Author: Jonathan Neville

“I’m not sure what is behind the increasing attacks upon the Prophet Joseph Smith in our current time, but one thing is for sure: it is increasing.”

He should take a look a what is going on at BYU/CES and in certain departments of the Church. That is where the most insidious attacks are taking place.

Jana Riess recently commented on her study of why Millennials leave the Church. She said that “Among Millennials, the top five answers were:
“I felt judged or misunderstood.”
[tied for first] “I did not trust the Church leadership to tell the truth surrounding controversial or historical issues.”

Anyone interested in why Millennials reach these conclusions should also look at what is going on at BYU/CES and in certain departments of the Church.

When students at BYU/CES are taught that the prophets and apostles are wrong about such a fundamental, straightforward issue as the New York Cumorah, how could they not reach the conclusion that Riess has identified? Especially when the intellectuals at BYU/CES are actively suppressing what the prophets and apostles have taught?

It is anything but a winning strategy to expect Millennials (or investigators, or anyone else for that matter) to remain ignorant of what Church leaders have so consistently and explicitly taught as the fact that the Hill Cumorah is in New York.

On top of that, thanks to the Church History Department, visitors to the Hill Cumorah today are never informed about the truth, leaving them confused and even bewildered about what to believe.
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Some have proposed a new twist. This is the idea that maybe the prophets and apostles were merely speaking according to their best understanding, but now the BYU/CES intellectuals have discovered the truth so we no longer care what the prophets and apostles have said in the past.

IOW, the prophets and apostles were wrong, even when they declared this was a fact and they bore testimony of it in General Conference, but it doesn’t matter because as long as we accept what the intellectuals approve of today, we are not expected to believe what the prophets and apostles have taught in the past.

Think about the implications of that one for a moment.

The absurdity of all this is that there is more physical evidence to support the prophets and apostles than there is to reject them.

Unless you are obsessed with confirming your bias about M2C.
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BYU/CES intellectuals explain Letter VII to their students

This cartoon frames the issue in terms of cognitive dissonance, but it could also have framed it in terms of bias confirmation.

This problem is even more serious than I realized when I started working on this issue a few years ago. I greatly underestimated the amount of bias confirmation I would encounter among intellectuals at BYU/CES and in Church departments.

There is definitely a lot of bias confirmation going on in the world. It’s a major cause of disagreements ranging from interpersonal arguments to international conflicts. But I can’t think of an application where it is more powerful than in the M2C context.

(M2C is the acronym for the Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs theory.)

Bias confirmation is so psychologically powerful that it drives faithful LDS scholars to promote M2C by rejecting the prophets and apostles, even while they are teaching their students to follow the prophets and apostles.

I frequently hear from readers, including students at BYU, who are observing this behavior on the part of the faculty. The intellectuals’ rejection of the prophets and apostles is manifest in the fantasy map being taught at BYU campuses and Institute classes throughout the Church, as well as in sundry Church exhibits and media.
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It is no surprise that what is taught in schools and universities is eventually accepted by society. It is no different in the Church. Children taught from Primary through BYU that the Hill Cumorah is in Mexico will accept it, especially when they are never taught what the prophets and apostles have taught about the New York Cumorah. In this sense, the M2C intellectuals have been highly successful in their efforts.

In fact, now their own students teach at BYU/CES and have become so bound by their M2C bias confirmation that they are psychologically incapable of even considering the possibility that the prophets and apostles are correct about the New York Cumorah. They reject the idea out of hand.

This reality surprises many older LDS who grew up when the New York Cumorah was taught by the prophets and apostles in General Conference. After all, the BYU/CES teachers are trusted with tremendous responsibility for teaching the rising generation in the Church. How could they so blatantly and even proudly teach the youth that the prophets and apostles are wrong?

Their delight in teaching M2C may be a front to hide their cognitive dissonance. It’s obvious they are uncomfortable with what they are doing. Their preferred technique is to keep their students ignorant of what the prophets and apostles have taught so they never have to face tough questions from students. They never include Letter VII in their materials or presentations.

The staff in the Church History Department colludes with their former professors to keep Letter VII as hidden as possible. They don’t want people to know about it, and they have been successful; most members of the Church (especially the younger ones) have never learned what President Cowdery had to say about the New York Cumorah. Church M2C staffers not only don’t want members to know that so many prophets and apostles affirmed what President Cowdery taught; they don’t even want people to know why they taught this.

Fortunately for truth-seekers, Joseph had his scribes copy President Cowdery’s letters into his own history as part of his life story. They can’t be completely suppressed. Today, anyone can read them in the Joseph Smith Papers. Letter VII is here, for example.

But look at the Editorial Note in Joseph Smith, History, 1834-1836, and see how carefully the editors avoided informing readers what the letters had to say about Cumorah and how ubiquitous these letters were when Joseph was alive. You would never know from these notes that Joseph encouraged the republication of these letters in the Times and Seasons, the Gospel Reflector, the Prophet, and the Millennial Star. You would never know that Joseph F. Smith republished them again in Utah in the Improvement Era.

Even the staff in the Missionary Department is in on this. They removed Articles of Faith and A Marvelous Work and a Wonder from the list of approved reading materials for missionaries. Both of those books specifically identified the “hill in New York” as the one Cumorah of the Book of Mormon. The department changed the artwork in the missionary edition of the Book of Mormon from teaching the one New York Cumorah to teaching the M2C theory. They created exhibits in the Visitors Centers to teach M2C (Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs). And they put up M2C graphics in the MTC and named buildings after early Church leaders and missionaries, but they don’t tell the missionaries that these apostles taught the New York Cumorah.

This deliberate effort to suppress the New York Cumorah is even more widespread among Church staffers. For example, I’ve shown how the Curriculum Committee edited the Wentworth Letter to omit an important paragraph that Joseph Smith wrote. This, despite Joseph having introduced the letter by writing to the intended publisher “all that I shall ask at his hands is that he publish the account entire, ungarnished, and without misrepresentation.”

Joseph didn’t need to worry about Mr. Barstow; he needed to worry about the Curriculum Committee.

Here’s what I wrote in the previous post about

“the well known suppression of an important part of the Wentworth letter in Chapter 38 of the manual, Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith.

If you want to read the entire letter, you can see it on lds.org at this link: https://www.lds.org/ensign/2002/07/the-wentworth-letter?lang=eng

[Note: that was published in 2002, before M2C completely took over.]

But you can’t read the entire letter in the lesson manual because the following passage was omitted:

Lesson manual (note the ellipses):

“Through the medium of the Urim and Thummim I translated the record by the gift and power of God.… This book … tells us that our Savior made His appearance upon this continent after His resurrection;”

Original letter (with the omitted portions in red): 

“Through the medium of the Urim and Thummim I translated the record by the gift and power of God.

“In this important and interesting book the history of ancient America is unfolded, from its first settlement by a colony that came from the Tower of Babel at the confusion of languages to the beginning of the fifth century of the Christian era. We are informed by these records that America in ancient times has been inhabited by two distinct races of people. The first were called Jaredites and came directly from the Tower of Babel. The second race came directly from the city of Jerusalem about six hundred years before Christ. They were principally Israelites of the descendants of Joseph. The Jaredites were destroyed about the time that the Israelites came from Jerusalem, who succeeded them in the inheritance of the country. The principal nation of the second race fell in battle towards the close of the fourth century. The remnant are the Indians that now inhabit this country. This book also tells us that our Savior made His appearance upon this continent after His Resurrection;”
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It’s bad enough that they deleted the important passage in red, but they even deleted the “also” so readers would have no idea that the Book told us something else important.

[Note: this lesson manual has been translated into many languages and is the main source of Joseph Smith’s teachings today. Consequently, millions of members of the Church are being deliberately misled about the Prophet’s teachings and will never realize it–especially future generations.]
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I could cite more examples of how M2C has infiltrated the Church, but let’s instead consider how Oliver and Joseph might have responded to this change in the Church’s course.

One reason why I think President Cowdery’s eight historical letters should be part of the BYU/CES curriculum (as well as the Gospel Doctrine curriculum) is because they address problems that Joseph Smith faced that remain issues today.

Here’s an example.

In Letter II, President Cowdery wrote:

“I cannot reasonably expect, then, that the large majority of professors will be willing to listen to my argument for a moment, as a careful, impartial, and faithful investigation of the doctrines which I believe to be correct, and the principles cherished in my bosom and believed by this church, by every honest man, must be admitted as truth.”

The syntax is a little awkward perhaps, but he is saying that most professors would not listen to his arguments because if they did so with an open mind, they would have to admit they were true.

This is what bias confirmation does to one’s mind.

For those who have never studied bias confirmation, there’s a nice overview on wikipedia, here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

This excerpt explains it pretty well.

“Some psychologists restrict the term confirmation bias to selective collection of evidence that supports what one already believes while ignoring or rejecting evidence that supports a different conclusion. Others apply the term more broadly to the tendency to preserve one’s existing beliefs when searching for evidence, interpreting it, or recalling it from memory.”

