Could you write the likes of Book of Mormon?

[Guest Just Curious]

Hey RC since you obviously have some first hand experience in meso american archeology.....how did the pottery hold up..I mean have they found reasonable amounts of pottery and fragments dating from the BoM periods or before, or is that lacking?

thanks

[A Random Catholic]

Oh yeah well I don't accept your sources..they're biased...na na na na boo boo!!!

They're all professional, secular archaeologists and art historians with absolutely no bias either way. See

Coe, Michael D, Linda Schele, and David Stuart. 1999. What the Heck is a Curelom, Anyway? We Don't Know and We Don't Care Emerald City: Strawman and Sons

Also, note this masterful treatment by the very father of modern Maya archaeology:

Thompson, J. Eric S. 2004. Could Somebody Please Baptise Me By Proxy Already, It's Been Almost Thirty Years, What Is the Hold-Up? Spirit World: Spirit World Press

[A Random Catholic]

Hey RC since you obviously have some first hand experience in meso american archeology.....how did the pottery hold up..I mean have they found reasonable amounts of pottery and fragments dating from the BoM periods or before, or is that lacking?

thanks

Define "reasonable." From which Book of Mormon "periods?" For that matter, define "pottery." (Hey, I'm gettin' good at this apologist gig )

Seriously: Yes, there are quite a few artifacts with heiroglyphs and illustrated scenes that give a fairly rich picture of some aspects of the Maya culture from late Book of Mormon times. We would look at ceramic pots and figurines, but also carvings in jade and carved lintels and monuments as well. Things like pollen core samples would also be useful. News flash: I'm not convinced (to say the least) but actual archaeologists and art historians far more informed than I cough-but-who-were-already-LDS-cough feel differently.

[Daniel Peterson]

News flash: I'm not convinced (to say the least) but actual archaeologists and art historians far more informed than I cough-but-who-were-already-LDS-cough feel differently.

But then -- dang, another stereotype down the drain -- there's that mixed American-Mexican couple, both archaeologists (she with a Ph.D., he still finishing his), who live near and work at the site of Teotihuac

[A Random Catholic]

News flash: I'm not convinced (to say the least) but actual archaeologists and art historians far more informed than I cough-but-who-were-already-LDS-cough feel differently.

But then -- dang, another stereotype down the drain -- there's that mixed American-Mexican couple, both archaeologists (she with a Ph.D., he still finishing his), who live near and work at the site of Teotihuac

[Daniel Peterson]

No, sir.  You can pry that stereotype from my cold, dead fingers.  You Saints have persistently and stubbornly failed to be as stupid and one-dimensional as you were billed, and it's gone far enough! 

My apology. I shall endeavor to do better, and to encourage my fellow mind-numbed cultists in their endeavors.

A Meso-American archaeologist without an agenda who accepted the historicity of the Book of Mormon- fancy that.

Two of them, actually.

In all seriousness, have they said or written anything that ties their professional experience with their understanding of the Book of Mormon?  I'd really be interested in learning more, although life is largely a continuum of tiny disappointments, in my experience.

I don't believe that they've published anything on the topic yet, and I don't know that they plan to do so.

The archaeologist was, strictly speaking, a Meso-American archaeologist studying the pre-Columbian Toltecs, as opposed to, I dunno, an anthropologist or linguist or something?

They both work at the site of Teotihuac

[pseudogratix]

Websters offers 'weariness', 'relief' or 'grief' as the possible reasons for a sigh.  I elected to suppose it would not be relief.  I don't suppose it's weariness.  If you're tired in general you should sleep.  If you're tired of this conversation you have no reason to continue.  I was left with "grief" (I said "sad") as the probable reason for all the sighs.  Please feel free to correct me if it's one of the other two.

Sigh. It is obvious from this that your understanding of and ability to use scientifically sound reasoning along with Webster's is far more extensive than I at first suspected. I plead the mercy of the court for ever doubting your razor blade accuracy in pinpointing my usage of sigh.

Rarely does a grant of this nature stipulate what they are allowed to reference as a guide in their studies.  Sigh.They don't ignore the BoM because of bills or monetary concerns.  This is a rediculous argument.

