Nhm

[phaedrus ut]

1 Nephi

16:32 And it came to pass that I did return to our tents, bearing the beasts which I had slain; and now when they beheld that I had obtained food, how great was their joy! And it came to pass that they did humble themselves before the Lord, and did give thanks unto him.

16:33 And it came to pass that we did again take our journey, traveling nearly the same course as in the beginning; and after we had traveled for the space of many days we did pitch our tents again, that we might tarry for the space of a time.

16:34 And it came to pass that Ishmael died, and was buried in the place which was called Nahom.

Completely ignored in this discussion is evidence discovered 1982 by D. Bluth of Payson,ut. D. Bluth was a former BYU student and obviously well acquianted with the Book of Mormon. What Mr. Bluth discovered was nimh. In recreating an extant text and publishing his findings for a wider audience Mr. Bluth's research reveals something in common with NHM. Like the altar that reads "Bi'athar, son of Sawad, son of Naw'an, the Nihmite, has consecrated to Almaqah Fari'at" the Nihmite is believed to be the tribal name of a person that came from a location with the root NHM. Like the nihmite, nimh is the name of a particular location but also became the associated group name of those previously living at that location. In the text the protagonist journeys to nimh and battles those of nimh.

Also the particular nomenclature and common usage has the acronym nimh pronounced as a single word rather than an initialism.

In showing additional evidence of antiquity nimh is also the Scottish Gaelic word for "poison" or "venom". This association with death is completely consistent with Ishmael's death in 1 Nephi 16:34.

The mathematically probabilities are far beyond coincidence. Right place right, right time, right word. Here is the list.

• Nmh and Nimh both tribal names and locations(HIT)
  
• Both are developed in a modern LDS context based on earlier written text (HIT).
  
• Both nhm and nimh as related to and associated with death and this is corroborated with a matching term in a ancient language(HIT).
  
• In the narrative of the texts we have both Ishmael sickness and death in 1 Nephi 16:34 and the apparently pneumonia of the protagonists family member in the nimh text(HIT).
  
• The nimh text has the use of a red stone amulet that doesn't have it's own powers but depends on the internal strength of it's possessor. This is much like the Liahonna working depending on righteousness(HIT).
  
• Both words have corroboration with a matching definition in an ancient language related to death.(Hit)
  

Additional details regarding nimh can be found here.

Phaedrus

[awyatt]

Completely ignored in this discussion is evidence discovered 1982 by D. Bluth of Payson,ut...

Funny, but irrelevant. Don Bluth wrote an intriguing story. Notice, as well, that it is not nimh, but NIMH, as in National Institute of Mental Health. You should be more precise, Phaedrus.

-Allen

[phaedrus ut]

Funny, but irrelevant. Don Bluth wrote an intriguing story. Notice, as well, that it is not nimh, but NIMH, as in National Institute of Mental Health. You should be more precise, Phaedrus.

-Allen

I was precise. I noted that nimh was an acronym pronounced as a word rather than an initialism. In that way it's like NATO rather than KGB. The 6 points listed on my evidences are far more specific and robust than the six initial ones listed by the OP.

I'm sure the "anti's" will come in and immediately dismiss this evidence. Or they will try to point out that there is more misses than hits. In fact I predict that someone like The Dude will just say it's a "coincidence". But the facts remain how could Joseph had gotten all this right?

As pointed out by Jerubaal the Joseph Smith Frontier Library must have had more than just books. It must have contained this "illuminated manuscript" because Joseph can't be just one lucky guesser again!

Phaedrus

[Olavarria]

Why does the BOM get almost everything wrong about the new world and the Old World?

Start a thread and back this assertion up. Back it up with evidence!

BOM completely misrepresents the flora, fauna, and topography of the lands proposed by the Limited Geography Theory.

start a thread!

Or even the random coincidence of the city Moroni on the Comoros Island. Both blow the NHM "evidence" out of the water by a factor of untold multiples.

Critics like to focus on the name. Proponants focus on the name and everthing else. Facts are stuburn things. Your post is the king of red herrings.

[Olavarria]

The altar reads "Bi'athar, son of Sawad, son of Naw'an, the Nihmite, has consecrated to Almaqah Fari'at" Nihmite is assumed to be a tribal name from the root NHM. It wasn't called Nahom. It was likely called Nihm or Nehem(see Kent Brown JBMS 8:1).

