Year of Maroni

[Zosimus]

1 hour ago, webbles said:

How Joseph pronounced it is completely different from how he spelled it.  If you had said "And how did Joseph Smith pronounce the name of the last person to engrave upon the Golden Plates? Maroni, just as it appears in the Kaempfer and Rafinesque Siamese zodiac tables. ", that is a little better.

Agree, that would be a better way to phrase it.

1 hour ago, webbles said:

Another instance is "Coriantumr".  In the first instance it occurs (Helaman 1:15 - https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/original-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-12-april-1828-circa-1-july-1829/194 ), Oliver writes "Coriantummer", then crosses it out and writes "Coriantumr".  Royal Skousen says that the "r" at the end of "Coriantumr" is done with a flourish and that is the only known instance of that flourish (page 2883 of Volume 4 of Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon).  Skousen speculates that Oliver is a little exasperated by the weird spelling of "Coriantumr".

Like I proposed earlier, the unusual spelling Cumr comes from the sons of Japheth in the Arabic geographies that were the founding rulers of Komr, the Malay Peninsula and later the Comoro Islands. (source) These sons of Japheth were known as Kumr, note the weird exasperating spelling.

Arabic geographers used the same unusual spelling that Joseph (according to Skousen) may have been particular about getting right. Given the context of the Kumr being from the same time period as the Jaredites and their similar historical role as civilization bearers to the east in boats modeled after Noah's ark, it's hard to dismiss as coincidence.

Though I earlier didn't want to get off-track by posting the following, I believe it demonstrates that the narrative of the Kumr was, at least tangentially and late, known within the context of Book of Mormon authorship. This is from Solomon Spaulding's brother, John Spaulding:

"In this work he mentioned that the American continent was colonized by Lehi, the son of Japheth, who sailed from Chaldea soon after the great dispersion, and landed near the isthmus of Darien. Lehi's descendants, who were styled Jaredites, spread gradually to the north, bearing with them the remains of antediluvian science, and building those cities the ruins of which we see in Central America, and the fortifications which are scattered along the Cordilleras."

I propose he, and others before him, got this from the Arabic geographies about the Kumr, or the Malayo-Polynesians in Mitchell's hypothesis:

"A branch of the family of Amur, son of Japheth, separated and went to China. The leader of this tribe built vessels on the model of the ark of Noah, his grandfather, in which all his family embarked; they crossed the sea, reached China, multiplied, built cities, and there developed the sciences and arts, and exploited its gold mines. This leader reigned three hundred years." - Akhbar al-Zaman

In the Book of Ether, and as noted by Nibley, "An important clue is the statement in Ether 6:7 that Jared’s boats were built on the same pattern as Noah’s ark." (source)

From the paper I linked earlier:

"The Qumr of Arabic sources provides an interesting comparison with the Chinese Kun-lun. However, as the etymology of the name Qumr is unusually complex, a few introductory remarks are in order. Ptolemy recorded a Greek transcription of a Bantu name to designate the mythical mountain at the source of the Nile River. The original Bantu name included the meaning of moon. This meaning was transmitted via Ptolemy to the Arabs who transcribed the pertinent name as Qumr. In the way, the Arabs knew the mountain at the source of the Nile as the Mountain of Qumr (Mountain of the Moon). Furthermore, the Arab name for Madagascar was the Island of Qumr (Island of the Moon) for reasons not explicit, the Arabs associated Madagascar with the region at the source of the Nile. In addition, the Arabs confounded the Khmers of Cambodia with Qumr of Africa and Madagascar. Finally, the Arabs designated the Qumr/Khmers as ethnic brothers of the Chinese. With these few prefatory remarks, the Arab story concerning the origins of the Qumr people can be understood. The story is as follows. Both the Chinese and the Qumr are descended from a grandson of Noah who reached the Far East by sea in a boat modelled on the more famous vessel built by his grandfather. The Chinese and the Qumr lived together on the mainland of Asia until discord and division resulted in the Qumr being chased to the coastal and island regions where they dwelt for a time under a king with the title of Kamrun. After a time, discords and divisions arose, and the faction not belonging to the royal family took to the sea and migrated to the Island of Qumr (Madagascar). Further discords and divisions resulted in many of them migrating to the East African coast and hinterland where they gave their name to the mountains at the source of the Nile." (source)

The author goes on to tell us that the myths of the Qumr or Kumr extend from the Nile to the Comoros to Khmer Funan (evident in the matrilineal references in the Maran inscription I mentioned earlier) to as far east as Easter Island. They are the Malayo-Polynesians which we already know to be the blood of Lehi. This isn't anything new for us. The Polynesians are Lehites, only from a different direction. They gave their name to the mountain at the source of the Nile (Komr or Comoro) and to the mountain in their promised land (Cumorah).

This forms the foundation of my hypothesis and geographical model. It's far more crucial than the spelling of Maroni/Moroni or Low's interview with a Siamese monk. Interestingly, all this converges on the same geographical context, the Malay Peninsula, known anciently as Komor-Malay, or Comoro:

"Certain geographies included under the name of Komor include not only Madagascar, but also Sumatra and Java, or more or less a part of these islands together. According to Nowayry and Al Dimasky, the Island of Komor was also called Malay….Komoriyya is mentioned by Dimasky and Ibn Sa'id." (source)

I would appreciate expert opinions on this matter, but they often focus on Comoro as a location on an 1830 map or a hideout for Captain Kidd, neglecting its true etymology and important role in pre-history, as Benjamin McGuire does in "Finding Parallels: Some Cautions and Criticisms, Part One" He doesn't even trace the etymology of the word Comoro, a word that originates with the Kumr people, and was applied to a mountain and an island/peninsula.

Edited February 19, 2024 by Zosimus

[webbles]

50 minutes ago, Zosimus said:

This forms the foundation of my hypothesis and geographical model. It's far more crucial than the spelling of Maroni/Moroni or Low's interview with a Siamese monk. Interestingly, all this converges on the same geographical context, the Malay Peninsula, known anciently as Comoro.

The Kumr stuff is interesting but I think the Maroni/Moroni connection hurts it.  Joseph wouldn't know how to spell Coriantumr if he had just heard it.  He would have to actually know the spelling.  And if so, it is really odd that he would be specific about the spelling for Coriantumr but not care about Maroni's spelling.

58 minutes ago, Zosimus said:

Though I earlier didn't want to get off-track by posting the following, I believe it demonstrates that the narrative of the Kumr was, at least tangentially and late, known within the context of Book of Mormon authorship. This is from Solomon Spaulding's brother, John Spaulding:

"In this work he mentioned that the American continent was colonized by Lehi, the son of Japheth, who sailed from Chaldea soon after the great dispersion, and landed near the isthmus of Darien. Lehi's descendants, who were styled Jaredites, spread gradually to the north, bearing with them the remains of antediluvian science, and building those cities the ruins of which we see in Central America, and the fortifications which are scattered along the Cordilleras."

You've mentioned John Spaulding before but I don't see why you would use him.  The extant "Manuscript Found" isn't anything like the Book of Mormon.  And if there was a second manuscript, it would have been written before 1816 since James died then.  That would mean that James would have to have known about the Kumr narrative before 1816.  Unless you are saying that the Spaulding manuscript didn't have anything to do with the Kumr narrative and instead John is just seeing a connection between the Book of Mormon and the Kumr narrative?

[Zosimus]

1 hour ago, webbles said:

The Kumr stuff is interesting but I think the Maroni/Moroni connection hurts it.  Joseph wouldn't know how to spell Coriantumr if he had just heard it.  He would have to actually know the spelling.  And if so, it is really odd that he would be specific about the spelling for Coriantumr but not care about Maroni's spelling.

"The Kumr stuff" is central. I don't want to get pulled back into minutia at the expense of discussing the foundation of the model. I've said pretty much all I can say about the spelling of Maroni. Its noteworthy, but not as interesting as the etymology and history of Comoro. No experts have covered this etymology and I'd really like to see it happen.

