Discussion Literature / TheBookOfMormon

Much of what is recognized as exclusively LDS doctrine is not present in the Book of Mormon, but there are some things (such as a rejection of infant baptism) that are. Texts which may be interpreted as referring to the trinity appear much as they do in the Bible, which should be unsurprising if you consider both to be inspired works. A Mormon would say that a deeper understanding of the Godhead was given to Joseph Smith in other revelations outside of the Bible and Bo M, and this would be in perfect harmony with the LDS principal of "line upon line, precept upon precept." In other words, more is revealed only after you have accepted what you have.

Joseph Smith never made a lot of money off the Book of Mormon - early missionaries did sell the book rather than give it away, as modern missionaries do, but they didn't sell it for enough to make Smith or the LDS church a profit.

The temple and its associated ordinances are regarded as sacred, not secret. There is a distinction between the two. The rites of Freemasonry and the temple ordinances are somewhat similar but not by any means indentical, and it would be inaccurate to say one is modeled on the other.

There is no mention of Kolob in the Book of Mormon. It is only mentioned in the Book of Abraham.

As per prior comments, the relationship between the Book of Mormon and any particular church's doctrine is not really relevant.

I have asked Mister Mackley about his decision to excise the section about the book's context - he is quite adament that this is a media-only page, and should consist solely of (the analysis of) tropes found within The Book Of Mormon itself without dwelling on the book's origins. Moreover, he has suggested that we move the content currently in the 'context' folder to a new 'Useful Notes' page for The Book Of Mormon.

I'm not sure what to make of his proposal, as creating a 'useful notes' page for a piece of media that already has its own page seems a bit excessive (not to mention the fact that the resultant page would be rather short) - I really do not see why we cannot just leave the page as it is. Thoughts?

Information on social context surrounding the book is not relevant to the needs of the main description, the wiki mantra of "we are not wikipedia" means that we are not trying to explain every aspect of the media in question but simply introduce it so that we can examine the tropes. Useful Notes and the Analysis Tab was created for the express purpose of having room to discuss things that go beyond introducing the media or trope and can be used as a reference point to the media or trope associated with it (ie Useful Notes on Mormonism to the Book of Mormon). Allow the reader to chose to access that information rather than forcing them to read through through an encyclopedia entry.

I will trim up the page and move necessary information to the analysis page.

KJ Mackley, The stuff on the Analysis page reads more like a list of typical criticisms of the book rather than an attempt to analyze the book's context. I know this isn't wikipedia, but could we make it a little more viewpoint-neutral? This is a text that is viewed as very important and even sacred to at least several million people.

Many of the items listed in that first paragraph are straw men, not things the book's text claims or that (modern) Mormons believe. For instance, the book doesn't make any claim that all American Indians are descended from one small population of Jews. Modern LDS scholarship thinks it very likely, and perfectly consistent with the text, that other inhabitants were present when the Nephites arrived and that intermarriage with these other inhabitants took place. In any case the book claims that the Nephites descended from the tribe of Manasseh, not Judah, so it claims they were Hebrews (or ancient Israelites, if you prefer) but not Jews.

To anyone interested in the subject I would recommend the LDS Chruch's article, which also includes an overview of the genetics involved, here: https://www.lds.org/topics/book-of-mormon-and-dna-studies?lang=eng

I wrote that.

If you could list 'all' of your problems with my conclusions, I would be happy to research further and see if I can make better ones with more information. I thought I had made room for the possibility that the Mormons had changed their views with the times (like the USA's 'creationists', etcetc [fascinating lot, aren't they?]) but I see that in the final edition I went for brevity rather than inclusiveness. You have no idea how much this little mistake of mine vexes me!

Anyhow. I don't suppose you, Dear Bense, have any detailed information on the subject of Amerindian genetics provided by groups who don't have vested interests in this topic, i.e. Mormons or ex-Mormons? I do so love a good university.

If Master Bense could also clarify what they meant by "vietpoint-neutral", that would also be fascinating.

VIEWPOINT. Viewpoint-neutral. Gah. I don't 'hate' touch-typing, but sometimes! Gah.

Frankly, I don't think there are any dis-interested groups who directly address the claims made in the Book of Mormon regarding the ancestry of the Native Americans - it's all either pro- or anti-Mormon, but I think the link I posted above, despite being pro- is worth a look. If there are obvious scientific errors in what it says then I don't see them. It boils down to "here are some reasons why genetic studies probably won't be able to either confirm or deny the Book of Mormon," and it is written largely by real geneticists (with footnotes).

I added a bit on the "Discussion" page of the "Analysis" page about the phrase "and it came to pass" and how that is in fact evidence for the book being a translation of an ancient Hebrew text, not evidence against it. I wondered if I had put it in too obscure a spot to be noticed.

Other problems with the list:

There definitely is archaeological evidence of "great agricultural civilisation(s)" in Meso-America in the time period described by the Book of Mormon - the Mayan pre-classical period.

The Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon were, indeed, "believers" when they saw the golden plates (displayed to them by an angel, in fact), but all three left the LDS Church afterwards, and several of them were highly critical of Joseph Smith. Despite having become non-believers they never recanted their testamony of having seen the plates.

Mormons do not believe the book was "perfectly translated". They believe it was translated with divine aid, yes, but the introduction to the book is perfectly willing to admit that there may be errors found in the text, and it is widely known (among Mormons, at least) that Joseph Smith made corrections to the first edition text in subsequent editions.

