the incredible expanding, shrinking, and disappearing Lehites

[rodheadlee]

And what has been accomplished in this thread to date?

Did you read Robert F. Smith's post or not?

[steelyray]

That says "see if you can make scripture as good as this" not "ask God if this is true."

Ibid.

None of which are "God will tell you the truth if you ask Him".

So, that leaves very little support for the idea that millions of Muslims believe that God has verified the truth claims of the Koran to them personally when they asked.

Perhaps you had best drop it.

So you think that the only way to determine from God whether or not a book is true and divine is to use the Moroni test as it is written? You don't think that Muslims have religious experiences which to them confirm their belief in the Qur'an? Your qualification here is far too narrow.

[Jason]

So you think that the only way to determine from God whether or not a book is true and divine is to use the Moroni test as it is written? You don't think that Muslims have religious experiences which to them confirm their belief in the Qur'an? Your qualification here is far too narrow.

I think, as I said earlier, that Moroni's test is more unique than you think it is, and that believing your religion has made your life better is not the same as believing God has verified your religion's truth claim personally.

Therefore Muslim religious experiences in no way discredit my own experiences.

[Zakuska]

I think, as I said earlier, that Moroni's test is more unique than you think it is, and that believing your religion has made your life better is not the same as believing God has verified your religion's truth claim personally.

Therefore Muslim religious experiences in no way discredit my own experiences.

Not to mention the fact that its not just Moroni's test.

Matt. 7: 7

7

[maupayman]

Did you read Robert F. Smith's post or not?

Which one, I may have missed it.

[steelyray]

It's certainly not proof. You saw a scrap of handwriting that someone told you was Jefferson's - you certainly didn't make that determination yourself.

Acceptable proof does not rely need soley upon me investigating every scrap of evidence for flaws. You can always constrain the boundaries of what constitutes 'proof' so as to not be able to prove anything at all. But this is a useless exercise for idle philosophers. I saw his handwriting, signature, and have the testimony of enough contemporary witnesses to his existence that he in fact, did exist beyond any reasonable doubt. I'm not going to go into some existentialist debate over what exactly constitutes 'proof.'

*sigh* You would make it much easier to debate with you if you weren't so needlessly insulting all the time. Try common courtesy (I know, it isn't really common, is it?).

And you would make it easier if you would address some of my earlier issues.

Like?

They had cement. They had metal working. They had written records, though the later civilizations and the Spanish got rid of the majority of those. They had large-scale governments and warfare. They had currency. They had walls and fortifications. They may have even had horses (the Nephites) and elephants (the Jaredites).

What exactly is missing?

Elephants and horses? I think not. A tapir is not terribly useful as a horse. Currency? Nothing that resembles the BoM.

Walls? Um, duh. Every warring civilization can build a wall. It's not exactly earth-shattering.

Metalworking? Copper, maybe extremely rarely. But steel? You're kidding me, right?

The Olmecs were cannibalistic, pantheistic, jaguar-centric, participants in human sacrifices, and liked to play their ball game, which was exported to both the Mayans and Aztecs, (but curiously not into the BoM). This doesn't fit the picture of observant Nephite or Israelite culture. Furthermore, everybody and their brother claims the Olmecs started from their own turf. There is 'evidence' that they were African, Australoid, Chinese, old European...

More importantly, how much of this could have been accurately guessed at by a 19th-century farmboy when it is so very different from what such a person would know of the American Indians. Do you think he would have accurately guessed about Indians using cement?

That doesn't strike me as an earthshattering prediction. It's been around since at least 5600 BC.

Now you're overreaching. You would have to know what Nephite culture looked like before you could positively say "this doesn't look like it". The BoM contains only the barest sketch, really.

See above.

Only they quite obviously weren't modeled after a 19th century view.

'View of the Hebrews,' perhaps?

My bias is that I already received a positive answer as to which was from God, and therefore don't need to inquire after every claim (although I have enquired about others that impressed me).

I don't use the term bigotry lightly, but I don't know what else to call "assuming that all members of a religious faith share the same undesirable traits".

I don't think your 'positive answer' is as overwhelmingly 'positive' as you claim. You might've gotten all goosepimply and felt centered and at peace, but those are at best physiological reactions that I can create by myself on command, not a good method to determine objective truth by.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Elephants and horses? I think not. A tapir is not terribly useful as a horse. Currency? Nothing that resembles the BoM.

When I see this it make me think that you don't understand the argument very well. Not that I favor or that I am arguing for that the nephite word for tapiar was translated as horse.

