The Book of Mormon is not a history book

[Kevin Christensen]

Kevin,

Are there any factual errors in the subject post?

Yes.

-This resulting foundational document, purporting to be a history of the pre-Columbian Native Americans, cannot be shown to have any basis in fact whatsoever.

This is an ideologically driven overstatement. Not a fact.

-Smith and his colleagues started a religion based on this and other imaginative writings of Joseph Smith and his colleagues.

The characterization of the start of the LDS religion as based on the Book of Mormon and "other imaginative writings of Joseph Smith and his colleagues" is a disputed opinion. Not a fact.

-The Church that Smith founded still claims these writings to be translations of ancient documents with no evidence that they actually were, and in the face of a great deal of scientific evidence that they were not.

Repetition of the same ideological claims in another bullet point does not convert them into facts. There is a substantial body of evidence, whether you find it sufficient or persuasive or not, consistent with an interpretation of the Book of Mormon as authentic scripture. On this, for example, see the body of scholarship on Lehi's journey. Claiming that it does not exist does not explain it. Disagreeing is permitted, of course. But failure to acknowledge it does not cancel out its existence. It simply demonstrates how your ideology governs what you notice and value.

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

[thesometimesaint]

44Foxtrot:

Yes there are and it has been noted. LDS claim neither the Book of Mormon nor the Bible as a history book in our modern sense of the word. We merely claim they are the word of God.

[44Foxtrot]

44Foxtrot:

Yes there are and it has been noted. LDS claim neither the Book of Mormon nor the Bible as a history book in our modern sense of the word. We merely claim they are the word of God.

thesometimesaint,

From your response, I cannot tell whether you would defend the historicity of the Book of Mormon or not. You say that it is not a history book (in the modern sense of the word) but is the word of God.

In the introduction to my Book of Mormon, an author and claimed principal compiler/editor of the BoM (Moroni), is specifically described as a prophet-historian. There are numerous references in Church literature to the Book of Mormon as a history of the American Indians. Your response seems like a carefully worded attempt to avoid the issue of BoM historicity.

Either the Nephites, Lamanites, Jaredites and other human populations described in the Book of Mormon actually existed as described, or they did not.

If they did exist more or less as described, then most folks would consider the Book of Mormon to have historical content, and expect that there would be some physical evidence for the existance of these Semitic populations that were described as numbering in the millions and living in the New World for centuries.

If the Nephites, Lamanites and others did not exist, then we would expect the situation we have today, namely; no physical evidence whatsoever that these populations were as described in the BoM. In one case the historicity of the Book of Mormon could be successfully defended. In the present case, it cannot.

So my question to you, scientist to scientist, is whether or not you believe, in the face of all of the physical evidence to the contrary, that the Nephitles, Lamanites and other Semetic peoples existed in the New World as described in the Book of Mormon.

Nuanced meanings are not required. A simple yes or no will suffice.

[thesometimesaint]

44Foxtrot:

I accept the historicity of the Book of Mormon.

You need to understand that the ancients did not view history in the same way as we do today. What they chose to include or not include was very much tied to their religious beliefs. Add in that they could only include what they saw(usually in first person). Now take that understanding forwards a thousands years. With all its changes in language and meanings of words. To me the Book of Mormon is a religious book, albeit a translation of a Reader Digest of a Reader Digest condensation, where the main events took place in actual history. However I fully allow for the book to tell me what the prophets of that era thought of what was happening.

Yes the Book of Mormon is the history of a small group whose descendants became some of the American Indians.

Yes the Nephites, Lamanites, Jaredites actually existed. The Book of Mormon is the story of some of their deeds. History books, even those written today can include only a small portion of what a people actually did. They are by there very nature incomplete. Why put a standard on the ancients that we today, with all our computers, internet, ease of communications couldn't possibly accomplish?

We have a very accurate description of Bountiful in the Old World. What we lack in the New World is a way to directly tie the artifacts we do have to the Lehites. There so far is nothing that says Nephi slept here, for instance. In the Nephites view anyone not a Nephites would be a Lamanite. Also the ancients weren't as particular in counting as we are today. Theirs was a wholly different world view.

Sorenson would disagree with that assessment.