You are correct that there is little archaeological evidence for some old-world animals or plants in the Americas pre-Columbus, such as wheat, goats, sheep, horses, elephants, and cattle. A counter point might be that there is very little archaeolgical evidence for Norse colonies in America pre-Columbus (amounting to one discovered site at present), and there is no evidence of european animals like chickens, pigs, sheep, and goats that they almost certainly brought with them, and that would be almost 600 years after the Book of Mormon's last mention of horses (2,000+ years after the last mention of elephants).

By "more viewpoint-neutral" I mean a page that recognizes that there is room for reasonable and/or educated people to disagree on the origin of the Book of Mormon, rather than one that paints Mormons as ignorant.

I think we can agree that you, I, and KJ Mackley have no vested interests in this and are just interested in finding the truth. Feel free to criticise the neutral, educated analysis that follows.

Things that are true if Joseph Smith made it up 1. Joseph Smith wanted to make it up. [Possible] 2. Making it up as he went along, he did. [Possible] 3. The 11 people who 'saw' the Book Of Mormon did not literally/actualy see it but saw it 'spiritually/mystically' in a way that was very common at the time - using mystical/meditative 'second-sight' which they usually used to perceive magical auras and fields - and/or pretended it was real because they were all lifelong Mormon believers (with brief relapses from some) who were very closely related to and involved with Mister Smith's most devoted followers. [Possible]

Things that are true if Joseph Smith did not make it up 1. Christianity was right about God, Jesus, and Holy Spirit existing. [Extremely unlikely] 2. There was an Ancient Jewish civilisation in The Americas that we have no evidence for (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeology_and_the_Book_of_Mormon) [Extremely Unlikely] 3. Joseph Smith was chosen, guided, and empowered by the Christian God to translate these from an undocumented Egyptian script (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformed_Egyptian) into English. [Assuming that 1# and 2# are true, unlikely] 4. When Joseph Smith claimed to use the Christian God's power to 'translate' The Book Of Abraham (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Abraham) in the same manner as he did the Ancient American Jews' records, he wasn't actually empowered to do so. [Unlikely] 5. Professor Anthon, a contemporary of Joseph Smith and professor of Classical Studies (inc. Egyptian) at the USA's Columbia University, lied about receiving a letter from Joseph Smith containing fake hieroglyphs copied from the Ancient Jewish American script we had never heard of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthon_Transcript). [Possible]

Re: the points you brought up.

There is no evidence of great agricultural civilisations in the North-eastern part of North America (where The Book Of Mormon was supposedly found), and there is no evidence that the Mayan, Olmec, Toltec peoples etcetc of Central America had any Jewish roots. All the 'witnesses' died as True Mormon Believers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Mormon_witnesses) and were totally caught up in the Church and its teachings. Can we agree upon 'divinely translated'? They do believe he was empowered by the Christian God, after all. Numbers and length of time. The Scandis would've been lucky to be around for a couple centuries and numbered in the thousands. The Ancient American Jewish civilisations are supposed to have lasted several hundred years and had tens of thousands (or more) people. Moreover, such civilisations would've interacted with the civilisations we have evidence existed... but there is no evidence of this kind of contact.

You forget also the extent of Viking Settlement - Greenland, and 'perhaps' Newfoundland. Places isolated from The Americas proper, in other words.

I'm not sure if this is the place to try to "prove" or "disprove" the foundational document of a major religion. There are plenty of other places on the internet to do this.

What I think serves the TV Tropes wiki better than the current analysis page would be a page that does not have "this book is a 19th-century fabrication" as the primary assumption behind all of its analysis. There are reasonable, educated, and intelligent people who do not find Smith's claims to be obviously untrue.

While I could attempt to refute your points (and some of them are still factually inaccurate), I don't think this is the proper forum or ultimately serves the purpose of improving the analysis page.

I note that the Literature/The Bible does not have an Analysis page. Perhaps that would be the best approach to Literature/The Book of Mormon as well, rather than inviting endless edit wars over what is sure to be a contentious subject.

I realise now that I was patronising to just present my findings.

I agree that instead, we should present the facts and likelihoods of the matter as I have presented them to you and leave the reader free to make up their own mind.

I have faith that our fellow tropers will respect the cold logic of this kind of analytical approach. It's worked for the article on Occam's Razor.

I hope you don't mind, but I made my own attempt at it. Your version still seemed a bit anti-religious to me, and potentially insulting to Christians as well as Mormons. (Saying "Christianity was right about God, Jesus, and Holy Spirit existing. [Extremely unlikely]" is probably not going to win you any Christian friends). I tried to build a version that recognizes how unlikely Joseph Smith's claims are from a secular viewpoint while also making it unobjectionable to a Mormon reader.

Your analysis is interesting.

However, I don't see how it is more perceptive or thorough than my own... or why mine should be destroyed and yours upheld in its place.

Stating reality takes precedence over soothing egos. You can't shelter people from reality just because it 'might' hurt their feelings. That way lies patronising madness, and a never-ending litany of lies.

Truth isn't simple, but it is absolute.

I feel the purpose of TV Tropes is to have fun and examine tropes in use, not try to convince people that their world view is seriously detached from reality, and not to start fights over religion. I feel my version is better in that it better serves the purposes of TV Tropes. However, I would be open to removing the "Literature" portion of the analysis page entirely rather than insisting on my own version being endorsed.

