Book of Mormon Central America... sigh

I hesitated to publish this post because I really like the people at Book of Mormon Central, but I have to clarify the situation for the many people who follow this blog. I suppose it was inevitable, but despite its statement of policy that claims to be neutral, Book of Mormon Central (BOMC) is taking the Mesoamerican perspective after all. This comes less than a week after I encouraged people at the conference at UVU to go to the site because it was neutral and was not Book of Mormon Central America.

What prompted this post is the KnoWhy titled "Why Was Coriantumr's Record Engraved on a "Large Stone"? I'll address that KnoWhy after I revisit the policy.

I still think there is good material at BOMC, and I encourage people to use it for research and study, but you're going to have to realize it is part of the citation cartel after all. It's a prime example of this: “Once you start looking at the Book of Mormon through a Mesoamerican lens, you can’t unsee it.”

The policy:

Book of Mormon Central Policy on Book of Mormon Geography

Book of Mormon Central at this time is officially geography neutral. We seek deep understanding of the Book of Mormon text. We hope diligent students work together to achieve working consensus on the geographic correlation issue. Until that happens, our selection of exegetical material is guided by these principles:

• In our hierarchy of evidence, the text itself is primary because it is closest to the divine.
• If profound and compelling location-specific insights shed light on the text, we highlight these regardless of their geographic provenience.
• We favor authors with credentials in their areas of interest.
• We favor formally published works from reputable presses.

We welcome good work from any geographic persuasion that is responsive to these principles. In our collective experience, proposed Book of Mormon correspondences from Mesoamerica tend to satisfy our criteria more consistently than those from other areas.

The obvious fallacy here is that "formally published works from reputable presses" includes these, all of which are exclusively Mesoamerican and reject any manuscript that does not support the Mesoamerican theory:

Ancient America Foundation

BYU Studies

Book of Mormon Archaeological Forum

BYU Religious Studies Center

BYU Maxwell Institute

FairMormon

Interpreter

BOMC does not have a single external link to any site or source that does not fully embrace the Mesoamerican perspective.

IOW, Book of Mormon Central is degenerating into more of the same, and its purported policy of neutrality is a sham. I hope that changes ASAP so I can delete this post.

____________________________

Below is the KnoWhy #77 that I find irrational and dogmatic, with my interlinear notes.

[Despite the problems I identify here, I wouldn't object to it if BOMC had also included an analysis showing an alternative perspective based on the North American setting; i.e., a truly neutral presentation. Instead, BOMC opted for an exclusively Mesoamerican perspective that, in my view, is fatally flawed both on its merits and on its exclusivity. And note that all of the references are to the citation cartel.

BTW, KnoWhy #75 on horses has the same problem. They skip right over the abundant evidence of horses in North America that was published recently in BYU Studies and resort to the old Mesoamerican claim that Joseph didn't translate the plates correctly. The only explanation I can offer for why the Mesoamerican proponents keep making things so difficult and convoluted is that they actually can't unsee Mesoamerica in the text, even if they have to distort the text to make it fit. Again, I wouldn't mind that BOMC offers "a variety of different ways" to interpret the presence of horses if they would only include the most obvious one; i.e., that the Book of Mormon took place in North America, where the indigenous people did have horses.

This refusal to let people even see both perspectives is characteristic of all the external links listed above. I've given up hope for those groups, but I'm still hopeful that BOMC will trust its readers enough to offer them a truly neutral approach to the question of Book of Mormon geography. Until then, all I can do is offer another perspective on this blog.]

The Know

When the people of Zarahemla met the elder Mosiah, they showed him a “large stone … with engravings on it” which Mosiah was able to interpret “by the gift and power of God.” The stone “gave an account of one Coriantumr, and the slain of his people,” and also “spake a few words concerning his fathers” and related the origin of the Jaredites “from the tower” (Omni 1:20–22). This is a misleading paraphrase of the scripture, which actually reads this:

"20 And it came to pass in the days of Mosiah, there was a large stone brought unto him with engravings on it; and he did interpret the engravings by the gift and power of God."

IOW, the people of Zarahemla did not "show" Mosiah a large stone--they brought it to him. The significance of this will become apparent in the next section below. 

There are 14 references in the BoM text to engravings, of which 12 involve metal plates and two involve stone (both in Omni 1:20). The engraved stone in Omni 1:20 is unique in the text. There are no other engraved stones; in fact, the rule of the kings and the history of the people were explicitly engraved on plates, not on stone (See 2 Nephi 5:33, Mormon 1:4, and everything in between). Even the Jaredites engraved their history on metal plates, not stone. Only Coriantumr engraved a stone, and it was "brought" to Mosiah; i.e., it was small enough to be transported, indicating it was "large" only in comparison to other stones with which the people were familiar. By comparison to Mesoamerican stelae, it was small.

Early Latter-day Saints living in Nauvoo were interested to learn that explorers John Lloyd Stephens and Fredrick Catherwood had discovered a large, engraved stone among the ruins of Quiriguá in Guatemala. In October 1842, with Joseph Smith at the helm as editor, [Apart from boilerplate at the end of every issue, there is no evidence that Joseph acted as editor and abundant evidence he did not] the Times and Seasons reported, “that a large stone with engravings upon it” had been found by Stephens, “among the left remembrances of the, (to him), lost and unknown.”1  This was seen as favorable evidence for the Book of Mormon by these first generation Mormons. [There are a handful of "these first generation Mormons" who saw the Central American ruins as favorable evidence, but these T&S articles were published anonymously; no one knows who wrote them, and outside of the T&S itself, few people discussed them. I'm not aware of a single reference to this Zarahemla article outside of the T&S. It was dead on arrival.