The other day I discussed the article in BYU Studies about animals in Mesoamerica. Yesterday I discussed the Meridian Magazine article about the LiDAR images from Mesoamerica.

If you look at the underlying sources–the non-LDS studies cited in the Animals article and the LiDAR data–you will see a distinct contrast in approach to the bias-confirming articles in BYU Studies and Meridian Magazine. The sources convey data; the articles transform the data into bias confirmation.

Last week, researchers announced a major discovery about Mayan civilization based on LiDAR scanning of jungles in Central America. This discovery will probably confirm your bias no matter what you believe; i.e., it will support your position whether: 

1. You accept the New York Cumorah as taught in President Cowdery’s Letter VII and reaffirmed by the prophets and apostles, which I refer to as Moroni’s America (MA);

2. You accept the Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs (M2C) theory taught by BYU/CES intellectuals, which repudiates Letter VII and the prophets and apostles.

Another way to say this:

M2C seeks to repudiate Letter VII and the prophets and apostles.

MA seeks to support Letter VII and the prophets and apostles.

You decide which bias you share and then interpret the scriptures accordingly.

I’ll have lots more to say about bias confirmation in upcoming posts because it fascinates me that two groups can derive such dramatically different expectations from the same text.

Because this news about the Mayans is so fresh, let’s start by looking at the discovery. Then we’ll look at how the scriptures are interpreted to confirm the respective biases.
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Here’s one report, along with an image from the article:

https://phys.org/news/2018-02-laser-technology-reveals-secrets-ancient.html

A comparison of LiDAR data showing the ancient Maya site of El Zotz covered in trees (left), and with the trees digitally removed. Credit: Ithaca College

The image on the left shows what the area looks like with tree coverage. On the right, the trees are removed, showing a complex of buildings and roads that are not visible naturally.

The new data revealed a much more extensive, sophisticated, and densely-populated civilization than was previously known or estimated.

One of the researchers, Thomas Garrison, will appear in a documentary on the National Geographic channel tomorrow (Feb 6). The article notes this: “Especially telling to Garrison are newly revealed agricultural features that would be necessary to support the lowland Maya population during their centuries of civilization—population estimates have now expanded from a few million to 10-20 million—and defensive structures that suggest warfare was far more prevalent than previously known.”

National Geographic has more photos here: https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/02/maya-laser-lidar-guatemala-pacunam/
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Next, let’s look at the respective biases.

As an MA supporter, my bias is this: 
I accept the New York Cumorah as taught by Letter VII and the prophets and apostles. I interpret the text and relevant scientific and historical evidence in a manner that corroborates and confirms my bias.

M2C supporters (those affiliated with BYU Studies, BookofMormonCentral, FairMormon, the Interpreter, Meridian Magazine, BMAF, etc.) have a bias expressed candidly by BMAF: 
“to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient Mesoamerican codex.” They interpret the text and relevant scientific and historical evidence in a manner that corroborates and confirms their bias.

After I started writing this post, Meridian Magazine posted an article about this finding titled “How an Incredible New Archaeological Discovery Corroborates the Book of Mormon.” Now I don’t have to infer what M2C intellectuals would think about this discovery: I can use their actual words. You can see why I’ve referred to this source as Meridian Mesoamerican Magazine. They will never, ever tell their readers about President Cowdery’s Letter VII because their owners don’t want their readers to know what the prophets and apostles have taught. I consider this deceitful, of course, and you can decide for yourself whether you agree, but I don’t blame them for seeking to confirm their biases because everyone does it–even when, in this case, they are trying to persuade members of the Church to disbelieve the prophets and apostles.

You can see the bias confirmation in the very title of this article!
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There is nothing inherently right or wrong about bias. Everyone has biases. It’s a question of whether we honestly recognize our own and those of others, and then recognize that we interpret the world (and the scriptures) to confirm our biases.

Once we recognize the biases of the various players, the rest is easy.

Here’s an example. My first job out of law school was as a law clerk to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New Mexico. After oral argument on a case, the Justices would vote on the outcome they wanted. Whichever outcome the majority voted for became the Court’s position, and the Justices assigned us, as the law clerks, to write the opinions accordingly.

Any of us law clerks could have written the opinion to reach whichever conclusion the Justices wanted. In close cases, it’s not a question of what the law is, but rather what the Justices want it to be. Then we write the opinion to make it look like the desired outcome was obvious all along. You always want the Court’s opinion frame the issue as a pursuit of the “correct law,” but everyone knows these opinions are anything but that. They are always a reflection of the personal philosophies of the judges. That’s why it makes such a big difference whether a conservative or a liberal is appointed to a court.

The reason lawyers charge clients so much money is not because they know what the law is, but because they know how to use the law to get what the clients want. 

BYU map designed to teach students that the apostles and prophets are wrong about the New York Cumorah

It’s really no different in scholarly work. The idea that one side or the other is pursuing “the truth” is a ruse. Everyone is seeking purely to confirm his/her biases. When you look at the fantasy map currently being taught at BYU, for example, it has nothing to do with seeking the truth, and everything to do with teaching the students that the prophets and apostles are wrong about the New York Cumorah. Otherwise, the BYU map would show Cumorah in New York.

The same thing is going on in the Church History department, btw, which I’ll be demonstrating in upcoming posts. The scholars there are colluding with the M2C proponents to portray Joseph Smith as a confused speculator who was wrong about the New York Cumorah.

This is why the semantic arguments about interpreting the Book of Mormon are pointless. LDS literature on this topic is full of subjective interpretations about such topics as what constitutes a “narrow neck,” and whether that is different from a “narrow neck of land.” You will agree or disagree with a particular interpretation depending on whether you agree or disagree with the bias of the person proposing that interpretation.

Actually, this is why the M2C proponents oppose Letter VII so vehemently. You can’t mistake President Cowdery’s meaning when he states it is a fact that the final battles of the Jaredites and Nephites took place in the mile-wide valley west of Cumorah. There’s no wiggle room there.

To reiterate this again:

MA proponents seek interpretations of the text and relevant science, history, etc. that corroborate Letter VII and the prophets and apostles because they want to demonstrate their teachings are correct.

M2C proponents seek interpretations of the text and relevant science, history, etc. that refute Letter VII and the prophets and apostles because they want to demonstrate their teachings are false.

Everything you read about this topic reflects these respective biases.

Meridian Magazine has an agenda of teaching members of the Church that the prophets and apostles are wrong about Cumorah, so they published this article to reinforce that agenda.

My agenda is to teach members of the Church that the prophets and apostles are correct about Cumorah, so I publish this blog to reinforce that agenda.

This is all very basic, but it is usually overlooked.

Now, let’s look at how the new data about the Mayans confirms these respective biases.
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MA position. If you believe in the New York Cumorah, you will likely view this LiDAR discovery as additional evidence that the Nephites could not possibly have lived among the Mayans.

I think the text shows Lehi’s colony landing in the promised land, planting their own seeds, finding animals and ore in the wilderness, all while completely unimpeded by any existing civilization. (1 Ne. 18:23-5). I think Lehi’s observation that “this land should be kept as yet from the knowledge of other nations” was accurate; i.e., that there were no “other nations” in the promised land where they landed, “for behold, many nations would overrun the land, that there would be no place for an inheritance” (2 Nephi 1:8). I do think think there were some indigenous people who went with Nephi when he fled (2 Nephi 5:6), but I infer they were unorganized hunter/gatherers that did not qualify as any sort of “nation” and were impressed by the Jewish immigrants’ technology, language, etc.

In my view, it is difficult enough to believe that Lehi’s family, a relative handful of immigrants from a distant culture speaking a different language, could have arrived and started planting crops on unclaimed land in Mesoamerica, encountering no resistance, but it is even more difficult to believe Lehi’s descendants could have managed to rule as kings and chief judges over even a part of a Mayan civilization, and that in the midst of this Mayan civilization, King Mosiah could have escaped with the Nephites into the wilderness and found a much larger group of illiterate people (the people of Zarahemla) who possessed exactly one engraven stone.

Now that we are learning from LiDAR that the Mayan civilization was even larger, more densely populated, and more sophisticated than we previously realized, the Book of Mormon seems even less plausible in that setting. IOW, the grander the Mayan civilization, the less likely it is that Lehi landed anywhere near that civilization.

This view is based on the text and has nothing directly to do with the New York Cumorah, but it does confirm my bias in favor of the New York Cumorah.
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M2C position. If you believe the M2C position that Cumorah is not in New York and that the entire Book of Mormon took place in Mesoamerica, you will likely view this LiDAR discovery as additional evidence that the Nephites must have lived among the Mayans.

The basic M2C concept is described in the Meridian Magazine article. It is the idea that the Nephites were absorbed into Mayan culture. That’s why there is no Israelite DNA in Central America, no traces of Nephite languages or the law of Moses or Christian beliefs and practices, etc. M2C proponents believe there were bottlenecks (both DNA-related and cultural) that screened out Nephite cultural influence.

The M2C proponents think the verses I quoted above describe an arrival in Mayan territory and complete absorption into that culture. They think the text describes a massive, sophisticated society of millions of people, so they interpret the new LiDAR discovery to confirm their bias.

