So There's No Archaeological Evidence For The Book Of Mormon?

[bcuzbcuz]

I don't know what you are looking for then. Will there ever be proof of the Truth Claims of the Book of Mormon? Probably not as long as either of us willl live. However I do think there is more and more evidences are coming forth that give plausibility to its story.

 

Without some type of text there can be no convergences. IE; It was the ancient Greek stories of Troy that had sparked an interest finding it. Until it was it was just fun stories from mythology.

 

Was Helen of Troy the most beautiful of women in the world? It is unlikely we will ever find a sign saying "Helen slept here" in the archaeology digs. Nor are we likely to find a road sign saying "Zarahemla Next Five Exists". So I really don't know what it is you are looking for.

 

I tend to think that New World Barley's are separate species for the Old World types. Close enough for the Lehites to be considered Barley but not the same species.

"Will there ever be proof of the truth claims of the BofM?" you ask. "Probably not", is your response, "in our life times." (paraphrased). You´re probably close to my age. I´ve got 10-15 years more according to the averages. Granted, that´s not much time, in archaeological terms, but so far, apart from "close enough" over a patchwork of materials and "probable" sites in Central America, there are not enough Nephite finds to fill a room in a museum, let alone a whole museum.

Your comparison to Greek mythology is appropriate. But Troy is merely one of a thousand archaeological hits. Almost anywhere on the Greek peninsula, or the coast of Turkey or the southwest of Sicily, a lowly tourist can literally stumble over Greek temples, homes and "Alexander was here" sites. Tens of thousands of archaeologists can and have made careers in finding millions (and I´m not using the term "millions" loosely) of stone, clay, cloth and metal objects that by their design say, "made in Greece".

[thesometimesaint]

"Will there ever be proof of the truth claims of the BofM?" you ask. "Probably not", is your response, "in our life times." (paraphrased). You´re probably close to my age. I´ve got 10-15 years more according to the averages. Granted, that´s not much time, in archaeological terms, but so far, apart from "close enough" over a patchwork of materials and "probable" sites in Central America, there are not enough Nephite finds to fill a room in a museum, let alone a whole museum.

Your comparison to Greek mythology is appropriate. But Troy is merely one of a thousand archaeological hits. Almost anywhere on the Greek peninsula, or the coast of Turkey or the southwest of Sicily, a lowly tourist can literally stumble over Greek temples, homes and "Alexander was here" sites. Tens of thousands of archaeologists can and have made careers in finding millions (and I´m not using the term "millions" loosely) of stone, clay, cloth and metal objects that by their design say, "made in Greece".

 

I'm 64. I'm rather pessimistic on short time scales for anything concerning archaeology. Would I like them to find scientific confirmation for the Book of Mormon? You bet. Do I expect it in my lifetime? No. So my main claim is one of personal spiritual confirmation rather than one of archaeology.

 

The problems with your Greek example is that Greece is one of constant civilization, and a healthy dose of reconstruction. IE; The Parthenon., the most famous of ancient Greece, has been rebuilt and structurally reinforced  more than once.  

SEE https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenon

 

We are no where near that level of knowledge for anything in the New World.

[Deborah]

Given that archeologists are still finding things in the Old World, I'm not surprised we aren't finding much here---yet! The Nephites were pretty much wiped out and so was their culture. It is not surprising there isn't much evidence of their existence.

[jkwilliams]

Given that archeologists are still finding things in the Old World, I'm not surprised we aren't finding much here---yet! The Nephites were pretty much wiped out and so was their culture. It is not surprising there isn't much evidence of their existence.

 

Maybe they followed the old Boy Scout policy: leave no trace.

[ERayR]

Maybe they followed the old Boy Scout policy: leave no trace.

 

The problem is that most do not know nor can they agree on what a trace would look like.

[canard78]

Given that archeologists are still finding things in the Old World, I'm not surprised we aren't finding much here---yet! The Nephites were pretty much wiped out and so was their culture. It is not surprising there isn't much evidence of their existence.