Not only that, but the Stelae at Quirigua post-date Book of Mormon times; Stela C is dated 775 AD and Stela D is dated 766 AD, for example. Stephens himself estimated the dates to be more recent than Book of Mormon times. The Mesoamerican ruins were used to combat contemporary anti-Mormon claims that the North American Indians were too primitive to qualify as the people described in the text, and they may retain some tangential relevance in a sort of hinterlands context, but they have nothing to do with the setting for the Book of Mormon itself.] 

Today, the large carved stones, called stelae (singular, stela), of the Maya and other Mesoamerican cultures are well known. [As are carved stones in many--probably most--cultures around the world. This is yet another illusory correspondence that actually disqualifies Mesoamerica. What the text describes is a people who recorded their history on metal plates, not on stones; the one engraved stone mentioned in the text is so unusual, the illiterate people of Zarahemla brought it to Mosiah to translate. What we see in Mesoamerica is a culture that recorded their history on "large stones" that were, as cited in the T&S itself, 20 feet high, 23-feet high, 26-feet high, etc. Which of these could possibly have been "brought" to Mosiah to translate? The Mayans recorded their history in enough detail that scholars today know the names and dates associated with the rulers. All of this directly contradicts the text, in which Nephi wrote, "if my people desire to know the more particular part of the history of my people they must search mine other plates." He didn't say they could consult the stone stelae. King Benjamin told his sons that if not for the plates, they would have dwindled in unbelief. There were no stone monuments from which his people could learn. If we're going to follow the text, we need to find a culture that did not write on stone monuments; a culture that recorded its history on stone monuments is excluded as a candidate for Book of Mormon society.] Brant A. Gardner explained, “Mesoamerica is unique in the Western Hemisphere for its writing systems. … Part of that tradition includes inscriptions on stelae, or large stones.”2 [I agree completely with this, which is why Mesoamerica cannot be the setting for the Book of Mormon, where no one (except a dying Coriantumr who had no access to metal plates) wrote on stelae.] These were called lakam-tuun by the Maya, which literally meant “large stone,” just as it is in Omni 1:20.3 LDS Mesoamericanists Mark Wright and Kerry Hull have both pointed out the potential significance of this connection.4 [Arghh! :) In Omni 1:20, a "large stone" was one the people "brought" to Mosiah. In Mayan culture, a "large stone" was one that rose 20+ feet into the air. The significance here is that the only engraved stone mentioned in the text is not the type of monument the Maya produced. Compared to the Mayan stelae, Coriantumr's stone would be considered small, not large.]

Comparing and contrasting the content on stelae with other writing media in the Mesoamerican area, John L. Sorenson explained:

The other large class of documents of which we know consisted of inscribed stones. Those too typically were written in double columns. Again some human figure or a more complex historical or mythological scene would be presented. Sometimes it was the texts that were primary, and the art secondary, and at other times, the reverse.5

Most stelae were meant to memorialize the king and his accomplishments.6 Mesoamerican art historians Maline D. Werness-Rude and Kaylee R. Spencer said, “Stelae most often depict the visages of a king,” and that “stelae must be seen … as historical records of past activities.” They added, 

Inscriptions carved on the sides and often the backs of the sculptures specifically anchor the ruler’s actions within time and space. They also often name particular gods and ancestors …. Both text and iconography create parallels between the sitter’s actions and those of past kings and queens—ancestors whose activities other stelae … recount.7

The origin of this practice began with the Olmec, a culture in mesoamerica contemporary with the Jaredites.8 By 400 BC stelae typically focused on a king or ruler, depicting him as a warrior, providing a record of his actions, and listing off the ruler’s ancestors.9 These details are broadly consistent with the brief description given in Omni 1:20–22.10 [This is a restatement of the illusory correspondence. Many cultures around the world engraved stones to record names and dates. While I'm fine with the proposition that the Olmecs were part of the much larger Jaredite nation, there is not a single indication anywhere in the text that the Nephites engraved stones. The Times and Seasons article is an anachronistic embarrassment and an example of an understandable missionary effort to defend anti-Mormon arguments, but it is not an indication of Joseph's speculation, scholarship, or inspiration, and it is certainly not reliable or credible evidence of a Mesoamerican setting for the Book of Mormon. Note that years later, Orson Pratt's footnotes placed Zarahemla in South America, albeit recognizing the speculative nature of that identification.] 

The Why

The monumental inscriptions of Mesoamerica were not widely known in the United States until after Stephens and Catherwood published their findings in 1841.11 The excitement in and around Nauvoo over their findings in 1842 indicates that Joseph Smith and early Latter-day Saints were most likely unaware of things like stone inscriptions found in the Americas previously. [This is simply not true. Josiah Priest had written about the hieroglyphics found in Central America in his popular 1833 American Antiquities, which Benjamin Winchester had referenced in 1841. Stephens and Catherwood were popular mainly because of Catherwood's drawings, not because they were the first to publish about stone inscriptions. Josiah Priest even published glyphs from Palenque. Even earlier, the well-known Humboldt had also published accounts of hieroglyphics he had discovered in Mexico.]

