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'Tis the Season: Elves (and Nephites)


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Posted (edited)
2 hours ago, pogi said:

I think this passage is more troublesome for your theory in that it doesn't mention departure by ship for the first group. 

Listening. For starters:

Issue # 1. Verse 4 contains no content to counter what I suggested. So that verse, without any other context, is neutral to what I've offered.

Issue # 2. However, nowhere in the entire chapter is there *any* description of a departure on foot. 

Issue #3. Yet several verses immediately after verse 4 describe departures by ship in considerable detail.

2 hours ago, pogi said:

The consecutive use of "and it came to pass" in these verses suggest a chronological order of different groups, and not an "expansion" or explanation of "previous verses". 

Listening carefully. So you interpret "and it came to pass" as a division of thought, as opposed to an expansion or explanation of previous content.

I propose we simply test your assertion and see how it compares to my suggestion. The very next use of "and it came to pass" is found 3 verses later.

7 "And in the thirty and eighth year, this man built other ships. And the first ship did also return, and many more people did enter into it; and they also took much provisions, and set out again to the land northward."

8 "And it came to pass that they were never heard of more. And we suppose that they were drowned in the depths of the sea...."

So which is a more reasonable and consistent assertion: that those "never heard of more" presents a completely separate thought relating to a completely different group of emigrants? Or that it simply continues and expands upon the description of the same group mentioned in the previous verse? If the latter, what then of the relation between verse 4 and the ship-related passages which immediately follow?

2 hours ago, pogi said:

I can't imagine building enough ships to hold 5,400 men with their wives and children.  That is around 11,000+ people journeying across the entire atlantic ocean in the year 60 B.C. seems unreasonable.  That is not counting Hagoth and the "many" others from the second group. 

? Nowhere does it say that all 5,400 men (and their families) embarked in the same voyage of the same ship. Nor have I claimed such.

Instead, the context describes two departures of Hagoth's "exceedingly large" ship, plus the building of additional ships. So with such a modest fleet at the emigrants' disposal, including *at least* one "exceedingly large" ship, plus with the description of multiple departures,  is there extensive cause to dismiss an emigration of thousands of people?

Thousands of Angles, Saxons, and others, for example, are later known to have migrated to Britain by sea, yet no one claims they all had to come on one ship, in one voyage. And no one seriously questions either the reality or the plausibility of *that* migration.

With everything shared so far, is there sufficient reason to dismiss an Israelite/Nephite diaspora to the four corners of the world - an outcome specifically foretold?

If you find no value in it this holiday, so be it. I wish you well either way. :0)

That said, do you feel I have sufficiently responded to your stated concerns?

Edited by hagoth7
Posted (edited)
On 12/24/2016 at 10:47 AM, hagoth7 said:

Hi again pogi,

 Your reply suggests that you have declined to consider the specific implications of the Yucatan map offered earlier.

The sea due west of the Yucatan *is* the Gulf of Mexico, as any compass or glance at the heavens would confirm.

You seem to be claiming otherwise. If I may ask, on what basis?

 

Furthermore, as previously mentioned, in sync with the text, that west sea's Gulf Stream leads *northward*...specifically to Europe. A solid match to both New World and European realities on numerous accounts.

 

Those who prefer to believe that the largest ship instead sailed into the *south* sea (the Pacific) rather than a  west sea *specifically* mentioned by Alma 63 do so in direct contradiction to both MesoAmerican geography *and* the Nephite text.

And those claiming such, who also claim that a voyage into the south sea then sailed northward are suggesting geographies and directions that match neither MesoAmerica nor the South Pacific. (The Pacific isles are *south* of MesoAmerica - the opposite of  "northward".)

 

Thoughts?