As a scientist I believe the Book of Mormon is mainly the story of a small group of Preexilic Israeli's that came to the Americas in about 600 BCE. It is a religious book with elements of historicity in it. Now, can I Prove that to scientific certainty? No I can not, anymore than I can prove that because we have found the ruins of ancient Troy the Greeks God's must be historically real.

[Kevin Christensen]

thesometimesaint,

SNIP

Either the Nephites, Lamanites, Jaredites and other human populations described in the Book of Mormon actually existed as described, or they did not.

SNIP

The key phrase here is "as described." It makes a huge, decisive difference if one actually goes to the author's descriptions, and to the cultural context perspective for that "as described," or to uncritical reader assumptions. "As described" by whom? Does careful reading matter? Does contextualization matter? Does interpretation color not only where an investigator looks for evidence, but does it also affect what they are looking for?

Those who look in the wrong places for the wrong things tend not to find much of interest.

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

[LifeOnaPlate]

I have read Perego's take on this issue. Mormon apologists don't get a pass for claiming that "we don't know for sure what Lehi's DNA looked like". While the Book of Mormon describes three migrations from the Middle East (Jaredites, Mulikites and Nephites), there is no mention of any other people (i.e. not from the Middle East) living in the New World.

Given the scientific evidence to date, as compared to what one would expect in the Native American genome if the Book of Mormon were indeed the record it claims to be, the weight of evidence supports my position and that of other scientists I know of who have looked at this problem.

Attempts to change the narrative regarding the Book of Mormon in order to make the DNA evidence appear less damaging don't do much to redistribute the weight of evidence.

It seems you either didn't read the article suggested or severely misunderstood it. I suggest reading it again and paying closer attention. Your response is near-nonsensical in light of the article itself.

With regard to my comment on the Perogo piece, I would suggest that you read it again.

hehe, oops, my mistake. I thought you were actually trying to have a productive conversation, not skip all relevant counter assertions by simply declaring victory over and over meaninglessly.

Now that I've read the tread entire, I advise that you disregard my comments. Brant and Kevin have answered sufficiently, I advise further engaging their comments and questions.

[LifeOnaPlate]

.

[LifeOnaPlate]

I don't know, when the guy plainly said that it wasn't a history book that looks like at least a whiff. For what it's worth, I think some folks look upon the Bible as little more than a Jewish history book.

Respectfully,

Balzer

It couldn't possibly be a history book in the current parlance of that label, and it never claimed to be. That it claims to contain authentic history does not mean it is strictly a "history book." One of the principle narrators in the record (Nephi) himself distinguishes between history and something different than history (see 1 Ne. 19).

Notice Elder Nelson also asserted the book is not a "novel," ie, it is not fictional. The view that the Church is trying to slyly present the BoM as being a fictional inspired record is contradicted within the very evidence used to prove the point.

[44Foxtrot]

44Foxtrot:

I accept the historicity of the Book of Mormon.

<SNIP>

Thanks for a straight answer.

[thesometimesaint]

44Foxtrot:

You are always welcome.

[Robert F. Smith]

If you read my post on the subject you will see that the one-to-one correspondence was not to Tironian notes alone but to a combination of Tironian notes, Ogham shorthand and old Gaelic as used extensively by Irish Catholic Priests between the 8th and 17th centuries. You seem to be unaware of the Detroit Manuscript, which was written using these characters, and its connection to the Smith family. The Detroit Manuscript, or portions of it as available to the Smith family, make a much more plausible source for "Reformed Egyptian" than do supernatural gold plates.

Anyone examining actual documents composed with ogham or short-hand Tironian, and similar old-fashioned writing or ciphers, will note the profusion of odd characters, from which one can select a few which seem to resemble some of the so-called "Anthon Transcript" characters. However, this would be true of nearly any writing system, and the late William F. Albright was appropriately critical of Ariel Crowley's comparisons of a hodge-podge of demotic and hieratic symbols from widely differing periods with the "Caractors" of the Anthon Transcript (see Crowley's series in the Improvement Era in the 1940s). Any sort of comparison must be systematic and scientific. What you have been doing on the other hand is even less systematic than that done by the late Barry Fell (who actually had a Ph.D. and could read old Gaelic and was probably more familiar with Ogham than anyone else alive), who made a laughing-stock of himself by accepting nearly every forged or suspicious carving as authentic, and imagining that he could read nearly anything -- including the Anthon Transcript. You need to do more than simply go to http://olivercowdery...0s/2001RBSt.htm and then to import some of their unsystematic notions to our MADB. You'd do better to consult first with Uncle Dale Broadhurst and with some linguistics experts who specialize in Ogham and such, and who have no axe to grind.

