Book of Mormon "Horses"

[beastie]

CI,

I have no idea. I have my doubts about this evidence being as clear as you all expect. Perhaps I've gotten jaded after my experience with Sorenson's "evidence" of smelting, which has been bandied about so often in these discussions.

[Confidential Informant]

I have my doubts about this evidence being as clear as you all expect.  Perhaps I've gotten jaded after my experience with Sorenson's "evidence" of smelting, which has been bandied about so often in these discussions.

I thought I as much as admitted that this was possible.

C.I.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Beastie writes:

You have asserted that simply having horses in Mesoamerica would not have necessarily impacted that culture in the way it impacted other cultures. Well, it certainly is true that there are factors that affect the evolution of a culture and how horses will impact it, but what you

[USU78]

It is irrelevant to my point that Nephi may have used the word "horse" to describe something that we would not recognize as a horse. I can safely concede that there were no horses (in fact more than not, my theory demands it).

I'm not convinced your theory demands the absence of the horse from the proposed situs of Lehite lands during BoM times. It requires the absence of horse qua horse, if we are to understand horse as the beast was used by Eurasians. I do not believe the discovery of BoM-time horse fossils requires that you discard your textual analysis.

[Benjamin McGuire]

USU78 writes:

I'm not convinced your theory demands the absence of the horse from the proposed situs of Lehite lands during BoM times. It requires the absence of horse qua horse, if we are to understand horse as the beast was used by Eurasians. I do not believe the discovery of BoM-time horse fossils requires that you discard your textual analysis.

Very early on, in this thread, I noted that it didn't matter one way or the other whether or not there were horses. There have been several individuals who have discussed the possibility (prior to this discussion here) that the horses in the Book of Mormon might be something else. My objective was, more or less, to lay the groundwork under which we could understand why or how this could occur. It was not to try and definitively show what that animal was. What my analysis requires is that the "horse" whatever it was was seen by the native population as being equivalent to the referent to the "horse" used on the Brass Plates. My suggestions here allow for that to occur whether or not it was really a horse as we generally understand the term.

Ben

[Addictio]

Ben:

Thanks for the response, particularly the comparison of Ether and Mosiah.

Interesting that under the Nibley approach, the similarity between the passages regarding Riplakish and Noah would be interpreted as further evidence of Jaredite culture impacting upon and being reflected in later Nephite culture. (As also with the secret, dark oaths, personal "Jaredite" names, etc.) The basic accuracy of the Jaredite historical record isn't questioned, or perhaps better said, isn't called into question.

Under the approach you summarize, the similarity in the formulaic textual content regarding Riplakish and Noah results (or may result?) instead from the impact of Moroni as the final ancient "redactor." You've suggested as much before, I know, but I appreciate your filling it out with that example.

(As you know, from the standpoint of a third -- JS as author -- approach, used by Dan Vogel and Susan Staker in her American Apocrypha article, the formulaic similarities you note would result instead from, and thus illustrate, the "pseudepigraphic" structure of the BoM as a whole.)

Following your Mosiah/Ether example, you summarize:

This is the model of the wicked king in Nephite society - at least as unuderstood by Mormon (Moroni's father) who penned the account in Mosiah. Moroni wrote the account in Ether - and I have to wonder if the language (assuming a consistent language was used in the Gold Plates for the similar content in the English Book of Mormon) of Moroni's text wasn't influenced by Mormon's text - and by extension if the content wasn't also influenced.

I do not understand what you mean/intend in the parenthetical, so perhaps you could explain. That is, you assume what about some connection between the language of the 24 gold plates (?) and some "similar content" in the English of the BoM?

I'm buried with other work, so have to leave off here, for a while. Eventually, I'll get back to you on your subsequent effort to contrast your healthy skepticism with my helpless credulity (Yep), but it may take a while. Your words, Ben, display but a form or shadow of skepticism, while denying the power thereof. Uhm, so to speak.

[beastie]

CI,

Yes, you qualified your statement, but that doesn't help me to try and think of a reason that the horses didn't have an impact on the culture. I'm sorry, I just can't. Even Sorenson mentions the utility of the horse post-conquest, p 247:

Bernal Diaz described one of the earliest Spanish battles on the mainland just a little east of here.  Thousands of native warriors waited to fight them on such a "plain", and this provided ideal terrain for the Spanish horses to maneuver.

So if and when serious evidence of the existence of the horse during the BoM time period is discovered, the experts will have to figure it out.

Ben,

Well, since I am arguing (in this thread) that there weren't horses (as we understand the term), what relevance does your argument have?

Even on this thread you offered the possibility that the horse was really a horse but not used as a horse. But even if you want to distance yourself from that, and switch to the tapir, then to avoid the "white crow" problem of falsifiability, you need to demonstrate that other Mesoamericans used the tapir in the manner described in the BoM.

Let me ask another question. Horses did live in the Americas. They existed there for centuries. The theory (that you have presented here) was that they had been hunted to extinction. Why didn't the cultures who were hunting the horses evolve along the same lines as other cultures who domesticated them?

The people were the Clovis people, and not everyone agrees that they hunted them to extinction, but they definitely ate the horses. The horse was not the modern horse, but a smaller version called Equus conversidens. This extinction occured centuries before the horse was domesticated anywhere by man. So I suspect that human beings had not evolved quite to the point of seeing the possible uses of horses besides as food, and that the earlier horses perhaps had traits that made them less adaptable to domestication (like their size).