Quote

You've mentioned John Spaulding before but I don't see why you would use him.  The extant "Manuscript Found" isn't anything like the Book of Mormon.  And if there was a second manuscript, it would have been written before 1816 since James died then.  That would mean that James would have to have known about the Kumr narrative before 1816.  Unless you are saying that the Spaulding manuscript didn't have anything to do with the Kumr narrative and instead John is just seeing a connection between the Book of Mormon and the Kumr narrative?

John Spaulding's 1851 statement is tangential to the model. I only mention it to demonstrate that the Arabic sources describing the Kumr were in circulation and were within the context of the Jaredites. Its unfortunate that the only reference connecting Jaredites to Kumr I can find comes from John Spaulding, because it confuses people about my hypothesis.

Let me be clear, the Kumr sources are not well known outside academic circles. Sylvestre de Sacy touches on the etymology of Komr in his text on Egypt, but it was in French. I have a few research threads ongoing including Luther Bradish, a Palmyra native, who traveled up the Nile and would have known the sources discussing the location of the Mountain of the Moon, but I cannot explain how the Jaredites look so similar to the Kumr in a book published in 1830. This is why I haven't rejected an historical Book of Mormon.

Quote

Unless you are saying that the Spaulding manuscript didn't have anything to do with the Kumr narrative and instead John is just seeing a connection between the Book of Mormon and the Kumr narrative?

No no, I'm not saying Kumr came from Solomon (you said James, I think you meant Solomon). I'm saying the Kumr were a historical people, and later accounts about them had influenced John Spaulding's late statement. Maybe John Spaulding made a second statement because he had seen in the account of the Kumr a resemblance with the Jaredites. So he fabricated another testimony 21 years after the BoM publication that conflicted his earlier statement on Manuscript Found. Or maybe he was simply mixing things he had heard together. My reference could also be used to show that the Book of Mormon has an uncanny resemblance to Kumr history and John Spaulding wanted to somehow take advantage of it.

I dunno. I only bring it up because its obviously referencing Arabic accounts of the Kumr, and I need to show that Arabic accounts of the Kumr were in circulation. But I still can't establish they were before 1851. There's nothing to suggest Mitchell or Rafinesque or anybody in pre-1830 NY was even aware of it. Luther Bradish is even a stretch since he couldn't read Arabic afaik.

I have low confidence it was knowable to Joseph before the BoM was published.

Edited February 19, 2024 by Zosimus

[Benjamin McGuire]

On 2/17/2024 at 5:08 PM, Zosimus said:

So again. Where is your point B? Where do you intuit the events in the Book of Mormon took place? Do you believe the Book of Mormon is history, if so, where?

I don't have a point B. That is, I am not arguing for any particular location where the Book of Mormon took place. However, I think that your question does provide a space for some relevant discussions -

1: The Book of Mormon alleges to be a translation. We need to be very clear that the Book of Mormon is produced in a specific time and place. Any attempt to deal with the historicity of the narratives in the text (to the extent that there may be a historicity to them) has to differentiate between features of the text that are attributable to the translation as opposed to the source text (the gold plates).

2: Being able to identify with certainty a location where the alleged events of the Book of Mormon took place helps us understand the text (and this is especially helpful for understanding the source for the translation). However, incorrectly identifying the location where the alleged events took place is harmful in understanding the text - and, I would argue, that this misidentification is more harmful than reading the text (in translation of course) without attempting to identify a specific location where the alleged events took place. In other words, reading the text with the wrong location in mind provides a reading that is worse than reading the text with no location in mind.

Because of this, I find no value in the various models attempting to identify a location. Until one comes out that works with enough certainty that I would be confident using it, I prefer not to read it in a specific historical context.

At the same time, it is worth pointing out that while Nephi understands the historical context of the Brass Plates, he deliberately withholds that information from his people. Instead, he adopts a paradigm of likening the text to their experience. This sort of reading doesn't require us to have a historical context - it always recontextualizes the text in the present. I bring this up only to point out that while there is a literary reason to avoid trying to contextualize the text into a specific historical place and time, there is also a reading paradigm in the text itself which suggests that the translation of the text provides us with everything we need to read it in the here and now.

Finally, as my own writing indicates, I have no problems with using historical contexts when the narrative provides it - which it does in its origin stories with Jerusalem.

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

there is also a reading paradigm in the text itself which suggests that the translation of the text provides us with everything we need to read it in the here and now.

Possibly done by Nephi in anticipation of both his own people very soon not having any original colony members left to explain the context, but also him realizing if it’s an issue with his people a generation or two removed from the location and culture that produced the text, how much more an issue it would be in 500, 1000, or 2000 or more years. 

[Zosimus]

18 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

1: The Book of Mormon alleges to be a translation. We need to be very clear that the Book of Mormon is produced in a specific time and place. Any attempt to deal with the historicity of the narratives in the text (to the extent that there may be a historicity to them) has to differentiate between features of the text that are attributable to the translation as opposed to the source text (the gold plates).

Then we'd need to pinpoint what we believe is due to translation versus original text. This can be difficult as it often uncovers biases, or our Point B. 

Even if we agreed we don't need a Point B, within 5 minutes of discussion we'd hit a snag. The events had to have happened on the American continent, even though there's no reason from the narrative to assume this. So why do it? With this untenable requirement, we have to start massaging the translation until an unambiguous term like elephant becomes an elephant-like mammal. Soon after the methodology becomes searching for any proboscidean that might have been useful to a Mayan.

We wouldn’t need to do this, if there was no Point B.

I can always tell when someone really has a Point B, because they immediately remind me that the text is a translation, and remind me that horses are odd-toed ungulates.

18 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

2: Being able to identify with certainty a location where the alleged events of the Book of Mormon took place helps us understand the text (and this is especially helpful for understanding the source for the translation). However, incorrectly identifying the location where the alleged events took place is harmful in understanding the text - and, I would argue, that this misidentification is more harmful than reading the text (in translation of course) without attempting to identify a specific location where the alleged events took place. In other words, reading the text with the wrong location in mind provides a reading that is worse than reading the text with no location in mind.

100%, but I'd add that we do need a model to show that if a Nephite really existed, his existence would not contradict historical data. I'm not asserting Nephite historicity, but rather establishing a model to understand the Book of Mormon narrative and its historical context. For instance, I'm not suggesting the Kumr were the Jaredites, but the Kumr exemplify a Biblical group that sailed east in boats, modeled on Noah's ark at the time the Book of Mormon narrative tells us the Jaredites did something analogous. If I'm understanding your comments on verisimilitude correctly. The historical accounts of the Kumr help us establish that the Jaredites are believable, plausible and lifelike. That's all lost if I'm required to carry that verisimilitude across the Pacific Ocean in 2500BC.

Edited February 20, 2024 by Zosimus

[Benjamin McGuire]

9 hours ago, Zosimus said:

100%, but I'd add that we do need a model to show that if a Nephite really existed, his existence would not contradict historical data.

I don't really agree with this.

Of course, I am a text guy, not a historian or a geographer. But, as Adele Berlin noted about the Book of Esther:

Quote

Among the leading arguments for Esther’s historicity are that its setting is authentic and that its knowledge of Persian custom is detailed and accurate. But this realistic back-ground proves nothing about the historicity of the story ... (JBL 120/1, 3-14).

Esther is still a fictional account. And the existence of the characters in the text contradict historical data. The problem that we face is that the Book of Mormon is a text - a work of literature, and the Nephites we see in the text are literary constructs. You want to create a close connection between the literary creation and history - but - you don't want to first deal with the literary problems.

To me, that only suggests that you are privileging an interpretation - one that is already competing with other interpretations. Looking for evidence to support your interpretation (especially when it ignores evidence that contradicts your interpretation) tends to make for circular arguments. It makes it difficult for you to distinguish between your evidences and pure speculation.