[Daniel Peterson]

To the top.

[Vance]

Either the Book of Mormon is non-fiction (a history) or it is fiction (a novel).

False dichotomy.

Are the epistles of Paul a history or a novel? Is the book of Revelation a history or a novel?

[44Foxtrot]

Anyone examining actual documents composed with ogham or short-hand Tironian, and similar old-fashioned writing or ciphers, will note the profusion of odd characters, from which one can select a few which seem to resemble some of the so-called "Anthon Transcript" characters. However, this would be true of nearly any writing system, and the late William F. Albright was appropriately critical of Ariel Crowley's comparisons of a hodge-podge of demotic and hieratic symbols from widely differing periods with the "Caractors" of the Anthon Transcript (see Crowley's series in the Improvement Era in the 1940s). Any sort of comparison must be systematic and scientific. What you have been doing on the other hand is even less systematic than that done by the late Barry Fell (who actually had a Ph.D. and could read old Gaelic and was probably more familiar with Ogham than anyone else alive), who made a laughing-stock of himself by accepting nearly every forged or suspicious carving as authentic, and imagining that he could read nearly anything -- including the Anthon Transcript. You need to do more than simply go to http://olivercowdery...0s/2001RBSt.htm and then to import some of their unsystematic notions to our MADB. You'd do better to consult first with Uncle Dale Broadhurst and with some linguistics experts who specialize in Ogham and such, and who have no axe to grind.

Who said anything about translation of the Anthon manuscript? Certainly not me.

After more than a century of work in the areas of archeology, genetics, linguistics, ethnology and by main stream science, the consensus is that Native American populations migrated from Asia across the Bering land bridge starting more than 13,000 years ago, and eventually formed the pre Columbian cultures found throughout the New World. This view is supported by overwhelming verifiable physical evidence from genetics, archeology, linguistics and other disciplines. This evidence includes date appropriate human artifacts found on the ocean floor in areas along land bridge route that would have been above water when the land bridge existed.

From what you have said here, I take it that you believe it is more likely that pre-Columbian New World populations can best be accounted for by three groups of Semites that came from the Old World to the New World on boats (or wooden semisubmersibles) starting around 2,500 BCE, grew in population to the millions, but left no written record except one that was delivered to the son of a rural family that practiced folk magic in the Northeastern US by an angel, said record being comprised of characters that can all be accounted for by reference to writing systems used by Catholic Priests in Ireland between the 8th and 17th centuries, and said record being now unavailable for confirmation of the claims because it was taken back heaven by an angel.

Is that about right?

[Wiki Wonka]

This is completely bogus analogical "reasoning." We know there was a Galilee and Jerusalem 2000+ years ago. We know Herod, Pontius Pilate, and Caiaphas existed. By way of contrast, there is not a scintilla of evidence for your transoceanic, Reformed-Egyptian-writing, Christians-before-Christ New World Jewry.

Actually, the first physical evidence that Pontius Pilate actually existed was discovered only in 1961 in Caesaria, when a stone was discovered bearing his name. He was also mentioned in the writings of Josephus (as well as Jesus), but this is not considered "proof" that either Pilate or Jesus actually existed. Most people only "know" that Pilate existed by reading the Bible.

WW

[Cold Steel]

The Book of Mormon is no more a history book than the Bible is a church handbook. There are elements of history in it, but it's not intended to be a history book.

For example, we know nothing of the people that Nephi and his brethren encountered when they came to the Americas -- nor do we know of the peoples that the Lamanites later mixed with. We're not even certain where the Book of Mormon lands were.

Where the Book of Mormon shines is in preaching the pure gospel of Jesus Christ. A person can pick up a Bible and read it and still be confused in the doctrine it teaches. The Book of Mormon leaves little to argue about in relation to the gospel of Christ. That's where it's value is.

[Robert F. Smith]

Who said anything about translation of the Anthon manuscript? Certainly not me.

I was referring to Dr. Barry Fell's absurd effort.