Even as awareness of Mesoamerican stelae grew, the inscriptions remained undecipherable, and as such the understanding of their contents was limited. Before the 1960s, most scholars believed that Mesoamerican monuments had no historical content whatsoever, but exclusively depicted and described gods and myths.12 Yet the Book of Mormon described a “large stone” engraved with the history of a king, his battles, his ancestors, and the origins of his ruling lineage. [The idea of stone monuments recording history and kings is hardly new; they are ubiquitous around the world. Pericles (495-429 BC) is quoted as having said "What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the hearts of others." The Continental Congress authorized the first national Revolutionary War memorial in 1776. To cite Mesoamerican stelae as "correspondences" to the solitary Jaredite engraved stone in the BoM text ignores the entirety of the rest of the text, which lacks a single reference to Nephites engraving stone.]

Today, it is easy to take for granted the evidence for large stone monuments from Mesoamerica and assume it is of little or no significance for the Book of Mormon. Such an attitude, however, fails to appreciate how unknown the practice was in Joseph Smith’s own time and the fact that it took 130–160 years for linguists and epigraphers to catch up with Amaleki’s description in Omni 1:20–22.13 [This illusory correspondence fails to appreciate how well known the practice of engraving stones was in Joseph Smith's own time. The most surprising thing about the text is that it only mentions one such stone--and it is present in an illiterate society, left by a non-Nephite culture. Had Joseph invented the text, he would more likely have described the Nephites as engraving stones--a common practice in his own society, as well as Mesoamerica. Instead, the text describes a far different culture that engraved on metal plates, not stone. The text describes anything but Mesoamerica.]

The more scholars learn about Mesoamerican stelae, the more comfortably Coriantumr’s stela fits the description. [This is awesome. Now Coriantumr's portable stone is a Mesoamerican stela! I'll add this to my list of Sorenson translations... Getting back to Joseph's translation, It is exactly the opposite of Mesoamerican culture, which features abundant monuments--stelae 20+ feet high. In the BoM, the Jaredites left no engraved stones; instead, they left engraved metal plates. In the entire text, only Coriantumr engraved a single stone, one small enough to be "brought" to Mosiah.] This is one instance where archaeology now strongly supports the Book of Mormon, whereas it did not seem to before. Realizing this underscores the importance of patience when it comes to comparing a text like the Book of Mormon to the archaeological record.14 [It's true that archaeology now strongly supports the Book of Mormon--by excluding Mesoamerica from consideration. The more we learn about Mesoamerica, the more we see that the people recorded their history on these stelae, contrary to the way the Nephites did it. This whole KnoWhy is a perfect example of how, once you look for Mesoamerica in the Book of Mormon, you "can't unsee it," even when the archaeological evidence in Mesoamerica directly contradicts the Book of Mormon text. Hence, my sigh... 

What Coriantumr's record tells us, and what this KnoWhy should present at least as an alternative, is that the engraved stone was an unusual exception to record-keeping in the Book of Mormon. The text tells us to look for an ancient culture that was illiterate until around 200 BC, combined with a culture that was literate but wrote on metal plates, and never on stone. That fits the North American setting and contradicts the Mesoamerican setting.]

Religion Today on KSL

People have been asking me about Religion Today because Martin Tanner went through the topic yesterday. Martin's a great guy. He has favored the Central American theory for many years and is part of the citation cartel (Interpreter, fairmormon, etc.).

I discussed the program back in August here. The program yesterday may have been a repeat.

Yesterday, he suggested people look at the Book of Mormon text itself and set aside preconditions (a great idea, but I've yet to see a single Mesoamerican do this, and Martin is no exception, as I'll show). The Mesoamerican lenses are quite powerful; those who have worn them for a long time "can't not see" Mesoamerica in the text, as I'll show here. Martin also recommends that people disregard what early leaders, including Joseph Smith, said. He said Joseph never claimed revelation about where BoM events happened, and that "his own personal ideas changed a great deal over time." Consequently, Martin says, Joseph merely speculated. This is all standard citation cartel dogma, the kind of thing one says when looking through the Mesoamerican lenses.

According to Martin, the promised land as described in the Book of Mormon talks about an "advanced civilization," a place where people reached an advanced state of culture and building. According to Martin, just that concept alone disqualifies anything in North America and qualifies the Central American location. Martin claims there are no "great civilizations" in North America between 600 BC and 400 AD. The Mesoamericans had millions of people and walled cities with great buildings. He claims these are absent from North America.

Martin makes basically the same argument the Federal Government did when, pursuant to Manifest Destiny and the approval of the Courts of the Conquereors (as the Supreme Court called itself), the government 1) fought the Indians, 2) removed them from their native lands, 3) forced them onto oppressive reservations, and 4) destroyed as much of their history and as many of their structures as it could. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Native American Mounds & Earthworks (not LDS) noted that "the large majority of America's mounds have been completely destroyed by farming, construction, looting, and deliberate total excavation...I am fairly certain that over 1,000,000 mounds once existed and that perhaps 100,000 still exist."

