you will find it listed in the CAD or the Concise Akkadian Ditionary under sheu(m).

Interesting. Cognates from Latin are usually based on the genitive form, but that's probably unique to Latin.

The pronunciation bit was Sorenson's point, not mine. In any case, I appreciate the input.

-CK

[The Dude]

Let's not become needlessly distracted by the ancient origins of words in the BoM that Mormon "might have" known but Joseph Smith "wouldn't" have, because all the words in the Book of Mormon came from Joseph Smith's mouth. None of them came from the plates.

So the question is: how did Joseph Smith come up with "sheum"? Was it from God or was it a coincidence?

Incidentally (or coincidentally) the words Moroni and Cumorah are the name of an island off the coast of Africa and that island's largest city. It is the same problem: How did Joseph Smith come up with those words? Was it by design or was it just a coincidence?

[maklelan]

Incidentally (or coincidentally) the words Moroni and Cumorah are the name of an island off the coast of Africa and that island's largest city. It is the same problem: How did Joseph Smith come up with those words? Was it by design or was it just a coincidence?

The Island has both names? Cumorah can also come from the Hebrew comer, which is a false priest from the Bible. Cohen is a priest, and priesthood is cahuna. Comer, making the same changes, would be camora (the mem makes the vowel change to an "o"), or Cumorah as we spell it in the Book of Mormon. Cute little fact.

[The Dude]

No, the island is Comoros (also Camora/Comora) and the capital is Moroni.

It's just funny that Joseph Smith had the names Cumorah and Moroni before he ever began translating the plates. They were associated in his story about the plates, with "Moroni" as the angel that instructed him and "Cumorah" as the hill where the plates were burried. And whaddayaknow, in real life the two names were/are geographically associated, since the island and city were called by these names even in Joseph Smith's time. Did he know that? (I'm willing to say he didn't, and it was just a coincidence.)

Put that in your "Book of Mormon Correlations" pipe and smoke it.

[noel00]

Its interesting the word "mormon" was associated with the puffin bird. http://www.audubon.org/bird/BoA/F44_G1a.html So there were "Mormon" in America before Smith's followers. Apparently the word means "frightening" in Greek. The puffin birds had black patches around their eyes and so looked frightening. I also saw once in an Italian book that a Bishop had the surname "Moroni" Years ago Wesley Walters sent me a Christam card with some Puffin Birds on the front and his comment was "some "Mormons" coming to greet you" . lol

[cdowis]

>Their [Jaredite} language would have been Adamic,

As Nibley points out, the BOM tells us that the Jaredite language was not confounded among themselves and their friends. It does not specifically say that it was the original Adamic language. Like the Hill Cumorah and no inhabitants when Lehi landed, this is just another myth not supported by the BOM text.

[cdowis]

>Incidentally (or coincidentally) the words Moroni and Cumorah are the name of an island off the coast of Africa and that island's largest city. It is the same problem: How did Joseph Smith come up with those words? Was it by design or was it just a coincidence?

I did abit of research on this, and found some interesting tidbits on its history. First it was not inhabited by Africans but Arabs, among others. Thus, these names probably came from the Arabs. (Need I mention that Lehi and his family traveled ..... etc)

Anyway, you can read it for yourself.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Madagascar

[The Dude]

I did abit of research on this, and found some interesting tidbits on its history. First it was not inhabited by Africans but Arabs, among others. Thus, these names probably came from the Arabs. (Need I mention that Lehi and his family traveled ..... etc)

Actually, the names are not Arabic. "Moroni" comes from the local language and means "at the place of fire." "Comoro" comes from old Swahili and also means a place of fire. The islands are highly volcanic and Moroni is built at the base of an active shield volcano called Karthala. So that much makes perfect sense.

Now how did Joseph Smith come up with this pair of names, and before he even acquired the plates?

I call it coincidence, but that's my explanation for everything.

[cdowis]

>"Moroni" comes from the local language and means "at the place of fire." "Comoro" comes from old Swahili and also means a place of fire.

1. And the "local language" is derived from.....? Are you saying that you know for a fact, Arabic has nothing to do with this place name?

2. And you are certain that place names in Madagasgar come from Swahili? You know that for a fact, is that correct.

Or, is this similar to the word Mormon coming from Greek, Chinese, etc. Can you directly tie this place name to Swahili? For example, other Swahili place names in Madagasgar would be of interest, Swahili speaking inhabitants living in this area, etc.

Not trying to be argumentitive, but there is alot of garbage out there on the internet. Just trying to find out if this is wheat or chaff.

[freakin a man]

No, the island is Comoros (also Camora/Comora) and the capital is Moroni.

It's just funny that Joseph Smith had the names Cumorah and Moroni before he ever began translating the plates. They were associated in his story about the plates, with "Moroni" as the angel that instructed him and "Cumorah" as the hill where the plates were burried. And whaddayaknow, in real life the two names were/are geographically associated, since the island and city were called by these names even in Joseph Smith's time. Did he know that? (I'm willing to say he didn't, and it was just a coincidence.)

Put that in your "Book of Mormon Correlations" pipe and smoke it.

Can you show a map from the 1820's that Joseph Smith would have used to know this. I know the Tanners in their claims showed a map about 50 years AFTER the Book of Mormon was published that using a map that old would mean that Joseph Smith had a time machine.