After more than a century of work in the areas of archeology, genetics, linguistics, ethnology and by main stream science, the consensus is that Native American populations migrated from Asia across the Bering land bridge starting more than 13,000 years ago, and eventually formed the pre Columbian cultures found throughout the New World. This view is supported by overwhelming verifiable physical evidence from genetics, archeology, linguistics and other disciplines. This evidence includes date appropriate human artifacts found on the ocean floor in areas along land bridge route that would have been above water when the land bridge existed.

From what you have said here, I take it that you believe it is more likely that pre-Columbian New World populations can best be accounted for by three groups of Semites that came from the Old World to the New World on boats (or wooden semisubmersibles) starting around 2,500 BCE, grew in population to the millions, but left no written record except one that was delivered to the son of a rural family that practiced folk magic in the Northeastern US by an angel, said record being comprised of characters that can all be accounted for by reference to writing systems used by Catholic Priests in Ireland between the 8th and 17th centuries, and said record being now unavailable for confirmation of the claims because it was taken back heaven by an angel.

Is that about right?

Not quite.

I tend to put the Jaredite migration at around 3100 B.C., and see their migration as merely one of many which took place over a period of tens of thousands of years. I know of no reason to think otherwise.

Your summary of the state of current scientific thought on such things is almost as out of date as B. H. Roberts' well-meaning 80-year-old summary.

The earliest human pleistocene remains so far discovered in the New World come from the Topper Site in South Carolina, and are dated at about 20,000 years before the present (BP). We can follow that with the Meadowcroft Rock Shelter in Pennsylvania at 17,000 BP, followed in turn by Lake Manix in the California Mojave Desert (15,500 BP), and then by La Brea Tar Pits butchery marks in southern California (15,000 BP), and then by Paisley Cave, Oregon, human coprolite DNA (14,300 BP), etc., down to the more recent Inuit migrations.

By 1998, mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and Y-chromosome studies indicated that at least ten to thirteen (10-13) different phylogenetic lineages of people migrated to the Americas, thus suggesting tremendous genetic diversity, i.e., rather than merely one simple crossing of Beringia, or even four or five "founder maternal Amerindian lineages," it now appears that there must have been around ten to thirteen. New World mtDNA markers can be interpreted to mean either (a) "a multiwave-founder colonization of America," or (b) "a monophyletic colonization from Asia." See Nestor Bianchi, et al., in American Journal of Human Genetics, 63 (1998), 1862.

Dennis Stanford (Smithsonian) has even suggested that the first Americans may have been European in a paper presented Feb 19, 2006, at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) -- see immediate report by Bjorn Carey in LiveScience.com at http://www.livescien..._americans.html . Stanford suggested that they may have been seal hunters from Iberia or France, comparing old European Solutrean spear points as ancestral to the Clovis found later in New Mexico. He also suggested various migrations by sea from Australia, Melanesia, subsaharan Africa, and Caucasoid relatives of the Ainu coming by boat around the Pacific rim. See also Heather Pringle, "Kelp Highways: Research Suggests that Ancient Mariners May Have Populated the New World -- and Other Regions -- by Boat More than 13,000 Years Ago," Discover: Science, Technology, and the Future, June 2008, 38-43.

Examination of eighty-one skulls of early humans (7,500 - 11,000 BP) from the Lagoa Santa region of Brazil seems to indicate an origin in Australia, Melanesia, or subsaharan Africa (Brian Handwerk, "Americas Settled by Two Groups of Early Humans, Study Says," National Geographic News, Dec 12, 2005, at http://news.national...s_americas.html .

Even more important than all that, however, is the hard scientific evidence of plant and animal transfer to the Americas which could not possibly have occurred via Beringia (it was simply too cold for many species) contained in John L. Sorenson & Carl L. Johannessen, "Biological Evidence for Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Voyages," in Victor H. Mair, ed., Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World (Honolulu: Univ. of Hawai'i Press, 2006), 238-297. This study virtually ends the argument about whether there were early oceanic voyages. There had to have been to account for the biological evidence!! Many of them.

This certainly gives credence to the comparison by Betty Meggars (Smithsonian) of early Japanese Jomon pottery with duplicate pottery found along the coast of South America, the presence of a complex jade culture in both China and Mesoamerica, the playing of an identical pre-Columbian board-game in both India (Parcheesi) and Mesoamerica (Patolli), similar calendar deities in Asia and Mesoamerica, etc. The literature is vast and quite provocative, most of it written by non-Mormon professionals. Check it out and draw your own conclusions.