This is why this whole position you take here is so ironic. My contribution to this thread has largely been about how and why when the text says "horse" it might mean something else. So, who cares whether or not if they had a horse, it would have been used differently. I do note that I did provide a scholarly article which suggested that Mesoamerican agriculture would not have seen the horse as an economical aide for their agricultural system. Unlike other agricultural systems, the horse would have been less efficient than available alternatives in mesoamerica. There is an article. It was documented. What more do I need to do to allow me to assert that had they had a horse, it would not have affected their culture in the same way that it affected other cultures? In a sense, you are the one asserting that all cultures must be the same and respond in the same fashion to specific elements. Yet, here, I have a single instance (the white crow so to speak) that proves that notion wrong. Yet, you don't come back and revisit the claim.

Oh, I did revisit it, obviously you either ignored it or forgot it. Agricultural use is just one manner in which the horse impacts the evolution of a culture, Ben. In fact, I remember us discussing the possible military uses of a horse, and I provided examples from the conquest of how important horses were, even in Mesoamerica. Apparently it made no impact on you, which is your perogative, but please don't misrepresent me by saying I never responded to your argument.

BTW, I hope you noticed the Sorenson quote at the beginning of this post, which is not very helpful to your position that horses would have been practically immaterial to Mesoamericans.

Of course these conversations have their natural limit. I never imagine, for one moment, that I will ever change your mind, or Brant's mind, or most of the LDS posters on this board, either. But what I do imagine is that there are people who read these boards who have questions about the historicity of the BoM, and I think they have a right to receive more information on the subject than they're going to get from FARMS.

Just to be clear - I have no problem with people viewing the BoM as an inspired, spiritual document. I have a problem with how, in my view, science and logic are abused in the process of trying to prove the BoM is an actual historical document from Mesoamerica. I also have a problem with some of the misleading statements made by apologists, to people who don't have the background to recognize the problems. And one more problem I have - ancient Mesoamerica has its own history, its own culture, its own "voice from the dust", and THAT is the voice that ought to be heard, not some nineteenth century christian primitivist culture pasted on top of them. Talk about ethnocentricity.

[exegete]

Hi Addictio,

Given your parenthetical comment that ...

As you know, from the standpoint of a third -- JS as author -- approach, used by Dan Vogel and Susan Staker in her American Apocrypha article, the formulaic similarities you note would result instead from, and thus illustrate, the "pseudepigraphic" structure of the BoM as a whole.

... you may be interested in my analysis published over a decade ago:

• Attention to other literary forms and structures can be similarly problematic. One striking literary phenomenon in the Book of Mormon is the instance of narratives which mirror each other.[1] As a case study we can distinguish twelve parallels between the stories of the Nephite king Noah and the Jaredite king Riplakish:
  
  • 1. Zeniff and Shez were both righteous kings succeeded by their sons Noah and Riplakish (Mosiah 11:1; Ether 10:4).
    

• 2. Unlike their fathers, Noah "did not keep the commandments of God" and Riplakish "did not do that which was right in the sight of the Lord" (Mosiah 11:2a; Ether 10:5a).
  

• 3. Noah and Riplakish each had "many wives and concubines" (Mosiah 11:2b; Ether 10:5b).
  

• 4. Noah compelled his subjects to "do that which was abominable ... and they did commit whoredoms," while Riplakish "did afflict the people with his whoredoms and abominations" (Mosiah 11:2c; Ether 10:7b).
  

• 5. By edict, Noah's and Riplakish's people were laden with oppressive taxes (Mosiah 11:3; Ether 10:5c).
  

• 6. Noah and Riplakish each erected "spacious buildings" with the money secured from taxation (Mosiah 11:[4

[Golden Tapir]

Yup, Golden Tapir won by acclamation!!

[Benjamin McGuire]

Addictio writes:

Interesting that under the Nibley approach, the similarity between the passages regarding Riplakish and Noah would be interpreted as further evidence of Jaredite culture impacting upon and being reflected in later Nephite culture. (As also with the secret, dark oaths, personal "Jaredite" names, etc.) The basic accuracy of the Jaredite historical record isn't questioned, or perhaps better said, isn't called into question.

I doubt this very much. Despite the similarities, the Mosiah account is very firmly rooted in the Mosaic texts (which is appropriate given the context since Abinadi attacks Noah's actions based on the Mosaic Law). The only way that your version could be given much credence would be to ignore the internal chronology of the text.

I do not understand what you mean/intend in the parenthetical, so perhaps you could explain. That is, you assume what about some connection between the language of the 24 gold plates (?) and some "similar content" in the English of the BoM?

The Gold Plates which Joseph Smith translates are written in one or two different languages. If two, then it would be presumed that Nephi wrote in Egyptian, and Mormon/Moroni wrote in a reformed Egyptian. If one, then it was all reformed Egyptian.

The assumption is that when Joseph Smith translates something, then X in the source text is consistently (generally speaking) translated Y in the English text. So, when the same identical phrases are used in the English, the assumption would be that identical phrases in the source language occur at both places in the original text. (This of course does not hold in some places where the text of the English translation is indebted to the KJV text - particularly the Isaiah passages). As long as this is the case, then (because the Ether text is a translation), there can be little doubt that a literary relationship exists between the two narratives. Whether that relationship is simply in the use of a common vocabulary to describe similar things or something more, isn't decided in my comments. I simply point out that the existence of these parallels demonstrates the fact, quite clearly, that the one text is related to the other, and that this relationship, given the nature of the text as I describe it, makes your assertion of certain facts problematic.