The problem we are running into here is that basically, Analysis/ is someone's interpretation and these don't have to be consistent. I would consider the option to add two different analyses in.

^ Quite right, Septimus. This has taken up way too much of our collective time, and not in an entirely entertaining way.

Right now the analysis page has an unoffensive but uninformative analysis by Bense and a decidedly incisive - and not at all cuddly - one by myself. I'd be happy to see both stay.

Shall we conclude this discussion?

If you insist on keeping both analyses, then I have a few suggestions:

First of all, remove the likelihood [Possible], [Extemely Unlikely], etc. qualifiers after each point. I think you should present a fact as you see it and leave how likely a point is to the judgment of the reader. Likewise the conclusion that it’s very unlikely.

For “Joseph Made it up”:

1. Do you really need separate points for “Joseph Smith wanted to make it up” and “He did”? I’m not sure why that is considered two separate points, except to make the list a little longer.

2. The 3 and 8 witnesses of the golden plates should be treated separately. Three of them saw the plates in conjunction with an angel, and this might be described as a “spiritual or mystical” experience because of that. One of the three witnesses, David Whitmer, never returned to the LDS Church, so calling his experience a “brief relapse” is inaccurate. Martin Harris left the Church for more than 40 years, so calling that “brief” is also rather inaccurate. Even Oliver Cowdery was out of the Church for 10 years. That might be called “brief” in relation to the other two, I suppose. The 8 witnesses simply went into the woods with Joseph and watched while he produced the plates from a hollow log, and then they were allowed to examine and “heft” them. There was nothing spiritual/mystical about their experience. Possibilities for fraud there include that the witnesses simply lied or possibly that Joseph had a mock-up of the plates to show them which fooled them. You should probably break the groups into separate points to reflect the differences in their experiences and accounts.

3. Additional suggestions for “things that are true if Joseph Smith made it up” A man with a 3rd-grade education managed to create a book that convinced thousands during his lifetime that it was authentic scripture, to the point that many of them gave up everything they had and endured severe religious persecution in order to support his church. He himself was jailed on numerous occasions, tarred and feathered multiple times, and ultimately killed by an angry mob without having ever recanted his position.

If the scribes weren’t lying about the process used, then Joseph Smith managed to create a narrative with a consistent internal chronology and geography while merely dictating the work without notes, including referencing things that happened hundreds of pages earlier.

Joseph Smith successfully used authentic Hebrew literary techniques and word structure, such as “and it came to pass” and chiasmus – again with a 3rd-grade education.

The Book of Mormon’s description of Lehi’s Arabian route just happens to correspond with real places in Arabia, including the burial place “NHM”/Nahum and the fertile valley of Wadi Sayq on the coast of Oman. (continued)

"If Joseph was telling the truth" section:

1. If Joseph Smith was telling the truth, then yes it means the Christian God exists (at least, as Mormons view Him), but it doesn’t necessarily follow that everything described in the Bible really happened. The Book of Mormon references events in the Bible, but not in the manner of “God says they all happened exactly as described.”

2. There is a difference between “Ancient Jewish” and “Ancient Hebrew” or “Ancient Israelite”. Lehi’s party and his descendants were not members of the tribe of Judah – they were from the tribe of Manasseh. Therefore “Jewish” is inaccurate.

3. The references to the Book of Abraham are irrelevant on a Book of Mormon analysis page.

4. The story of Professor Anthon is that Martin Harris showed him a paper with copies of the characters from the plates with an accompanying translation and he said they were authentic and a valid translation and provided him with a certificate to that effect. Once Harris told him where he copied the characters from he ripped up the certificate and later said he had spotted a hoax immediately and refused to give any written opinion. It was not a letter from Joseph Smith, calling them fake/gibberish is out of place in the “if Joseph Smith was telling the truth” section.

(continued)

“A Book With A Context” Section:

1. The claim in the introduction of the Book of Mormon is that the Nephites and Lamanites are “among the ancestors of the American Indian”. And as discussed earlier, there is no claim that the Nephites were Jewish.

2. There is ample archaeological evidence in Meso-America of great agricultural civilizations in the time period described by the book of Mormon – the Mayan pre-classical period.

3. As discussed previously, all three witnesses of the Book of Mormon broke with Joseph Smith and left the Church, becoming “non-believers” who had seen the plates.

4. Whether the Book of Mormon reads like the text it is supposed to be is a matter of personal judgment.

5. The LDS Church does claim the book was translated with divine aid. It does not claim the resulting English text is a “perfect translation”. Nor does it claim that it is “eloquent” or “concise”.

6. The phrase “and it came to pass” appears 1,404 times in the Book of Mormon, not 1,298.

7. The Hebrew word “wayehi” – “and it came to pass” occurs in the Hebrew Bible 1,204 times, almost exclusively within the narrative books. “And it came to pass” occurs only in the narrative sections of the Book of Mormon.

8. Joseph Smith did not believe the seeing stone was “magic”, but that his ability to translate and see visions was divine in nature.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_the_Author

Thanks for your criticism. I shall have to see if there are non-Mormon sources for the claims you make. One irritating thing about being an uber-logical perfectionist dedicated to the pursuit of ultimate truth is that you have to actually 'investigate' every claim XD

-_-

; )

^_^

I think you don't give Joseph Smith enough credit. People of his place, day, and age were very used to remembering things out of necessity. The oral traditions of numerous nomadic African and Australian people are astounding in both their detail and accuracy. Indeed, I have heard say that the Old Testament is itself largely the codification of a long oral tradition.