Sigh. Again, I am sorry, I wasn't aware of your extensive experience as a scientist and/or your many years of surveying of a statistically meaningful number of scientists to come up with such findings. Again, I beg for court's mercy.

They will know about the BoM, at least the most basics.  If they find something that gives credence to the BoM they would have zero reason to cover it up.

Sigh. I again plea for mercy and curse JR's and ARC's replies. They obviously pale in knowledge/experience in this realm in the which you are the hands down king of knowledge.

Discoveries make the scientist.  Not a few of them would love to get their name in the papers over something controversial.

Sigh. Again, I plea for mercy for overlooking this self-evident fact. I should have never doubted your deep understanding gained from years of employment as a researcher and scientist and/or as gained in years of relevant observation/surveying of a statistically meaningful number of scientists.

Absolutely.  Happy you approve.

Sigh. Always one step ahead of me. How do you do it? I again plea for mercy.

You lost me.  Did you mean "are NOT"?

Sigh. Alas, it appears that in my blundering ways that I revised my post before you responded. Please forgive me for my blundering ways.

That's true AND false.  There are two different types.  There are those doing field work - the results of which end up in journals of varioos sorts .  And there are those that publish conclusions.  Some do both.  The Leakey's did both.

Sigh. Forgive me for not knowing of the two different types. Please further forgive me for not knowing of all the conclusions being published by the publishing type of scientists in reputable journals in regard to the Book of Mormon.

The problem with the BoM is that it doesn't take a scientist saying "The Mayans fought a war between Copan and blah blah in the year 335 AD, etc. which means the BoM is false!" to suggest there is no backing for the BoM.  Richard Leakey didn't say "This fossile is 35,000 years old and therefor the Bible's creation account is false.".  He merely said "This fossile is 35,000 years old and is considered a key point in human evolution" - which statement can be logically used to deduce the Biblical account of a 6 days creation and 6000 year old Earth is not supported by scientists, for the most part.

Sigh. If only I had realized how simple it was. Forgive me for not getting the same advanced degrees in science and logic that you apparently have.

With the BoM we all look at the same and come to different conclusions.  That's why I keep asking - what piece are you looking at that leads you to a different conclusion than I?  You know my own views.  I've done a lot of research into the idea that there were Nephies or Lamanites living somewhere in that big jungle.  I've seen not one scrap of physical evidence to support the idea - there or anywhere else.  So why do others disagree?  What are they looking at that I am not?  Or what thing have I glossed over?  I dunno.  I keep asking only to have people question my own deduction methods.

Sigh. My wise and noble t2t2. Alas, you have glossed over nothing. It is self-evidently so that your wisdom and knowledge is so extensive that even the gods tremble in your presence. I'm not worthy to post to you. Mercy, I beg, mercy.

[kolobian]

I've been only roughly following this thread so forgive me if I am redundant or non-responsive.

It seems to me, though, that producing a work like the Book of Mormon would be very difficult. Even if one is not persuaded in the hisorical/archeological debate, I am of the school that the book itself is interesting as evidence. Certainly as Dr. Shades notes above one could put songs, poetry, battles, etc into a book--that is no particular achievement. But the Book of Mormon is intertesting in that it has a high level of internal complexity, corresponding with a high level of internal consistency. What would make this even more difficult is the framed narrative in which one moves forwards and backwards chronologically without any inconsistent information being given inadvertently. That is especially tricky when, too my knowledge, no other book takes exactly the form the Book of Mormon does, in terms of rapid changes and reversals in time and authoriship. As Givens explains, Moroni is situated outside the text to facilitate his objectification of it in the final chapters, which is critical of course to its success. To misappropriate Lakatos, this is the sort of novelty that seems to indicate meaningful progress. Where does it come from?

Whether a book like the Book of Mormon could be written is at least an interesting question becuase it is still a question--a book like the Book of Mormon does not exist. The closest sorts of things we have, View of the Hebrews, etc, seem to me to only highlight how much more complex and nuanced and less stilted the Book of Mormon sounds. I think any such comparison is favorable to the bliever.