I don't see many Vikings or Romans on the highstreets any more but they seem to have managed to leave plenty of evidence behind them.

[jkwilliams]

I don't see many Vikings or Romans on the highstreets any more but they seem to have managed to leave plenty of evidence behind them.

 

Heck, they even left traces in the Americas.

[thesometimesaint]

I don't see many Vikings or Romans on the highstreets any more but they seem to have managed to leave plenty of evidence behind them.

 

You probably see their descendents every day.

[canard78]

The problem is that most do not know nor can they agree on what a trace would look like.

Elephantine. That's what it looks like when Jews migrate, resettle and mix with the locals. They keep records (just like the Nephites), they build a temple (like the Nephites) and maintain a recognisable Jewish identity despite their new different cultural circumstances.

Difference is, we don't need 19thC supernatural scripture to identify Elephantine. We can see their records, temple and cultural imprint. Elephantine is what evidence looks like. Book of Mormon has nothing even close.

Show me a single piece of evidence that the Law of Moses was practiced in Mesoamerica. They did it for 600 years so you've got a decent window.

[canard78]

You probably see their descendents every day.

And how about Lehi's decedents... seen any of those recently?

[thesometimesaint]

And how about Lehi's decedents... seen any of those recently?

 

Probably. We have a few descendents of American Indians from Mesoamerica in our Ward.

[canard78]

You actually do what many critics do, and you don't really represent the BoM accurately. For example, outside of a few stock mentions of fauna, and some Isaiah scriptures, horses are only mentioned twice in relation to Nephite actions. When Ammon is preparing King Lamoni's chariots (~Alma 18), and when the Nephites are gathering together to withstand a siege (3 Nephi 3-4). Two occurrences in a thousand years is hardly a "horse culture" similar to the Xiongnu. So its a rather unreasonable demand to make on the text and archaeology.

This large culture that fielded million man armies is another one. For much of Nephite history we don't even have records outside of the barest outline. But as last as the book of Alma much of the action revolved around single cities (Nephi and Zarahemla) led by a single person like Alma. Even after the Nephites expanded and won the great war they quickly lost their territory. In Helaman 1 they lost their capital, and Helaman 4 said that Moronihah could only regain "half" the land. The prophet Nephi had to specifically qualify his words to the lands that the Nephites possessed, implying that there were many they did not possess (~Helaman 7). The book of Helaman is filled with examples of Nephite political fragmentation closer in scope to the rump states of the Roman empire, or the city states of ancient Greece, than the monolithic entity that many critics and even members believe.

Moreover, I've done research into the military participation ratios. This is a war and society approach used by military historians to calculate army and population sizes. Basically, the ratio dictates that a society can only muster about 15% of its population for war. So its pretty eye opening to me that Moroni listed the Nephite people as being as numerous as the "sands of the sea" (Mormon 1), yet this innumerable people could only muster about 30,000 in their war of survival against the Lamanites (Mormon 2:42). But that number just happens to be about 15% of 200,000, or the final number of people listed at Cumorah (see Mormon 6:7 for example which seems to suggest that women and children were among the soldiers.). I discuss this in far greater detail in my second book, and you can see some preliminary outlines of it here: http://mormonwar.blogspot.com/2013/05/military-participation-ratio-and-wrong.html (Can't seem to get the link to work. Click the demographics button on the left to find the post.)

But my point is that your knowledge doesn't seem very accurate. No offense, it seems quite simplistic. You claim it would be easy to find these million man horse culture armies, when the text really doesn't demand that we look for that. What Hamblin said is entirely accurate then, you need to have a proper grasp of archaeology, but you also need to have a proper understanding of what you should be looking for and then look to see how those intersect. This was only a cursory summary of many pages of research, but the BoM that I read, supported by a close analysis dozens of verses, and reinforced by an extensive study of history, doesn't support the idea that we should look for "large iron age horse cultures" with million man armies. Instead, I look for Nephites that were sometimes a dominate force of a coalition (Alma 8:11-12; Mormon 2:4) but mostly politically fragmented, rarely used horses, and had armies that numbered in only the few tens of thousands. Thanks for commenting, I love discussing the Book of Mormon.