Populations, according to Martin, are too large for North America. Hundreds of thousands up to millions. There is no objective evidence that there was any kind of civilization in North America that had millions of people as part of a city or as part of a battle or series of battles. But there are such in Central America.

In my view, it's audacious to claim there is no evidence when we know it was intentionally destroyed, but despite the destruction, the documented earthworks in North America demonstrate a high degree of civilization, both in terms of cooperative effort and in knowledge of math, geometry, and celestial events (including calendaring). Martin is either unaware of this or is misleading his listeners (and I like to think the former).

Martin says there are "No great cities made of cement like we read in the Book of Helaman," or of walls and towers in North America. Now that he's asking his listeners to stick to the text, you would think he would do so, but he doesn't. (I'll assume here that he honestly thinks the text speaks of "cement cities" because that's what everyone who wears the Mesoamerican lenses sees, but readers and listeners need to know Martin's not talking about Joseph Smith's translation.)

Here's what I wrote back in August:

Martin claims there were "cement cities," but there are four references to cement in the BoM, and none of them describe cement cities:

Helaman 3:7

7 And there being but little timber upon the face of the land, nevertheless the people who went forth became exceedingly expert in the working of cement; therefore they did build houses of cement, in the which they did dwell.

Helaman 3:11

11 And thus they did enable the people in the land northward that they might build many cities, both of wood and of cement.

Helaman 3:9

9 And the people who were in the land northward did dwell in tents, and in houses of cement, and they did suffer whatsoever tree should spring up upon the face of the land that it should grow up, that in time they might have timber to build their houses, yea, their cities, and their temples, and their synagogues, and their sanctuaries, and all manner of their buildings.

Testimony of JS-“Having removed the earth, I obtained a lever, which I got fixed under the edge of the stone, and with a little exertion raised it up. I looked in, and there indeed did I behold the plates, the Urim and Thummim, and the breastplate, as stated by the messenger. The box in which they lay was formed by laying stones together in some kind of cement. In the bottom of the box were laid two stones crossways of the box, and on these stones lay the plates and the other things with them.

So, Joseph uses the term "cement" to describe the box--in New York. Besides Joseph's own description (and the even more detailed description by Oliver Cowdery), there is abundant evidence of the North American Indians using cement. Many of the mounds were covered with cement, to the point that they were difficult for farmers to tear down. Some used jackhammers to break up the cement. Even today, at Cahokia, they have recreated a portion of the ancient wall around the city. It consists of tall timbers, covered with cement. 

The scripture says they built houses of cement, and cities "both of wood and of cement." While there may have been Mesoamerican cities made of wood and cement, the ones cited in the 1842Times and Seasons articles that started the Mesoamerican theory are all stone and cement (referring to Teotihuacan and the cities discovered by Stephens and Catherwood). Maybe the Book of Mormon says they built cities and pyramids out of stone and cement, but not in the version I have. 

Must be in the Sorenson translation.

One reference says they built walls of stone around the cities, but the cities were built with mounds of earth--which is what the Hopewell in North America did, including the mounds Joseph described as Nephite. Consequently, in my opinion the cement verses exclude Mesoamerica as a potential location described by the text. (And that's not even getting into the law of Moses problem with Mesoamerican architecture.)

Martin claims that agriculture was limited in North America, but not on the large scale and not with the kinds of grains described, that there are no flocks and herds raised by Native American cultures, etc. He doesn't cite any verses, so I don't know what "large scale" he's referring to, but North American cultures developed agriculture after 600 BC, which museums throughout the Southeastern U.S. explain.

Martin says that in Mesoamerica, they had significant efforts to raise and keep llamas, alpacas, goats, and other herded animals. I've visited Mesoamerica, but the only llamas and alpacas I've seen were in Peru. Llamas and alpacas are called "the sheep of the Andes." Maybe they thrive in hot lowland jungles, but that's news to me.

Martin says the description in BoM of major public buildings, including religious ones, is found in Mesoamerica, but not in North America at all. Hmm. Since he doesn't cite verses, it's hard to know to what he is referring. King Noah built "many elegant and spacious buildings" and "a spacious palace," but they were ornamented with wood not stone and precious things, including gold, silver, iron, brass, and copper. The massive earthworks in North America were "major" by any measure.

He recommends An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon by John Sorenson. He's going through the evidence, based on the text itself.

Martin says there were a number of large-scale of wars between 600 BC and 400 AD but not archaeological evidence in North America, but they do exist in Central America, along with the implements of war. In North America we have some spears, bows and arrows, occasionally other kinds of weapons, such as axes and hatchets. But what we have described in the BoM is swords. We do find swords described in ancient Mesoamerica. Also scimitars, completely absent in North America, but used in Central America. Head shields and body armor in text, but not in North America except for only ceremonial headresses that wouldn't be worn in battle. In Mesoamerica, there are murals showing this kind of thing. Head shields, body armor, etc.

This one sounds like it came from the old Sorenson list. It's so thoroughly uninformed that I won't waste time detailing the problems (I've done that many times before). Anyone with an open mind can find out how many thousands of weapons have been recovered throughout North America. You can see the head plates in museums in Ohio, as well as the breast plates, arm bands, etc.