Let’s look at some of the verses cited in the Meridian Magazine article to demonstrate how the respective interpretation confirm the respective biases.
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M2C proponents generally believe the Nephites lived among a much larger culture (i.e., Mayan culture in Mesoamerica). The Meridian article cites Mormon 1:7 as evidence of a huge Nephite population, possibly in the millions, with intensive agriculture, etc.

6 And it came to pass that I, being eleven years old, was carried by my father into the land southward, even to the land of Zarahemla.

7 The whole face of the land had become covered with buildings, and the people were as numerous almost, as it were the sand of the sea.

If you look at the published LiDAR images, and you want to confirm your M2C bias of a large, dense civilization, you will eagerly conclude that (i) Mayan buildings literally “covered” the land, and (ii) Mormon somehow knew this without the benefit of satellite images.

But if you’re not seeking to confirm your M2C bias, you look at the selected LiDAR images and notice they do not show the land to be “covered with buildings.” There are more structures than archaeologists realized, for sure, but most of the terrain remains uninhabited, just like in the much more heavily populated modern world. 

The National Geographic article points out that “The results suggest that Central America supported an advanced civilization that was, at its peak some 1,200 years ago, more comparable to sophisticated cultures such as ancient Greece or China than to the scattered and sparsely populated city states that ground-based research had long suggested.”

No ancient civilizations in Greece, China, Mesoamerica, or anywhere else, covered the land with buildings. The LiDAR articles themselves don’t make any such claim. Instead, they note that “Complex irrigation and terracing systems supported intensive agriculture capable of feeding masses of workers who dramatically reshaped the landscape.”

LiDAR shows us that the “face of the land” was mainly covered with agricultural activities and wilderness, with some areas containing a concentration of buildings, just as the land today is throughout the world, even in densely populated countries such as Taiwan, South Korea, Lebanon, and Israel.

Only a bias-confirming M2C proponent would delude himself/herself into thinking that these LiDAR images show “the whole face of the land covered with buildings.”

Am I saying Mormon was wrong?

Not at all.

Let’s look at the scripture. He says he was 11 years old when his father took him on this trip. Why would he say the face of the land was “covered with buildings,” when such a description, if taken literally, is impossible as we just saw.

1. First, we have to consider this from the perspective of an 11-year-old boy.
2. Second, we have to consider what someone on the ground would see, without the benefit of satellite images.
3. Third, we have to consider what the term “building” means.

I’ve addressed all of this before in my book, Moroni’s America, but I’ll quickly summarize it here.

1. The perception of an 11-year-old differs from the perception of an adult. Think of Mormon as a Cub Scout. He wasn’t even old enough to be a Deacon. How would a Cub Scout perceive the world? To children, everything looks bigger. Who hasn’t revisited a childhood home and been surprised at how small it was compared with what you remembered?

Tikal viewed from the air

2. Without the benefit of satellite or aerial imagery, how would ancient people know what “the face of the land” was like? If you’ve climbed to the top of the Mayan ruins in Yucatan as I have, you know you can look over the relatively flat terrain and see the peaks of other ruins, many of them still covered with jungle. Let’s assume that in Mormon’s day the jungle was cut back so you could see the structures clearly.

What would Mormon see from the top of one of these temples?

He would see mostly agricultural land, just as the LiDAR images show.

The Meridian Magazine article, paradoxically, recognizes the inconsistency of its own argument. Look at these two applications of Mormon 1:7:

“Maya lowland population at apogee could have reached 15 million Mormon 1:7” (we can all see that Mormon 1:7 gives no population numbers).

“land use was intensive – nearing 100% utilization is some areas Mormon 1:7” (we can all read that Mormon 1:7 describes buildings covering the whole face of the earth, not “intensive land use”).

Besides reading into the text the M2C bias, these two claims are inconsistent. Which is it? “The whole face of the earth is covered with buildings” (Mormon’s description)” or “intensive land use in some areas” for agriculture (Meridian Magazine’s M2C description)? Do you see how bias confirmation can lead to absurd interpretations of the text?
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So what could Mormon have meant in these verses?

He could only have reported what he saw (or was told). I think this means that on his way to Zarahemla, he traveled in heavily populated areas.

I think everyone can agree that he did not have an aerial view.

So let’s think. How would an 11-year-old boy taking what was essentially a long field trip travel through a heavily populated area that was “covered with buildings” with so many people that it seemed to him like “the people were as numerous almost, as it were the sand of the sea?”

One thing is for sure; Mormon either did not describe his experience accurately, or he could not have been traveling through the areas captured in these LiDAR images, because most of the land he would have traveled through was agricultural or wilderness.

National Geographic is going to show the most spectacular LiDAR images of stone structures, including temples and roads. They will show indicia of irrigation, including canals, dykes and reservoirs (none of which are mentioned in the text, btw). But by far, most of the land even in this “densely populated” ancient Mayan world captured by LiDAR is not covered by buildings.

Again, I’m not saying Mormon reported his observations inaccurately. I’m saying just the opposite.

Distribution of mounds and earthworks in the eastern United States. Red dots indicate relative occurrence and comparative distribution rather than individual major remains.

I think Mormon was traveling along the Allegheny and Ohio rivers on his way to the land of Zarahemla (Illinois and Iowa). In ancient North America, people lived along these rivers.

This map shows how the ancient moundbuilders in North America located mostly along rivers. This makes sense; rivers provided water, fish, and other wildlife. They were transportation corridors. They also served as boundaries between competing groups.

If, as I have proposed, Mormon was traveling along these rivers, he would have seen little more than buildings and people. (One non-LDS experts reports there were over a million mounds in ancient North America.)

Had Mormon instead been walking through Mesoamerica, he would have seen mostly agricultural and wilderness areas, occasionally interspersed with the Mayan structures.

From my perspective, confirming my bias in favor of Letter VII and the New York Cumorah, young Mormon was describing a long-distance journey through a heavily populated area where the “face of the land” (as opposed to the rivers he was on) appeared to be “covered with buildings” along with lots and lots of people.

From my perspective, a person traveling through the lands depicted in the Mayan LiDAR photos would never have described the land as “covered with buildings” because most of it was agricultural and wilderness.

3. What does the term “building” mean in the first place?

First, we have to recognize that not a verse in the Book of Mormon says any “buildings” were made of stone. We are told they were made of wood and, for one brief period in one location, of wood and cement (Helaman 3). But the only stone buildings in the text are in the imagination of the reader. 

If you want to confirm an M2C bias, then you can read “stone” into the text wherever you want. People who share your bias will undoubtedly agree with you.

But because I don’t share the M2C bias, I don’t see any stone buildings.

However, I do see “their shipping and building of ships,” which Mormon didn’t take the time to describe in detail but was just as much a part of Nephite society as “their building of temples, and of synagogues and their sanctuaries” (Helaman 3:14). I take this to mean they lived along rivers.

So what could Mormon have meant by “buildings” in verse 7?

In my presentation at the 2017 Mormon History Association in St. Louis (you can read it here), I pointed out that Dr. Roger Kennedy, the former director of the Smithsonian’s American History Museum, addressed a misperception about earth mounds, noting that earth mounds are actually buildings. “Build and building are also very old words, often used in this text [his book] as they were when the English language was being invented, to denote earthen structures. About 1150, when the word build was first employed in English, it referred to the construction of an earthen grave. 350 years later, an early use of the term to build up was the description of the process by which King Priam of Troy constructed a “big down to bare earth.” So when we refer to the earthworks of the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys as buildings no one should be surprised.”

Even today when you drive along the Ohio River you see lots of ancient mounds that have been preserved. I’ve taken photos of many of these. By far, most have been destroyed and replaced by modern roads and structures. But as the map above shows, in ancient times if you traveled along these rivers, there were mound cities and defensive positions along the banks.

Most of the modern depictions of the moundbuilder sites illustrate Mississippian or later culture because these were built over earlier settlements that dated to Book of Mormon times, but they give a rough idea of what Mormon would have seen during his field trip.

This painting shows young Mormon on his way to Zarahemla.

A Cub Scout seeing this would definitely conclude that the “whole face of the land” was “covered with buildings.”

Nevertheless, if your bias is that Letter VII and the prophets and apostles are wrong, then you cannot accept my interpretation of the text because it would contradict your bias. It would generate cognitive dissonance you seek to avoid.

Instead, you must persuade yourself that traveling through agricultural and wilderness land, by foot, occasionally passing through areas of dense human habitation, would lead you to write that the “whole face of the land had become covered with buildings, and the people were as numerous almost, as it were the sand of the sea.”
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You can also pretend that you don’t have a bias; i.e., you don’t have an opinion on whether or not Letter VII and the prophets and apostles are correct. You just want to look at the “facts” and decide.

If so, I’m interested in an explanation of how these Mayan LiDAR images show anything like the “whole face of the land covered with buildings.”
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There’s one more aspect of this passage we should examine.

The M2C proponents claim the Book of Mormon describes a Nephite civilization numbering in the millions (or at least in the midst of millions of Mayans). The LiDAR discoveries have increased population estimates to as high as 15 million, which confirms the M2C bias.