Anyhow. Shall we wrap this up, then?

'peoples', plural -_- ^_^

With regards to sources - if your goal in writing an analysis of the Book of Mormon is the "pursuit of ultimate truth" then you really are duty-bound to check Mormon as well as non-Mormon sources. In fact, you really should read the entire book cover to cover yourself, and sincerely accept its challenge to see what result you receive.

In any case, some of the Wikipedia articles you linked to in your earlier post include the details of some of the claims I just made, such as the differences between the experiences of the three and eight witnesses, the length of time that the three left the Church, etc.

With regards to oral traditions - there is a difference between repeating the legends of your people which you have heard thousands of times yourself which include the tools of repetition and other techniques that allow them to be more easily remembered and retold, and creating a brand new narrative whole cloth while dictating to a scribe. And Joseph Smith's society was a literate one, even if not as literate as our modern society.

Hmm. Well, that's the problem. I'm used to dealing with explanations and hypotheses that can be interpreted a number of ways based on evidence - was the Tokugawa-era economy capital-rich or capital-poor, for instance, and does the absence of European-style joint-stock banks, etcetc in favour of Japanese-style institutions mean that it was necessarily inferior, blahblah.

That said, it really does look like the pre-Meiji economy was highly developed and the country was doing well for itself, though it was coming to the limits of what non-industrial agriculture could support population-wise.

But this case is a lot like that of Victor Suvorov and his 'Stalin wanted to attack Hitler in 1941/2' thesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_offensive_plans_controversy#Suvorov.2C_Icebreaker.2C_and_the_1980s). In Suvorov's case, and that of Soviet-instigated war upon Germany in general, there is some limited circumstantial evidence for (interpretation of geopolitical situation, interpretation of Stalin's character, itnerpretation of Soviet training and doctrine) and a mountain of solid evidence (General staff planning, diaries, war-production schedules) against it. Indeed, the only thesis about Soviet Offensive Plans that I heard mooted was that of a 1942 offensive - as the idea of an offensive in 1941 has been so thoroughly discredited. One shudders to consider the unfortunate implication that 22/6/1941 and the 25 million deaths it entailed was justified, but it really wasn't.

If it's any help I have excoriated a long-winded but only tangentially-related passage about how The Book Of Mormon contradicts my Latin-American-History and World Economic History lecturers and etcetc, because the way I have been personally lied to by a dozen so-called experts (if The Book is true) is neither here nor there.

My point, after so much rambling, is that The Book Of Mormon makes some incredibly important and world-changing claims and nothing can be more important than determining the veracity of the book and (if it is genuine) becoming a Mormon.

But all we have to believe it is true is some personal testimony and a very selective interpretation of The Book Of Mormon itself ('horses' = 'llamas, even though llamas can't be ridden or used in agriculture' for instance).

If that was proof enough for me then you can bet your immortal soul I would've signed up for their religion and saved myself from their 'Outer Darkness', etcetc in a heartbeat.

tldnr: The Mormon Sources are not credible, they cherry-pick evidence to try to prove hypotheses they have already formed based upon Mormon teachings.

You're quite right about the 19th Century being a time of increasing literacy (so many people forget that! it's very frustrating) - I forget just how literate, though... I vaguely recall illiteracy of US WWI-conscripts at 20%, compared to Russian illiteracy of 30%? Or perhaps it was Russian illiteracy that was at 20%, I really can't recall. Astonishingly high, anyway, for anyone who's ever worked with pre-20th-century societies!

That said, Smith's time was still largely one of oral tradition, but not just in a sacred/perfect-recall sense (newspaper-reading - aloud, to one's fellow inn-goers - was an art in contemporary London, or so I'm given to understand) but also a mundane and fun/frivolous sense. Telling stories was an art and a way of life, and sadly one that's fallen by the wayside these days (don't know about you, but I 'loved' it when our teachers used to read to us! They'd do the voices and everything XD ^_^ ...could be why I listen to audio-books so much these days).

Perhaps the problem is that you are approaching the text as an historical document, when it is in fact a religious text.

The majority of people who are convinced of its authenticity weren't convinced because of theories of loan-words or the fact that "and it came to pass" is an authentic Hebrewism. They were convinced because they accepted the challenge of the book mentioned in my analysis and had a significant personal religious experience as a result.

A personal religious experience such as this cannot be refuted by an appeal to a lack of archaeological evidence. There is literally no point in doing any sort of probability analysis for someone who has had such an experience. That is why I limited my analysis to "some say the promise worked and some say it didn't", and why I feel your analysis is generally not going to convince anyone who doesn't already feel the way you do.

By the way, the non-Mormon sources are at least equally guilty of cherry-picking. In my experience there are no truly viewpoint-neutral sources of information on the Book of Mormon or the LDS Church. All sources seem to have an agenda of some kind, either pro- or anti-. It's a controversial topic, so that's probably what one should expect.

Did you check out the LDS page on DNA studies and the Book of Mormon that I linked to earlier? I would be interested to hear your take on what they got wrong or how they "cherry picked" it.

I recommend again to write more than one analysis.

Septimus Heap -One "pro-Mormon" and one "anti-Mormon"? Multiple analyses from multiple viewpoints?

Well, since you guys are in disagreement on how to word an analysis, I would just suggest for you and the other guy to write each an analysis.

Well, we did write two.