In a nod to @mfbukowski it's worth pointing out that our need to prove that the Nephites existed isn't particularly important to our reading of the text. It especially isn't important if we are going to read as Nephi suggests, by likening the text to ourselves.

9 hours ago, Zosimus said:

That's all lost if I'm required to carry that verisimilitude across the Pacific Ocean in 2500BC.

And of course, to deal with this, we have theories (which I don't particularly subscribe to either) that Lehi and company sailed south and west around Africa and crossed the Atlantic. The text is problematic because (like all texts) it represents a communicative act - and only when we understand that communicative act can we start to understand the reasons for the details that are included in the text. And I can see this problem here in the idea you have of the Lehite expedition sailing east instead of south when the direction they sailed simply isn't a part of the narrative.

And as a note, I really don't have a point B. I have never (in the decades I have been posting here) ever suggested that I favored one geographic model. My concern isn't deciphering the geography of the text - after all, in discussing the text as a communicative act, I note with some certainly that it isn't within the scope of its intent to make it easy to produce a map of the various journeys and locations mentioned.

[Zosimus]

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Among the leading arguments for Esther’s historicity are that its setting is authentic and that its knowledge of Persian custom is detailed and accurate. But this realistic back-ground proves nothing about the historicity of the story ... (JBL 120/1, 3-14).

First of all the Book of Mormon can't be dated to the 4th century BC and it has never been canonized. If it was either, or both, of those things there'd be no reason to have this discussion. Secondly, even if the story of Esther is not historical, there's an established authentic setting. The knowledge is of Persian culture, and it is detailed and accurate.

The Book of Mormon has none of this yet. We haven't even established a setting. The knowledge seems to be of some culture with steel, chariots, horses, silk, elephants and Hebrew/Egyptian inscriptions on metal plates. If we could establish this realistic background with a known culture, say Persian or Mesoamerican, then it would be far easier to even have a discussion about authenticity and historicity. As it is, we can't even establish the setting or the culture.

If the Book of Esther started off with Esther getting on a boat and sailing to an unidentified distant land where she encounters hebrews wearing silk garments and making use of elephants and horses, what would Adele Berlin say about the setting or culture of the Book of Esther? Mesoamerica wouldn't be considered a candidate for the setting, or culture. I seriously doubt anybody would even propose it. And even if someone did, they’d have to convince Berlin that the word horse in the translated text could have meant another odd-toed ungulate in the source text. Nobody would buy it. I'd guess the discussion about historical setting and culture would focus around India, or somewhere in Asia. Somewhere that Persians had access to, by sea, and somewhere with elephants and silk and horses in the 4th century BC.

With Berlin's comment on setting and culture in mind, I propose another text as being more relevant to our discussion given its dating and uncertain place in the canon (source) alongside an unknown setting and culture. The Narrative of Zosimus is a 4th century Jewish/Christian expansion of Jeremiah 35. The narrative tells us of a Biblical group that quits Jerusalem in the 6th century BC and are led by God to an island (or peninsula) set aside for them in the middle of the sea. Given the similarities between this group (known as Rahmans in Slavonic versions) and the Camarini in Syriac/Greek texts or the Qumr in Arabic texts, a relationship between 4th century Jewish/Christan accounts of exiles from Jerusalem and the Kumr from Arabic accounts can be established (source)

Within this historical context, we can begin to have a discussion about where this group from the land of Judah had gone. It’s clear that accounts of the Rechabites/Rahmans from Jerusalem resemble the earliest accounts of the Camarini/Kumr of the Malay Peninsula. Therefore it can be established that the intended geographical and historical setting of the Narrative of Zosimus was something resembling early accounts of India and/or the Malay Peninsula, and the culture is established as Khmer. (translated from Italian source)

"The geographical dimension of the Constantinian era therefore does not lose sight of the utopian component inherited from classical antiquity, and now duly Christianised. This is shown by the excursus on the people of the 'camarini', which occupies the first chapters of the Expositio and is substantially similar to a text handed down in Greek and Georgian from a probable Syriac original, called Itinerary From the Garden of Eden to the Romans. In the Greek version of this text, the camarini become Makarinoi; this alludes to the tradition - both biblical and Hellenistic - which placed the lands of the Blessed (makarioi) at the edge of the world. In reality, the Camarini must be identified with populations that actually existed: an emporium of Kamara is known from India, while the "Camari" islands are located in Arabia. However, the most suggestive hypothesis is the one that refers to the Khmer, the Indochinese people known to the Arabs as Qimar. We insist here on the utopian character of these populations, which distance themselves from the habits common to the human race."

Also this reference from Two Eastern Christian Sources on Medieval Nusantara:

With the Kamara Model (which I'll be proposing in the other thread) we can get much closer to being able to say something like:

"Among the leading arguments for the Book of Mormon's historicity are that its setting is authentic and that its knowledge of Kumr custom is detailed and accurate. But this realistic back-ground proves nothing about the historicity of the story" (ZOSIMUS 1/1, 1-1).

Edited February 21, 2024 by Zosimus

[Zosimus]

11 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

And I can see this problem here in the idea you have of the Lehite expedition sailing east instead of south when the direction they sailed simply isn't a part of the narrative.

I was referring to the Jaredites, pretty sure consensus is that they went east across the Pacific. But no matter, there's zero evidence for either direction and as soon as that is set as a requirement for our narrative, we unnecessarily raise the difficulty of establishing a setting and culture that is detailed and accurate.

Edited February 21, 2024 by Zosimus

[Benjamin McGuire]

13 hours ago, Zosimus said:

First of all the Book of Mormon can't be dated to the 4th century BC and it has never been canonized.

Of course it's been canonized. Just only by Mormons. If Mormons didn't believe it was scripture we wouldn't be having this conversation either.

13 hours ago, Zosimus said:

Secondly, even if the story of Esther is not historical, there's an established authentic setting. The knowledge is of Persian culture, and it is detailed and accurate.

Right, but it's still a work of fiction. This is the problem that we run into when we deal with something like the Kedah Annals that you are so fond of. The Kedah Annals are dated to the late 18th or early 19th century. It claims to be a history of a much earlier period - but - much of what it describes isn't historical at all. Just as an example - the appearance of the Garuda as a major plot element is problematic (wouldn't you agree).

I point this out because if we use the standards of Esther in terms of claiming that it establishes an authentic setting (this is perhaps the beginning of a discussion on methods), then we can believe that the Kedah Annals do not provide an authentic setting. By the same token, it is likely that the Book of Mormon doesn't provide us with an authentic setting either. The part of the text that would be the closest to history (assuming that the narrative is at least somewhat authentic) would be the contents of the small plates of Nephi - which allegedly were written by eye-witnesses to the events, and which were then translated only once some 2500 years later. The Jaredite record is provided (according to the text) only in a late translation of a highly editorialized early translation. It likely counts as mythical in the same way that the Kedah Annals contain mythical information.

13 hours ago, Zosimus said:

The Book of Mormon has none of this yet. We haven't even established a setting. The knowledge seems to be of some culture with steel, chariots, horses, silk, elephants and Hebrew/Egyptian inscriptions on metal plates. If we could establish this realistic background with a known culture, say Persian or Mesoamerican, then it would be far easier to even have a discussion about authenticity and historicity. As it is, we can't even establish the setting or the culture.

The Book of Mormon has a very clearly established setting. It was produced between 1827 and 1829 in the United States. Your concerns have a fairly high degree of irrelevancy until you come up with some sort of plan to distinguish between the translation and the urtext. What we really want is the source text - and without that source text, everything becomes speculative. There are lots of reasons for this - which I have discussed in various venues. The issue of the "elephant" is one of these issues. You keep bringing it up, but it is mentioned once in the text - and in a fairly contextless fashion - Ether 9:19

Quote

And they also had horses, and asses, and there were elephants and cureloms and cumoms; all of which were useful unto man, and more especially the elephants and cureloms and cumoms.