You should at least try your hardest to understand the argument before just dogmatically saying that "nothing that resembles the BoM".

[Craig Paxton]

Thanks for the memories...its been real fun...especially all the kind and loving comments from...well you know who you are...

Cheers,

Craig

[rodheadlee]

Which one, I may have missed it.

This post #25, by Robert F. Smith:

"There are indeed some very impressive patterns-in-common between the Pre-Columbians and the Book of Mormon, while not including in that pattern Classical Israel (or the Bible, to put it less broadly). The notion that this can be restricted only to two cultures worldwide is unrealistic, however, since most experts now accept evidence of profound cultural influence from Asia directly to the Americas. For example, the mythical Hindu Kaliyuga cycle of time, which uses 360-day years, began Feb 18, 3102 B.C. (Julian), which suggests the repetitive Mesoamerican Long Count cycle which began on Aug 11, 3114 B.C. and also uses 360-day years (see David Kelley, "The World Ages in India and Mesoamerica," SEHA Newsletter, 137 [Mar 1975], 3; A. L. Basham, The Wonder That Was India [Grove Press, 1954], 320-321; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15th ed., Macropaedia, 8:929).

This is important only because the systematic dating in the Book of Mormon includes a prediction that Jesus will be born 600 years after Lehi & Co. leave Jerusalem in the 1st year of the reign of King Zedekiah of Judah (I Nephi 1:4, 10:4, 19:8; Helaman 14:2, III Nephi superscription, 1:1, 2:8, etc.). Since scholars maintain that Jesus could not have been born after the death of Herod the Great in early 4 B.C., and that Zedekiah's first year ran from the Spring of 597 to 596 B.C., only the 360-day year of the Mesoamerican Long Count can shoe-horn the requisite 600 years in that interval. Likewise, the claim that Jesus died in his 34th year and 4th day (III Nephi 8:5) can only be accommodated by the same 360-day year count if we accept that he is born on Jewish New Year's Day (Rosh haShana) in the Autumn. The Book of Mormon thus successfully correlates three separate dates in real time.

Without, however, being able to demonstrate a similar pattern with Mesoamerican weights & measures, one can show some quite striking parallels between the Book of Mormon weights & measures (Alma 11:4-19) and features of the non-biblical (archeologically recovered) use of Egyptian hieratic numerals and signs on Israelite ostraca and weights. Where, for example, we see an ancient Egyptian decimal sequence of 5, 10, 20, 30, 40 with those numerals written on Israelite shekel weights, the Israelites redefined them as 4, 8, 16, 24, 32 -- the proportion or ratio remaining the same, but the hieratic numerals redefined. Thus, an Egyptian 10 qdt weight was redefined by the Israelites as an 8-shekel weight = 1 Egyptian diban. Bill Dever has said that the 8-shekel weight is the "basic module" here (Dever in P. Achtemeier, ed., Harper's Bible Dictionary [sBL/HarperSanFrancisco, 1985], 1128-1129), so that we would want to call attention to the possible correlation of that module to the Nephite basic unit of value, the gold senine or silver senum, which is exchangeable for 1 measure of grain. Why? Because 7 x 8 shekels = 56, the number of leahs in the gold limnah or silver onti, either of which is equivalent to the Israelite mina-weight. Reynolds & Sjodahl long ago suggested that the limnah is Hebrew and means "to-a-mina" or the like, and they appear to be correct in that etymology. Book of Mormon senine and senum likely come from ancient Egyptian sniw (snw, snny) which was the Egyptian word for the basic silver unit of value in their commodity pricing system (J. Janssen, Commodity Prices from the Ramessid Period [brill, 1975], 102-109). This is merely a sampling of the sort of discoveries which have revolutionized our knowledge of the Book of Mormon in recent decades, i.e., why it and the Brass Plates of Laban were written in Egyptian has always seemed so odd -- until we find powerful evidence of professional Hebrew scribes regularly using ancient Egyptian hieratic (see Stefan Wimmer, Palaestinisches Hieratisch [Harrassowitz, 2008]; Anson Rainey, "The Saga of Eliashib," Biblical Archaeology Review, 13/2 [Mar-Apr 1987]:37, 39; O. Goldwasser, "An Egyptian Scribe from Lachish and the Hieratic Tradition of the Hebrew Kingdoms," Tel Aviv, 18 [1991]:248-253). The Bible said nothing about such a phenomenon, and the first inkling of such a fact only became apparent long after the death of Joseph Smith."

[mfbukowski]

I understand that it makes it easier to discount and mentally manage my questions by using your "troll" reference. And although I completely understand how this makes it easier for you...wouldn't we all benefit by dropping the ad hominem attacks. These do nothing but muddy the waters.