The "west sea" is specifically mentioned 48 times in the book of Mormon.  Unless the entire Book of Mormon geography was limited to the Yucatan peninsula, and the people were completely ignorant of the larger geography (umm...no!), it would be confusing and absurd to call the gulf of Mexico the "west sea".  The Yucatan "peninsula" is obviously a "peninsula" which protrudes into the same sea (east sea), even the Nephites would have been able to recognize that obvious fact.  These people were seafarers and explorers and would have been familiar with the larger coastlines of the Americas before making a much more dangerous and massive emigration across the Atlantic ocean.  To call the Gulf of Mexico the "west sea" is to assume that they were completely ignorant of their larger surroundings, which is unfathomable.   

The land northward is divided by the land southward in the book of Mormon by a narrow neck of land (which happens to be mentioned as the launching place of Hagoth in Alma 63).  The land northward is mentioned 150 times in the Book of Mormon and was described before Hagoth ever set sail, so clearly the "land northward" is not in reference to Europe.  One glaring problem in your theory is that the Book of Mormon people claim to be traveling to the land "northward", which means they would tell the people where they traveled to that they came from the land southward, but that is not the claim of the Elven people.  Not very consistent of your theory.  If the Elven people were indeed the Nephites who claimed to have come from the land west, then the Book of Mormon would match that language and state that they were traveling eastward and not northward. 

 

Edited by pogi
Posted (edited)
On 12/24/2016 at 10:53 AM, hagoth7 said:

Ah, I just realized that your name traces to a people in the Pacific. Is that the reason for the ongoing cognitive dissonance?

If you think that what I've offered here attempts to challenge or  negate Hagothian departure(s)  into the Pacific, that's not my assertion at all. (As I have written years ago, the text leaves room for other voyages, into other nearby seas, heading off in unnamed directions.)

So this isn't a negation of Pacific Islander heritage. It is instead an expansion of Lehite/Nephite heritage...of the promises made to our mutual fathers.

Fair enough?

Cognitive dissonance?  I am not the one who thinks that Hagoth, the purported world traveler who was familiar with the Americas, Europe, and the Pacific, would have called the Gulf of Mexico the "west sea" because he was too ignorant to recognize that the Yucatan was a peninsula :blink:  This is the same world traveler who called Europe the "land northward" so as to not confuse it with the land "more northward" :crazy:

No, I don't have Pacific Island heritage.  I'm just damn good looking, or at least the Filipinos who called me "pogi" thought so.

Edited by pogi
Posted (edited)
7 hours ago, pogi said:

...(umm...no!), it would be confusing and absurd to call the gulf of Mexico the "west sea".  The Yucatan "peninsula" is obviously a "peninsula" which protrudes into the same sea (east sea), even the Nephites would have been able to recognize that obvious fact....To call the Gulf of Mexico the "west sea" is to assume that they were completely ignorant of their larger surroundings, which is unfathomable.

I respect your right to maintain that perspective.

And I'll respond for the sake of any keenly interested in the promises made to their fathers, who wish to test things thoroughly:

Perspectives from some who think outside the USA-centric box/paradigm:

1. During the American Revolutionary War, the English mapmaker who became the King's hydrographer published a book in which he explained why the Gulf of Mexico should have instead been called the West Indian Sea. (That Gulf being in the west is confirmed by our modern compass.) With that, it's reasonable that a Nephite in such a region might use a very similar orientation.  

2. Also the demarcation between what we call the Gulf and what we call the Caribbean just happens to be...a peninsula. (The Yucatan.)  Modern people have no qualms with such a demarcation between what is essentially the same body of water. As such, I can't see why an ancient Nephite would have had an issue with a similar demarcation.

3. There is only one mention of a narrow neck in a Nephite context: precisely and only with the first mention of Hagoth in Alma 63:5. In that verse, based on the position of a comma, it can either be saying that the narrow neck is what led to the land northward (the default unconscious paradigm), or that the west sea is instead what led to the land northward. Food for thought:

  • "...for the Lord has made the sea our path..." 
  • "And they who are in the north countries shall come in remembrance before the Lord; and their prophets shall hear his voice, and shall no longer stay themselves; and they shall smite the rocks, and the ice shall flow down at their presence.  And an highway shall be cast up in the midst of the great deep."  