The MA bias sees it differently. I read the text as describing a Nephite civilization of tens of thousands, not millions, of people. (I’m not discussing the Jaredites here.) Because of my bias, when I read LiDAR discoveries that there were many millions more Mayan than previously believed, that takes the Mayan civilization even further away from the descriptions in the text.

I keep reading in Mormon 1. During the same year as Mormon’s field trip, he says there began to be a war (verse 8).

8 And it came to pass in this year there began to be a war between the Nephites, who consisted of the Nephites and the Jacobites and the Josephites and the Zoramites; and this war was between the Nephites, and the Lamanites and the Lemuelites and the Ishmaelites.

9 Now the Lamanites and the Lemuelites and the Ishmaelites were called Lamanites, and the two parties were Nephites and Lamanites.

10 And it came to pass that the war began to be among them in the borders of Zarahemla, by the waters of Sidon.

Sounds like a lot of people involved, doesn’t it? Seven separate groups, allied into two camps: the Nephites and the Lamanites.

In fact, Mormon says “the Nephites had gathered together a great number of men” for this war. They had a number of battles during which the Nephite “did slay many of” the Lamanites.

Now, how many men did Mormon consider to be a “great number?”

30,000.

Well, “even to exceed the number of thirty thousand.”

Look at how that is phrased. Mormon seeks to impress the reader with the size of this Nephite army by calling it “a great number of men, even to exceed the number of thirty thousand.”

As if the reader can hardly imagine a number as great as 30,000.

In the context of a civilization of 15 million people, how would this be at all impressive?

Do you see why, in my interpretation of the text, a Nephite civilization in the midst of 15 million people makes no sense?

Later, Mormon tells us that after he gathered in his people “together in one body” he was able to recruit an army of 42,000. (Mormon 2:7-9). That’s even more impressive than the 30,000, but still insignificant in the midst of 15 million people.

For these and similar reasons, the larger the Mayan civilization turns out to be, the less likely it has anything to do with the Book of Mormon.
_____

So far, I’ve only addressed Mormon 1:7 to show how confirmation bias drives one’s interpretation of the text. I could do the same with the rest of the Meridian Magazine article.

I freely admit my bias: I seek to corroborate and support President Cowdery’s Letter VII and the prophets and apostles who have consistently affirmed it.

M2C proponents also freely admit their bias: they seek “to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient Mesoamerican codex,” which requires them to refute and reject President Cowdery’s Letter VII and the prophets and apostles who have consistently affirmed it.

In my view, the intellectuals who push M2C don’t really care what the text actually says, so long as they can construe it–or make stuff up–up to confirm their biases.

They are so obsessed with proving the prophets and apostles wrong that they resort to strained interpretations of the text and seeing terms and concepts that don’t appear in the text anywhere. That’s how they come up with the 3 Js (Jaguars, Jungles and Jade) and the three Ms (Mayans, Mountains and Massive stone temples) that are characteristic of Mesoamerica but not the Book of Mormon. (Not to mention volcanoes…).
_____

Every time you read Meridian Magazine (or BYU Studies, or anything produced by any other members of the citation cartel), you need to recognize that the authors are confirming their biases.

If you share their biases, then you will probably accept what they write, no problem.

If you don’t share their biases, you will see right through their rhetoric.

Confirmation bias looks exactly like a mountain of evidence.

The sentence is a quotation from an article published the other day by the Wall St. Journal. The author, Scott Adams, focused on a political topic, but the principle applies to Book of Mormon studies.

Here is the relevant quotation:

Confirmation bias looks exactly like a mountain of evidence. ILLUSTRATION: SCOTT ADAMS

Whatever your political views, the point Adams makes is that what we often consider to be evidence is really an illusion. It’s nothing but pure bias confirmation.

We all do it. The question for us is whether we realize it, and whether we own our biases.

Look at what’s going on in Book of Mormon studies.

There are two basic positions on geography. One position is that the Hill Cumorah is in New York. The other is that the Hill Cumorah is somewhere other than in New York.

For decades, I went along with the LDS intellectuals who taught me at BYU and whose work seemed fact-based, rational, and faithful. In the last few years, I’ve come to realize their work is none of those.

What made the difference?

I began to recognize which bias they were confirming. And it was a bias I didn’t share.

For all those years, I either didn’t know or didn’t understand the academic bias that exalts formal education and training over the voices of the prophets. It was always kind of “cool” at BYU to learn from faithful professors who had a more sophisticated, nuanced view than the simplistic “Sunday School versions” of Church history and Book of Mormon topics.

But now I see that academic arrogance is poisonous.

I’m not painting with a broad brush here. In my experience, most BYU/CES teachers are awesome people, humble and cognizant that their own intellect and training cannot supersede prophetic direction.

But there are more than a few who have persuaded themselves that the prophets are wrong about some things. Sadly, they have persuaded their students of the same thing.

Specifically, I’m referring to the New York Cumorah.

The advocates of M2C (Mesoamerica/two-Cumorahs) have persuaded themselves that the best fit for the text is Mesoamerica. But as I’ve pointed out, it is their interpretation of the text they are relying on. I pointed out examples of this in the BYU Studies article on animals, but the problems involves more than just animal species.

I’ve pointed out that the corporate mission of Book of Mormon Central (and by extension, the entire citation cartel) is “to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient Mesoamerican codex.” This is the bias they seek to confirm in everything they do. That’s how BYU Studies ends up publishing a paper like the one I reviewed yesterday.

To the M2C intellectuals, there really is a mountain of evidence. It is such a huge mountain that they feel justified in rejecting the words of the prophets about Cumorah. They’ve rationalized teaching students at BYU/CES that the prophets and apostles are wrong about Cumorah because they “can’t unsee Mesoamerica” when they read the text.

Take a book such as Mormon’s Codex, the book which Terryl Givens praised so highly in the Foreword. Once you denude the premise of a Mesoamerican bias, the entire manuscript becomes an exercise in absurdity.

Once we shift our bias, we find there are mountains of evidence to support our new bias. I speak from personal experience when I say that when our first bias is to believe the prophets and apostles, we will find abundant evidence to support and corroborate them.

We each have our own biases, many of which are subconscious. Think about the bias you possess regarding Book of Mormon geography and historicity.

Do you have a bias for or against accepting the teachings of the prophets and apostles?

If you’re biased for them, you accept the New York Cumorah and go from there.

If you’re biased against them, you reject the New York Cumorah and go from there.

That’s really all this debate about Book of Mormon geography boils down to.

Volume 56:4 (2017)

As usual, it’s full M2C (Mesoamerica/two Cumorahs).

Sadly, when it comes to Book of Mormon studies, BYU Studies has deteriorated into little more than a dressing up of the corporate mission and mandate at Book of Mormon Central “to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient American codex.”

This issue includes an article titled “Animals in the Book of Mormon” that features many of the problems I’ve documented on this blog. Here’s my conclusion after reading this article:

If, hypothetically, the prophets and apostles had taught that Cumorah was in southern Mexico, then the strained combinations of bias confirmation, argument, and textual interpretation that the M2C intellectuals rely upon might be excusable in an effort to vindicate the prophets.

But when these same strained combinations of bias confirmation, argument and textual interpretation are being used to repudiate the prophets, the effort is not only futile but destructive. 

I call upon BYU Studies and the rest of the citation cartel to change course and direct their efforts toward supporting and sustaining what the prophets and apostles have taught about Cumorah in New York instead of continuing to assert their intellect and training as the primary source of authority regarding the Book of Mormon.
_____

Some readers have asked me to do more of the articles in which I conduct a “peer review” of articles such as this. I did some of those early in this blog as well as on my other blog,
http://interpreterpeerreviews.blogspot.com/ 

If I wasn’t so busy with things other than these topics, I’d like to do more of those peer reviews.

In fact, I’ve offered to do confidential pre-publication peer reviews for the citation cartel, but not surprisingly they’ve rejected my offer.

This article is a good example of how a serious peer review would have helped. But, as we know from long experience, the M2C citation cartel is interested in peer approval, not peer review. They are desperate to keep their M2C “consensus” alive, even as it is becoming less convincing every day.

(I have a post on bias confirmation scheduled for tomorrow that explains this M2C consensus.)
_____

If you have the print edition of BYU Studies, the article starts on page 133. If you have a subscription, you can download the issue here: https://byustudies.byu.edu/content/volume-564-2017. If you don’t subscribe, maybe you can find the issue at a library.

Here I’ll comment on one section in particular, plus the overall logic and conclusions. Key to this discussion is the distinction between North America and Mesoamerica. As used here, the two areas are mutually exclusive. They correspond to the New York Cumorah and the Mexican Cumorah, respectively.
_____

Overall, this is a helpful article. It addresses the arguments by critics of the Book of Mormon who claim animals mentioned in the text did not live in America concurrently with the Nephites and Jaredites. The authors have collected some useful sources and make good points about the difficulty of identifying which animals went extinct when.