I'm a truth seeker...who would sincerely like Mormonism to be all it claims to be. And taking the onus on myself, I just find Mormonism impossible to believe.

Have I misunderstood something? Perhaps I have. Do I give greater weight to some things at the expense of other items....I believe we are all guilty of doing this.

With respect to the original subject of this post...Knowing what I know, I find it unbelievable that the bronze-aged Christian Civilizations with all of their peculiarities and unique characteristics described in the Book of Mormon ever existed. I cannot wrap my brain around a Nephite Nation that supposedly existed

[mfbukowski]

Thanks for the memories...its been real fun...especially all the kind and loving comments from...well you know who you are...

Cheers,

Craig

You came on false pretenses from your first post! Now you turn on the passive-aggressive wounded fawn stuff? Man if you can't take it you better not dish it.

[mfbukowski]

Objectivity isn't just about what can be seen with the unaided eye.

Very true.

And subjectivity is not just about what can be observed with all the wonderful equipment the world has to offer. It all still goes through a human brain.

If my brain subjectively sees what your brain subjectively sees, we call it "real". But if we both see something different, it still can be "real", and we both can be right.

That is the point.

[mfbukowski]

Dude! Seriously. Do you not realize how sophomorpic that sounds? Next you will be asking him to explain the taste of salt. LOL

An interesting ploy. Why don't you go ahead and do that?

For most of us, the question is more than whether that book affects lives in a spiritual way or not. The Lord of the Rings does that and better.

If you really believe that, why are you even here? I am sure there are also Harry Potter boards you could be posting on. Those might really give you a spiritual uplift. I mean why waste your time when you can be having a REAL intellectual and spiritual discussion?

[sunstoned]

Yes I think you have misunderstood something.

Read Jacob 1:12 and the next several verses. By the time of the death of Nephi, the Nephites had mixed with the surrounding populace to such an extent that Jacob himself says they cannot be distinguished from the Lamanites and the other peoples, saying that he will (rather arbitrarily) call the Nephites the "good guys" and the Lamanites the "bad guys".

Just to be clear, Jacob does not mention "other peoples". He talks of Lamanites and Nephites. A standard reading of the Book of Mormon reveals no hint of a large population of "others".

[Kevin Christensen]

Just to be clear, Jacob does not mention "other peoples". He talks of Lamanites and Nephites. A standard reading of the Book of Mormon reveals no hint of a large population of "others".

Whose standard? That of superficial critics disinclined to find others on grounds that the lack would be a welcome club to beat believers with?

If the "standard" reading should be defined as "the best reading with reference to others," the most comprehensive, careful and perceptive, I'd nominate these essays by Matt Roper and Brant Gardner:

http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/?vol=15&num=2&id=505

Among the many valuable insights Roper offers, this, on Jacob, for instance:

So the Lehite "tree" of the allegory consists of a population geographically "transplanted" from the original Israelite promised land and "grafted" onto a wild root

[Dr. Jd]

First let me say that I don't think Tapirs are BOM horses. But I also don't think the idea should be mocked. When I was hunting in Argentina I discovered that they refer to tapirs as deer (so I don't think horse is a huge leap). But that is the extent of my knowledge about tapirs.

[mfbukowski]

For the record, after reading Sorenson's essay in JBMS 1, I started spotting references to "others" all over the Book of Mormon, and published on that topic in 1995. Roper and Gardner though, surpass Sorenson and me on the topic. As the best studies, they ought to be recognized as the standard word on the topic. It's quite odd that this thread could get this far without reference to them.

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

Thanks for your post.

I need to do more reading- and less re-inventing the wheel.

I did mention this scripture way back in post 37, but I did not know about Roper and Gardener. I will have to look them up. Thanks again.

[maupayman]

This post #25, by Robert F. Smith:

"There are indeed some very impressive patterns-in-common between the Pre-Columbians and the Book of Mormon, while not including in that pattern Classical Israel (or the Bible, to put it less broadly). The notion that this can be restricted only to two cultures worldwide is unrealistic, however, since most experts now accept evidence of profound cultural influence from Asia directly to the Americas. For example, the mythical Hindu Kaliyuga cycle of time, which uses 360-day years, began Feb 18, 3102 B.C. (Julian), which suggests the repetitive Mesoamerican Long Count cycle which began on Aug 11, 3114 B.C. and also uses 360-day years (see David Kelley, "The World Ages in India and Mesoamerica," SEHA Newsletter, 137 [Mar 1975], 3; A. L. Basham, The Wonder That Was India [Grove Press, 1954], 320-321; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15th ed., Macropaedia, 8:929).