So because horses are only mentioned twice we can assume they were hardly and shouldn't be traceable. On the other hand, these coalitions with other natives are common and happen through several generations of Nephites but are never directly mentioned once?

[canard78]

Probably. We have a few descendents of American Indians from Mesoamerica in our Ward.

Ask them for a DNA sample. I can't wait to finally have some evidence of middle eastern people in Mesoamerica.

[thesometimesaint]

Ask them for a DNA sample. I can't wait to finally have some evidence of middle eastern people in Mesoamerica.

 

Not sure that a DNA sample would do much good.

SEE https://www.lds.org/topics/book-of-mormon-and-dna-studies?lang=eng

[Robert F. Smith]

There is no acceptable reason why ABMS cannot be a legitimate area of academic study, except for prejudice, John.  You may be right to say that it "isn't considered" to be such by people like Jenkins, who come to the matter with strong apriori views, and who expel or disregard even ordinary academic standards -- which would be freely applied to non-controversial issues.  The failings of apologists who fudge the data are frequently the same failings of the critics who deny the obvious.  Either side can be in a rush to judgment, heedless of reasonable interpretations.  Either side can make impossible demands, which no professional archeologist would ever make.  What is good for the goose is good for the gander.  Right?

I disagree. The issue with ABMS is not that some people fudge details but that it does not have the same goals and methodology as accepted academic inquiry. 

So, are you saying that we must preclude even the possibility of doing ancient Book of Mormon studies (ABMS) because it must of necessity have non-academic goals and methodology?  That is what I meant by "prejudice."  By such lights, it is not even possible to discuss ABMS because of apriori notions that it is impossible.  A circular rationale at best.

 

I have been saying all along that there must be no difference in the academic standards applied to ABMS as to any other such academic line of inquiry.  And I have been doing that myself in my own writings.  Thus, if my "goals and methodology" are wrong in such instances, I would certainly like to know where I have gone wrong.  Please enlighten me, so that I can get on the straight and narrow . . .

Edited August 8, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[ERayR]

So because horses are only mentioned twice we can assume they were hardly and shouldn't be traceable. On the other hand, these coalitions with other natives are common and happen through several generations of Nephites but are never directly mentioned once?

Not necessarily but then again one shouldn't assume that everybody had a herd of them either. 

 

I would never think to equate my horses with my neighbors but then again I do have a couple of neighbors that resemble certain horse body parts.

[Robert F. Smith]

First, I do accept the evidences. I'm asking, in this thread, for a specific type of evidence and, if any of it was produced I'd add it to the pool of evidence I already accept and consider reasonable.

I know Jeff personally and respect the countless hours he puts into his website. All of those ancient evidences are convergences. There isn't a single piece of evidence that is independent of the text.

As to your examples, they don't answer the request of this thread. Bountiful is a convergence. But I'm not looking for a convergence in this thread.

The two coastal Arabian locations only show that Lehi & co could have found somewhere like what is described as Bountiful. There's no evidence in those actual locations that Nephites were there, is there.

And yes, there might be a few examples of Barley in the Americas, but that's not evidence that this barley was brought by a group of Jews, is it?

You are certainly entitled to make whatever demands you wish as to which evidence you would find most convincing, but you are creating a straw man in the process.  The Book of Mormon does not say that the Lehites brought barley with them.  Rather the book mentions barley, and generations of critics have claimed outright that this is false.  If we point out in response that there was indeed cultivated barley in the New World, we get hit in the head for simply replying.  Is that fair, canard?  See John Sorenson and my “Barley in Ancient America,” FARMS Update, December 1983 and December 1984, reprinted in John W. Welch, ed., Reexploring the Book of Mormon: The F.A.R.M.S. Updates (Provo: FARMS/SLC: Deseret Book, 1992), 130-132.  Online at http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/books/?bookid=71&chapid=802 .  It would be silly to claim that the presence of a species of barley in the New World proves the Book of Mormon true, and no one makes that claim.