Just the existence of the name NHM in South Arabia does not rise to the level of evidence. Is NHM the name of a location or just a tribal name? Is NHM Nahom? Or is it Nuhum or Niham or Nohm. Since the place is known to the people as Nihm are we to assume is was different anciently? Remember the name on the altar refers to a tribe and has the possibility of also being a place name. How likely are a people to forget how to pronounce their own tribal name?

As far as I understand, in semetic languages what count are the constanants. NHM can equal Nehem,Nahom or Nahum depending on the context and language.

The evidence is not just in the name, but the name reletive to the correct time(600 bce), place( 6-9 months journey from Palestine and nearly due east of the only possible Bountiful{Wadi Sayq, which has all the makings of a bountiful, ancient ship building tradition dating to at least 500BCE,or so say the native arab muslim scholars}). Again, its not just the name, ye masters of the strawman, but the name in the place at the time, Which could not have been known by Jospeh Smith.

The records that Joseph Smith translated claim to come from the ancient world(and they do). Their validity as ancient texts must be tested by comparing them to what is known about the ancient world and other ancient texts. One does not study the Dead Sea Scrolls by comparing them to the works of Jane Austen. One studys the Dead Sea Scrolls by comparing them ancient christian and jewish texts from the perod. The same goes for the Book of Mormon

[phaedrus ut]

Her Amum,

The flora/fauna problems of the BOM have been discussed here so often that starting such a thread may not only be redundant but only enjoyed ad nauseum. You're welcome to start one if you wish. If you are just curious here is the recent Horses in the Book of Mormon thread.

The reality is NHM only has evidentuary value when view through the eyes of the believer. A bigger question is why NHM? Why does this difficult match hold the present best evidence for the BOM? The Ensign from Feb. 2001 said it best when discussing Nahom "This is the first archaeological find that supports a Book of Mormon place-name other than Jerusalem or the Red Sea"

The distance between the apologetics written to associate with someone called "the Nihmite" with NHM then back to Nahom is strained. It requires dismissing all the other evidence that indicates the name isn't Nahom. And accepting some casual associations made by apologists.

If the scholarship connecting "the Nihmite" to the Nahom is acceptable then my subsequent analysis on The Secret of Nimh should be given serious consideration.

Phaedrus

[cdowis]

>The distance between the apologetics written to associate with someone called "the Nihmite" with NHM then back to Nahom is strained.

So you subscribe to Dude's coincidence theory? Just a jumble of letters which happen to be coincident in the BOM text with another jumble of letters in the correct geographical location. Otherwise it has no meaning.

Is that your view?

Just a coincidence.

[Olavarria]

The reality is NHM only has evidentuary when view through the eyes of the believer.

More ad hominums....why am i surprised.

The flora/fauna problems of the BOM have been discussed here so often that starting such a thread may not only be redundant but only enjoyed ad nauseum

You made a sweeping assertion, please, back it up. It would be no more redundant than this thread.

bigger question is why NHM? Why does this difficult match hold the present best evidence for the BOM? The Ensign from Feb. 2001 said it best when discussing Nahom "This is the first archaeological find that supports a Book of Mormon place-name other than Jerusalem or the Red Sea

Dodging the issues raised in my original post....sigh

[charity]

phaedrus wrote, "I noted that nimh was an acronym pronounced as a word rather than an initialism. In that way it's like NATO rather than KGB." Dang. And to think all this time I have been giving it the Russian pronounciation of "kugub." Oops.

But really, phaedrus, why would you ask why only an Old World place could be located and no New World places. The answer is continuous occupation. That is a fact in the Old World. Many, if not most, of the ancient sites in the New World do not have continuous occupation. There is not even any way to know from the existing writings how to pronounce any of them. But I suspect you already knew that.

[phaedrus ut]

Dodging the issues raised in my original post....sigh

How am I dodging the issues? You summarize the Kent Brown's paper. I first saw Brown's idea's when he published them in JBMS studies in 1999. I even cited that paper earlier in the thread when I mentioned that the location "wasn't called Nahom. It was likely called Nihm or Nehem" here.

Maybe I missed something in your original post. I'll go back and see if you are raising issues and I'll respond accordingly.

cdowis,

I've looked at this issue as both a believer and a skeptic. My conclusion is that it's coincidence. And not even a good coincidence at that. As I mentioned earlier I think it's very strange there isn't more coincidencidental matches. Considering the opportunity for such matches it's strange there isn't that could really stand on it's own.