This is important only because the systematic dating in the Book of Mormon includes a prediction that Jesus will be born 600 years after Lehi & Co. leave Jerusalem in the 1st year of the reign of King Zedekiah of Judah (I Nephi 1:4, 10:4, 19:8; Helaman 14:2, III Nephi superscription, 1:1, 2:8, etc.). Since scholars maintain that Jesus could not have been born after the death of Herod the Great in early 4 B.C., and that Zedekiah's first year ran from the Spring of 597 to 596 B.C., only the 360-day year of the Mesoamerican Long Count can shoe-horn the requisite 600 years in that interval. Likewise, the claim that Jesus died in his 34th year and 4th day (III Nephi 8:5) can only be accommodated by the same 360-day year count if we accept that he is born on Jewish New Year's Day (Rosh haShana) in the Autumn. The Book of Mormon thus successfully correlates three separate dates in real time.

Without, however, being able to demonstrate a similar pattern with Mesoamerican weights & measures, one can show some quite striking parallels between the Book of Mormon weights & measures (Alma 11:4-19) and features of the non-biblical (archeologically recovered) use of Egyptian hieratic numerals and signs on Israelite ostraca and weights. Where, for example, we see an ancient Egyptian decimal sequence of 5, 10, 20, 30, 40 with those numerals written on Israelite shekel weights, the Israelites redefined them as 4, 8, 16, 24, 32 -- the proportion or ratio remaining the same, but the hieratic numerals redefined. Thus, an Egyptian 10 qdt weight was redefined by the Israelites as an 8-shekel weight = 1 Egyptian diban. Bill Dever has said that the 8-shekel weight is the "basic module" here (Dever in P. Achtemeier, ed., Harper's Bible Dictionary [sBL/HarperSanFrancisco, 1985], 1128-1129), so that we would want to call attention to the possible correlation of that module to the Nephite basic unit of value, the gold senine or silver senum, which is exchangeable for 1 measure of grain. Why? Because 7 x 8 shekels = 56, the number of leahs in the gold limnah or silver onti, either of which is equivalent to the Israelite mina-weight. Reynolds & Sjodahl long ago suggested that the limnah is Hebrew and means "to-a-mina" or the like, and they appear to be correct in that etymology. Book of Mormon senine and senum likely come from ancient Egyptian sniw (snw, snny) which was the Egyptian word for the basic silver unit of value in their commodity pricing system (J. Janssen, Commodity Prices from the Ramessid Period [brill, 1975], 102-109). This is merely a sampling of the sort of discoveries which have revolutionized our knowledge of the Book of Mormon in recent decades, i.e., why it and the Brass Plates of Laban were written in Egyptian has always seemed so odd -- until we find powerful evidence of professional Hebrew scribes regularly using ancient Egyptian hieratic (see Stefan Wimmer, Palaestinisches Hieratisch [Harrassowitz, 2008]; Anson Rainey, "The Saga of Eliashib," Biblical Archaeology Review, 13/2 [Mar-Apr 1987]:37, 39; O. Goldwasser, "An Egyptian Scribe from Lachish and the Hieratic Tradition of the Hebrew Kingdoms," Tel Aviv, 18 [1991]:248-253). The Bible said nothing about such a phenomenon, and the first inkling of such a fact only became apparent long after the death of Joseph Smith."

Yes, I did read this post. This does not answer my point, from the thread I posted. So, yes, it is interesting, but does not answer the problems I see with the whole idea that the "coinage" from the BoM was actually explaining weights and measures. I think the verses make far more sense, if referring to coinage. I think i'm in good company in reading the verses this way too.

[steelyray]

Out of curiosity, what are your personal thoughts on the Bible? Fact or fiction?

Quick, take every book in your house and now classify the whole lot as fact or fiction. This is massively oversimplified in terms of category choices. In contrast to the BoM, the Bible was not a one-man production, but had many purposes.

Therefore its contents cannot simply be thrown into two categories. Poetry, politics, midrash, ritual, rants, religious instruction, history, borrowed history, etc. as collected and carefully scribed by a fascinating but superstitious nomadic people in their attempts at governing society, appealing to supernatural protection, protecting their estates, preserving their culture, and instructing their descendants. What are your thoughts, on, say, the Epic of Gilgamesh, or the Egyptian Books of the Dead?