 

You whine about all the convergences, but those have had to be pointed out for the same reason as the barley -- critics loudly complained that this or that feature of Jaredite or Nephite civilization was implausible, often falsifying the actual contents of the Book of Mormon or of archeology in order to justify their claims.  If we reply, we are automatically in the wrong or not presenting the kind of evidence you prefer.  The shoe had rather be on the other foot, don't you think?

[canard78]

You are certainly entitled to make whatever demands you wish as to which evidence you would find most convincing, but you are creating a straw man in the process. The Book of Mormon does not say that the Lehites brought barley with them. Rather the book mentions barley, and generations of critics have claimed outright that this is false. If we point out in response that there was indeed cultivated barley in the New World, we get hit in the head for simply replying. Is that fair, canard? See John Sorenson and my “Barley in Ancient America,” FARMS Update, December 1983 and December 1984, reprinted in John W. Welch, ed., Reexploring the Book of Mormon: The F.A.R.M.S. Updates (Provo: FARMS/SLC: Deseret Book, 1992), 130-132. Online at http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/books/?bookid=71&chapid=802 . It would be silly to claim that the presence of a species of barley in the New World proves the Book of Mormon true, and no one makes that claim.

I didn't bring up barley, I was replying to thesometimesaint who claimed Barley was evidence for the Book of Mormon:

Why be so limiting in the evidence you'll accept? If the archaeology establishes that Bountiful in the Old World exits. Then is\t is unnecessarily restrictive to exclude it as evidence. If Barley has been discovered in the New World. Why do you exclude it as evidence?

My reply wasn't what you are suggesting it was. I wasn't asking for evidence that New World Barley was brought over by the Lehites. I was pointing out that finding evidence of ancient barley is not itself evidence in favour of the Book of Mormon. Instead finding New World Barley refutes evidence against the Book of Mormon. Finding barley does nothing towards proving the book historically accurate (and I'm not even suggesting it should). It merely helps to dismiss an evidence that it is historically inaccurate.

You whine about all the convergences, but those have had to be pointed out for the same reason as the barley -- critics loudly complained that this or that feature of Jaredite or Nephite civilization was implausible, often falsifying the actual contents of the Book of Mormon or of archeology in order to justify their claims. If we reply, we are automatically in the wrong or not presenting the kind of evidence you prefer. The shoe had rather be on the other foot, don't you think?

Is that really all that convergences do? I don't see Sorenson's huge volume of convergences being solely refutations of criticisms. They are also a group of evidences for the Book of Mormon, not simply ways of dismissing a specific critique. Finding paintings of dark and light-skinned people together is an example of one that supports the proposal that the Book of Mormon might be a true history. There are certainly other possible explanations for the paintings and there's no further evidence in those paintings that the people were from the middle east. But I don't think that it's challenging a critique.

[TOmNossor]

Would the aquatic ape hypothesis be a better comparison to ancient BOM studies, hopefully without offending anyone who has a sincere belief in the historicity of the BOM? 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_ape_hypothesis

 

It doesn't seem to have the connotations of ridicule that we think of when we talk about Bigfoot or alien abductions, but at the same time it hasn't passed the peer review process either. 

Because it is easy and I have already written this long in the past let me propose the the BOM is more like the Saga of Eric the Red and the Greenlanders’ Saga than it is like Bigfoot or Aquatic Apes.