Your words, Ben, display but a form or shadow of skepticism, while denying the power thereof. Uhm, so to speak.

Let me remind you again, that I only appy this skepticism to portions of the text. Yet, it is precisely these portions that you are trying to use to assert facts. I would think, given your universal skepticism, that you could deal with those areas of the text for which we have a much better alleged transmission process ....

Ben

[Benjamin McGuire]

Beastie writes:

Even on this thread you offered the possibility that the horse was really a horse but not used as a horse. But even if you want to distance yourself from that, and switch to the tapir, then to avoid the "white crow" problem of falsifiability, you need to demonstrate that other Mesoamericans used the tapir in the manner described in the BoM.

Allow me to quote myself from various places in this thread:

On 4/2/05 Tarski wrote:

OK, so why would Nephi do such a thing? What were those "horses" then? You aren't going with deer or tapir are you?

I responded:

It doesn't really matter to me what they actually are. The text discusses the various roles which they play. I am more than willing to let others speculate. Nor am I dead set against it referring to a real horse. I am simply pointing out that it is not implausible (assuming the historicity of the text) for the term to refer to somethign other than what corresponds with our conceptual and semantic model of a horse.

On 4/4/05 I wrote:

So far, everyone has been so willing to jump after me (and Brant) based on their notions of what they think the translation should have been. Yet, no one has yet to comment on Marco Polo and his Unicorn. And as I pointed out, this is a real world corollary to the situation which I am proposing (at least for Nephi). And it is a corrolary which goes a long way to describe the rlationship between a horse and any of the creatures which have been proposed as possible alternative interpretations based on the functions of the creatures in the text.

On 4/26/05 I reiterated my foundational position:

To bring this back to the discussion, we then have an issue. Joseph can only mean horse, because that is what the text says. And the text certainly means "horse" as we traditionally understand the term in at least one instance (when Isaiah is quoted).

But, if we presume, for a moment, the historicity of the text, then we are left with a different problem. If there was no horse, then we are left with the realization that, much like Marco Polo, Nephi was describing an unknown using a conceptual and semantic model which he had. Which means, that the "horse" which he experienced in the New World did not even have to so much resemble the horse of the Old World, as it had to resemble at least in part the conceptual and sematic model of the horse in the Old World. Nephi then, intends to use the word "horse" to describe the unknown - rather than to introduce a new name for a creature in his text.

On 4/29/05 I wrote:

You know, what I am asserting is that Marco Polo, when he saw a rhinocerous, called it a unicorn. This, despited the fact (and he recognizes these points in his text) that it was dark, not white, that it's hair was not like a horse but rather like a buffalo, that it's horn was black, that it was not slender legged, and that (most importantly) it would not respond to a virgin. So, if Nephi does the same thing (and I believe that he actually did do some of this in places - I am not convinced that there were no horses), then it seems quite reasonable that although the text says "horse", what that "horse" is should be examined through the text in terms of its description, how it is used, and so on. And this is all part of my point. Obviously, the horse isn't described in terms we would normally expect. This is true both of Nephi, and of Joseph Smith. And these are indicators that perhaps the horse isn't really a horse as we understand the term.

On 5/3/05 I wrote:

Other apologists have in fact made concrete suggestions. The reason why I believe that you aren't going to carry on a reasonable discussion is that you are unwilling to address those issues. Deer? Tapirs? These things have been discussed in literature, so there is no need for me to raise these issues or defend them. Have you addressed these issues which have already been raised?

On 5/4/05 I wrote:

But, apart from this last issue (which I am not sure you even recognize), there is no difficulty substituting deer or tapir for horse within the text. There is no change in the meaning of the text. There is simply a shift in the conceptual and semantic model with which you read it.

On 5/11/05 I wrote:

If you took the time to understand my argument this wouldn't be so difficult. The word "horse" has a meaning. But that meaning can vary as different groups may have different conceptual and semantic models of what a horse is. If Nephi calls a Tapir a "horse", he isn't just renaming the Tapir, he is expanding the conceptual and semantic model of the term "horse". This is comparable to Marco Polo, who not only calls a Rhinoceros a "unicorn" but then clearly comments that his "unicorn" is different from what he traditionally believed a "unicorn" was. It had an expanded meaning. Marco Polo, had he also encountered a mammalian, slender-legged, white, quadruped with a horn in its forehead would also have recognized it as a unicorn. After Nephi dies (and everyone else who came from the Old World), there isn't anyone left who has experienced an Old World horse. So over a period of time, the conceptual and semantic model which Nephi had expanded, is reduced within the group until it generally refers only to Tapirs. A Nephite who later encountered a horse might recognize it as a horse or he might not. And if he did recognize it as a horse, it would be because he expanded his own conceptual and semantic model to include this new kind of horse.

And so on.