My last group of suggestions are for places where I feel MAI 742's analysis isn't quite in line with the facts or could be changed to be less potentially offensive to the religiously-inclined. I'm not going to argue whether God exists or not, but facts like how many times "and it came to pass" appears in the Book of Mormon, the claims the LDS Church actually makes concerning the book (instead of the strawmen critics like to use), the lengths of time the 3 witnesses were out of the church and the differences in the experiences of the 3 and 8 Witnesses of the Book of Mormon are well-atested facts we should be able to come to agreement on.

If he makes changes to bring it more in line with the facts then I can live with having two analyses, though I think one (my own, of course) or no analysis at all might be better.

That's exactly what we've done, and between us we've covered all the bases - Bense has written an analysis that will appease Mormons, and I've written a no-nonsense analysis that sacrifices tact for truth.

When I say 'shall we wrap this up' and the like, that is an invitation for Bense to stop deleting and editing my analysis and just accept it as I have accepted theirs. I know that not everyone wants the truth, but people should at least respect my desire to find it.

Bense - when I have a moment I will rewrite analysis #2 to account for the policy-changes the Mormons' church has made in response to evidence that contradicts their claims.

In a casual sweep I can only find the one scholar - a Mormon himself - who felt the need to test The Mormons' claims about the Amerindian Peoples being wholly (or even partly) Jewish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_W._Murphy_%28anthropologist%29). His article on the 'limited geography' model that the Mormons have adopted in response to the overwhelming evidence that there were no Ancient Jewish American Civilisations is paritcularly interestis (i.e. claiming that only the Mayans and/or their precursors were Jews) is particularly interesting.

If we can all just pretend that I never said "is paritucularly interestis", that would be great? XD

Again: TOUCH-TYPING. -_- ^_^

I am unaware of any POLICY changes that the LDS Church has made in response to any DNA studies. The LDS Church has never had an official position on where the events of the Book of Mormon took place other than "somewhere in the Americas." The Book of Mormon introduction did receive a slight alteration recently to change "the principal ancestors of the American Indians" to "among the ancestors of the American Indians," but it is debatable whether this was because of any genetic study.

Did you read the link I posted earlier which is basically the Church's response to DNA studies? The basic position of the Church is that it does not expect that DNA studies will either confirm or deny the Book of Mormon. The reasons are:

1. The Founder Effect. We basically have no idea of what Lehi and his family's DNA should look like in the first place. We therefore have no idea what genetic traits in a Native American would point to having a Lehite ancestor. To say "we haven't found any pre-1490 Jewish genetic traits in any Native Americans" is pretty much completely irrelevant to the claims of the Book of Mormon.

2. Population Bottleneck. Not only does the Book of Mormon describe a genocidal war that eliminated the Nephites as a people, but the European conquest was devastating to the genetic diversity of the Native American peoples. Genetic traits that might have shown Lehite ancestry, if we knew what to look for, may have been lost in either event.

3. Genetic Drift. Genetic drift is the slow loss of distinctive genetic traits over generations. It is especially prominent in small, isolated communities. It is possible that Lehite genetic traits could have been lost through genetic drift.

Again, these are not "out there" theories, but pretty basic genetics. It's simply very unlikely that genetic studies will prove anything about the Book of Mormon's claims for the ancestry of the American Indian.

Mr. Murphy is only nominally a member of the LDS Church. He seems to have enjoyed parading his unbelief before the media, practically daring the Church to excommunicate him. He could hardly be considered an unbiased source of information.

The "Limited Geography" model might indeed be called a "non-traditional" reading of the Book of Mormon, in that early Church members tended to believe in what might be called the "hemispherical" model - that the Lehites were the only people in the Americas during the Book of Mormon period and that their civilization covered a good portion of the Western Hemisphere. However, the Limited Geography model is not popular among LDS scholars because of genetic studies, and it in fact pre-dates any understanding of DNA. It first appeared in the 1920s (Janne Sjodahl in the LDS publication Improvement Era). The model came about because a close reading of the text revealed that the travel times mentioned indicated a much more limited area than the hemispheric model. It became popular enough to appear in Church educational materials in the late '30s, and it has gained popularity among LDS scholars since that time simply because it seems to better fit the text. It has been generally accepted by the Church as the more correct model since at least the mid-'70s, when it appeared as the only model in teaching materials like "Ancient America Speaks", though again the Church has no official position on exactly where the events of the Book of Mormon narrative took place. There are actually several versions of the "Limited Geography" model as well - Meso-America is simply the most popular.

The Church, by the way, does not claim that the Mayans were Jews. The Mayan pre-classical civilization is approximately the right time period and possibly the right place, but the classical Mayan civilization would have been after the narrative of the Book of Mormon had concluded, making it inaccurate to claim that the Mayans were the Lehites/Nephites/Lamanites.

Exactly!

I have the greatest admiration for their leadership, frankly. It's not a stroke of genius, as such, but it was still a very wise policy to adopt!

Unfortunately, the original problem remains: they can't prove these claims which are... literally more important than anything in the history of ever. I've said it before and I'll say it again - if true then the Mormons' claims completely change absolutely everything. Nothing could possibly be more important than determining whether they're right (along with all the other groups making such claims, of course).

...but they can't prove anything.

And the conditions necessary for them to not be wrong are very, 'very' specific - as you just pointed out with the 'genetics' argument.

Question:

Did their church change its policy because they did a more comprehensive study than mine and found that (the premise of) The Book Of Mormon was genuine, or because their organisation is founded on the premise that The Book is genuine?