The BOM is a religious book that happens to include items from the culture that purportedly produced it.  It is not a theory of human evolution or a description/explanation of phenomenon in deep woods of United States.  Brant's work BTW treats the BOM as a potentially ancient text and uses the tools ethnohistory to evaluate that claim.  I am not an ethnohistorian nor an archeologist, but I continue to believe the BOM is best explained as an ancient book not an 19th century production.  The presence of things document by Brant and things like Lehi’s journey are hard to explain via the fiction/fraud theory and the absence of horse culture and iron culture are IMO sufficiently addressed with some of the MITIGATING discussions offered by apologists.  Not to mention, what did the natives call San Lorenzo, La Venta, and El Mirador.  They were not Spanish people so those sites are not what they were called.  We do not know.  As a layman, I lean towards the view that lack of textual evidence in Mesoamerica is the biggest problem for those who lament the lack of archeological evidence for the BOM.  As Dr. Hamblin has suggested, without textual evidence, the Jews would disappear as a peculiar people and be just one of the mob.

Here is what I wrote a long time ago:

 

 

All of the material in quotes below comes from Jared Diamond’s book, Collapse.

 

Let’s pretend it is 1960.  We have written accounts of the Vikings’ attempt to settle North America.  “The written accounts consist mainly of two sagas describing the initial Vinland voyages of discovery and exploration, transmitted orally for several centuries and finally written down in Iceland during the 1200s.  In the absence of independent confirming evidence, scholars tended to dismiss the sagas as fiction and to doubt that the Vikings ever reached the New World.”  This is where we stood in 1960.

There was much invested in the minds of scholars that said Columbus was the first to settle the New World.  Even though these texts from the 1200’s were suitably ancient and spoke of voyages and settlements that had solid oral tradition and occurred sometime about 6 or 7 generations earlier than the first written accounts, scholars still dismissed them as fiction.  Columbus was first.  Such things continue today outside of the great LDS vs. non-LDS debates only not about the Vikings.

This is because that in 1961 “the debate was finally settled when archaeologists located the Vikings’ New-foundland base camp.”  “The saga accounts of Vinland are now recognized to be the oldest written descriptions of North America, although scholars still debate the accuracy of their details.  They are contained in two separate manuscripts, termed Greenlanders’ Saga and Erik the Red’s Saga, which are in broad agreement but have many differences of finer points.”

 

 

There is still considerable intellectual momentum behind the denials of Old World to New World contact.  Non-LDS diffusionist continue to debate with non-LDS non-diffusionist about possible contact between the Old World and New World.  If I understand the state of the archeological community, this debate is now a respected disagreement with neither side claiming the other is simply brain washed religious fools.

 

I would suggest that if ancient texts like the Saga of Eric the Red are largely dismissed by the academic community, miraculous texts like the BOM will have a much greater problem.  This will not change that fact that there are problems and evidences for the ancientness of the BOM.

 

 

Charity, TOm

Edited August 8, 2015 by TOmNossor

[Bob Crockett]

Heck, they even left traces in the Americas.

Well, so did the Romans and Hebrews if you give account to excavation of coins in mounds.

[Robert F. Smith]

I didn't bring up barley, I was replying to thesometimesaint who claimed Barley was evidence for the Book of Mormon:

My reply wasn't what you are suggesting it was. I wasn't asking for evidence that New World Barley was brought over by the Lehites.

But that is just what you suggested when you said "And yes, there might be a few examples of Barley in the Americas, but that's not evidence that this barley was brought by a group of Jews, is it?"  You are unable to accurately separate out the various types of evidence and their value.  For you all evidence mentioned in connection with the Book of Mormon is all of the same type and serves the same purpose.

 

I was pointing out that finding evidence of ancient barley is not itself evidence in favour of the Book of Mormon. Instead finding New World Barley refutes evidence against the Book of Mormon. Finding barley does nothing towards proving the book historically accurate (and I'm not even suggesting it should). It merely helps to dismiss an evidence that it is historically inaccurate.

But isn't that just what I and others have been saying?  Why would it even become an issue?

 

Is that really all that convergences do? I don't see Sorenson's huge volume of convergences being solely refutations of criticisms. They are also a group of evidences for the Book of Mormon, not simply ways of dismissing a specific critique. Finding paintings of dark and light-skinned people together is an example of one that supports the proposal that the Book of Mormon might be a true history. There are certainly other possible explanations for the paintings and there's no further evidence in those paintings that the people were from the middle east. But I don't think that it's challenging a critique.