I have never, in this thread, attempted to define what the corrolary was. I noted that I wasn't an expert in Mesoamerican wildlife. It hasn't been my purpose here in this thread to attempt to define the word "horse" or to defend (at any great length in any case) any of the theories which were linked to at the beginning of this thread which offer concrete theories about what the horse was. Early in this thread, Mighty Curelom asserted this idea:

Joseph can only mean "horse" when he says "horse" in the BofM, and here's why.

And my comments have been aimed at this assertion.

I have demonstrated, I think, that whether or not Joseph could only mean "horse", that Nephi was not limited in such a fashion when writing the text. My argument has been about meaning, and about verbal repertoires as the exist for disparate groups. So tell me, how have I made this argument unfalsifiable? What claims have I made that need to be so hotly contested? I have simply removed an argument against the proposals made by others. In the process, I have repeatedly suggested that whatever speculation is given, it needs to account for the data within the text.

Oh, I did revisit it, obviously you either ignored it or forgot it. Agricultural use is just one manner in which the horse impacts the evolution of a culture, Ben.

It changes the dynamic. Further, the use of the horse in warfare would be limited in a jungle environment, in mountainous regions, etc. I don't think you have revisited it - simply because you keep asserting the same thing.

No matter how you look at it, if the horse existed as a domesticated animal in mesoamerica, its affect on culture and other aspects of their society would not have been the same as its affect on other cultures. It doesn't work to say (any time an issue comes up which suggests otherwise) that "well, apart from this, it is the same or it should be the same".

Finally, a couple quick question for you - when Diaz is making his descriptions, is he referring to the twenty horses that Cortez brought with him? And does this occur in the area which Sorenson believes is the region in which the events in the Book of Mormon took place?

Ben

[Benjamin McGuire]

Brent writes:

Attention to other literary forms and structures can be similarly problematic. One striking literary phenomenon in the Book of Mormon is the instance of narratives which mirror each other.[1] As a case study we can distinguish twelve parallels between the stories of the Nephite king Noah and the Jaredite king Riplakish:

One of the challenges I find with Brent's approach here is that it is incomplete. The Mosiah text, for example, seems to be reliant on an old testament passage in Deuteronomy 17. The text reads (vss. 14-20):

When you enter the land the LORD your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, "Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us," be sure to appoint over you the king the LORD your God chooses. He must be from among your own brothers. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not a brother Israelite. The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the LORD has told you, "You are not to go back that way again." He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.

When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the priests, who are Levites. It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the LORD his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees and not consider himself better than his brothers and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel.

There is a parallel to this passage in Deuteronomy 18 dealing with prophets - "The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him. ..." This wouldn't be quite so significant, except for the fact that it is quoted in the Book of Mormon. In any case, there are some significant parallels between the Mosiah text and the Deuteronomy text which don't show up in this list -

DT: "his heart will be lead astray"

MO: "he did walk after the desires of his own heart"

DT: "He must not take many wives"

MO: "he had many wives and concubines"

DT: "He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold."

MO: "he laid a tax of one fifth part of all they possessed, a fifth part of their gold and of their silver, ... And all this did he take to support himself, ... "

Then, as the scene unfolds (in Mosiah 12 and 13), the second part of this passage is paralleled.

Abinadai makes the prophetic claim that unless Noah repents, his life will be cut short (DT: "Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom"), the priests read scripture to Abinadi and claim that they teach the people appropriately (which Abinadi denounces.) And so on. The phrase "right in the sight of the Lord" is one which occurs several times in the Deuteronomic corpus. So, when Brent notes that "Noah and Riplakish are the only monarchs identified as polygamists and taxers, ..." this is something which we would expect from the model of the wicked king given the setting of the Mosaic Law.

I did enjoy this line: "These mirrorings suggest that one narrative may depend on the other, and that only one, or perhaps neither, represents a factual account of historical events." Well, what do we expect? These aren't merely factual recountings, but interpretations. (In fact, most histories are simply interpretations). But the fact that the way an event is told is determined by outside issues doesn't mean that the event never happened. A good case in point is the whole nature of the Bible itself - which falls suspect to the same issue. Do we then declare that because the Bible is a work of literature, that it becomes untrustable as a "factual account of historical events"? Of course. But neither the Bible nor the Book of Mormon has a primary goal of providing us with a "factual account of historical events". So, why this should bother us is a real question. Most histories are derived from literary texts - documents which are not merely factual accounts of historical events.

What escapes Brent, perhaps, is that in describing King Noah in the way that Mosiah does, the intent is to make it clear that Noah was a wicked king who was violating specific issues relative to his kingship. More than this, this connection is used to presage even Abinadi's prophecy that Noah would suffer an untimely demise.

In other words, Brent is asserting that the text is not trustworthy as an accurate factual account of historical events. And frankly, I would agree. This was never its intent. But Brent also doesn't look at the obvious counter arguments. Not too many of the Jaredite kings are described in any degree of detail. Is Moroni's inclusion of Riplakish based on the similarity? We have a model of the wicked king with which Moroni is familiar (in Mosiah) and when he comes across a similar king in the Jaredite record, he inlcudes it - to show that the Jaredites also had wicked kings. Would we expect him to paint Riplakish in substantially different lanugage than his father used to paint king Noah?

Some Book of Mormon students have implied that we may be dealing with a wicked-king literary formula.[3] Yet other decadent kings in the book do not follow this pattern with any precision.

And this is significant? The wicked king formula quite clearly exists outside of the Book of Mormon text. It seems to me that the conclusion that we are dealing with the wicked king formula is quite convincing.