They conclude that “fossils of horses, elephants, mastodons, and other animals that may relate to the Book of Mormon have been uncovered in Mesoamerica and may date to the time period covered in that. We conclude that once all the facts are known, the scientific record will not conflict with the scriptural one.” (page 175)

Well, there’s the M2C giveaway. The article is not as helpful as we would have hoped because the authors focus on Mesoamerica. This is a purely M2C article, as we have come to expect from BYU Studies. As with everything published by the citation cartel, we have to read carefully to see what is dogmatic M2C rhetoric and what is thoughtful and useful for actual Book of Mormon studies.
_____

Before delving into the substance, here’s an example of the kind of thing a serious peer review would have corrected. On page 141, I read this sentence and said to myself, “not true.”

Only a minuscule number of animals that have lived on earth have become fossilized or preserved. 

I thought, “surely they meant to say a minuscule percentage of animals.” Sure enough, when I reached page 144, I read this:

Most ancient animals and plants are known only through their fossils. Although fossils number in the many trillions, the percentage of organisms that have become fossilized is minute—probably much less than 0.1 percent. 

Are we supposed to believe that “many trillions” is “a minuscule number?” Of course not. This is just an oversight, not a major one, but the type of error that reveals the level of “peer review” (and editorial oversight) that M2C articles receive. That’s because the citation cartel is all about confirming the collective bias, not about challenging that bias.
_____

On the substance, I’m going to do an interlinear peer review after all, but only one one section.

p. 135 Book of Mormon Lands

One important topic bearing upon the issue of animals in the Book of Mormon is the location of the lands described in the text. Agreed. In our view, an ancient Mesoamerican setting is best supported by the information given in the Book of Mormon. 

“Our view” being not only that of the two authors, but of BookofMormonCentral, which employs one of the authors, BYU Studies, and all the other participants in the citation cartel.

Notice the careful qualifier here: “best supported by the information given in the Book of Mormon.” This is a euphemism for rejecting the words of the prophets and apostles, starting with Letter VII and continuing through modern-day General Conference, who have consistently and persistently taught that there is one Hill Cumorah and it is in New York. 

The M2C intellectuals adamantly reject the New York Cumorah–they say the prophets and apostles have been expressing their own opinions, which are false and misleading to members of the Church–but the intellectuals don’t want people to realize how directly they repudiate the prophets and apostles. So instead, they misdirect by pretending to focus on the “information given” in the text.

But even that’s not true. Instead, they focus on their own interpretation of the text, as we’ll see below. 

This technique of focusing on Mesoamerica without advertising that they are repudiating the prophets and apostles is called “thinking past the sale.” I’ve addressed that before here:
http://mormonmesomania.blogspot.com/2016/12/thinking-past-sale.html

The idea is that you get people focusing on Mesoamerica so they don’t realize they’ve unconsciously bought into the two-Cumorahs theory. That’s how we ended up with the Visitors Center on Temple Square teaching two-Cumorahs to millions of people every year. It’s clever, and has been successful–so far. 

Fortunately, people are starting to catch on.   

The evidence for this conclusion, as has been addressed by many scholars, includes the limited geography of events and travel described in the text and a historical chronology consistent with the archaeological record of the region.4 

This is clever rhetoric as well. The “evidence” cited here isn’t really evidence; it’s pure bias confirming interpretation of the text, which is anything but evidence. For example, the “limited geography of events and travel” is based on a series of cascading assumptions about how far someone could walk in a day over mountainous territory and through jungles. 

When you analyze the “historical chronology” in any detail you quickly observe that the M2C scholars “can’t unsee Mesoamerica” so they latch onto Mayan society to find “correspondences” between the Mayans and the Nephites/Lamanites. To someone not infected with Mesomania, these M2C “correspondences” are transparently common attributes of most human societies. It’s bias confirmation at its worst.

(BTW, the M2C bias confirmation is evident from the refusal, or inability, of M2C intellectuals to do a side-by-side comparison between Mesoamerica and North America. This article is awesome in this respect, as we’ll see.) 

Notice the qualifier, “many scholars.” Again, this specifically excludes the prophets and apostles, as well as Joseph and Oliver themselves.

Cultural evidence for an ancient Mesoamerican setting includes proof of a sophisticated tradition of writing in a variety of media,5 

We all agree with this statement about Mesoamerican writing. But that’s evidence against the Mesoamerican setting, based on the text of the Book of Mormon.

The only “media” specifically mentioned in the text are metal plates and, arguably, a combustible material (which also could have been metal). The Nephites kept “many books and many records of every kind” (Hel. 3:15), but paper is never mentioned. Abinadom said “the record of this people is engraven upon plates.” The people of Zarahemla, of course, had no written language, and they were far more numerous than the Nephites. Even after the Nephites taught them to write, it’s not clear how widespread that knowledge was.

The Lamanites also had no written language, except once when the Nephites taught them a written language. But they were intent on destroying records. In fact, it was because the “Lamanites would destroy them” that Mormon “hid up in the hill Cumorah all the records which had been entrusted to me.” (Mormon 6:6). If all the records were in the hill Cumorah, we wouldn’t expect to find records engraven on stones and codexes throughout the land, which is what we see in Mesoamerica.

For that matter, there is only one stone “with engravings on it” mentioned in the text. (Omni 1:20). It was so unusual that the people brought it to Mosiah to be translated.

Obviously, no reformed Egyptian or mention of Nephites (or Jaredites) has been discovered in Mesoamerica. Some scholars claim there are “correspondences” between some Mayan names and Book of Mormon names, but this is more bias confirmation because there are common sounds in every language.  

a complex society with large populations, 

We don’t know the population of the Nephites, although Mormon mentioned that “the Nephites had gathered together a great number of men, even to exceed the number of thirty thousand.” If 30,000 is a “great number of men,” how big could the society really have been? I’ve observed elsewhere that although 2 million Jaredites were killed over decades of war and conflict, fewer than 10,000 survived for the final battle at Cumorah. I also think there were only 20,000 to 30,000 Nephites at Cumorah for several reasons. 

Standard M2C orthodoxy has the Nephites as a small group mingling with a larger Mayan civilization, so maybe we roughly agree on the size of the Nephite population. But, of course, there’s no mention in the text of Mayans. I don’t think even M2C intellectuals conflate the “wild, ferocious and blood-thirsty” Lamanites with the Mayans, do they?

Furthermore, we can only make rough inferences about how “complex” their society was. They had a system of judges, and a government sophisticated enough to break down into tribes. If we try, from an M2C lens, to spot indicia of Mayan civilization in the text, we can undoubtedly find what we’re looking for. But the same is true in ancient North America. It was not a bunch of ignorant hunter/gatherers who constructed the sophisticated earthworks in Ohio, for example.  

many large and complex buildings and fortifications, not a single stone building is even mentioned in the text, let alone massive stone pyramids and complexes. Instead, we have “ridges of earth” with “works of timbers built up” and a “wall of timbers and earth” (Alma 50:2, 53:4), exactly as we find in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois–the area Joseph Smith himself identified as “the plains of the Nephites.”  

warfare, ubiquitous in human societies a high degree of art, not mentioned in the text, except for King Noah’s wooden palace ornamented with gold and silver and some gold workmanship in a Jaredite prison a good understanding of astronomy, highly accurate calendar systems, like the earthworks in Newark, Ohio, the largest earthworks in the world an advanced knowledge of agriculture and husbandry, we’ll see this in the article itself and sophisticated cement technologies introduced over two thousand years ago. 

I have to comment about cement because it’s one of the delightful M2C memes that actually argues against Mesoamerica. 

M2C intellectuals like to tell their followers that there is no cement in ancient North America. But if you go to a digital version of the Book of Mormon and search for “cement” it shows up 4 times: 3 times in Helaman 3, and once in the testimony of Joseph Smith, who said Moroni built the stone box in the Hill Cumorah out of stone and cement. 

IOW, the only known Nephite cement was in New York.

Helaman 3 refers to people using cement because they ran out of wood. They “did dwell in tents, and in houses of cement.” The built many cities “both of wood and of cement.” Notice, they built nothing out of stone. Anyone who has visited the Mayan sites in Mesoamerica knows the primary building material was stone. They used cement between the stones, but none of those structures are made of cement.

Before and after the Helaman 3 account, Mormon never mentions cement, but he does mention building with wood. The cement was an unusual, temporary building material. There’s a useful article on this topic here. 

How much Nephite cement would we expect to survive to the present? Moroni’s box was carefully constructed to repel moisture, but exposed cement deteriorates quickly, especially when exposed to freezing and thawing. Some ancient cement, such as the Roman Pantheon, has endured exceptionally well because the Romans included volcanic ash in the mortar. See here. Perhaps that also explains why the Mayan cement has endured. 

But in an area without volcanoes, such as the American Midwest to New York area, we wouldn’t expect to find volcanic ash in the mortar, so we also wouldn’t expect to find long-lasting cement, at least not above ground. 

These combined characteristics of advanced civilization are not known anywhere else in North America, north of Mesoamerica.6

They are not known to M2C intellectuals, for sure. But people who are not seeking to confirm their M2C biases know about these things right where Joseph said they would be.