This is supposed to come from the Jaredite record. We don't really have a Jaredite record of course - because the Book of Ether isn't a translation, even in a very loose sense, of the Jaredite record. After all, in Ether 6:1 we read: "And now I, Moroni, proceed to give the record of Jared and his brother." Six chapters in, and only now are we getting the record? It is highly editorialized. And we have to wonder, is the elephant in Ether 9 significantly different from the Garudah in the Kedah Annals (and for those who are just following the discussion, you can read about the Garuda here). So we have a translation of a text that allegedly occurs a little over 2,000 years ago (the actual events, being contemporaneous with the mythical confounding of the languages concurrent with the tower of Babel, which is dated to more than 4,000 years ago), and this is at best paraphrased in the Nephite record in the Book of Ether, which is included with the gold plates that are then translated in 1828 into English. So we end up with a text that is less than helpful, two translations which may or may not be all that accurate, and so on. And yet, you want to argue that this is somehow significant for us in trying to put a historical context on the text of the Book of Mormon.

You have to understand why this would raise a high level of skepticism right from the beginning.

[Zosimus]

1 hour ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Right, but it's still a work of fiction. This is the problem that we run into when we deal with something like the Kedah Annals that you are so fond of. The Kedah Annals are dated to the late 18th or early 19th century. It claims to be a history of a much earlier period - but - much of what it describes isn't historical at all. Just as an example - the appearance of the Garuda as a major plot element is problematic (wouldn't you agree).

I would agree, and did so here: "The whole story is whitewashed. Instead of the phoenix (garuda) visiting Shiva at the top of Mount Meru, the garuda pays a visit to King Solomon in Jerusalem. "

And here: "It doesn't fit in the Islamicized Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa"

And here: "Also my reason for Marong not being critical to my hypothesis. He's late. The HMM has been thoroughly whitewashed by Islamic historians. Its only useful for identifying patterns that might reflect earlier accounts"

By the way, of the two early 19th century accounts we've been discussing, I'm far more fond of the Book of Mormon.

1 hour ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

And we have to wonder, is the elephant in Ether 9 significantly different from the Garudah in the Kedah Annals (and for those who are just following the discussion, you can read about the Garuda here).

I wondered about it, and am certain that a phoenix flying from Sri Lanka to Jerusalem to conspire with King Solomon over how to prevent the wedding of a Persian prince and a Chinese princess is significantly different from the elephants mentioned in Ether 9.

1 hour ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

And yet, you want to argue that this is somehow significant for us in trying to put a historical context on the text of the Book of Mormon.

I don't think I'm the first on this forum to argue for using the Book of Ether in trying to put a historical context on the text of the Book of Mormon. Although I may be the first to have had the argument with a reviewer for the Mormon Interpreter. Let me point out that my earlier response proposes the Narrative of Zosimus as being the most relevant text to our discussion on establishing setting and culture. So instead of comparing elephants to garudas, let's compare the textual account of the Rechabites in the Narrative of Zosimus and the Lehites in the Book of Mormon. John Welch has already done some work on this, although I don't agree with everything here:

https://archive.bookofmormoncentral.org/sites/default/files/archive-files/pdf/welch/2019-12-30/13_john_w._welch_the_narrative_of_zosimus_and_the_book_of_mormon_323-374.pdf
 

Edited February 21, 2024 by Zosimus

[Benjamin McGuire]

20 hours ago, Zosimus said:

Let me point out that my earlier response proposes the Narrative of Zosimus as being the most relevant text to our discussion on establishing setting and culture.

Why? And I mean this question seriously. Here are the issues:

1: Similarities exist between traditions that are purely coincidental. We can find these kinds of coincidences elsewhere.

2: In light of point 1, there has to be some way of connecting the two traditions. This cannot be based on the similarities themselves. This is an important issue in these sorts of questions because, if we base the alleged connection on the parallels themselves, then point 1 is negated - and we should assume that all similarities should be recognized as being non-coincidental and significant.

So in light of these two ideas, we get Jack's article that you link to - and here he offers two possibilities (which are more than a little problematic in my opinion). Here is the first one:

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In a religious context, the parallels between the two writings may be explained as deriving from a common source of revelation or religious experience.

Unpacking this argument, this is the position that the similarity is coincidental - only linked by an underlying truth claim that is actually true. In other words, any group that receives the same revelation or religious experience would express this in ways that are similar. In science, for example, we could draw an analogy by saying that two scientists can come to the exact same conclusion through observation of the same natural principles. An understanding of gravity by two different cultures in two isolated parts of the world wouldn't surprise us - because the similarity in conclusions are drawn from natural laws that we view as generally being universal. We expect to see these kinds of similarities, and we wouldn't conclude that their existence implies any sort of close connection. The problem is, of course, that to suggest that the two (the story of Zosimus and the Book of Mormon) are referencing the same event - one known from history and one from some sort of revelation - isn't really a defensible position. The broad range of variations on this theme don't seem to be all that interesting either.

The second one is this:

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Even though I cannot account for these parallels in all respects, their mere existence tends to support claims of ancient Near Eastern origins for Book of Mormon authorship.

We can see how this reflects your perspective - and we can see how it has a problem. Nowhere does Jack actually challenge the idea that they might be purely coincidental without the idea of revelation. Jack formulates his argument like this:

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While no one knows who Zosimus was, if he even existed, or what the name Zosimus means or where it may have come from, the ancient narrative that bears this name records traditions about a righteous people who left Jerusalem at the time of the prophet Jeremiah. They were led by God to an ideal land across the ocean.

This is great and all that, but it is already introducing problems associated with what I label parallelomania. One of the biggest problems is the "they were led by God to an ideal land across the ocean". Except, they weren't. This is the last part of Chapter 10 of the apocryphon:

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and [the angel] placed us in (the) air, and carried us to the water of the river; then he said to us, ‘Wherever the water proceeds, you proceed, also’. And we walked with the water and with the angel. Then, when it carried us to this place, the river became dry, and the water was lost, and the place was split, and water came up out of the abyss. And surrounded this country, and a wall of cloud came and overshadowed the water. And [God] did not scatter us all over the earth, but gave us this country.

Now there is some recognition of this in Jack's essay. He does note that: "After extended prayer, he [Zosimus] is caught away to a place beside a river or great ocean, which turns out to be a cloudy and watery barrier between this world and paradise, or the land of blessedness." But, you can see how this fits the later narrative we get of the Rechabites and how their paradise was constructed. The Rechabites (the one who actually traveled to their paradise - Zosimus just visits them - didn't cross an ocean to get there. They go to a spot and an ocean (although it isn't really an ocean - it is a barrier created from the waters of the abyss) is created around them. By the way, I love the reference to scattering here - there's lots of ways we could understand that - but, certainly the Nephites understood themselves as having been scattered.

Anyways, this brings us to a really important point for both Jack's work and your use of Jack's work. While the narrative of Zosimus uses Jeremiah as its starting point, it isn't contemporary with Jeremiah. But, the problem that gets faced is that the story of the Rechabites isn't particularly interesting (from that point of view). Why? Well let's get to something a little more recent in terms of academic studies than what Jack engages - here is some material from Ronit Nikolsky's 2002 article "The History of the Rechabites and the Jeremiah Literature", from the Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 13.2. This is from page 196 and is in reference to that passage I quoted earlier from the text:

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This passage, which relates a pious group’s escape from disaster to a legendary place where they are saved and live a miraculous life, is a known narrative tradition in late antiquity. It is found in some pseudepigraphic texts of an apocalyptic nature, including The Sibylline Oracles, where group of righteous people are led by an angel, and saved from the events of the end of days; the Ascension of Isaiah, where a group of prophets escapes from Jerusalem which was under the control of a Satanic ruler, and goes off to live an ascetic life in the mountains, eating nothing but wild herbs; and the Apocalypse of Elijah, where the righteous are removed from the world at the time of the coming of the antichrist, a scene probably influenced by Rev. 7.9-17. In the apocryphon, the Rechabites are described in a similar manner: as a group of pious people who are whisked away from their normal domicile to an unnamed land.