Again, Sorenson's entire volume has only one type of evidence -- convergences -- and nothing more?

 

You even admit that it is not solely a volume of convergences.  Well, then, what else is in there, and does it pass muster as real archeology?  What purpose does it serve?

[Teancum]

Given that archeologists are still finding things in the Old World, I'm not surprised we aren't finding much here---yet! The Nephites were pretty much wiped out and so was their culture. It is not surprising there isn't much evidence of their existence.

A substantive civilization would still leave traces and evidences. There is seems to be little to nothing to substantiate a Nepite culture.

[Bob Crockett]

A substantive civilization would still leave traces and evidences. There is seems to be little to nothing to substantiate a Nepite culture.

There's an Aztec piece of art in the Mexican National History of Anthropology which shows two different indigenous people at war, a brown-skinned and a white-skinned.  My university professor (Mexican) tour guide told me there was once two races in Mexico.  He had no clue I was LDS.

 

My Haywood book from the 1820s documents findings of iron implements of war in the Tennessee and Ohio Valley.

 

I'd say there's some pretty good evidence.

 

That kind of stuff gets no play with the Sorenson crowd because it doesn't fit the model.  Their task is to draw the box so small that one can't find anything there; however, the box they have drawn is in the middle of an impassable swamp, and I highly doubt Dr. Sorenson has ever been there.

Edited August 9, 2015 by Bob Crockett

[Robert F. Smith]

A substantive civilization would still leave traces and evidences. There is seems to be little to nothing to substantiate a Nepite culture.

What would a Nephite culture look like, if found in the midst of Formative Mesoamerican civilizations?  Realizing, of course, that nearly everything done in Mesoamerican archeology has been in the later Classic and Post-Classic Maya period.  There have been some notable exceptions, but the bulk of interest has long been upon the Maya region and history -- and influences upon it from elsewhere.

 

Of course, "a substantive civilization would . . . leave traces and evidences," but what would that mean?  For example, we can see many of the "traces and evidences" of Olmec high culture in later Mesoamerica.

 

Would we recognize the traces and evidences of Jaredite culture, or of Nephite culture in the New World, if we ran across it?  Isn’t it likely that, if the Book of Mormon is authentic, that we have already run across just such archeological traces and evidence without realizing it?  What might we have missed in our haste to find a direct, wholesale transfer of the culture of late pre-Exilic Judah into the New World – via two small boatloads of people from the Middle East, who find themselves living a wholly new environment, and in the midst of some very different sorts of people.  A very numerous set of peoples with a variety of languages and already having a foreign cult, calendar, and sophisticated astronomy, math, and writing systems.  Can a foreign elite have dominated a small sector of these cultures?  We already know that such took place regularly, as with the rulers from Teotihuacan in central Mexico dominating some Maya City States.  No reason at all why the Nephites and Lamanites cannot have done likewise.  We need to be sensitive to the sorts of traces and evidences which this might have left, rather than expecting a reprise of Elephantine.

Edited August 9, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[Robert F. Smith]

.................................................................................  

That kind of stuff gets no play with the Sorenson crowd because it doesn't fit the model.  Their task is to draw the box so small that one can't find anything there; however, the box they have drawn is in the middle of an impassable swamp, and I highly doubt Dr. Sorenson has ever been there.

You mean the "impassable swamp" in which Olmec (Jaredite) civilization flourished for so long?  The horrible swamp in Veracruz, which was home to the mother culture of Mesoamerica?  The swamp with riverine access which the Conquistadores used?  Where Michael Coe excavated?  That "impassable swamp" is the sole area used by John Sorenson as the primary focus of Book of Mormon events?  A "box so small that one can't find anything there"?

 

Surely you jest.  You mock John with outrageous hyperbole.  Then you doubt he has ever been there, but have you been there?  We have had something like this very conversation before, and you appear not to have learned anything from it (including your statement that you would be checking on a source I provided at the research library at UCLA).