Actually, my favorite part of this section is the footnotes. Look at footnote 6, for example: Sorenson, Mormon’s Codex. We come full circle in the citation cartel. One author of this article, Matt Roper, works for Book of Mormon Central. Book of Mormon Central’s corporate mission is “to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient American codex.” We expect Brother Roper to cite bias-confirming sources, and what better one could there possibly be than Mormon’s Codex? This is the infamous book that ridicules those who “still believe” in what Joseph, Oliver, and all the other prophets and apostles have taught about the New York Cumorah.

When you look at the footnotes throughout this article, you see why I use the term “citation cartel” here. I know some of the M2C intellectuals are upset by that term, but I’ve asked them to give me another one and they haven’t. I can’t think of another term to describe this phenomenon. I don’t intend any offense. I’m just trying to point out what’s going on here.

Additional convergences are found in the Book of Mormon account, “convergences” are the same as the illusory “correspondences” that the M2C intellectuals always discuss

including the destruction in 3 Nephi 8–10, which is consistent with volcanic events accompanied by earthquakes.7 

“Volcanoes” are the second of the trifecta of M2C dogma. (The first being “cement” and the third being “snow.” We’ll see if this article mentions snow.) Of course, the text never mentions volcanoes. You have to infer that (i) what Mormon described was volcanic action and that (ii) Mormon didn’t know what a volcano was, or didn’t have a word for it, or Joseph mistranslated again.

The “volcano” argument is perhaps the worst bias confirmation of all. These M2C intellectuals told us in the second sentence of this section that their Mesoamerican setting “is best supported by the information given in the Book of Mormon.” But here, they rely on information not even given in the text!

I readily concede that had the Book of Mormon mentioned volcanoes, we’d have to be looking in a part of the world that has volcanoes (or had them in the relevant time frame). But because the text never once mentions volcanoes, the last place we should be looking is a part of the world where volcanoes are common and part of daily life. 

Now, look at the next sentence. 

Middle America is one of the most volcanically active regions in the world.8 

What can I say? These M2C intellectuals are disqualifying their own theory, but they are so blinded by their bias confirmation that they don’t realize it.

Readers of this blog already know that the destruction in 3 Nephi is not only easily explained by earthquake events in the Midwestern U.S., but within the historical record, people living in that area have described their experiences that line up exactly with what the text describes. 

IOW, Mormon didn’t mention volcanoes because he never saw volcanoes, and none of the people he wrote about did either.

Also, gold and silver are two precious metals mentioned as being abundant in Book of Mormon lands (1 Ne. 18:25; Hel. 6:9; Ether 9:17; 10:23). Both gold and silver are plentiful in Mesoamerica. 

More pure bias confirmation. Gold and silver are found throughout the world, from South Africa to Indonesia to Russia, as well as throughout the Americas. Its presence in Mesoamerica is unremarkable. But what is remarkable, and little known, is that the first American gold rush was in North Carolina, where a 12-year-old found a 17-pound gold nugget at a creek on his father’s farm in 1799. There’s a geological formation from Virginia through the Carolinas to Georgia that features gold and silver in abundance. If Lehi’s family landed near the 30th parallel in Florida or Georgia, they weren’t far from these gold deposits. Lots more on this, but the point is, gold and silver are located in many places.  

“Fine pearls” are mentioned as an important luxury item (4 Ne. 1:24). While pearl-bearing oysters and other clams occur in both fresh and salt waters the world over, the most precious pearls come from tropical to subtropical seas. The “fine” pearls are known to be abundant off the coasts of southern Mexico and were prized by Mesoamerican peoples from preclassic times.9 

You have to admire this clause: “the most precious pearls come from tropical to subtropical seas.” That’s in there because pearls are common in museums in the Midwestern U.S., which feature strands of pearls and other pearl ornaments taken from Hopewell (Nephite) mounds. You can see examples here.  The M2C intellectuals don’t tell you that; instead, in case you find out from other sources about the Hopewell pearls, they imply that pearls not from “tropical to subtropical seas” cannot qualify as “fine.” It’s an absurd argument, of course, but most readers will passively accept this type of rhetoric, especially if they read BYU Studies to confirm their M2C biases. 

Descriptions of climate and its implications in the Book of Mormon text suggest that warm and mild conditions were typical (Alma 51:33). 

In case you don’t know this reference by heart after hearing it repeated as a mantra by M2C intellectuals, the verse says, “behold, sleep had overpowered them because of their much fatigue, which was caused by the labors and heat of the day.”

This is one verse in a thousand years of history and it’s supposedly “typical” of the climate. But what does it say, really?

I think it is hardly remarkable that “sleep” would “overpower” someone. It happens daily for most people. But here, they had marched, they had fought in a war until it was dark, and they were fatigued because of “the labors and heat of the day.” 

This is the sole use in the text of the term “heat” in connection with weather, but are there any inhabited places on the planet that don’t have “heat of the day,” especially when you’re engaged in something as strenuous as fighting a war? This summer I went snorkeling along the Atlantic rift in 38 degree water in Iceland. But the weather outside was warm. I was wearing a dry suit, but we changed in open air. I was sweaty and tired from the exertion. Hiking around the Althing (oldest parliament) nearby made us hot and tired. If that’s the case in Iceland, where couldn’t someone become tired from the labors and heat of the day? It’s really a reflection on the amount of exertion than on the outside temperatures.

Maybe they were hot because they wore thick clothing (Alma 43:19). I don’t know about you, but when I’ve explored the ruins in Mesoamerica, “thick clothing” was the last thing I wanted to wear. In fact, I once got heat stroke along the Amazon in Peru just because I was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt–hardly “thick clothing.”

I realize these are semantic debates that resolve nothing, but remember, this is the type of “evidence” the M2C intellectuals cite. Put a single instance of “heat of the day” through the meat grinder of M2C dogma and you get–no surprise–“warm and mild conditions” “typical” of the entire Book of Mormon.

Or, you could ask yourself why people were wearing “thick clothing” while fighting in a tropical jungle. 

Any decent peer reviewer would have asked that question.

There is no mention of snow and ice in the land of promise, and the single reference to hail is atypical (Mosiah 12:6). 

Aha, we’ve reached the trifecta! Snow after all. Whew. I feared they’d let us down.

The M2C intellectuals don’t like to admit that Nephi cited “snow” as a metaphor (1 Nephi 11:8). Here, for example, they emphasize “snow and ice” are not mentioned in the land of promise. But why would Nephi use “snow” as a metaphor if his people didn’t know what it was? And not just “snow,” but “driven snow.” This isn’t a reference to something white on the tips of the volcanoes in the distance. “Driven snow” is what you experience when you’re in a snow storm. 

But I love this tell for cognitive dissonance. “The single reference to hail is atypical” but a single reference to “heat of the day” manages to “suggest that warm and mild conditions were typical.”

IOW, what is and what is not “typical” depends on what M2C intellectuals want you to think. As I pointed out in the beginning, it has nothing to do with the text; it’s purely and solely their bias confirming interpretation that matters.

And, don’t forget, it is this sort of “evidence” that justified their repudiation of the prophets and apostles.

Even better, the Mosiah 12:6 is not even the only textual reference to hail! Helaman cautioned his sons about the devil and “his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you” (Hel. 5:12).  M2C intellectuals don’t like to discuss the term “whirlwind” either, so it’s not surprising they would omit this second reference to hail. 

While not proof of warm to semitropical climate, this combination of factors is suggestive of them. These and other factors seem to point toward a pre-Columbian Mesoamerican setting for the Book of Mormon.

The inevitable nod to “neutrality.” These M2C intellectuals realize that the Church is “officially neutral” on the question of Book of Mormon geography (whatever that means). The intellectuals have managed to convert that “neutrality” into a repudiation of the prophets and apostles who have taught the New York Cumorah, but they recognize they’re still working toward an official repudiation of the prophets and apostles, so they don’t want to rock the boat too badly. 

Even though their corporate mission is “to increase understanding of the Book of Mormon as an ancient American codex,” they don’t want Church leaders to realize what they are doing so they like to throw in a little “neutrality” rhetoric such as this last paragraph. 

But they’re not fooling us.

Here are the footnotes. Brother Roper even cites himself, along with the usual suspects I’ve discussed on this blog many times.