Just as important - at least as far as the Nephite model goes, there aren't a lot of examples of wicked kings. We have King Nephi. (His successors were all supposed to be named Nephi as well). We don't know much about the second king (although Jacob's sermon tells us about the people). Then we get King Mosiah. We presume, in the gap that the people became wicked. But the text we have doesn't tell us much. And then we have King Benjamin. And then another King Mosiah. And then no more kings. We get a brief section on Zeniff - where we have King Zeniff, King Noah, and King Limhi. Of all these kings, the only one mentioned who was portrayed as a wicked king was King Noah.

The rest of the decadent kings would have come from the Jaredite record (who would not use the Mosiac Law from which the model of the wicked king is drawn) or from the Lamanites. So, I suppose an argument could be made that we should expect such from Amalickiah, or Ammoron, or Tubaloth, but the extent to which these can be applied to the situation that Brent mentions is limited.

Still, allowing for a literary device, questions regarding historicity remain since it is possible that Noah and Riplakish were actually monogamists but were portrayed as polygamists to accentuate their debauchery. If Noah and Riplakish existed anciently, the historicity of every detail of their biographical sketches is nonetheless uncertain.

I suppose that this is possible. But, it seems unlikely. Of course, reading any work which makes historical claims puts the reader in the position of having to judge those claims. After all, on the Merneptah stele, we have Pharoah Merneptah claiming that he had completely wiped out Israel. We wonder then, if Pharoah Merneptah is making a factually accurate statement, then why does Israel later exist - and if not, then what is the value of the statement (at least the is the position which Brent puts us in). I also feel like pointing out that Brent doesn't believe that the Book of Mormon is ancient fiction any more than he believes that it is ancient fact. He is simply providing this as a conundrum for believers to face - which he himself doesn't have to answer. Brent summarizes his position as follows:

It is as risky for apologists to stake claims of Book of Mormon historicity on evidence from literary studies as it is on evidence from theories of geography. In fact, emphasis on literary phenomena may be even more precarious, since careful attention to literary features underscores the complicated relation between language and reality. Even if one could plausibly argue for the antiquity of the Book of Mormon within this context, the historicity of every Book of Mormon person and event would be suspect. Apologists must delineate why sacred fiction has greater religious merit when written by ancient prophets than a nineteenth-century prophet.

And this is his major point. Obviously, for those of us who read the Book of Mormon as a work of literature, Brent suggests that the text becomes uncertain.

Fortunately, for those of us post-modernists, we recognize that all literature presents uncertainty. There is no difference in reading the Book of Mormon as history than there is in reading the Bible as history. And uncertainty can be reduced. And not all uncertainties are the same. The fact remains that whether or not the Book of Mormin is authentic, it is still a work of literature. That is to say, that independant of any "apologetic" issue, these questions still have to be addressed. And certainly, no one is going to argue that the Biblical text isn't ancient. As we read the Book of Mormon as a literary work, we can become more aware of the intentions of the author, and less involved with out own misapprehension of the text caused by our own socially and linguistically driven reading of the material.

More to the point, there is a difference in Brent's claims in that an ancient Book of Mormon which incorporates fictional elements (of which the extent and nature are uncertain) also includes non-fictional elements. And there is a vast difference between an author who provides a literary account in which the material is stylized and modified to fit specific rhetorical purposes - but who does not view his product as being fiction, and an author who produces an entirely ficticious work (which is essentially what Brent propose for Joseph Smith). You may call it risky. I call it necessary. What Biblical scholarship has done for the Old Testament must also be done for the Book of Mormon if we are to seriously attempt to use its contents as a way of examining the culture which produced it. And here, your primary objective seems to be to deride or minimize the value of such an undertaking. How provincial of you.

Ben

[Beowulf]

Just a note from an Asian Studies guy (me). This problem of ancient fiction incorporated into historical texts is rampant in Japanese and Chinese works (in fact, fiction was not even recognized as a literary genre in Han China and earlier).

The example that comes to mind (a la Riplakish/Noah) is the 5th C Japanese Emperor depicted as evil and corrupt in the Nihon Shoki and Kojiki (he appears in both documents). The language used to describe his terrible reign is word-for-word identical to Chinese descriptions of evil kings that date back to the Spring and Autumn Annals (6th C bce and even earlier). Plainly the details are not literal. So did this king even exist? While there is debate, I would say that he did exist, and that he WAS a bad guy, even if the details have been lost.

This sort of thing, a hallmark of all ancient literature everywhere, pops right up in BofM material, as Ben McGuire has shown. While such a literary device may not be definitive evidence in favor of the ancient nature of the BofM, it is one more datum in that direction, and certainly not evidence against...

Beowulf

[beastie]

Ben,

http://www.chapala.com/chapala/goldglory.htm

Yes, the horses were the few in number, but as I have pointed out many times, those who actually experienced their effect did not minimize their impact the way you do.

Once again, in Diaz, we have the first person narrator telling us how important these horses were to them.

In Europe, horses had been an effective weapon of war for centuries but they were rare and hellishly expensive in the islands. Those sixteen horses probably represented a high percentage of the entire equine population of the New World. Bernal Diaz del Castillo, a soldier who fought through every important campaign of the Conquest, says that horses "were worth their weight in gold, and that is why more were not taken, for there were none to be bought."