I can't speak for a US-religion I've never encountered, but from what I've noticed organisations tend to act in the self-interest of their leadership - sacrificing even the organisation's original purpose to that end. I usually despise philosophy because it's just so... pointless and irrelevant, but there was an incredibly insightful observation by Vaclav Havel that I saw applied to the question of Russian Nationalism and the mobilisation of 1914 and it seems awfully relevant to this question. More specifically, Mister Sanborn was addressing the question of whether or not there was any widespread belief in the existence of a Russian Nation in 1914.

"individuals need not believe in all these [ideological] mystifications, but they must behave as though they did... It is enough for them to have accepted their life with it and in it. For by this very fact, individuals confirm the system, fulfill the system, make the system, 'are' the system."

His conclusion was that it didn't really matter whether people believed there really was a nation of Imperial Russia or not, because almost everyone 'behaved' as if they did - there being no rumbles about Kazakh or Ukrainian independence, for instance. It's sort of like Nationalism in modern (mainland) China - even though the provinces are just so incredibly different from each other, there is absolutely no talk of any of them ever being independent again. So it was with Imperial Russia, and to an extent modern India.

Thanks for a such an interesting discussion, incidentally - the internet is such a wonderful tool for finding people with similar interests ^_^

While it's true that an 'organisation' cannot have a 'mind' on a matter like this, I've been taught to think of them as being composed of individuals who think one way or another (on a given position). On important matters, such as the unbelievably important and polarising claims made by their church, people are almost never undecided/ambivalent.

I mentioned this earlier. People believe in the Book of Mormon (and in the LDS Church) because of personal religious experiences, not because of some sort of archaeological proof or theory. They accept the challenge of the Book, read it, ponder it, pray about it, and receive an answer that it is true (or fail to receive an answer). The validity of the book is proved in this way to hundreds of thousands of people every year, and it is the technique most practiced by the Church's missionaries.

There has been no change in policy - the LDS Church has never attempted to fix a location for the events of the Book of Mormon narrative. The change from a hemispherical to a limited geography model is an informal one of the general membership, not something dictated by the leadership of the Church.

As to whether the leadership of the Church believes their own claims, my judgment is that yes, they do in fact believe - all the way to the top. For the general membership of the Church I find that there are certainly people who are sticking with the Church because it is their cultural heritage rather than because of their belief, but I would say that a good majority of them really do believe to one degree or another.

Ooh. I wonder if it was just a happy accident that they were kind of vague on that in official circles, or a cautious-policy thing? The Catholic and Orthodox churches definitely seem to stick to the latter... and those 'THE EARTH IS SIX THOUSAND YEARS OLD' people are looking crazier by the day... XD : / ^_^

So belief isn't based upon people analysing The Book Of Mormon's claims and determining that, yes, they are probably true... so much as them just sort of falling into it by being born in or marrying into a Mormon community, and/or not thinking their acceptance of The Book Of Mormon and its claims through and instead choosing to be overwhelmed by some sort of emotional experience? : /

Seems a bit risky to put off the quest for death by putting one's faith in that kind of thing. I mean, just think all the people that could be re-born as crippled or just plain poor people as a result... : / : (

(love how well Buddhism and Social Darwinism go together! It's a match made in Imperial Japanese Army [of the 1930s-40s] heaven ^_^ )

Probably cautious policy, but really there is no real reason for a religious organization to be making archaeological pronouncements. A Church's primary role is to provide religious answers to life's big questions, not to try to recover the ark of the covenant.

I suppose there may be some people who have been convinced to join the LDS Church by some sort of purely secular analysis of historical claims, but I would be surprised. The strongest archaeological evidence is probably the existence of NHM/Nahum and Wadi Sayq in present-day Oman, which are locations Joseph Smith couldn't possibly have known about during his lifetime. That's not much to base a life-changing decision on.

The LDS Church's own report last April (2013's report is due next week) was that there were 272,330 convert baptisms in 2012, compared to 122,273 "children of record" (children born to Church members and officially named on Church records - they aren't technically memebers until baptized at age 8). That would indicate that at present about twice as many members are making a conscious choice to join than are joining by being born into a Mormon community.

"[N]ot thinking...choosing to be overwhelmed by some sort of emotional experience?" No, that's not at all what I said. I said that people are convinced by reading the Book, pondering it (thinking about its claims, in other words), praying about it, and receiving a personal religious experience which affirms the book's validity. A personal religious experience is not quite the same thing as an emotional experience.

Is it risky? Well, if you feel you have received a personal religious experience from God telling you that the Mormon Church is correct and that you should join it, is it riskier to ignore that experience, or accept it?

...that's just what they want you to think ; )

('they' = 'ilerminarti' =_= =_= =_= )

If there was 'any' credible evidence the archaeological community would never stop talking about it.... and it'd be all over wikipedia. You have 'no idea' how excitable those guys (archies) are... they were excavating skeletons from the law school basement a couple years back XD

Then again, that's academics for you. All curiosity, no money. : /

Hmm. Don't suppose there are figures for people who've married into their ranks? The decision to make their young live - especailly the rich ones - live among poorer people would be a real winner as far as that's concerned :3

...I mean, do you know if they pressure people (inc. mormon-non-mormon pairings) to get married if they are going to have a bastard child? Can't be moral without marriage, etcetc :D

...suppose that only works for the hetero couples, though. You go, Mormon-not-sluts! Politely seducing for your cause... XD ^_^

It's what 'I' said, not you, thilly thauthaj ; )

I am still confused though. So what you were saying was...