Finally, not that I take myself to be even slightly relevant, but I do think the Book of Mormon deserves further study--that is to say, arguments for it are not exhausted. I would be curious what Dr. Shades thinks of my argument, posted here ealier, that the Book of Mormon governance exhibits dyadic political behavior predicted by contemporary models. This I take to be interesting because it is precisely the opposite of the behavior that Americans, informed by theorists like Madison, Montesqui and de Toqueville, anticipated in the early 1800s. They were wrong, but Joseph Smith--oddly enough--was right. The Book of Mormon has at least been more difficult to falsify than one would expect.

[pseudogratix]

...Even if one is not persuaded in the hisorical/archeological debate, I am of the school that the book itself is interesting as evidence....

Sigh. Ya evil reprobate uneducated mermen. Scientists have shown the Book of Mormon to be a fraud. It is all black and white. It is so simple. You too can learn the wise ways of rigid fundamentalism mixed with arm chair science and logic. Just release your mind and submit. Be free.

[kolobian]

Just release your mind and submit.

ahhhh. Confusing directives. Cannot compute...

[A Random Catholic]

Discoveries make the scientist.

[VEL]

I'm just wondering - If Paul McCartney and John Lennon claimed to have received the inspiration for their songs from a visit from God himself would you have to beleve them because nobody has been able to match their success?? Besides, you would have no way to determine that God didn't hum the tune to "Yesterday" to them, and you feel good when you listen to their songs so they must be from God.

Paul and John had no formal musical training and had an enormous amount of hits in a very short time which nobody else has been able to even come close to duplicating.

...was Joseph Smith possessed of a sufficiently vivid and creative imagination as to produce such a work as the Book of Mormon from such materials as have been indicated in the preceding chapters ... That such power of imagination would have to be of a high order is conceded; that Joseph Smith possessed such a gift of mind there can be no question. (B.H. Roberts - "Studies of the Book of Mormon", page 243)

[kolobian]

Paul and John had no formal musical training and had an enormous amount of hits in a very short time which nobody else has been able to even come close to duplicating.

Of course the Beatles were inspired! Was that supposed to be a counterfactual?

[Guest yowzaa]

I'm just wondering - If Paul McCartney and John Lennon claimed to have received the inspiration for their songs from a visit from God himself would you have to beleve them because nobody has been able to match their success??  Besides, you would have no way to determine that God didn't hum the tune to "Yesterday" to them, and you feel good when you listen to their songs so they must be from God.

Vel,

If that was so, then John Lennon feel from grace after writing "Imagine"

[Calm]

Random, if you can find one for me in teal, I'll take it!

[Brant Gardner]

I am coming to this quite late, but A Random Catholic is making some strong statements about Mesoamerican archaeology and ethnohistory that don't sit well with me. For full disclosure purposes, I have an MA in Anthropology and specialized in Mesoamerica. I was and am LDS. My publication record is short because I had to earn a living elsewhere, but I know that two of my articles are still well-regarded.

Much earlier RC said:

Then I flip through my new Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya  and just feel like I'm looking at a whole different world. What would you say is the single best example of one of the many things that we didn't know ten years ago that we do know today that dovetails with the Book of Mormon?

Part of the problem is that RC is asking us to take his/her opinion as our guide to a congruence between the Book of Mormon and Mesoamerican history. Since there are any number of people whose opinion of the world of the Bible is similarly incongruent with history, that particular argument is hardly impressive. Matching archaeology with texts is not always a simple process and when misconceptions about the text and its relationship to history are involved, it can become much more difficult.

I have posted this list before, but it appears to be time for it again. In response to RC's question of what we know now about the congruence between the Book of Mormoh and Mesoamerican history, I offer the following outline of data. I recognize that for each point on the list there is an entire argument that needs to be made and a lot of history that much be understood - but this is a list and explaining this list is a book. Please be assured that there are data behind each point. What is important is that this isn't a single item but rather an entire set of cultural items that all place the Book of Mormon in a Mesoamerican context. In fact, that Mesoamerican context actually explains certain actions and events in the Book of Mormon that are otherwise enigmatic.

I propose that RC's "different world" is one of his/her perception - not reality at all.

Note: I haven't been able to learn the secret of formatting this so that the indentations are retained. My apologies.