What is fascinating here is that the story itself isn't particularly unique or special. But Jack isn't focusing on the issues that we would see as definitive of the work (and which allow us to place it into the family of similar works with which it is normally associated). Jack wants to emphasize just the features of the text that bring it closer to the Lehi story. This is what we generally refer to when we talk about parallelomania. Yes, Lehi's story fits into a particular context. But this context (the idea's that Nikolsky provides above) are a sort of natural progression from the original narrative used by these groups - the miraculous saving of a people by moving them from a bad place to a good one that we find in the Old Testament Exodus, with Moses. And I have argued (along with others) that there is a deliberate attempt in the Lehi narrative to fashion that narrative around this Old Testament source.

What makes the story of Zosimus appealing for parallels isn't really the similarities between the texts. It is the apologetic gain that comes from trying to claim that the Lehi narrative is similar to a story that wasn't translated from it's ancient sources until the later part of the 19th century. You can see that interest in Jack's comment here:

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The first known reappearance in modem times of the Narrative of Zosimus was its translation into Russian from an Old Church Slavonic text in the 1870s, almost fifty years after the translation of the Book of Mormon into English.

This is what makes it of interest to Jack and others. But, this means that the search for similarities is in part driven by the desire to use the parallels in another argument - and not for the parallels themselves. This is an apologetic argument from beginning to end. I have a lot of respect for Jack. But, I think that he represents the beginning and not the end of the discussion of any relationship between the two narratives.

At any rate, this is just the tip of what we could discuss - but I am not so interested at this point in the details - because a mountain of details won't save a thesis if the methods are bad and the conclusions so tenuous. My earliest published piece laid out a great deal of my interest in method and an appropriate way to look at parallels. And you will see that I am more interested in the literary aspects - parallels between literature and history are much more problematic - unless they are explicitly referenced in the literature. If we want to find references between history and literature, it's not hard to do. Modern Latter-day Saints saw themselves as actively reliving an Exodus type event when they left Nauvoo and traveled west to Utah. A wonderful example of this would be Arrington's biography: Brigham Young: American Moses. Asked in a 1995 interview about the title, Arrington said (as quoted here😞

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Brigham was the same sort of a leader as Moses in serving people for a long period of time, in achieving their goal of entering into a kingdom blessed by God ... there's ... no trick reason why I should have used American Moses. I thought Moses was a person understood by nearly everybody, and that Brigham was something for us that Moses was for the people of Israel. He led his people figuratively and quite literally, and they survived because of that leadership and their faith.

You can see how this takes a historical narrative in the vein of what I have been discussing here, and then applies it to a real historical event. The comparison is itself a part of the message. My arguments are generally specific. And they rely on the notion that there is some intention conveyed through texts. Although, I will also admit that even my nuanced efforts to deal with intention are themselves sometimes subject to criticism (see for example, Frederick Kleiner's Dissertation: Experiment Upon the Word).

Hopefully this helps you understand a little more my skepticism. I am a fairly equal opportunity skeptic, I think.

[Zosimus]

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Why? And I mean this question seriously. Here are the issues:

I’m not the first to bring this up, and I won’t be the last. The Narrative of Zosimus has been discussed within Book of Mormon studies circles for almost three decades as supporting evidence for an ancient setting.

Dan Peterson for example:

"The similarities to the Book of Mormon — and there are more than are summarized here — will be obvious to anybody who’s read even 1 Nephi. They’re difficult to explain from either a faithful perspective or that of someone seeking to refute the claims of Joseph Smith and the Restoration." (source)

A google search on keywords "Narrative of Zosimus" brings up dozens of references, with titles like:

• Little-Known Ancient Record 'Narrative of Zosimus' Echoes Book of Mormon
• Why are we finding Ancient Near Eastern books resembling the Book of Mormon (Narrative of Zosimus)?
• Correlations Between The Book of Mormon and The Narrative of Zosimus (History of the Rechabites)
• The Rechabites: A Model Group in Lehi's World
• 4 Ancient Book of Mormon-ish Texts Joseph Smith Didn't Know About!

There are also instances of scholars using NoZ in the context of parallels with the story of Lehi passing through a wasteland to the bank of a river or the Lehites leaving Jerusalem for a blessed land somewhere across a great sea:

Blake Ostler: "When does a parallel entail dependence? Similar ideas presented in identical order and expressed in similar phraseology may suggest dependence, but chronology is also important. For example, the extensive parallels between 1 Nephi and the Narrative of Zosimus, a Jewish work written during the intertestamental period, include some uncommon ideas about writing upon tablets and a vision in which Zosimus is led by an angel through a dark and dreary wasteland to the bank of a river obscured by a mist of darkness. He crosses the river to a tree with surpassingly sweet fruit, of which he partakes. It is clear, however, that the Narrative of Zosimus as we know it was composed (circa first to fourth century A.D. ) after Lehi's family reached the New World and discovered too late to be a source for Joseph Smith. Hence, these parallels must be explained in another way, perhaps, as some scholars hypothesize, by an earlier tradition whose roots cannot specifically be traced (Charlesworth 1983, 2:444; Welch 1982)."

Margaret Barker: "The extraordinary similarity between a text that is sometimes called the History of the Rechabites and sometimes the Narrative of Zosimus—the extraordinary similarity between this story and the story of Lehi leaving Jerusalem—has already been studied by Mormon scholars. This ancient text, which survives in Greek, Syriac, and Ethioptic, tells the story of some people who left Jerusalem about 600 BCE and they went to live in a “blessed land.” They didn’t drink wine. They were called the sons of Rechab, which could mean that Rechab was their ancestor, or it could be the Hebrew way of saying that they were temple servants, priests who served the divine throne. In their blessed lands, angels had announced to them the incarnation of the Word of God from the holy virgin who is the mother of God. Nobody can explain this text."

Hugh Nibley was so impressed by the similarities between the Rechabites and the Lehites that he went as far as to say "The Lehites were Rechabites". Sure there are problems with that conclusion, but it does show that regardless of how skeptical you might be, the Narrative of Zosimus and the Rechabites will continue to be referenced by highly respected scholars to support the ancient setting of the Book of Mormon.

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

The problem is, of course, that to suggest that the two (the story of Zosimus and the Book of Mormon) are referencing the same event - one known from history and one from some sort of revelation - isn't really a defensible position. 

I understand the difficulty. But the argument does seem to be that they do reference the same event. Groups that flee Jerusalem after Josiah's reforms.

Margaret Barker (again): "Remnants of the older faith survived in many places, preserved by the descendants of those who fled from Josiah’s purge. There were the mysterious sons of Rechab whose story was told in the History of the Rechabites. Beneath the layers of fantasy and folk tale in this widely known ancient text, we glimpse a group who described themselves as angels, and who had fled from Jerusalem after the time of Josiah. Angels had released them from prison, and they had escaped to the desert, and crossed the great sea to a Paradise land of fruit trees, honey and abundant water. Angels continued to inform them about events in their former world, and so they knew about the life of Jesus. Zosimus, who visited the Rechabites, brought back stone tablets with an account of them. Now Rechab is an interesting name; it can also mean a chariot, and so the angel sons of Rechab might have been the devotees of the chariot throne in the temple who fled from Jerusalem after Josiah’s purge, and settled somewhere across a great sea."

So I'll leave it to you and the other experts. I have no confidence I can influence anything one way or the other.

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

One of the biggest problems is the "they were led by God to an ideal land across the ocean". Except, they weren't. 