    In his True History of the Conquest of New Spain, written more than half a century later, Diaz would recall each animal in loving detail. Though he often confessed to forgetting the name of one of his companions-in-arms, Diaz never forgot a horse. He listed each horse and mare by owner, temperament, color, gait, conformation and fighting qualities. Thus, Cortez is listed as owner of a vicious dark chestnut,' Pedro de Alvarez was co-owner of 'a very good sorrel mare, good for both sport and as a charger," Diego de Ordas had "a gray mare, barren, tolerably good, but not fast" and one Lares, who seems, significantly, to have been known only as "the good horseman' rode 'an excellent horse of a rather light chestnut color, a very good goer". Some horses are assessed as 'not much good' or "no good for anything," others drew praise as "very fast" or 'very easily handled.'

    Such detailed memories serve to stress the important role of horses in the conquest. From their first belated arrival on a hotly contested field of battle, they proved their worth. The Spanish, though superior weapons allowed them to hold their own, were vastly outnumbered and could make no headway against a sea of foes.

From Ancient America, p 247

The city of Nephihah, founded at the same time as Moroni, plausibly is one ofa cluster of sites of Late Preclassic date located by Siosson a few mileswest of the Rio Seco frontier.  The "plains" near Nephiha (Alma 62:18) would be part of the Contalpa's extensive, anciently uncultivable, savanna grasslands.  (Bernard Diaz described one of the earliest Spanish battles on the mainland just a little east of here.  Thousands ofnative warriors waited to fight them on such a "plain", and this proved ideal terrain for the Spanish horses to maneuver.)

I've already pointed out that the Mesoamerican region covered wide range of geography, that we know trade between these regions had been ongoing for a very long time (well within the BoM time period), and it makes no sense to insist that none of these people, in different regions - some very amenable to horses as noted above - would not use the horse in this fashion, which would impact their history.

I don't have time to respond to each of your quotes, so will use this one as example.

It doesn't really matter to me what they actually are. The text discusses the various roles which they play. I am more than willing to let others speculate. Nor am I dead set against it referring to a real horse. I am simply pointing out that it is not implausible (assuming the historicity of the text) for the term to refer to somethign other than what corresponds with our conceptual and semantic model of a horse.

It does matter what they are, due to the fact that, to avoid the white crow problem, you must demonstrate that the (whatever it was) was used by others in the same culture and time period in a similar fashion as animal X. Simply by refusing to engage in that portion of the conversation does not innoculate you from engaging in an argument that renders the point unfalsifiable.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Beastie writes:

Yes, the horses were the few in number, but as I have pointed out many times, those who actually experienced their effect did not minimize their impact the way you do.

True. You do have a single source from an eyewitness. We have to wonder at its value. I am reminded of another source (which you provided) which noted:

The major effect of the arms and horses was psychological.

So who is right? You seem highly selective about the material you highlight (that comes with starting with a preconceived conclusion ...).

It does matter what they are, due to the fact that, to avoid the white crow problem, you must demonstrate that the (whatever it was) was used by others in the same culture and time period in a similar fashion as animal X. Simply by refusing to engage in that portion of the conversation does not innoculate you from engaging in an argument that renders the point unfalsifiable.

It doesn't matter for the position of my argument. As I noted, (and continue to note) others have made these arguments. That means that others believe that there was an animal X. Your point isn't valid here.

What is the white crow that I am asking you to find? What is the "white crow problem" here?

Ben

[exegete]

Hi Ben,

I don't have time to engage you in a protracted discussion (I've got two articles and a book that I'm trying to complete), nor do I have the interest in commenting on every idiosyncratic opinion that you can pull out of your apologetic hat. I'm content in letting readers decide whose arguments they find most compelling. I figure that I've got the upper hand

[beastie]

Ben,

I'm being selective? Didn't you just quote from a quote that I provided on this thread?

Certainly part of the effect of horses is psychological, why wouldn't it be? The impact of any striking new technology on people completely unfamiliar with it is always partly psychological. The effect of the guns was partly psychological. How does this affect my argument?

Look at what we're arguing here - whether or not sixteen horses had an impact on these battles. Sixteen horses, Ben. How many thousands of years did the Jaredites/Nephites have animal X, that apparently functioned and looked enough like a horse for Nephi and his family to call it a horse? I guess we don't know the exact dating due to the uncertainty of the dating of the Jaredites, but let's be safe and say two thousand years. So for two thousand years, they had animal X, moved animal X in a group, mentioned animal X over and over with "chariots", whatever the heck that was, and at least one time animal X was used to pull the "chariot", animal X is mentioned in conjunction with movement of human beings - and it left no impact on the Mesoamerican history. IOW, the history of the Mesoamericans would look no different than if animal X had never existed - of course that statement can be made for the Nephites, et al, as well.

And you - nor Brant, who IS an expert in Mesoamerican studies - can suggest a single animal that fits the bill, and that is known to have been used by the culture in such a fashion.