In short, I am an agnostic that places much more respect in works that are not demonstrably the work of one person than I do in the creations of any single 'prophet.' For this reason I do not consider the Qur'an to be that respectable, either.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

In short, I am an agnostic that places much more respect in works that are not demonstrably the work of one person than I do in the creations of any single 'prophet.' For this reason I do not consider the Qur'an to be that respectable, either.

I have yet to see a good theory that the BoM was written by one person. Even the people that claim a Spaulding/ Rigdon Theory, that theory has many many holes. So claiming that it is demonstrably the work of one man is a feat that I would really like to see. People smarter than you and I have tried and failed.

[maupayman]

I have yet to see a good theory that the BoM was written by one person. Even the people that claim a Spaulding/ Rigdon Theory, that theory has many many holes. So claiming that it is demonstrably the work of one man is a feat that I would really like to see. People smarter than you and I have tried and failed.

I'm curious what the many many holes are in the Spaulding/Rigdon theory. And has there actually been an official theory published on this matter?

[Jason]

Acceptable proof does not rely need soley upon me investigating every scrap of evidence for flaws. You can always constrain the boundaries of what constitutes 'proof' so as to not be able to prove anything at all. But this is a useless exercise for idle philosophers. I saw his handwriting, signature, and have the testimony of enough contemporary witnesses to his existence that he in fact, did exist beyond any reasonable doubt. I'm not going to go into some existentialist debate over what exactly constitutes 'proof.'

Then let me say that I have received enough evidence that the Book of Mormon is what it claims to believe it is correct beyond any resaonable doubt.

Elephants and horses? I think not. A tapir is not terribly useful as a horse. Currency? Nothing that resembles the BoM.

I wasn't speaking of tapirs. And what exactly does the BoM describe as Nephite currency (notice that the word "coin" is not used)? How does it fail to match archaelogical evidence.

Metalworking? Copper, maybe extremely rarely. But steel? You're kidding me, right?

Where does the Book of Mormon say that the Nephites mass-produced steel?

The Olmecs were cannibalistic, pantheistic, jaguar-centric, participants in human sacrifices, and liked to play their ball game, which was exported to both the Mayans and Aztecs, (but curiously not into the BoM). This doesn't fit the picture of observant Nephite or Israelite culture. Furthermore, everybody and their brother claims the Olmecs started from their own turf. There is 'evidence' that they were African, Australoid, Chinese, old European...

The Olmecs would not be the Nephites. They are too early - better identified with the Jaredites.

And the Jaredites were not nice people (nor were they Israelites).

Why should a religious text describe a ball game?

I don't think your 'positive answer' is as overwhelmingly 'positive' as you claim. You might've gotten all goosepimply and felt centered and at peace, but those are at best physiological reactions that I can create by myself on command, not a good method to determine objective truth by.

If "goosepimply" is the best you can come up with then you obviously have no idea what you are talking about. But how could you, really? You don't have access to my experiences and thus cannot evaluate them beyond what I say about them. Second-hand hearsay, as it were.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

I'm curious what the many many holes are in the Spaulding/Rigdon theory. And has there actually been an official theory published on this matter?

Do a search on the forum. There have been many a debate. I think Uncle Dale does the best job of explaining the theory. You can read through the threads or start a new one.

[Craig Paxton]

Yes I think you have misunderstood something.

Read Jacob 1:12 and the next several verses. By the time of the death of Nephi, the Nephites had mixed with the surrounding populace to such an extent that Jacob himself says they cannot be distinguished from the Lamanites and the other peoples, saying that he will (rather arbitrarily) call the Nephites the "good guys" and the Lamanites the "bad guys".

So what we have of "pure Nephites" consists of a few of Nephi's direct descendents, limited to his life time, - a very limited population in a very limited location.

Exactly how many cities do you think such a group of what- 50 people or so- in a portion of one person's life time- would leave, labled in huge stone letters, (in Reformed Egyptian, of course) saying "Welcome to Nephi's City!" (Population 47)?

Oh heck, I will paste the quote directly

Jacob 1:

So the designation "Nephite" early on- at the close of Nephi's life in fact- becomes a rather arbitrary one to the Nephites, and the rest of the references in the BOM carry forth this designation. Jacob says that the designation applied to the "good guys" from his point of view- that's all.

So what evidence would you like to find for these few folks?

Sorry but I just could let this post go without some response...

I understand the need for the LDS apologist community to create

[maupayman]

Do a search on the forum. There have been many a debate. I think Uncle Dale does the best job of explaining the theory. You can read through the threads or start a new one.

I have read numerous threads on the subject, yet have not noticed the many many holes you referenced. Help get me started, since you've obviously read through them as well.