Martin claims there are no human-made improved roads in North America. In Central America, where the rainforest grew at tremendous rates, the cultures built improved roads to prevent overgrowth. It makes sense in Mesoamerica but not North America, etc.

Seriously? Start with the great Hopewell road, here.

Martin says great towers not found in North America but found in Central America. If he means stone towers, I completely agree. But nowhere does the text refer to stone towers, and there is evidence of abundant wooden towers in North America.

Martin points out there was writing and record keeping in Mesoamerica, but not North America. Spanish gathered them up and burned them, but we still have some. Mesoamerican codices held in libraries, including the Vatican. Plus glyphs on temples. No known books written by Native Americans in North America. The Windtalkers had an advantage of not having a written language to be consulted to allow the Japanese or Germans to break the code.

This is one of my favorite Mesoamerican arguments, because it only makes sense if you're wearing a good pair of Mesoamerican spectacles. As soon as you take them off, you see the argument disproves Mesoamerica. The whole point of the plates was to preserve the history and teachings because the Lamanites would destroy them. The people of Zarahemla had no written language, and they lived in the main city. King Benjamin told his sons that but for the plates, "we must have suffered in ignorance, even at this present time (130-124 B.C.), not knowing the mysteries of God... were it not for these things... we should have been like unto our brethren, the Lamanites." (Mosiah 1). If they were living in Mesoamerica, they could have put the records on the stones and in the codices. Instead, they wrote on plates of metal. The only carved stone in the entire text is the one Coriantumr left with the people of Zarahemla, who couldn't read it. It's difficult to imagine a description more different from Mesoamerica than what the Book of Mormon gives us with respect to writing and record keeping. Not only that, but we have the Mesoamerican records! True, the Spanish destroyed many of them, but we know when the kings lived, what they worshiped and how, etc. The Book of Mormon, by stark contrast, is a lost record of an otherwise unknown history.

Martin asserts that the Nephites followed several calendar systems, but no known calendar systems in North America. That's a compound error, often addressed elsewhere.

Martin claims another thing described in great detail, refining of gold and silver to make plates, described by the Spanish when they got here. None discovered among Native Americans before 400 AD.

The only known smelting in the Americas from Book of Mormon time frames was in Indiana.

Martin raises the old straw man: No hint of cold or snow in BoM, but we would have it if was located in North America.

The New Testament doesn't mention cold or snow, yet I was in Cappadocia recently, where Paul traveled, and it was snowing in April. Does this mean the New Testament could not have taken place where it says it did? It's a goofy argument, even by Mesoamerican standards. Maybe if I put on the Mesoamerican spectacles I could find references in the text to the rainy and dry seasons of Mesoamerica (along with all the volcanoes and jade and tapirs, etc.). What the text does say is there were "some seasons of the year" when fevers were "very frequent in the land." In Mesoamerica, you have two seasons: wet and dry. You can't have "some seasons" when there are only two seasons. In North America, you have four. Anyone familiar with Church history knows that there were "some seasons of the year" when fevers were "very frequent in the land" around Nauvoo.

Martin claims the river Sidon is described as having a "head" up in the south, implying that it ran north from some southern mountain ranges. No North American rivers work for that. But the Grijalva river does work.

This is fully addressed in Moroni's America for anyone who still thinks this is an issue for the North American setting. You'll see you need to wear Mesoamerican spectacles to make any sense out of Martin's argument (which is not at all based on the text, btw).

Martin points out that in Alma Chapter 2, wading across the river Sidon, way up high in the south. Where are you going to wade across the Mississippi or Missouri?

How about at Zarahemla, across from Nauvoo? And around St. Louis?

I admit, it's annoying to keep pounding these rhetorical gophers into the ground. The Mesoamericans have always resorted on incorrect facts, fallacious arguments, and their own additions/modifications of the text. Once they admitted that when you put on the Mesoamerican lenses you can't not see Mesoamerica everywhere, the gig was up.

More and more people realize it. If you're not sure yet, take off the Mesoamerican lenses and think for yourself, reading the text as Joseph translated it. You'll be surprised at how obvious the North American setting is.

:)

Fun with volcanoes

Lava in Guatemala that doesn't exist if you're wearing Mesoamerican lenses

Today I want to have some fun with volcanoes.

There's another new translation of the Book of Mormon making the rounds--again. This one adds "volcanoes" to the text. You won't find this translation on lds.org, and the term is not found in any official version of the text, but you will find it in numerous "scholarly" articles and presentations by the usual suspects (the citation cartel). Like the Sorenson and other new translations, the "volcano" translation is produced by a new kind of seer; i.e., those who "see" or "find" Mesoamerica in the Book of Mormon.

Here's a good explanation, from BYU's Daily Universe of all places:

“There has been a shift more recently to finding Mesoamerica in the Book of Mormon instead of finding the Book of Mormon in Mesoamerica,” he said. “Once you start looking at the Book of Mormon through a Mesoamerican lens, you can’t unsee it.”

That last sentence pretty well explains the whole reason for this blog. Thanks to a historical mistake from 1842, millions of people have been indoctrinated to read the Book of Mormon through a Mesoamerican lens and now they "can't unsee it."

They're stuck.

And so they produce new translations that reflect what they "see" through the Mesoamerican lens. (Maybe we should go ahead and call it the Mesoamerican Urim and Thummim, because that's how authoritative these new translations have become.)