You really don't see the white crow in all this? You don't recognize the tactic in what I was using with the figurative Jubilee? If you don't, then there really is no point in further discussion.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Brent writes:

Given your repeated contention that interpreters can recover pristine "authorial intent" from texts, you've never struck me as someone who would embrace Lyotard's rejection of grand narratives (a.k.a. metanarratives), or Foucault's articulation of Scientia Sexualis. Maybe you feel more comfy with Barthes' poststructuralist notion of the Death of the Author? Better yet, perhaps Baudrillard's Death of the Real or his universal simulacrum suits your fancy? (Did you notice Baudrillard's book sitting on Neo's nightstand in The Matrix?) Ben, do you have a hankering or antipathy for foundationalism? Do you even know what foundationalism is? (My questions, of course, are rhetorical; but feel free to respond if you're so inclined. But please understand if I refrain from a rejoinder.)

Actually, Brent, I have never made the contention that interpreters can "recover prinstine "authorial intent" from texts". (And I have made claims of being a postmodernist for a few years now - something which you should remember since you have commented on it before - in this forum even, I think.)

Engaging in this kind of rhetoric is really quite fun - although the real purpose seems to be avoiding the charge which I leveled at you. Your comments clearly disparage reading the text as a work of literature (at least from the perspective of the faithful believing LDS). Why would you make such a claim - when in fact, this would seem to be the only appropriate avenue of discussion when dealing with the historicity of the text?

As far as my postmodernist beliefs go, I am more of a constructionist than a deconstructionist. While I recognize that there are virtually an infinite number of possible readings for a particular text or utterance, I suggest that we place more weight on those meanings which approach the intentions of the author and less on those which don't. What are your views?

Lyotard is really quite interesting. I wonder exactly what you mean when you discuss his rejection of "grand narratives" and why I wouldn't be interested in his points. After all, one thing that has become patently clear in technology driven communities (of which this FAIR board is one) is that knowledge is no longer a quantification of what you know - but rather a quantification of what you have access to - more particularly, what can be digitized. Just as the opposite of knowledge (within such a community) is no longer ignorance, but noise. Personally, I agree with Lyotard that these "grand narratives" are themselves flawed. And his discussion can easily be carried into this arena. Do we pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge? Are there things not worth knowing? Are we selective (despite the claim that knowledge for the sake of knowledge is a valuable pursuit) in what we try and learn?

Within the course of religious discussion, one such "grand narrative" is the notion that the revealed will is consistent. Within Mormonism, for example, this is reflected in the often popular belief that what we teach in church today was taught to Adam. Personally, I side with Larry Hurtado who noted in his recent book:

Wishing to preserve the religious and theological validity of traditional Christological claims, the anticritical view attempted to deny or minimize as far as possible the historically conditioned nature of early Christ-devotion. On the other hand, the history-of-religions scholars were convinced that their demonstration of the historically conditioned nature of early Christ-devotion proved that it was no longer to be treated as theologically valid or binding for modern Christians. In both views the assumption is the same: if something can be shown to have arisen through a historical process, then it cannot be divine "revelation" or have continuing theological validity.

Here, this metanarrative affects nearly all of the interpretation of scripture by either camp (and personally, I, like Hurtado, feel that this assumption is flawed). In rejecting such a metanarrative, we recognize that in attempting to create a unifying theory (so to speak) for all of scripture merely creates disharmony. In terms of reading a text, these metanarrative force a particular reading of the text instead of allowing the reader the luxury of searching for the intent of the author. (I speak of this in literary terms since I am much more interested in postmodernism in literature and meaning than I am in its applications to science and the philosophy of science). Only in rejecting the metanarrative is scripture allowed to have its own voice - and we can try and understand the text on its own or within the context of a limited narrative (which we find of value).

In this sense, literaty analysis (whether it is directed at the Book of Mormon or the Bible, or even any other work - but particularly scripture - as you point out in your comments earlier in this thread) runs the risk of suffering from an excessive concern for the truth. Metanarratives which provide this "truth" are inevitably going to be flawed - and so it is far better to take the text as the authority, and eliminate the need for such over-arching structures in which to attempt to understand the material.

I have little interest in Foucault's topic.

With Barthes (and I have discussed Barthes briefly elsewhere in this forum), it comes as no surprise that you would dislike the notion. After all (as I have also discussed on another thread) you have a vested interest (at least within the context of Mormon issues) of deriding this notion, as you engage (along with Vogel) in the intentional fallacy. Barthes's claim that the author was dead is really a claim that the author's intentions in creating a text are irrelevant to the interpretation of the text. This is the position of a deconstructionist. (I am not a deconstructionist). As I note above, I tend to believe that we can place a set of values on the interpretations of a work. And that, as a normal sequence of events, we (the reader) tend to place a higher value on certain meanings. Whether that higher value is placed on the meaning intended by the author, or whether that higher value is placed on meanings which conform to our pre-existing metanarrative, we tend to exclude meanings as we encounter them if other meanings have higher values. Barthes suggestion is that any kind of valuation is wrong. On the other hand, when you or I write, we write with the anticipation that our audience will understand a specific thing. Competent writers can include clues to help their intended audience form the meaning that they intend to produce. In doing so, the author stops being the anchor by which a text is interpreted, and allows the text itself to become the source of interpretation. The meaning of the text is drawn from the text, and not from alleged biographical details about the author.