Of course I know plenty of people to whom the absence of evidence is the evidence. It's the "the adversary hiding the truth".

Phaedrus

[maklelan]

Maklelan:

Speculating about why a particular passage is translated the way it is is perfectly pointless. It involves multiple assumptions about a revelatory translation process which I daresay no one participating on this board has experienced. It requires us to read not only the mind of Joseph Smith, but the mind of God.

If I were forced to speculate as to why that particular translation was made, I might suggest that God knew it would evetually be recognized as a Hebraism, and did it to annoy anti-Mormons.

http://www.fairboards.org/index.php?s=&amp...mp;p=1208013024

Here is my post:

Yeah, Phaedrus! Way to engage that evidence!

To both Dan and Phaedrus, I would like to remind you that Joseph Smith didn't really translate characters written on ancient plates. He dictated the word "Nahom", supposedly as it appeared in the stone he was viewing in a darkened hat. Because of that, I don't think we can be tied to the logic of "a twenty-six-century-old South Arabian toponym, heard by traveling Hebrews, that was recorded, most likely, in a demotic Egyptian script (probably several decades after leaving the area), and that was then transliterated into Roman letters."

Why not? Nephi was not under the influence of revelation or inspiration when he heard the name. He was not given revelation on how to spell it when he recorded it. His script was not magically altered to represent a transcendant representation of the word. He was not given revelation when he remembered the name. God (whether directly from Nephi's text, or from his own understanding) did transliterate it into Roman letters. These things in no way, shape, or form make Joseph's Smith's style of translation an issue.

Please point out where I explain the "why" of anything at all.

Your post addressed the opinion that if Joseph Smith received the spelling of the name through supernatural means, then it could not have possibly been transmitted through the channels to which someone referred. I opined that, irrespective of the manner of transmittal from the plates to Joseph Smith, Nephi had to hear the word, understand it in his own language, write it down in a different language, and it then had to be presented to Joseph Smith in Roman letters. Those are several stages, and we cannot expect the spelling and pronunciation to remain perfect. Irrespective of how God transmitted it, it went from one language to another to get to Joseph. That is transliteration. I never made a single statement about why anything was translated, and it was never my intention to so do. I feel this is perfectly clear. Is that reasonable?

[Daniel Peterson]

The reality is NHM only has evidentuary value when view through the eyes of the believer.

I can't begin to fathom why you would imagine that to be "the reality."

A bigger question is why NHM? Why does this difficult match hold the present best evidence for the BOM? The Ensign from Feb. 2001 said it best when discussing Nahom "This is the first archaeological find that supports a Book of Mormon place-name other than Jerusalem or the Red Sea."

Saying that it's the first direct toponymic evidence is not the same thing as saying that it's the best evidence altogether.

My conclusion is that it's coincidence.

Dude II.

And not even a good coincidence at that. As I mentioned earlier I think it's very strange there isn't more coincidencidental matches. Considering the opportunity for such matches it's strange there isn't that could really stand on it's own.

You think that there should be scads and scads of Old South Arabian toponyms in the handful of chapters that summarize the Lehite party's passage through sparsely-populated Arabia in the early sixth-century BCE? A passage that seems, at one point at least, to have been deliberately seeking to avoid contact with other people?

Why on earth would you expect that?

[latterdayteancum]

Joseph Smith dicated the book from a stone in his hat. Unless you can read his mind, and the mind of God, you have no idea if Semitic philology is relevant or not.

The book is what it is. You shouldn't pretend to know more about the method of it's production that the rest of us.

Aren't we talking about the plausibility? I don't believe Daniel Peterson presented his explanation as fact.

[cdowis]

++++++++++++++++++

cdowis,

I've looked at this issue as both a believer and a skeptic. My conclusion is that it's coincidence. And not even a good coincidence at that. As I mentioned earlier I think it's very strange there isn't more coincidencidental matches. Considering the opportunity for such matches it's strange there isn't that could really stand on it's own.

Of course I know plenty of people to whom the absence of evidence is the evidence. It's the "the adversary hiding the truth".

Phaedrus

++++++++++++++++++++++

And the Land Bountiful which is also where the BOM tells us, relative to NHM. It has twelve points which correspond to the BOM text. Just another coincidence.