Here's the process by which these new translations are developed:

1. Assume a Mesoamerican setting because of the anonymous 1842 Times and Seasons articles.
2. Put on the Mesoamerican lens (or eyeglasses, or spectacles, or Urim and Thummim).
3. "See" a hill in Mesoamerica that "fits" the text. Reject the New York Cumorah (along with David Whitmer, Oliver Cowdery, and Joseph Smith, because they were merely relying on a folk tradition started by unknown Mormons, they were unreliable people anyway, and they didn't have the Mesoamerican lenses that would have given them the correct understanding that modern scholars have achieved.
4. "See" such things as headwaters, a narrow strip of mountainous wilderness, tapirs, jade, etc.
5. "See" volcanoes.

I'm going to stop at volcanoes today.

[BTW, I mentioned at the conference a few days ago that I have a manuscript titled "Because of This Theory" that I'll probably never publish, but I'm tempted. The title comes from Joseph Fielding Smith's apt observation about the two-Cumorah theory: "Because of this theory some members of the Church have become confused and greatly disturbed in their faith in the Book of Mormon." My manuscript is a collection of "greatest hits" from the citation cartel, but I suppose everyone who follows this topic has their own lists. There is no shortage of material. For example, look at FairMormon's treatment of President Smith's comment here. Maybe we'll have some fun with that one down the road.]

Okay, back to volcanoes.

For years, I've been told about volcanoes in the Book of Mormon. Here's the kind of question you get from CES people (or anyone indoctrinated by CES, BYU, etc.): "Where is the evidence of volcanic activity (3 Nephi 8) in the North American setting for the Book of Mormon?"

I always respond to this by asking where is the evidence of volcanic activity in the Book of Mormon? The people supposedly lived in Central America for 1,000 years and never once mentioned volcanoes?

Of course, when you're wearing Mesoamerican spectacles, you simply read the evidence into the text. You can't not see the volcanoes.

According to the Mesoamerican seers, if you don't see volcanoes in the text, you're wrong; you just need to put on the right spectacles.

I'm going to give some examples next, but first I want to emphasize what I've said from the outset: I know many of the Mesoamerican proponents, including some of the authors of the articles I cite in this post. I like every one of them on a personal level. I consider them brothers and sisters in the gospel. I intend no offense, and I don't criticize any of them. I'm focused solely on the words on the page, the evidence and arguments made, etc.  Whenever you read the ad hominem attacks in FARMS, Fairmormon, BMAF, the Interpreter, etc., I hope you chalk it up to desperation, as I do. The last resort of a losing argument is to attack others personally. I don't care who wrote any of these articles; actually, I wish they had left them anonymous the way Benjamin Winchester did in the Gospel Reflector and the Times and Seasons.

________________________

Here's a fun one to start with: Volcanism and Earthquakes in the Book of Mormon found here. Check out this quotation from the introduction: "The main reason for the article on the BMAF website is to show that the events that occurred throughout the Book of Mormon could not possibly have been located in the eastern half of North America."

I've pointed out before that BMAF is essentially a club for Mesoamerican seers; i.e., people who wear the Mesoamerican spectacles. They are only interested in archaeology, anthropology, etc., "within a Mesoamerican context." They don't even purport to be neutral, let alone objective. The organization exists to perpetuate the Mesoamerican setting. I have no problem with that; in fact, it's delightful, sort of like a Klingon fan club.

So this article fits right in. Most of it is quotations from others who wear the Mesoamerican lenses, so I'm only going to focus on the original material.

The premise, of course, is that 3 Nephi describes volcanoes. Somehow Mormon supposedly described all the things a volcano did but didn't think to simply write, "Volcanoes erupted." That's no problem when you read the text with the Mesoamerican spectacles, though; the word is apparently on every page, invisible to anyone not wearing these specs.

To save time and space, I'll make interlinear notes.

Research has shown that there are no volcanoes east of the Rocky Mountains in North America, aside from four extremely ancient ones: one in Mississippi dating to 65 million years ago; two in New Hampshire that last erupted 400 million years ago, and one in Missouri, the last eruption of which was one-and-a-half billion years ago. [In other words, research has shown that North America, east of the Rocky Mountains, is just like the place the Book of Mormon text describes--no volcanoes in the time frame during which the Nephites and Lamanites inhabited the land.] 

Earthquakes, also, are extremely rare in the US heartland. Dr. Nibley mentioned the earthquake in 1811 of New Madrid, Missouri, down in the very southeast corner of the state. There have been no reports of any earth tremors since then 

[This BMAF article is so badly researched I'm surprised it didn't show up as a "peer-reviewed" article in the Interpreter. This section leads me to conclude that the Mesoamerican spectacles also serve as filters on Google (which actually explains an awful lot of the nonsense you read in Mesoamerican publications). In one minute on google, I discovered this:

Small earthquakes and tremors occur frequently in Missouri. Thousands of quakes have been noted in the state since 1795 and have been recorded since 1908. In recent times, earthquakes have been known to rock tall buildings and crack plaster in Missouri homes. Most were accompanied by numerous aftershocks, which are a series of successive quakes that can cause more damage than the initial shock.