This is a hard position for intentionalists to accept. After all, the intentionalist will suggest that when the philosophy professor gives John a reference (as I noted in an earlier post) which reads: "John is very punctual and he has excellent penmanship", the only meaning is "John is lousy at philosophy". All other possible interpretations do not convey the meaning of the text. Yet, this really doesn't do justice to the fact that the text (separated from the author) says something entirely different. Only the priviledged reader (who is aware of the ocaision) is capable then of actually understanding the text. I am reminded of a recent (5/31/05) essay in the New York Times by Stanley Fish (dean emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago) titled "Devoid of Content". The essay reverses the situation. He notes:

WE are at that time of year when millions of American college and high school students will stride across the stage, take diploma in hand and set out to the wider world, most of them utterly unable to write a clear and coherent English sentence. How is this possible? The answer is simple and even obvious: Students can't write clean English sentences because they are not being taught what sentences are.

Most composition courses that American students take today emphasize content rather than form, on the theory that if you chew over big ideas long enough, the ability to write about them will (mysteriously) follow. The theory is wrong. Content is a lure and a delusion, and it should be banished from the classroom. Form is the way.

Many people struggle (are incompetent communicators) because the presume that what they mean and what they say are the same thing. (And in fact, as I not, the intentionalist camp makes this claim explicitly). In any case, you (Brent) come into direct conflict with Barthe when you make comments like these (which you have made here on FAIR):

[GravyBoat]

The horses keep me up at night...

Sorry, I couldn't resist. I'm a huge fan of the film.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Beastie writes:

I'm being selective? Didn't you just quote from a quote that I provided on this thread?

No, IIRC, I just quoted a source which you quoted from as well (you didn't quote the part I provided I don't think. I could be wrong, and I don't want to take the time at the moment to go hunt it down).

How many thousands of years did the Jaredites/Nephites have animal X, that apparently functioned and looked enough like a horse for Nephi and his family to call it a horse? I guess we don't know the exact dating due to the uncertainty of the dating of the Jaredites, but let's be safe and say two thousand years. So for two thousand years, they had animal X, moved animal X in a group, mentioned animal X over and over with "chariots", whatever the heck that was, and at least one time animal X was used to pull the "chariot", animal X is mentioned in conjunction with movement of human beings - and it left no impact on the Mesoamerican history. IOW, the history of the Mesoamericans would look no different than if animal X had never existed - of course that statement can be made for the Nephites, et al, as well.

You are still missing my argument. How close does animal X have to be to a "horse" for Nephi to call it a "horse"? How close did the "rhinoceros" have to be to a unicorn for Marco Polo to call it a "unicorn". The answer, clearly, is that it doesn't have to be all that close at all. And I pointed out several issues which might make some choices quite appealing. It all depends on what criteria are used to determine the similarities. In the case of Marco Polo, the one particular issue which outweighed all other issues was the horn in the forehead. If we were to propose that the horse was a Tapir, for example, as one FARMS publication suggests, we might consider the fact that both the horse and the tapir are three toed ungulates (we also note that for Israelites, the kind of feet that an animal had was considered a highly significant factor - as that would determine the animals status and allowable uses).

Second, what is this nonsense you are providing about the Jaredite record? You seem to be asserting here that:

A) The Jaredites had an animal X

B) The Jaredites moved animal X in a group

C) The Jaredites mentioned animal X over and over with "chariots"

D) The Jaredites used the animal X to pull the chariot

E) The animal X is mentioned in conjunction with the movement of human beings

There is only one reference to the "horse" within the context of the Jaredite record, and that instance is Ether 9:19 which reads:

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.

As far as the Jaredites go, of your statements, only A can be asserted from the text. So when you make the statement:

I guess we don't know the exact dating due to the uncertainty of the dating of the Jaredites, but let's be safe and say two thousand years. So for two thousand years, ...

Let's be accurate, and leave out of your assertions the Jaredites with the possible exception of assertion A. Because the text doesn't support your claims. And this discussion is all about what the text actually says, and not how you read it. Personally, I think you have consistently inflated the nature of the references to "horses" in the Book of Mormon in this thread. The passage which discuss the moving of "horses" in a group are clearly ambiguous, since "horses" aren't being moved - rather "the horses and the chariots" are being moved. An important distinction - particularly given your approach to the "chariot".

In answer to your earlier comment:

Certainly part of the effect of horses is psychological, why wouldn't it be? The impact of any striking new technology on people completely unfamiliar with it is always partly psychological. The effect of the guns was partly psychological. How does this affect my argument?

Because, I think it is fairly evident from the evidences that we do have, that the armor, and the horses, had a far less significant impact on native populations than did other issues including disease.

In many ways, however, this is simply a non-issue. The Book of Mormon never speaks of horses being used in warfare. So we get back to the question of relevance. How does the impact of the horse when brought by the Spanish impact my suggestion that animal X is not a horse at all, but something else?

Ben

[exegete]

Hi Ben,

Just a few quick musings (I'm absolutely swamped with other commitments); take them for what they're worth.

You've lost me, my friend. Your depictions of ideas about digitized knowledge and revelatory consistency as "grand narratives" or "metanarratives" bear virtually no resemblance to my understanding of Jean-Fan

[Benjamin McGuire]

I missed this post earlier, or I would have responded to it sooner.

Brent writes:

"imulacrums"? You made me smile, Ben. Try simulacra.

http://www.freesearch.co.uk/dictionary/simulacra

Either is now considered an acceptable plural.

In your words, you are "more of a constructionist than a deconstructionist." Do you mean constructivist (as in social constructivist)?