4. J. A. Washburn, An Approach to the Study of Book of Mormon Geogra- phy (American Fork, Utah: Alpine Publishing, 1939); John L. Sorenson, Mor- mon’s Map (Provo, Utah: FARMS, 2000); John E. Clark, “Revisiting ‘A Key for Evaluating Nephite Geographies,’” Mormon Studies Review 23, no. 1 (2011): 13–43; Matthew Roper, “Plausibility, Probability, and the Cumorah Question,” The Religious Educator 10 (2009): 135–58; Sorenson, Mormon’s Codex, 119–43. For archaeological correlations, see Sorenson, Mormon’s Codex, 499–707; and John E. Clark, “Archaeological Trends and Book of Mormon Origins,” BYU Studies 44, no. 4 (2005): 89–91.
5. Sorenson, Mormon’s Codex, 184–232.
6. Sorenson, Mormon’s Codex, 265–495.
7. Bart J. Kowalis, “‘In the Thirty and Fourth Year’: A Geologist’s View of the Great Destruction in 3 Nephi,” BYU Studies 37, no. 3 (1997–1998): 136–90; Wade E. Miller, Creation of the Earth for Man (Laguna Niguel, Calif.: KCT & Associates, 2010); Jerry D. Grover, Geology and the Book of Mormon (Vineyard, Utah: By the author, 2014).
8. Robert H. Dott and Roger L. Batten, Evolution of the Earth (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1988), 4.
9. Michael D. Coe, “Archaeological Synthesis of Southern Veracruz and Tabasco,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians, ed. Gordon S. Wiley (Aus- tin: University of Texas Press, 1965), 3:697; Alfonso Caso, “Lapidary Work, Goldwork, and Copper Work from Oaxaca,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians: Volumes 2 and 3, Archaeology of Southern Mesoamerica, ed. Gordon R. Willey (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1965), 915.
_____

Now, to the substance of the article.

The usual arguments appear. One section titled “Cross-Cultural Naming Challenges” tells us that “When discussing Book of Mormon animals, we need to consider that the Lehite, Mulekite, and Jaredite migrants may have applied Old World terms to New World species.” (page 138).

This is open season on Joseph’s translation, of course. Instead of claiming Joseph translated the plates incorrectly because of his New England background as they once did, the M2C intellectuals can now blame Mormon for using the wrong terms–even though neither Mormon nor any of the other authors of the text after Nephi/Jacob ever lived in the old world, so they could not have created the cross-cultural naming problem. Apparently, then, Nephi caused the problem by naming Mesoamerican animals after the Old World animals he was familiar with.

The argument, on its face, is reasonable. Certainly explorers arriving in new lands encounter new species and try to describe them in familiar terms. For example, Spanish explorers referred to American bison as “cattle,” “cows,” and “bulls,” (page 151), which makes sense even in today’s world when we see them herding and feeding. (Regarding this example, the article notes regarding the phrase “both the cow and the ox” (2 Ne. 18:25) that “it is possible these terms refer to the American bison, which apparently survived throughout various regions of Mexico and as far south as Nicaragua until fairly recent times.”

Uh huh. Now we have herds of migrating bison in Nicaragua. And that’s more persuasive than the occasional, isolated individual bison who might have been found in the American Midwest once upon a time.

Okay, sarcasm off.

The Book of Mormon situation is unlike the case of early explorers, however. According to his mother, Joseph Smith “would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of traveling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life with them.”

Joseph was familiar with two things before he even obtained the plates: (1) the animals he lived among (and presumably learned about in school and from books, including the Bible) and (2) the animals the Nephites used. The M2C assertion that Joseph translated the text wrong because of his background, or that the text used the wrong words because of cross-cultural identification, ignores Joseph’s knowledge. If he could describe Nephite society before he even got the plates, and he knew the people were riding around on tapirs, would he still have used the wrong term to describe the animals?

Speaking of tapirs, this article has an entire paragraph on descriptions of tapirs. You can see why M2C intellectuals love the tapir. According to the article, early explorers compared it to a “cow,” “ox,” buffalo,”, “ass,” and “elephant.” Brother Sorenson (Mormon’s Codex) may be the first to compare a tapir to a horse. He should have also compared it to a goat, and then we’d be done with the article. That way, a tapir could account for every animal mentioned in the text.

Unfortunately, tapirs were known by people living in the United States in 1828 (presumably including Joseph Smith). Webster’s 1828 dictionary defines a tapir this way: “A quadruped of S. America, about 6 feet long and 3 l/2 high, resembling a hog in shape, with a short movable proboscis. It frequents the water, like the hippopotamus.”

So a tapir not only qualifies as all the animals mentioned above, but also a “hog” and a “hippopotamus.”

The authors address tapirs as possible “cureloms and cumoms” as well.

One relatively large animal currently living in Mesoamerica (and also now living in South America and Southeast Asia), but doubtfully known to Joseph Smith, is the tapir. In the past, this animal had a much greater northward geographic range in North America. It lived all throughout Mexico and north well into the United States. (p. 168).

As I showed, tapirs were defined in Webster’s 1828 dictionary. The authors don’t explain why they assume tapirs would be “doubtfully known to Joseph Smith,” but we infer that such knowledge on Joseph’s part would contradict, instead of confirm, their bias. And as we’ve seen, that’s reason enough for many of their assumptions and interpretations.
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The article makes a good point about extinction of species. (The heading to this section is odd: “Extinction of Animals and the Record of Past Life.” Animals aren’t extinct; species are. Another note for the absentee peer reviewers.)

The key point is the one I agreed with at the outset; i.e., only a tiny percentage of dead animals become fossilized or otherwise preserved. The authors remind us of Hamblin’s point that there are few remains of the Hun horses, which numbered in the hundreds of thousands according to historical accounts. We expect animal bodies to decay and disintegrate after death; otherwise, the Earth would be littered with carcasses. 

As a species nears extinction, declining numbers would mean fewer opportunities for preservation of remains. It is impossible to know when the last individual of a species lived.

All this means that we are unlikely to find much, if any, evidence of extinct species near the time of extinction. IOW, we know horses and elephants lived in North America anciently, but no remains have been found that date to Book of Mormon time frames. But, as the aphorism goes, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The article goes on to explain how the species specifically named in the text could, arguably, have been present in Mesoamerica at the mentioned times. But in most cases, such as the bison, horse, mountain sheep, mamoths, goats, and elephants, the preponderance of evidence for the species comes from North America, especially the Midwestern U.S.

To support the M2C dogma, this article looks for needles in haystacks; i.e., rare, obscure indicia of North American species (the needles) among the far more numerous species (the hay) in Mesoamerica.

The absurdity of this approach is evident when we realize that the inverse is true in North America; i.e., the evidence of these species is relatively abundant in North America.

When we look for evidence of the Book of Mormon in North America, with Cumorah in New York, it’s like looking for hay in a haystack.
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Let’s look at the conclusion again, this time on page 174.

Various lines of evidence based on geography, geology, archaeology, climate, and more point to an area in Mesoamerica as the place where Book of Mormon events occurred. The fossils known from the area are also compatible with this view. Doubts regarding the historicity of the Book of Mormon, however, have arisen for many since horses, elephants, and other animals listed in the Book of Mormon were thought to be extinct in North America long before the record was written. Continuing research, on the other hand, shows that in fact many of these animals may have lived into Book of Mormon times. During the past century, a number of animals and plants once thought to have become extinct much earlier in time lived hundreds, thousands, and even millions of years later.

By now, you see the logical fallacy. First, the geography, geology, archaeology, climate and more point more toward North America than toward Mesoamerica. But the contrast is even more evident when we consider animal species and the fossil record. All the examples cited in support of Mesoamerica are much more abundant in North America.

I repeat what I wrote at the outset.

If, hypothetically, the prophets and apostles had taught that Cumorah was in southern Mexico, then the strained combinations of facts, argument, and textual interpretation might be excusable in an effort to vindicate the prophets.

But when these same strained combinations of facts, argument and textual interpretation are being used to repudiate the prophets, the effort is not only futile but destructive.

Once again, I ask that BYU Studies and the rest of the citation cartel change course.

Today we’ll look at Seminary and Institute.

The Seminary manual on the Book of Mormon contains 160 lessons, most of which focus on one chapter from the text. They’re great lessons.

Here’s an example from Lesson 139, which covers Mormon 5-6.

This is good. The lesson points out that the Nephites gathered to the land of Cumorah and that Mormon hid the Nephite records in the Hill Cumorah.

What’s even better, the manual encourages teachers to show students the Arnold Friberg painting of Mormon and Moroni together at the Hill Cumorah in New York.

I’m a little surprised the Curriculum Committee let this in.

This is the painting that was removed from the missionary edition of the Book of Mormon in 1981, to be replaced with the two-Cumorahs images of (i) Moroni alone at the New York hill and (ii) Christ ministering to Mayans in Central America.

At any rate, we’re happy to see this painting in the Seminary manual. Friberg painted an oak leaf hanging from the enormous oak tree so there can be no mistake: this Cumorah is in New York.

However, the problem is not solved.

The very last item in the manual is titled “Possible Book of Mormon Sites (in Relation to Each Other).” When you turn to the page, you find this:

Yes, it’s basically the BYU fantasy map!

Like the BYU map, this Seminary manual map incorporates the M2C interpretation of the text.

You’ve got the north-flowing River Sidon, the “Narrow Neck of Land” that conflates all the “narrow” features into one, etc.

A qualifier at the bottom of the map tries to save the day.

*Possible relationships of sites in the Book of Mormon, based on internal evidence. No effort should be made to identify points on this map with any existing geographical location. The map spans Jaredites and Nephite/Lamanite periods during which settlements changed over time.

Now, put yourself in the place of a Seminary student (or teacher). This fantasy map is “based on internal evidence,” as if there is only one way to interpret the text. (This is the same unstated premise behind BYU’s fancier fantasy map.)