I assume it is possible that JS took a trip to the Arabian peninsula to carefully map out Lehi's trip to correspond to actual geographical features.

I believe that idea makes more sense than the coincidence theory.

He extensively studied the ancient languages -- Egyptian (Paanchi, Pahoran) , Akkadian (sheum), Hebrew (Mosiah, Alma as a male name, etc).

Nope, too many coincidences. This was a deliberate attempt, and as Albright indicated in his letter, he went to alot of time and expense to fool those NY farmers.

[Olavarria]

How am I dodging the issues?

You havent explained away the name of the place with the relevant name and time and its trajectory in relation to Palestine and Wadi Sayq(the only place that has all the makings of Bountiful)

[Luigi]

Could someone please give a link to this research on Bountiful-I would love to see how convincing it is but I've yet to see the research on Wayd Saqr(or whatever it is). If this is really the ONLY place that could be Bountiful it seems it would have required a pretty thorough investigation of the entire Arabian coastline.

[It occurs to me . . .]

We're talking about a twenty-six-century-old South Arabian toponym, heard by traveling Hebrews, that was recorded, most likely, in a demotic Egyptian script (probably several decades after leaving the area), and that was then transliterated into Roman letters.

Since the place is known to the people as Nihm are we to assume is was different anciently?

With the passage of 2600 years, and given the shift from the South Arabian language current in the area in 600 BC to Arabic proper (a quite distinct Semitic language whose oldest written texts date from fully a thousand years after Lehi), I would be absolutely astonished if it were not different anciently.

Remember the name on the altar refers to a tribe and has the possibility of also being a place name. How likely are a people to forget how to pronounce their own tribal name?

With the passage of twenty-six centuries, or roughly 100 generations, and in view of the massive cultural and linguistic shift that occurred with the spread of Arabic and the rise of Islam, it is very likely indeed that pronunciation of the name would change.

There are even variations between classical Arabic and the various local vernaculars, including variations in the pronunciation of toponyms. The pyramids of Egypt, for example, stand on the outskirts of Giza. But that's Cairene-dialect Arabic. In the dialect of Luxor and the Egyptian Saâ??id, and in the classical language, the pyramids stand on the outskirts of Jiza. Jerusalem is called al-Quds in modern standard Arabic, but al-â??uds in colloquial Palestinian.

Since translation assumes a Hebrew name written in reformed Egyptian on the plates and then translated to English wouldn't you expect the translator to try to match the sound of the name not a close spelling?

What makes you think that a Hebrew place name was somehow sitting there in the southeast Arabian Peninsula in 600 BC?

I've been thinking about this post the last few days. I'm not a linguist, so can someone tell me where my thinking is screwed up?

We have Lehi et al traveling through the area 600 BC, hearing a local name in an unfamiliar language, decades later, someone writes down the name phonetically in a "demotic Egyptian script". This subsequently goes through no one knows how many rewrites over approximately 800 years (are we assuming that all these scribes had working knowledge of Hebrew, and demotic Egyptian script?) Later this is transalated phonetically into English by Joseph (or he saw the actual word appear of the stone, we can't seem to reach a consensus on this).

What would amaze me was if there were any resemblance at all. How did this exact word (or at least the essentials) make it through all these steps?

I mean, how accurate was Marco Polo's phonetic Chinese? If someone who didn't understand Italian tried to rewrite the "phonetic Chinese Italian" into a third language, how much correlation would we expect between the real Chinese and the last translation? I would be amazed to see one that had all the essential letters in the right place.

Again, someone tell me what I'm missing.

[The Dude]

What would amaze me was if there were any resemblance at all. How did this exact word (or at least the essentials) make it through all these steps?

Coincidence!!

Also, remember that the site was not found by following 1 Nephi like a treasure map. Oh, no -- someone just coincidentally stumbled upon it. Is it possible that the true site of "Nahom" is actually somewhere else in the Arabian peninsula? I would like one of the hard-core proponents to offer a % likelyhood estimate that NHM represents the true site.

[phaedrus ut]

How am I dodging the issues?

You havent explained away the name of the place with the relevant name and time and its trajectory in relation to Palestine and Wadi Sayq(the only place that has all the makings of Bountiful)

I did explain how the name doesn't match how both the people and the region have been historically known. In addition the eventual transcription of this to Nahom is very unlikey considering it's lack of a suitable etymological match.