1) Text

a) Structures reflecting a non-western perspective

1) Conclusions begin chapters rather than end them

2) The construction of the book names follows a discernible logic, but not one that has ever been explained, nor which follows traditional assumptions

b ) The Book of Mormon contains metastories that are absolutely parallel to Old Testament modes of writing scripture, but which tend to be lost on the more literal modern mind.

1) Exodus motif

2) Nephi and Joseph

3) Nephi and David

c) The internally described structure of the text is the best explanation for its features

1) Nephi-Omni material is holographic

2) Mormon as editor with vision and control

3) Moroni

d) Usage of scriptural texts, such as Isaiah and the Sermon on the Mount differ (even though similar in production methodology)

1) Nephi and Jacob

[A Random Catholic]

Random, if you can find one for me in teal, I'll take it!

l33t! I have that plaque, y'know (it's sorta sandy tan, actually). It wasn't my intention to take the image from that site, but it turned out to be the best image I found in the first page or two of Google. The baptism/ cross/ Holy Spirit thing comes from my looking at it and saying to myself, "If I really wanted this to be Nephite, what would I find?" There's lots more, y'know- see the three circles at the bottom of the Stick of Joseph, indicating the BoM, D&C, & PoGP? And, though it's hard to see in my image, that thing connected to his (obviously Hebrew) nose is a bird secondary image of the Holy Ghost, this one representing His indwelling of Pakal as he emerges from the font...

[t2t2]

Does not, in fact, show Pakal being lowered in a basket from the world (represented by the Tree of Life) into the Underworld (represented by the jaws of a serpent) as witnessed by the Gods (represented by the Celestial Bird at the center of the top) but really shows Pacal being baptized by immersion at the foot of the Cross while the Holy Ghost hovers in the form of a dove, breathing forth the Stick of Judah and the Stick of Joseph, that art historian would very likely go out for sushi and forget about the whole thing, because it's simply too implausible and would only serve to damage his or her credibility without being taken seriously...

This is why I suggested that there are two types - those in the field and those that interpret their works.

Take the above. Of all art in the Temple of Inscriptions, where we'd surely see Pakal's belief set were he Christian, there's not one other piece that could taken as such. At least not that I've seen published. So the explanation offered that his tomb casing depicts a baptism simply isn't credible at all. One has to go in looking for ANYTHING that might work to see such.

On the other hand...if they start seeing a pattern of work that looks odd, or looks to have several possible interpretations - as you pointed out, it would indeed make it's way out into the world for the pundits to chew on.

[t2t2]

OK Random - have a go at this one.

[alienward]

2) Geography

  a) Old World

This is all one needs to look at in your laundry list. The BoM excludes itself from the New World.

[A Random Catholic]

t2t2: I'm stumped. MUEagle shrunk down and locked in a terrarium?

Brant:

Part of the problem is that RC is asking us to take his/her opinion as our guide to a congruence between the Book of Mormon and Mesoamerican history.

I guess... In any event, if you decline my request, I'm hardly in a position to complain.

Matching archaeology with texts is not always a simple process and when misconceptions about the text and its relationship to history are involved, it can become much more difficult.

A double-edged sword. As an unbeliever, I'm terribly biased against the historicity of the text, of course. But in your case, you know the old saying- "When you set out to prove something, it helps to know that it's true."

Needless to say, this would have to be engaged in little bites. Any chance it's fleshed out a bit more elsewhere? I know it's not on your website, which I poke around from time to time. What would be really helpful to this poor, benighted heathen would be Book of Mormon cites- for example, 3-i

Teotihuacan alters the political alliances and introduces a new and devastating mode of warfare at the same time as the Book of Mormon describes a group of northerners who alter the mode of warfare.

probably refers to a specific passage in the Book of Mormon, but I wouldn't know how to find it. Please don't put yourself to any additional effort (I know how that "making a living when you'd rather be ogling pre-Columbian art" thing goes) but if by chance there's a longer document, I'd love to have it.

[Brant Gardner]

RC: There isn't a separate paper written on this. You can find the beginning of the argument in a paper I gave at a FAIR conference which is on the FAIR site: http://www.fairlds.org/pubs/conf/2002GarB.html. That paper proposes Mormon's identification of the Gadianton Robbers of his time as the incursion of Teotihuacano influence in the Southern Mexico area.