There are quite a few recensions of the text. Some do describe the Rechabites in a real-world location referred to in the Bible as Sinim, other accounts describe a peninsula/island inhabited by a similar group called the Sons of Moses. (source) 

There are dozens of variations on the Rechabite theme and they all describe the land of the blessed in different ways. Given the well-established similarities between the Rechabites and historical accounts of historical groups in the east, we even have some respected scholars arguing that the intended setting was the Malay Peninsula. See my references to Braginsky (also an expert on the Kedah Annals) earlier. 

I think you can understand why I feel a geography model that is centered on this semi-mythical yet entirely historical peninsular setting once inhabited (according to the texts we’ve been discussing) by a Biblical group dispersed from the tower, the Sons of Moses and also exiles from Josiah's reforms, helps us to understand the setting and culture of the Book of Mormon, more than Mesoamerica.

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

What is fascinating here is that the story itself isn't particularly unique or special.

Narrative of Zosimus is not unique. Like the Kedah Annals, and the Persian texts that the Kedah Annals borrow from, there is dependency on the different variations of the Alexander Romance and earlier sources discussing the pious Brahmans/Rahmans/Camarini/Kumr of the east. There is an entire genre of texts that draw from this same material. (source) Perhaps the Book of Lehi is also not unique.

13 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

A wonderful example of this would be Arrington's biography: Brigham Young: American Moses ... Brigham was the same sort of a leader as Moses in serving people for a long period of time, in achieving their goal of entering into a kingdom blessed by God 

Another example: "The Saints are actually the 'Rechabites' of this age, as much as the descendants of Recheb were in the days of Jeremiah, when Israel went into captivity." - Brigham Young

Edited February 23, 2024 by Zosimus

[Benjamin McGuire]

10 hours ago, Zosimus said:

I’m not the first to bring this up, and I won’t be the last. The Narrative of Zosimus has been discussed within Book of Mormon studies circles for almost three decades as supporting evidence for an ancient setting.

Except, of course, it doesn't provide supporting evidence for an ancient setting for the Book of Mormon. It doesn't provide evidence at all. At the very best, it provides some sense of plausibility - which is very different from evidence. I will continue to stand by this assessment. You provided a lot of links - but not a single one of those links goes to an academic source. The closest we get is the Jack Welch article. Mormon Studies has come a long way since Jack last wrote about the Rechabites - it is starting to move away from the parallel hunting that was so pervasive decades ago.

10 hours ago, Zosimus said:

the Narrative of Zosimus and the Rechabites will continue to be referenced by highly respected scholars to support the ancient setting of the Book of Mormon.

Except that this isn't really happening, is it. Can you show me something published in an academic venue that draws any of these kinds of conclusions published in the past 15 years? What is going to remain popular is the appeal for apologists, who like the idea of a text with parallels that was unavailable to Joseph Smith. That is the one detail that makes this whole thing popular. Should we find a translation of this text published in English in 1825 and available in Joseph Smith's neighborhood, we would suddenly be having an entirely different discussion about it.

Nothing that you write here challenges my points. Zosimus is a late text (relative to the gold plates). Zosimus fits into a popular theme at the time. While it is loosely inspired by Jeremiah, it isn't some sort of real history of the group that Jeremiah discusses. The similarities to the Book of Mormon narrative are not particularly interesting. So, do we really call this evidence of anything at all?

10 hours ago, Zosimus said:

I understand the difficulty. But the argument does seem to be that they do reference the same event. Groups that flee Jerusalem after Josiah's reforms.

Ummmm ok ....

Well actually, let's break this down a bit. The Jews who were pushed out of Jerusalem after the Jewish revolt (66-70 CE) all left after Josiah's reforms too, didn't they (just several hundred years afterwards). Did Jeremiah flee Jerusalem with a bunch of Jews because of Josiah's reforms? No. They fled because of the impending invasion by the Babylonians. And come to think of it, this was the reason why Lehi left - because he was told that Jerusalem was going to be destroyed (and of course a pretty big deal is made in the text about how that prophecy was known to have been fulfilled when the Nephites meet the Mulekites). There is nothing in either text about Josiah's reform. And there isn't really any reason to read it there as part of the intent of the narrative. So you are really going out into left field here.

10 hours ago, Zosimus said:

There are quite a few recensions of the text. Some do describe the Rechabites in a real-world location referred to in the Bible as Sinim, other accounts describe a peninsula/island inhabited by a similar group called the Sons of Moses. (source) 

Who cares? None of these things are real history. Somewhere along the line you may have forgotten what it means to be labeled as pseudepigrapha (as the article that you link describes the text). Of course, the author of that article you link also notes that the narrative makes extensive use of the Septuagint (and not the Hebrew) text of the Old Testament. That the known copies we have have been redacted by Christians, and that the date of authorship (for the History of the Rechabites itself) is difficult to pin down, occurring most likely after 70 AD and before 700 AD. He asserts that it is an original work in Greek and was not based on some earlier Hebrew text. And while the author of that article does provide a reference to the Sons of Moses (the sons of Levi). This is what he writes:

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Compare the image in the legend of the sons of Moses, cited by Ginzberg from Targum Τ to Exodus 34,10 where the Levites (i.e. the sons of Moses) of the exilic period are taken to a place of safety surrounded by a cloud and guided by a pillar of fire. Their place of safety is surrounded by sea on three sides, but God causes the Sambation to appear on the fourth, to completely surround the sons of Moses, who are able, however, to remain in contact with the other tribes beyond the river—by carrier pigeon.

What is facinating about this (at least as far as it is relevant to this discussion) is that we have the cloud and the pillar of fire. Lehi, of course, also sees his pillar of fire (1 Ne. 1:6) - but it ought to be clear that the pillar of fire here comes from the narrative of the mother of all wilderness journey narratives in Israelite literature - the Exodus from Egypt. So there are similarities. The strongest similarities in the Book of Mormon narrative are to the Exodus journey of ancient Israel and not to these much later fictional accounts.

This is a real problem for trying to connect the Zosimus narratives to the Book of Mormon from an apologetics perspective. It doesn't do much good to argue a close connection between the Book of Mormon and a fictional (but historical) work. Although in this case, that issue is somewhat blurred because of the apologetic argument. If the text is genuinely historical, then because we cannot produce an actual history of the text, we ought to assume that the narrative of its production is plausible. In any case, Jerusalem is a real-world historical place. The Book of Esther was couched in a real-world location. Just because fiction is put into real-world locations, doesn't somehow mean that it isn't fiction. It just means that people are familiar with those places (or at least the names of those places).

11 hours ago, Zosimus said:

I think you can understand why I feel a geography model that is centered on this semi-mythical yet entirely historical peninsular setting once inhabited (according to the texts we’ve been discussing) by a Biblical group dispersed from the tower, the Sons of Moses and also exiles from Josiah's reforms, helps us to understand the setting and culture of the Book of Mormon, more than Mesoamerica.

Yes, I understand that you don't have a clued - and that you wouldn't recognize a legitimate methodology if it bit you on the backside. All of this is nonsense.

You aren't helping yourself by continuing to try and build up this mountain of parallels. I have done a lot of work with literary parallels over the decades - I understand how easy it is to produce all of this - and have it be completely meaningless.

[Zosimus]

6 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

There is nothing in either text about Josiah's reform. And there isn't really any reason to read it there as part of the intent of the narrative. So you are really going out into left field here.

"Remnants of the older faith survived in many places, preserved by the descendants of those who fled from Josiah’s purge. There were the mysterious sons of Rechab whose story was told in the History of the Rechabites. Beneath the layers of fantasy and folk tale in this widely known ancient text, we glimpse a group ... the angel sons of Rechab might have been the devotees of the chariot throne in the temple who fled from Jerusalem after Josiah’s purge, and settled somewhere across a great sea." - Margaret Barker

Like I said, I'll leave it to you and the other experts.

6 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Except that this isn't really happening, is it. Can you show me something published in an academic venue that draws any of these kinds of conclusions published in the past 15 years?