In another minute, I found this:  

USGS increases earthquake risk along New Madrid Fault

Posted: Jul 22, 2014 3:34 PM MDTUpdated: Jul 22, 2014 3:36 PM MDT

 

Courtesy: USGS

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- The midwest region is preparing for earthquakes that are bigger and more powerful than ever believed imaginable.

The U.S. Geological Survey updated their seismic hazards map last week, and in it, Kentucky is listed as one of 16 states at highest risk of earthquakes.

USGS says the New Madrid Fault, which runs through a number of midwestern states, has been identified as an area that has potential for larger and more powerful quakes than previously thought.

But wait. There's more. The Central United States Earthquake Consortium is so concerned about future earthquakes that they are working with FEMA and the USGS to educate and prepare people. See here. 

I suggest BMAF loan some of their Mesoamerican spectacles to the Federal government to alleviate these concerns. 

Pay particular attention to the next part of the BMAF article:

and there appears to be no indication if there was any earthquake activity before 1811, especially around the time of Christ; 

Everyone who has followed the Mesoamerican theory knows the Mesoamerican spectacles filter out everything published by the Smithsonian, including its first publication (Squier and Davis). Here's another example. I took me another minute on google to find this:

"two decades ago, paleoseismology expert Martitia Tuttle and her colleagues began dissecting “sand blows” in the five states surrounding New Madrid. The sand blows were left by geysers when debris surged up through narrow dikes and landed in wide mounds. “Sand blows tell a dramatic story of the widespread shaking of these large earthquakes,” she says.

Tuttle’s team excavated potsherds, spear points and corn kernels and realized that many of the sand blows were more than 200 years old. “Some had archaeological sites on top of them with 2,000-year-old artifacts,” Tuttle says. “There’s no way the New Madrid earthquakes were a one-time freak event.” The Midwest had been slammed by violent quakes around A.D. 1450 and 900 and 2350 B.C.—and probably more often.

Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-great-midwest-earthquake-of-1811-46342/#pffkcYHByOxTZaZe.99

If a quick google search locates evidence of 2,000-year-old archaeological sites in the Midwestern U.S. on top of remains from earthquakes, what accounts for the claims in the BMAF article? I suggest two possibilities. One, the Mesoamerican spectacles blind the wearers to any evidence that contradicts their theory. Two, see number one.  

Or maybe an archaeological date 2,000 years ago is too inaccurate for BMAF. Maybe they think Christ visited the Nephites in 34 A.D., so the correct archaeological date should be 1,982 years ago, and the 18 year discrepancy excludes North America from consideration.

Now, here's more from the article.

whereas there are minor earthquakes that occur almost weekly and major ones that happen every few years in Mesoamerica. [Normally, the term "whereas" denotes a distinction, but here, the article is making a claim about Mesoamerica that is identical to what happens in the Midwestern U.S. Apparently those Mesoamerican spectacles also reveal Alice-in-Wonderland definitions of ordinary words.] 

Volcanoes are a way of life in Mesoamerica with at least two of them smoking all the time outside Antigua, Guatemala. At least two volcanoes erupted in Mesoamerica closely around the time of Christ’s crucifixion. [Here, the author makes my point; i.e., if the Nephites lived in Mesoamerica, how could they have avoided a single mention of this important "way of life" for 1,000 years? I've been to Antigua. I got a painting of the city with the volcano in the background. You can see it from miles around. But you can only see it in the text of the Book of Mormon if you're a Mesoamerican seer. On the point of the volcanoes erupting 2,000 years ago, assuming that is an accurate statement (unlike the other statements of fact in this article), it can mean only that Samuel the Lamanite was referring to far more than the local area when he made his predictions. 3 Nephi itself never mentions volcanoes.]

Some people make note of the multiple tornadoes that occur in the heartland of America (Tornado Alley), stating that one or more tornadoes would account for the destruction that has been mentioned. [Classic straw-man argument. I've read a lot of stuff on this topic, and I've yet to see a single claim that tornadoes alone would cause all the destruction in 3 Nephi.] Even half-a-dozen tornadoes occurring simultaneously, although causing much devastation, would not produce all the factors that are discussed in 3 Nephi, especially the poisonous gases that were developed. [Agreed, but this is an argument against a claim no one has made. Do the Mesoamerican lenses force the wearers to make logical fallacies? This sentence also provides another example of the Mesoamerican seers coming up with their own translation. Their 3 Nephi has "poisonous gases" arising. Maybe this is a good time to point out that, as always, I concede that Mesoamerica fits their new translations. That's axiomatic. If they would only take off their Mesoamerican lenses for a moment, though, they would see that Mesoamerica does not fit the text Joseph and Oliver translated.] Only a volcano could produce those effects. [Well, another ten seconds of google searching produces the accounts from the New Madrid earthquakes in which people describe conditions exactly like those described in 3 Nephi. E.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1811%E2%80%9312_New_Madrid_earthquakes Notice that the New Madrid victims did not report volcanic eruptions--but neither does the Book of Mormon.]

Mention was also made of the possibility of a hurricane being involved in 3 Nephi. The only place in the western hemisphere where a hurricane, volcanic eruption, and a major earthquake happening at the same time is in Mesoamerica and the nearby Caribbean area. [So now we add "hurricane" to the text, on top of "volcanic eruption." Even during the decades when I accepted the Mesoamerican theory, I didn't see these words in the text. Maybe my professors forgot to give me a pair of specs so I could play along. I love this argument, though. "Mention was made" by other Mesoamerican seers, therefore we need to find a place where there are hurricanes and volcanic eruptions, and the only place is Mesoamerica. Do people really not see the Alice-in-Wonderland nature of these arguments?]