1# People who read the text and have a spiritual-emotional experience when doing so can be convinced that the text is authentic.

2# People who try to determine whether or not the book is authentic will determine that the text is fabricated.

?

: /

if we can pretend I said 'text' instead of 'book' in statement 2#, that would be great -_- ^_^

So you're saying it must not be credible that there is an old world location called "NHM" that is a burial place exactly where the Book of Mormon narrative says there is a burial place called "Nahom" becuase if it were credible "it would be all over Wikipedia." There is an alternative: perhaps the Wikipedia community doesn't want to seem to be confirming Joseph Smith's preposterous story of being lead to golden plates by an angel, which they would be if they acknowledged that he got something right that he couldn't possibly have known about without divine help.

I would note that if the first option is your position then it rests on the idea that Wikipedia is an unbiased source of information, or that wiki authors have no personal agendas when they choose what to write about.

(Note that I mis-spelled "Nahom" in earlier entries, using the name of the Old Testament prophet Nahum rather than the spelling used for the burial place in the Book of Mormon. I apologize for not having checked my spelling.)

So MAI 742, are you going to take some time to review my suggestions above and edit your Analysis accordingly? Improving TV Tropes is the ultimate purpose of this discussion, isn't it?

I'm saying that the (normal, non-Mormon) archos are probably poring over this new discovery as we speak, and that they will tell us exactly what it is.

I'm also saying that there's no anti-Mormon conspiracy or bias among academia, wikipedia, or the world at large.

It's true that reality isn't kind to Mormon claims, which are based on no evidence and ignore a great deal of evidence that casts great doubt upon them, but no-one would accuse 'reality' of having an anti-Mormon bias

^ And yes, it's just too interesting not to share the way that even though The Book Of Mormon's claims have been discredited by research, the interpretations Mormons have subsequently given the text have resulted in Mormon claims that are more complicated (and nuanced!) but not as fanciful! :D ^_^

...while that would be a note on 'recent interpretations by readers' rather than analysis of the text itself, I'm sure they that little tidbit has a place in the 'a book with a context' section. ^_^

...buuuut I'm a little busy with a slight overhaul of World War One, so... please be patient with me? XD

Reality does not have an anti-Mormon bias, but many people certainly do, including members of adcademia, wikipedia, and the world at large. And there certainly are what could be called anti-Mormon conspiracies out there.

Of course, these people often don't even realize they are biased. For example, some people don't seem to realize they are insulting an entire religious community when they do things like call mixed-religious children "bastards", and their mothers "not-sluts...politely seducing for your cause," imply that they are all rich (a sin in today's world), and generally beleive that they are incapable of rational thought on one of the matters most important to them because they are "overwhelmed by emotion" or were just born in to this crazy religion.

Would you mind if I take a pass at editing your analysis to better match reality, since you are tied up?

Of course emotion and logic aren't mutually exclusive. People are forever using logic to justify decisions they have taken based upon their feelings! One need look no further than the nearest bakery to see this principle in action for oneself! ; ) XD

While I would agree that US citizens do seem extraordinarily dour and humourless for the most part, they do have at least a vocal minority which has produced some of the world's best contemporary avante-garde humour (such as the South Park and Colbert Report people. Amazing stuff!)

Anyhow. I wouldn't get too hung up on the 'anti-Mormon conspiracies are EVERYWHERE =_= ' thing if I were you. It's very easy to perceive everyone as conspiring against a viewpoint when that viewpoint is, well... extreme, and at best has no basis in evidence (and by usual standards would be considered thoroughly discredited by it). : / : (

Oh, would you be so kind? (i.e. 'yes please!'). I kind of don't want to stop thinking about WWI right now. Very complicated, keep feeling I'm on the verge of a breakthrough (GEDDIT? 'COS THEY'RE EXTRAORDINARILY DIFFICULT OF EXPLOIT BECAUSE OF POOR INTER-SERVICE CO-ORDINATION, LOGISTICS, AND PLANNING :D ) but, well... XD

...unless it's the Eastern Front, of course. Then counter-offensives are the problem-thing, really... : /

I hope my revision preserves your intent. I didn't say anything about anti-Mormon conspiracies EVERYWHERE, just that there really are some out there.

Oh, no! I can't have my name on something like 'that'! It's so...

Fluffy! That's the word. It takes one of the clearest-cut issues I've ever come across and makes it 'unclear'! XD

I'd hate to waste your time and effort, though, so I'll just take my name off that and replace it with your own, Glorious and Most Patriotic Comrade Bense. And I think I shall restore my own analyses - adding some notes on how the Mormons' interpretations of the text have changed over time.

That done, can we all go home now? I have never been drawn into so much conversation before on this website... XD

Re conspiracies:

Is any person who questions the authenticity of The Book, rather than simply feeling that it is true, 'anti-Mormon'?

I mean... does an 'anti-Mormon' actually have to be, well, anti-Mormon... or can people like me be 'anti-Mormon' too, just by taking their text's claims seriously and seeking to determine whether they are true or not?

I'm not surprised that you haven't had a similar conversation on this site before. Analyzing World War I or a movie is nothing like analyzing someone's religion. You are telling millions of people (or at least those that view this site) that they are ignorant or at least incorrect about one of the most important aspects of their life, whether it has long been a part of their familial identity or whether they are newly come to the LDS faith.