You can follow the argument (though the text presumes previous documentation) in my online commentary on Mormon 4.

For Mesoamerican history, examine the Entrada of the Teotihuacanos into Tikal and other areas. Read any of the modern writers on the advent of what they call "Star Wars" the alteration of the "rules" of warfare. Compare that to the complaints that Mormon has in chapter 4.

Compare to:

"The magical nature of warfare did not change with the fourth-century inception of Venus-Tlaloc war and the victory of Tikal over Waxaktun, but its specific manifestations and political objectives did. Before the fourth century, we believe, warfare was not the wholesale slaughter that it later became. It was fought by rigidly observed codes -- the intent not to destroy neighboring kingdoms but to take captives for sacrifice. Long before the Teotihuacan allies of Tikal arrived on the scene, the Maya War Jaguars had prowled for victims on the open savannas of the lowlands. it was the changing of the rules of conduct and the intent of war associated with the new imagery that eventually led to the downfall of Maya kingship."

(David Freidel, Linda Schele, and Joy Parker, Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path (New York: William Morrow and Company, 04/06/23 1993), 323.)

You said:

As an unbeliever, I'm terribly biased against the historicity of the text, of course. But in your case, you know the old saying- "When you set out to prove something, it helps to know that it's true."

That is an interesting statement since it assumes that I set out to prove something and began with a bias. That statement must have come from your own bias against the Book of Mormon because it does not describe any of the work I have done. If you would like a quick reference, check out my work on Quetzalcoatl.

If one is going to do good work, one must be willing to follow evidence. If I had set out to prove the Book of Mormon, I would have come up with very different ideas about it. I rather set out to see if the Book of Mormon fit into a Mesoamerican context according to the basic rules of ethnohistorical research.

When you attempt to begin a conversation by an admission of being "terribly biased" and assuming that I must also be biased, I am not confident that we are on an academic foundation. It seems you might be following in J. Eric S. Thompson's footsteps when he discussed Knorozov's work. Thompson was quite biased and extremely vocal. He was also extremely wrong, although it took a lot of competent work by people willing to come out from under his shadow to recognize the value of Knorozov.

[A Random Catholic]

If one is going to do good work, one must be willing to follow evidence. If I had set out to prove the Book of Mormon, I would have come up with very different ideas about it. I rather set out to see if the Book of Mormon fit into a Mesoamerican context according to the basic rules of ethnohistorical research.

Did you come up with any substantive evidence towards the cumulative case that the Book of Mormon does not fit into a Mesoamerican context according to the basic rules of ethnohistorical research?

[A Random Catholic]

When you attempt to begin a conversation by an admission of being "terribly biased" and assuming that I must also be biased, I am not confident that we are on an academic foundation.

We must be talking past one another. We are staking our eternal destinies on a choice that we have made with respect to the Prophetic Office of Joseph Smith. I find it inconceivable that we wouldn't be biased- not close-minded, but biased. I'm never on an "academic foundation" in matters of faith. For example, I will always believe that Jesus Christ loves me and gave Himself for me, whatever the evidence shows. Sue me...

It seems you might be following in J. Eric S. Thompson's footsteps when he discussed Knorozov's work. Thompson was quite biased and extremely vocal. He was also extremely wrong, although it took a lot of competent work by people willing to come out from under his shadow to recognize the value of Knorozov.

I'm gonna demonstrate my sincerity by not subjecting this to the usual cursory Google before I post it: Are you referring to his opposition to the logographic model of Maya glyphs? And didn't he admit he was wrong (or at least had overstated his case) towards the end of his life? There's always hope, Mr. Gardner...

[A Random Catholic]

Dr. Peterson and other Latter-day Saints whom I respect have said that they believe that Book of Mormon history took place within the context of Meso-American history. I find it extremely interesting (not to say courageous) that you and Professor Clark are willing to take this one step further- from Clark's May 2004 BYU devotional: "Book of Mormon cities have been found, they are well known, and their artifacts grace the finest museums. They are merely masked by archaeological labels such as "Maya," "Olmec," and so on." From 3-g above(paraphrased) "It is plausible that Santa Rosa is, in fact, Zarahemla." It seems to me that this is just the sort of thing that could be productively engaged.