________________________

The next article to discuss is titled "“Thick Darkness”: Volcanoes and the Historicity of the Book of Mormon." It's found here.

While this article is as fun as the first one, it has a little more serious implications. The gist of the article is that Joseph Smith could not have been an eyewitness to a volcanic eruption, so he could not have described one "with such vividness and accuracy." Of course, the author is wearing the Mesoamerican spectacles; the text Joseph and Oliver translated doesn't mention volcanoes.

The reason I say it has serious implications is that what the text describes is fully consistent with the reports from the New Madrid earthquakes from 1811-1812. IOW, the BMAF argument folds back on itself; instead of proving Joseph couldn't have written 3 Nephi because he hadn't experienced a volcanic eruption, the article supports anti-Mormon arguments that Joseph could have been simply repeating what was known about the New Madrid events.

This is a typical outcome of articles written by the Mesoamerican seers. Their desperation to prop up an indefensible theory of geography leads them to make claims that undermine the text.

Here's an example from this article. "When readers truly understand the nature of massive volcanic eruptions, their evaluation of Joseph Smith in Palmyra, New York, in 1829 will be that the New World crucifixion-of-Christ events recorded in 3 Nephi 8 show, from a historicity perspective, that Joseph Smith translated, not merely authored, the Book of Mormon."

Arguments such as this are persuasive only to Mesoamerican seers; if you're not wearing the Mesoamerican lenses, then you can't see the term "volcano" anywhere in the Book of Mormon. Like other Mesoamerican arguments, this one boils down to the assertion that Joseph just didn't translate the text correctly, so we have to supply the terms he overlooked.

Here's another missing term supplied by the Mesoamerican Urim and Thummim: "That wording clearly suggests the presence of poisonous volcanic gases that are commonly associated with volcanic eruptions and that can be fatal to those who breathe the air filled with those gases."

The article goes on to cite Mount St. Helens and Vesuvius as examples of volcanoes that caused widespread destruction. I've visited both of those sites and a major feature of each is the volcanic ash. I know people in the military who spent months in Washington cleaning up the ash. Yet, unless you're wearing the Mesoamerican lenses, you can't find a single reference in the text to all this ash.

Here's one of my favorite lines from the article: "The singular, most remarkable thing about 3 Nephi 8 is that it is obviously an eyewitness account of the events that commonly take place during certain kinds of massive volcanic eruptions." 

I can't wait to see an actual, detailed account of a "massive volcanic eruption" that doesn't mention either the volcano or the ash (let alone the lava). The author provides no such account as an example--except for the account in the Book of Mormon itself.

The author cites Payson Sheets' account of a volcanic eruption in Central America in the second century A.D. Here's what Sheets also had to say: "After the eruption, the area could not sustain its entire population and there­fore groups of Protoclassic people emigrated to sites where they might hope to establish new homes."

By contrast, what does the Book of Mormon say? Instead of abandoning the land, as the people in Central America and Pompeii did and the people in Washington would have but for modern mechanized equipment, the Book of Mormon people rebuilt the cities, including Zarahemla. The land was not covered with thick ash.

In most cases, when you remove the Mesoamerican lenses, you realize that the arguments made by the Mesoamerican seers disproves their own theory. Here, the claim that 3 Nephi describes massive volcanic eruptions is contradicted by the text itself.

IOW, not only does the otherwise detailed account in 3 Nephi never once mention volcanoes or volcanic ash, the Nephites immediately rebuilt the cities, which would have been impossible if they had been buried in volcanic ash.

Here's another fun quotation: "Kowallis also says that “Central American volcanoes are so explosive that liquid lava is rarely erupted. Instead, almost all (99 percent) of the magma erupted out of Central American volcanoes is in the form of ash and pumice. This would perhaps explain why there is no mention in the 3 Nephi account of anything that sounds like lava flows.”

Juxtapose this with another quotation from the article: "A “great mountain” took the place of the city of Moronihah, and hills and valleys took the place of other cities. The Book of Mormon wording for these events describes aptly the city of Paricutin, Mexico, west of Mexico City. In the 1940s, a volcanic eruption caused the earth to cover the entire village. Thereafter, the only visible evidence of the village is the Catholic church steeple that pokes up through the lava."

So first the text never mentions lava because Mesoamerican volcanoes don't produce lava, but then the text specifically describes lava as the "great mountain" that "took the place of the city of Moronihah." The proof is that a city in Mexico was completely covered with lava except for the steeple of a Catholic church.

You need to wear Mesoamerican lenses to think this is a coherent argument.

Finally, I'll just note what the official text says. Readers should remove their Mesoamerican spectacles for a moment, if possible.

3 Nephi 8:10 And the earth was carried up upon the city of Moronihah, that in the place of the city there became a great mountain.

How is earth "carried up upon" a city? I'll leave it to you to figure that one out, although it's pretty simple if you aren't wearing Mesoamerican lenses.

Hint: It's not a lava flow...

:)