Not sure what qualifies as an academic venue for Book of Mormon studies, but it’s still passing review, in a journal that you review. 

Could Joseph Smith Have Drawn on Ancient Manuscripts When He Translated the Story of Enoch?: Recent Updates on a Persistent Question
Jeffrey M. Bradshaw and @Ryan Dahle

"“Whoso … climbeth up by me shall never fall” (Moses 7:53). In al-Kisa’i’s Tales of the Prophets, we read that Ridwa, the gatekeeper of Paradise, told Enoch that a branch of the Tuba Tree would “hang down toward him” and that “he should cling to it, and it will bring him into Paradise.” Some of the imagery in this story (particularly of the need to climb up a branch to enter into Paradise) can be meaningfully compared to the Narrative of Zosimus and to Lehi’s dream of the Tree of Life."

Estimating the Evidence
"Though critics would look to the dream of Joseph Smith Sr. as the primary source for Lehi’s dream, there are many more details in it corroborated by ancient texts and symbolism than are recounted by Joseph’s father, including similarities to the Narrative of Zosimus, Nephi’s connecting of the tree to the divine feminine, and the inclusion of the river of filthy water, which was a common ancient symbol for hell."

Anyway I think there's no point in carrying on here. If the model is useful for others like it has been for me, then great. If not, then there will be others I'd expect.

Edited February 23, 2024 by Zosimus

[Zosimus]

On 2/23/2024 at 8:28 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

Zosimus is a late text (relative to the gold plates). Zosimus fits into a popular theme at the time. While it is loosely inspired by Jeremiah, it isn't some sort of real history of the group that Jeremiah discusses. The similarities to the Book of Mormon narrative are not particularly interesting. So, do we really call this evidence of anything at all?

On second thought, it wouldn't be right to conclude without mentioning Paul Owen. Jeff Lindsay does a better job summarizing than I could, so I quote (source):

"Fascinating insight into the significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls for the Book of Mormon and LDS religion in general is offered by two non-LDS writers, Carl Mosser and Paul Owen, who presented a paper at the 1997 Evangelical Theological Society Far West Annual Meeting, April 25, 1997. They warned the evangelical community about the impressive efforts of LDS scholars. Their article, "Mormon Scholarship, Apologetics, and Evangelical Neglect: Losing the Battle and Not Knowing It?" (later published in Trinity Journal, Fall 1998, pp. 179-205), is one of the most intriguing non-LDS articles I've ever encountered from critics of the Church. It warns that anti-LDS writers have ignored the significant work of respected LDS scholars who are providing "robust defenses" of the LDS faith. In preparing their paper, Mosser and Owen did something that few critics have done: they have actually read a wide variety of LDS scholarly writings. Their article notes the many apparent evidences that LDS scholars have uncovered which, according to the LDS perspective (not that of Mosser and Owen), give plausibility to the Book of Mormon as an ancient Semitic text....Mosser and Owen go on to discuss other Jewish writings (the pseudepigrapha) that have more specific similarities with LDS scriptures. These writings are used to LDS scholars to establish an ancient milieu for the Book of Mormon. Among several examples, they cite work of Stephen E. Robinson on the Narrative of Zosimus (or History of the Rechabites) "which contains an interesting tradition about Jews leaving Jerusalem in Jeremiah's time, and traveling across the ocean to a land of promise."

In his paper "Theological Apostasy and the Role of Canonical Scripture: A Thematic Analysis of 1 Nephi 13-14"

"What I am suggesting, in essence, is that the Book of Mormon could be taken as a genuinely restored ancient text with a fictional narrative that originated in the Old World, an account that bore some connection to the mysterious (and probably later) History of the Rechabites. Sometime after ad 421, a Christian apocryphal book was penned in the deserts of Palestine. I will call it the History of the Lehites. This book told a story (set in the days prior to the fall of Jerusalem in the sixth century bc) of the voyage of a Jew named Lehi, who traveled with his family to a new promised land found on the other side of a great body of water, their settlement in that land, their wars and subsequent history, and the visitation of the resurrected Savior among them. Perhaps due to its antiestablishment ecclesiology, or its small circle of exposure in the Christian world, the History of the Lehites was soon lost to the sands of time. Maybe its influence was eclipsed and replaced by the more widely known History of the Rechabites. However, its valuable contents reappeared through Moroni’s apocalyptic disclosure to Joseph Smith (now with updates and expansions appropriate to the religious and cultural concerns of nineteenth-century America). Moroni’s words to Joseph, indicating that the Book of Mormon contained “an account of the former inhabitants of this continent, and the source from whence they sprang” (Joseph Smith—History 1:34), in this view, would still be an accurate summary of the fictional (though ancient) narrative as Joseph received it from the angel, though such a detailed application to the Americas specifically would no doubt have been expressed in more cryptic terms in the original History of the Lehites. The broad outlines of this apocalyptic approach to the Book of Mormon is one that has significant explanatory scope and one that I think should be given more consideration on both sides of the debate over the origins of this fascinating text of scripture."

Paul had mentioned in his footnotes that he was planning to write further on this subject, so I mailed him in 2020 to follow up:

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Hello Paul, I hope you don't mind me dropping an email unintroduced. I've read your essay "Theological Apostasy and the Role of Canonical Scripture: A Thematic Analysis of 1 Nephi 13-14" and noticed that you added in the footnotes that you intended to expand on your conclusions in another essay entitled “The Book of Mormon: A Revelation for the Modern World.” I'm curious if this available anywhere.

My research follows the relationship between the Book of Mormon and various texts such as the History of the Rechabites and the Narrative of Zosimus, in particular my hypothesis is that the setting of the Book of Mormon is in that part of the Old World where the Rechabites (whether historical of fictional) were thought to have dwelled. I trace aligned narratives, typographies and geographies in various apocryphal accounts of the Rechabites/Rahmans, in particular those known to Slavonic authors.

I'd love to read your latest essays on related topics, if available.

His response, in January 2020: 

Quote

"That sounds really interesting. The essay to which you refer was to appear in a volume which seems to have died somewhere in the production process I’m afraid. In it I only touched on the question of the Book of Mormon’s relationship to the History of the Rechabites in passing. The essay mostly dealt with other introductory issues for a general audience. Your hypothesis sounds fascinating.  If there is any real relationship between the contents of the Book of Mormon and any text from antiquity, it definitely has something to do with the Narrative of Zosimus. Curious what you think about the putative New World setting?  The only option that I personally think has any possible case to be made is the Great Lakes region. This whole Mesoamerican obsession in BoM studies has been nothing but a colossal waste of time (in my opinion)."

I won't post the rest of our discussion here, but he (a conservative Biblical scholar) went on to essentially say he finds the similarities between the History of the Rechabites and the Book of Mormon interesting, but he became weary of the unproductive discussions with conservative LDS scholars and noted the impossible dissonance with liberal LDS scholars, so he "stepped out of the discussion".

I've had a similar ongoing conversation with Philip Jenkins since his debate with Bill Hamblin. He also finds my basic argument to be interesting, and plausible.

So I don't agree with your conclusions here. Even though Mormon scholars have backed off writing about the History of the Rechabites and similar texts, non-Mormon scholars do still find the subject interesting, and plausible, as recently as 2020 (Paul Owen) and Philip Jenkins (4 days ago). Maybe this interest is why Mormon scholars have stepped away from the discussion?

In any case, non-Mormon scholars struggle to engage with Mormon scholars as they tag-team the issues based on some unknowable double-standard for evidence and engagement of the evidence. For example, the History of the Rechabites is supporting evidence for BoM historicity when it is convenient and parallel-building nonsense when it is not. I understand Paul Owen's frustration when it comes to engaging Mormon scholars on this text.