You have admitted to never even having met a Mormon. What then qualifies you to determine that they have no justification to believe as they do? If you feel "I must speak the truth, even if it hurts" perhaps you should recall that the Westboro Baptists feel exactly the same way. Does that justify their activites?

I renew my call for having no analysis at all, in keeping with the other religious texts on TV Tropes such as the Bible or the Koran.

Re anti-Mormon: No. Someone who questions the authenticity of the Book of Mormon is not necessarily an anti-Mormon. An anti-Mormon would be someone who actively speaks against Mormon beliefs or who works in other ways against Mormon interests. Someone who largely ignores the Mormons is not an anti-Mormon. Someone who protests in front of an LDS church building is.

I have submitted the issue of whether there should be an analysis page at all to "Ask the Tropers."

When a fact hurts someone's feelings, that doesn't make it untrue.

The only thing that qualifies anyone to ever make any claims... is analysis of evidence. Good analysis (even if ultimately flawed) always deserves respect. I love truth like nothing else.

If The Book Of Mormon was genuine, I would be screaming it from the rooftops. But it's almost certaintly not, and I'm afraid I have to say that too.

In the end, it's fascinating that this should go out of our hands.

I wonder if they will consider The Book Of Mormon to be of a similar calibre to The Yijing, The Analects, The Torah, etcetc? They will have to choose between putting it above criticism, to avoid offending hyper-emotional Mormons who might feel hurt at any kind of impartial analysis of their sacred texts....

...or they could consider the book on its own merits, on its own authenticity.

I imagine they will go for the first, because that will avoid any kind of conflict or controversy... but this is gonna be pretty interesting either way. ^_^

"When a fact hurts someone's feelings, that doesn't make it untrue." Quite right, but not especially useful when trying to persuade.

When someone considers something sacred the blunt approach is almost always unwise. If you wish to convince someone that your view is correct, a better approach is almost always to build a realtionship of trust on beliefs that you have in common, and only then approach the points on which you disagree. Tact is worth more than truth, at least to begin with, and if a person respects and trusts you (and feels that you return that respect and trust) then they are more likely to listen to your arguments.

It also nearly always pays to be open-minded and to have a humble opinion of one's own ability to analyze and detect the truth. If you use the good faith approach that someone may indeed have good reasons for believing as they do, rather than prejudging their beliefs as uninformed and/or contemptible, then a real dialogue may develop and you may come away learning something you didn't know before. And of course, it's important to use the right forum. In between articles on the Lord of the Rings and Bladerunner is not really the proper palce for a theological debate. That is the real reason that the analysis was deleted, not a desire to prevent hurt feelings.

You would be screaming it from the rooftops if it were genuine? I very much doubt you have actually read any more than tiny out-of-context excerpts of the Book of Mormon, and I am certain that you have done nothing to explore the modern LDS view of its claims. You didn't even read the link I posted above about genetic studies. You dismissed Mormon views as biased, uninformed, and contemptible without actually exploring them in any way.

How can you scream "falsehood" before you've fully examined the evidence? How can you refute arguments you haven't even read? Is that really the attitude of someone who loves truth like nothing else?

OK, I think this is getting a notch too hot a discussion. Mind cooling it down?

Especially since wiki discussion pages aren't the place for discussion except the one pertaining to the wiki article content. We have this place for discussion of religion.

That was pretty much my final word on the matter. If MAI 742 wants to discuss it further we'll find another forum.

Ooh, neat-o. I didn't even know those existed! XD

'Now' shall we declare this discussion closed? ^_^

Bense...

Bense...

I came into this discussion knowing nothing, and being painfully aware of it.

But then you helped me - you gave me your thoughts, which in turn gave my own structure and purpose. You played Devil's Advocate and we matched arguments, researched, and argued again. You taught me much.

And together, we found the truth.

I couldn't have done it without you.

So... thanks, Bense. It's been really interesting [sincerity mode!]. : ) ^_^

I actually do think there were some Israelites among the many Pre-Columbians to travel to the New World. But it unlikely the specific narrative of the Book of Mormon fits.

It's not really an appropriate topic for discussion here, where we're talking about the wiki entry. There are forums where you could discuss it on TV Tropes, however.

How so?

The plates were written by the prophet historians from Nephi all the way down to Mormon. Mormon abridged the majority of the history onto the gold plates and Moroni added a bit more (including the Book of Ether) afterwards. So Moroni only wrote the latter part of the plates.

...I'm inclined to agree with Ramenth. One wonders whether the text actually reflects the bias one would expect - given what the text says about its own origins - from 'Moroni'.

It's pretty obvious to a careful reader that Mormon's interests and biases are reflected in the text. For instance, he had roughly 1,000 years of Nephite history to cover and the vast majority of the book (from Mosiah to 3 Nephi) is only about 160 years of that history. Mormon was also a general, and a good portion of the books of Alma and Helaman describe in detail the wars fought at the time, during which the Nephite armies were lead by a general that Mormon named his own son Moroni after.

Which parts were you thinking of censoring?

Censor how, and for what 'flavour'?

Values Dissonance only applies to works of media wherein the values of the writer are different from the values of the reader due to the passing of time.

As far as the Mormons are concerned, that bit wasn't written by Mister Smith - if it was, would indeed be Values Dissonance - but by people who saw God do it. According to the text itself, and the people who believe its claims, it's not Values Dissonance.