You have completely ignored my six direct points of evidence for NHM and Nimh!

I do have a proposal for you. We find a suitable linguistic anthropologist with a background in the near east. We present them with the evidence. And see if they find the any confidence in the "match". There is probably a good dozen universities with departments of Near Eastern Languages just here in the US. Many more if we go internationally. Either randomly or picked by you I will approach an expert at one of these institutions and present them with only the positive evidence for Nahom asking for their opinion. If they agree that NHM is strong evidence then I will conceed as much. On the other hand if they disagree on NHM then I ask the same concession.

What do you think?

Phaedrus

[phaedrus ut]

Her Amun,

Are you interested in my offer to put this before a third-party?

Phaedrus

[consiglieri]

Her Amun?

Are you interested in my offer to put this before a third-party?

Phaedrus

I don't know about Her Amun, but I would be interested in the opinions of other non-interested third-parties.

I think the problem associated with this, however, is getting a non-interested third party with sufficient credentials to weigh in on a subject like this when it becomes evident (as I think it would have to) that we are looking at this as confirmation of an aspect of a golden book given by an angel to a ploughboy.

That does tend to put off a number of sufficiently credentialed third parties. Any ideas on how to work around this problem?

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[Olavarria]

Also, remember that the site was not found by following 1 Nephi like a treasure map. Oh, no -- someone just coincidentally stumbled upon it. Is it possible that the true site of "Nahom" is actually somewhere else in the Arabian peninsula?

Wrong, Nibly was the first to propuse roughly what is now known as Lehi's trail, along with the Nehem/Nahom link. The altars in Marib simple confirm what was not confirmable when Nibly did his research: that NHM existed, where it is today, during 600bce.

[Olavarria]

Her Amun?

Are you interested in my offer to put this before a third-party?

Phaedrus

I don't know about Her Amun, but I would be interested in the opinions of other non-interested third-parties.

I think the problem associated with this, however, is getting a non-interested third party with sufficient credentials to weigh in on a subject like this when it becomes evident (as I think it would have to) that we are looking at this as confirmation of an aspect of a golden book given by an angel to a ploughboy.

That does tend to put off a number of sufficiently credentialed third parties. Any ideas on how to work around this problem?

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

Here, here

Are you interested in my offer to put this before a third-party?

Ya go ahead?

What criterion are going to be used to identify someone as an unterested third party?

Are you going to buy them every mormon book or DVD done on the subject?

I take science seriosly. I am grateful for the insights scholars(mormon and non) contribute to the understanding of the world around us. However, I dont see what such an excersise would prove. I have the power of reason. I will not surrender that power to a PHD. Nor would I surrender that power to a Latter-Day Prophet. Frankly, to see you willing to change your opinion based on one man's or group of men's word only is somewhat disturbing

Anti: "I dont believe in Lehi's trail"

non mormon PhD: "its a nifty match."

Anti: "Ok now i believe in it"

mormon: "i believe the BoM is true."

non-mormon scholar: "I dont"

mormon: "ok, I dont either."

[Not quite me]

Anti: "I dont believe in Lehi's trail"

non mormon PhD: "its a nifty match."

Anti: "Ok now i believe in it"

mormon: "i believe the BoM is true."

non-mormon scholar: "I dont"

mormon: "ok, I dont either."

I think it would be more like this:

critic: I think the NHM issue is bogus

non-Mormon scholar: I don't

critic: ok, I don't either

Or vice versa.

[cdowis]

>treasure map

There were several attempts to follow Lehi's trail, and evidence of NHM was discovered during these investigations:

"In 1976, Lynn M. and Hope Hilton traveled though Arabia and published an illustrated report in which they proposed that the place called Nahom, where Ishmael died and was buried, was around Al Kunfidah near the Red Sea coast of Saudi Arabia.1 Ross T. Christensen soon suggested an alternative location for Nahom, based upon a map of Yemen prepared as a result of a 1762-64 exploration by Carsten Niebuhr for Danish King Frederick V.2 To investigate these competing claims, Warren P. and Michaela J. Aston of Australia visited Yemen in November 1984, searching for additional evidence concerning Nahom and the route taken by Lehi and his party."

This was no random discovery. It was a search based on the BOM text itself.

http://www.meridianmagazine.com/farms/010321lehitrail.html