Edited February 25, 2024 by Zosimus

[LoopyMTB]

Just my two cents.  Tanah Merah, which sits precisely where internal book of Mormon maps would place Zarahemla, means red land or red earth.  Hugh Nibley stated that Zarahemla meant Red City.  So Tanah Merah sits west of a north flowing river, sounds like Zarahemla, and nearly means the same thing.  Until I see better information coming from America, to me it is almost undeniable that the Book of Mormon took place on the Malay peninsula.  

[Benjamin McGuire]

On 2/23/2024 at 1:25 PM, Zosimus said:

"Remnants of the older faith survived in many places, preserved by the descendants of those who fled from Josiah’s purge. There were the mysterious sons of Rechab whose story was told in the History of the Rechabites. Beneath the layers of fantasy and folk tale in this widely known ancient text, we glimpse a group ... the angel sons of Rechab might have been the devotees of the chariot throne in the temple who fled from Jerusalem after Josiah’s purge, and settled somewhere across a great sea." - Margaret Barker

You just don't seem to be getting the problems here. So I'll try again.

1: This is speculation. Barker seems pretty clear about that. Speculation isn't evidence. Part of the problem is what Barker describes in the story as "fantasy and folk tale." Part of the problem is the fact that the story was composed at least 700 years after after the Josian  reform. So I might reasonably ask (since you want to use this in some way as evidence) what the likelihood is that this reflects some actual historical event - and how you come to that assessment beyond simply your intuition.

2: There is a problem with the translation that Barker uses. I have provided sources that explain that the Rechabites didn't cross a great sea. The text doesn't actually say this.

3: Much of what you want to use as parallels to the Book of Mormon (or other things) are part of what we can clearly see is the fantasy and folk tale. This is a problem when you are trying to relate it to some real history in a real place and time.

You aren't addressing anything that I am saying here - you keep returning to your bad claims of evidence. You keep returning to the parallelomania. What you are providing isn't meaningful at all. And while I tend to think that a number of LDS writers are going to far, if you were only going as far as they do, it wouldn't be that bad - but you leapfrog over them into an entirely different level of parallelomania here.

[Benjamin McGuire]

1 hour ago, LoopyMTB said:

Just my two cents.  Tanah Merah, which sits precisely where internal book of Mormon maps would place Zarahemla, means red land or red earth.  Hugh Nibley stated that Zarahemla meant Red City.  So Tanah Merah sits west of a north flowing river, sounds like Zarahemla, and nearly means the same thing.  Until I see better information coming from America, to me it is almost undeniable that the Book of Mormon took place on the Malay peninsula.  

Or this, right (which is not mine and does not reflect my views)? The challenge will always be how you can make a connection that rises above the level of coincidence ...

Edited February 25, 2024 by Benjamin McGuire

[Zosimus]

5 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

1: This is speculation. Barker seems pretty clear about that. Speculation isn't evidence. Part of the problem is what Barker describes in the story as "fantasy and folk tale." Part of the problem is the fact that the story was composed at least 700 years after after the Josian  reform. So I might reasonably ask (since you want to use this in some way as evidence) what the likelihood is that this reflects some actual historical event - and how you come to that assessment beyond simply your intuition.

But I'm not arguing for historical events. I'm arguing for a historical setting. This must be why we are talking past each other. I pick up where Paul Owen stepped away from the discussion: “What I am suggesting, in essence, is that the Book of Mormon could be taken as a genuinely restored ancient text with a fictional narrative that originated in the Old World, an account that bore some connection to the mysterious (and probably later) History of the Rechabites.”

The Book of Mormon is a genuinely restored ancient text with a fictional narrative. That narrative, like the Book of Esther, has a historical setting and culture.

5 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

2: There is a problem with the translation that Barker uses. I have provided sources that explain that the Rechabites didn't cross a great sea. The text doesn't actually say this.

I already responded to this, its not really a problem. In many texts, especially those describing the isles of the blessed or the land of promise across a river, the river was the ocean. Or the ocean is a River Ocean. From the Apocalypse of Paul:

You'd have to read the material already out there on the River Eumeles described in some versions of the Narrative of Zosimus before arriving at your conclusion that the Rechabites didn't cross a great sea, or that the text doesn't say this. (source)

You say the river in the Narrative of Zosimus was not a great sea. It doesn't seem to be exactly correct. There's even a Syriac version that is titled "The History of the Sons of Jonadab, the Son of Rechab, who are in the Midst of the Ocean, the Great Sea". Again, it appears you're doing the things you accuse me of: drawing a conclusion, without looking closely at the sources, and without offering evidence to back it up. I'll stand corrected if you can provide a source to support your argument that the river in the text is just a river, instead of a River Ocean, great sea, or a symbolic passage to Paradise.

5 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

What you are providing isn't meaningful at all. And while I tend to think that a number of LDS writers are going to far, if you were only going as far as they do, it wouldn't be that bad - but you leapfrog over them into an entirely different level of parallelomania here.

I haven't provided the model yet. I'll be starting with the physical geography, where it won't even possible for me to engage in parallelomania. Either there's a narrow neck that takes 1-1.5 days to walk across, or there isn't, and so on.

I'll get into the cultural and historical parallel hunting/sniping once we have a real world geography that fits John Clark's elemental geography. At that point, you might compare the Malay-Comoro Model against the other models to determine which modelers are the worst offenders when it comes to parallelomania. I probably won't be doing such an analysis, but I can guarantee you that my model will not depend on tenuous parallels as much as Heartland or even Meso. It will be able to stand on the physical geography and the historical/archeological evidence of the migrations of the Kumr (Malayo-Polynesians) alone.

Edited February 25, 2024 by Zosimus

[Zosimus]

9 hours ago, LoopyMTB said:

Just my two cents.  Tanah Merah, which sits precisely where internal book of Mormon maps would place Zarahemla, means red land or red earth.  Hugh Nibley stated that Zarahemla meant Red City.  So Tanah Merah sits west of a north flowing river, sounds like Zarahemla, and nearly means the same thing.  Until I see better information coming from America, to me it is almost undeniable that the Book of Mormon took place on the Malay peninsula.  

Although a good fit topographically, Tanah Merah doesn't work archeologically or chronologically. There's no evidence that the modern city called Tanah Merah was the Chi Tu (Red Earth Land) of the 6th century Chinese accounts. Its far more likely that Chi Tu was a larger area covering the Malay Peninsula. We know from the 5th century Buddhagupta Stone found in Kedah that there was a Raktamrttika "red earth land" in India in the 5th century and we know from the 6th century Chinese account that a location on the Malay Peninsula was also known as "Red Earth". Now the problem, these inscriptions date close enough to the Book of Mormon time period that we should start to see actual Book of Mormon names in them, if we're arguing for a historical Book of Mormon. Of course "Red Earth Land" could become Dar al-Hamra, but only if we're assuming an Arabic translation of the source account. Like Nibley said: "I don’t know if there’s anything to it or not, but it’s good clean fun to engage in these things."

I'll get more into the historical evidence for the original location of the Chinese Chi Tu (Red Earth) and Arabic Dar al-Hamra (Red House) in the geography model thread. In short, it was Tambralinga (tam and tambra also mean red) in Ligor and Singorra. But best to start with geospatial convergence, because none of this other stuff matters if the geography doesn't fit.

Edited February 25, 2024 by Zosimus

[ZealouslyStriving]

Where does Mahonri Moriancumr fit into all this? 🤔 J/k

 

[Calm]

5 minutes ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

Where does Mahonri Moriancumr fit into all this? 🤔 J/k

 

I am starting to appreciate you.  
How did you find us?

[ZealouslyStriving]

It's a long story... I was here many 🌙 ago but with quite a confused perspective. Thankfully the Lord was long-suffering with my stupidity. That's why I chose this username and put Mosiah 27:35 in my signature (when I remember.

 

[Calm]

2 minutes ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

It's a long story... I was here many 🌙 ago but with quite a confused perspective. Thankfully the Lord was long-suffering with my stupidity. That's why I chose this username and put Mosiah 27:35 in my signature (when I remember.

 

Welcome back….