4. Again, does the narrow neck in the Book of Mormon serve as some land bridge to a land northward? (It isn't described anywhere as such.) Or is it the water bordering the narrow neck that instead leads northward? To help answer that question, I suggest that people carefully consider the only other Book-of-Mormon mention of a narrow neck. I'll decline to comment further on that matter.

Edited by hagoth7
Posted (edited)
15 hours ago, pogi said:

The land northward is divided by the land southward in the book of Mormon by a narrow neck of land.... 

Many read that into the one passage. Respectfully, with the clarifying context of the one other passage, and with an extensive amount of additional good cause, I don't.

15 hours ago, pogi said:

The land northward...was described before Hagoth ever set sail, so clearly the "land northward" is not in reference to Europe.... 

1. strawman. I did not say the land northward "is" Europe. I instead suggested that the land northward *includes* Europe. Important distinction. 

2. You assert that simply because Hagoth is mentioned after several mentions of land northward that Europe somehow couldn't be part of such a general reference. That might be true if there were no Nephite shipbuilding or seafaring before Hagoth's day. However, we have less than 1% of Nephite shipping and shipbuilding activity from the plates. As to the rest of the 100%, Nephite shipbuilding and seafaring existed both before *and* after Hagoth. And Europe existed before Hagoth. (Hints from a well-known LDS author.) So descriptions of land northward predating Hagoth has zero bearing as to whether Europe was included in general reference to land northward. In ancient and medieval times, people's understand of geography was extremely inaccurate - and often failed to understand whether or where one distant land was separate from or connected to another. I'd put up a few old maps to illustrate, but any who search for such will quickly see what I mean. 

3. Including what I've alluded to above, there is extensive good reason to believe that references to land northward included Europe. A glimpse of just one such reason: exceeding expertise in the working of cement, just happened to blossom in Europe precisely when the Nephite record said it did. 

15 hours ago, pogi said:

One glaring problem in your theory is that the Book of Mormon people claim to be traveling to the land "northward", which means they would tell the people where they traveled to that they came from the land southward, but that is not the claim of the Elven people.  Not very consistent of your theory.  If the Elven people were indeed the Nephites who claimed to have come from the land west, then the Book of Mormon would match that language and state that they were traveling eastward and not northward

Your insistence on geographic laser-precision among ancients is noted. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, northward doesn't mean due north. In Joseph's day, it simply meant "towards the north", "or towards a point nearer to the north than the east and west points." So a journey from south of America to Europe along the Gulf Stream actually was northward, especially during the first half of that voyage.

1. And the latter portion of such a voyage was instead eastward. So, in reverse direction, a passed-down memory of needing to first sail west on a return voyage would be both appropriate and accurate. Wouldn't you agree? 

2. Also you're assuming their ancestors wanted them to return precisely to the coordinates from whence they came - which may not have been the case at all. Just as Moroni was said to prophetically dedicate temple grounds across North America generations in advance, it is reasonable that Nephite emigrants with the gift of prophecy knew their descendants would eventually benefit from a westward voyage to North America where through the Restoration their record would be unfolded to their descendants - similar to how Nephi, when he asked to see concerning his seed, was clearly shown the interplay between Europe and America. How else would Hagoth's Nephites have accepted God's guidance to leave Nephite homelands without having at least some portion of the spirit of prophecy? And with such, wouldn't some of them know what general bearing was best? 

In either of those two scenarios, westward was an appropriate general bearing for them to pass down from generation to generation. 

Edited by hagoth7
Posted (edited)

I've enjoyed the privilege of discussing this with you.

Thank you for engaging with me on the topic, for your interesting questions and concerns, and for considering my responses.

As indicated in another thread, my focus is needed offsite for a while. So I'll suspend my participation on that note.

Edited by hagoth7
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