But the real kicker is this: “No effort should be made to identify points on this map with any geographical location.”

IOW, you have to learn the Book of Mormon by thinking of it in a fantasy land. And despite the Friberg painting of Cumorah, you must not think of Cumorah as being in New York.

The “land northward” in fantasyland

The manual goes to great pains to disavow the New York Cumorah.

To make sure no one could possibly entertain the idea that President Cowdery, Joseph Smith, David Whitmer, Brigham Young, etc. taught the truth about Cumorah, this map portrays a location for Cumorah that, just like the BYU fantasy map, resembles no place on planet Earth.

The “Hill Cumorah” in fantasyland

People often ask me how this type of thing occurs. I think it’s the inevitable result of certain intellectuals pushing the M2C narrative for so long that it has become the de factor lens through which everyone, including staff at Church headquarters, interprets the text.

They “can’t unsee Mesoamerica.”

But, unlike BYU Studies, they try to follow a policy of neutrality, so they end up with maps such as this.

Now, imagine you’re a Seminary student (or teacher, or parent) and a friend of yours says, “Hey, did you know the early Church leaders taught that Cumorah was in New York?”

Based on this manual, you’d have to say, “No. In fact, we aren’t supposed to identify any Book of Mormon sites with any existing geographical location.”

So the friend (or Internet search such as this http://www.utlm.org/onlineresources/cumorah.htm) shows you a quotation from, say, Orson Pratt, who explained there were two departments in the Hill Cumorah in New York: one for Mormon’s depository (Mormon 6:6) and one for Moroni’s stone box.

Or the friend reads the passage from James E. Talmage’s Articles of Faith. Or from President Romney’s General Conference address. Or from any of many other teachings of the prophets and apostles, including Letter VII.

Thanks to the BYU/CES curriculum, this will all be news to you.

And you will be in the position of trying to defend criticism when you have never been given the facts.

You will suddenly realize why so many people have been telling you the Church isn’t open about its history. You will realize why so many people have been saying the Church changes its teachings, that the scholars don’t believe the prophets, etc.

All because our LDS intellectuals have persuaded generations of Latter-day Saints that the prophets and apostles were wrong about the Hill Cumorah.

It’s difficult to imagine a more senseless, yet devastating, teaching than M2C.
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Rather than have students, missionaries, and ordinary members of the Church learn about the conflict between the prophets and the intellectuals from antagonistic (or sincerely puzzled) friends and associates (and web pages), we would do well to teach the people about Letter VII and the teachings of the prophets and apostles that corroborate the New York Cumorah.

Actually, I think we would do well to embrace the teachings of the prophets and apostles about the New York Cumorah. 

But apparently that’s too much to ask right now.

M2C is subtle but present throughout Church media and curriculum. Look at the cover of the Seminary manual itself and notice the massive stone pyramid in the background.

Fortunately, it’s relative muted, but it conveys a clear impression of Mayan culture.

Worse, the manual encourages teachers to show students the ubiquitous painting “Jesus Teaching in the Western Hemisphere,” which you see in nearly every chapel around the world. (see below)

There’s a long way to go before we get serious about Cumorah. Joseph and Oliver put us on a clear course. Joseph re-emphasized that course over and over while he was alive by having Letter VII reprinted in every outlet available to him. His successors kept us on the course for over 150 years.

But lately the intellectuals derailed us and now seem to have prevailed over the prophets and apostles.

But we don’t have to let that continue.

In spite paintings such as this:

Today we’ll look at BYU itself.

There is one simple change that would solve the problems caused by M2C: make President Cowdery’s eight historical letters required reading for all BYU students in Book of Mormon and Church History classes.

I say this not only because the Saints in Joseph Smith’s day were all familiar with these letters, although that’s an important point as well. These letters should be required reading because familiarity with them is critical for both Church History and Book of Mormon studies.

President Cowdery’s letters, including Letter VII, were part of the “cultural literacy” of early members of the Church. If you were a member of the Church between 1835 and 1845, you would have been familiar with these important letters. These letters are part of the lens through which we should read and understand Church history as well as the Book of Mormon.

1844 Liverpool pamphlet

The letters were published in all the Church magazines: Messenger and Advocate (Kirtland), Millennial Star (England), Gospel Reflector (Philadelphia), Times and Seasons (Nauvoo), and The Prophet (New York City). Portions were translated into German, Dutch, and French. Thousands of copies were printed as a separate pamphlet in England.

The letters were not only the principal account of the critical historical events of the Restoration available during Joseph’s lifetime, but they also addressed important issues of the times that remain relevant today. President Cowdery addressed anti-Mormon attacks, explored reasons why people accept or reject the gospel, explained that prophets and apostles are inspired–but not perfect–people, and provided a real-world context for the Book of Mormon and the plates from which it was translated.

Studying Church history without knowing President Cowdery’s letters is like studying Shakespeare without knowing the Bible (because you’ll never catch Shakespeare’s biblical allusions).

For example, in D&C 128, Joseph Smith wrote, “Glad tidings from Cumorah!” D&C 128 is a letter Joseph wrote to the editor of the Times and Seasons on September 6, 1842. It was published in the Times and Seasons in October 1842. Some LDS scholars are unaware that a year earlier, the same Times and Seasons published Letter VII, which declares that Cumorah is in western New York. Because they don’t understand this context, they have proposed that in D&C 128, Joseph was referring to a hill in Mexico!

Joseph didn’t need to cite Letter VII, any more than Shakespeare had to cite chapter and verse for his biblical allusions. Joseph knew readers were fully aware that Cumorah is in New York because they had read Letter VII. It was part of the common understanding of the Saints in his day.

But instead of teaching these historical letters at BYU, the faculty seeks to suppress them. If a student asks about them, faculty respond that the letters are just “Oliver Cowdery’s opinion,” that they are wrong and that they shouldn’t be read.

Why?

Because they contain Letter VII, and Letter VII contradicts the M2C narrative that so many intellectuals in the Church, including BYU professors, continue to promote
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BYU fantasy map based on M2C interpretation of the text

One of the most obvious improvements we’d see at BYU is the elimination of the fantasy map of Book of Mormon geography that imprints a Mesoamerican setting on the minds of the students.

I won’t belabor that here, since I addressed it recently here:

http://bookofmormonwars.blogspot.com/2018/01/getting-real-about-cumorah-part-2.html

In my view, this fantasy map is the modern equivalent of Mormonism Unvailed, the 1835 anti-Mormon book that also taught the Book of Mormon was fictional.

Teaching Letter VII today would accomplish the same objective President Cowdery had in 1835; i.e., it would place the Book of Mormon firmly in the real world, taking it out of the realm of myth or fiction.

Obviously, knowing that there is one Hill Cumorah and it is in New York doesn’t solve or even address the rest of Book of Mormon geography. Contemporaries of Joseph and Oliver, who all accepted their teaching about Cumorah in New York, nevertheless speculated wildly about the location of Zarahemla, Lehi’s landing site, etc. (We’ll discuss why that happened in a later installment in this series.)

But having one pin in the map–the New York Cumorah–informs our study of the historicity of the Book of Mormon. Bright, faithful students, unencumbered with the imprinted M2C interpretation of the text, could develop possible scenarios that would support, instead of repudiate, the teachings of the prophets and apostles.
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The two departments at BYU that would modify their courses if BYU decided to get real about Cumorah are The Department of Ancient Scripture and the Department of Church History and Doctrine.

At the end of this post I list the departments and their course offerings, from this link:
https://catalog.byu.edu/courses?cd=11

While we’re on this topic, the quality and extent of Book of Mormon studies was criticized by a BYU Professor a few years ago. His piece is titled “How BYU Destroyed Ancient Book of Mormon Studies.”

You can read that here: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/enigmaticmirror/2015/09/08/how-byu-destroyed-ancient-book-of-mormon-studies/#disqus_thread

I agree with his point that Book of Mormon studies at BYU are anemic, but not with his focus on M2C. Just have students and faculty learn Letter VII and see what happens when they learn how archaeology, anthropology, geology and geography vindicate the teachings of the prophets.
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BYU offers three 2-hour courses on the Book of Mormon:

REL A 122 – The Book of Mormon

REL A 275 – Teachings and Doctrine of the Book of Mormon

The first two are required classes. This means you can graduate from BYU having taken only 4 semester hours of coursework on the Book of Mormon. That means attending a 50-minute class twice a week for a total of 30 weeks (15 weeks per semester), which makes 60 class periods. 

This is a little more than studying the Book of Mormon in Sunday School for a year (48 class periods/year). Compare that against the 160 lessons in the Seminary manual (see the manual here). Rel A 275 is essentially the Institute class (see the manual here). You can read the expected learning outcomes here: 

https://learningoutcomes.byu.edu/Instructors/course-instructors/04997/050/REL+A+121/zSiswi/1019

These classes are wonderful and achieve their purpose. In addition, faculty throughout BYU incorporate the scriptures, including the Book of Mormon, into their secular classes whenever possible. We’re not training ministers, after all.

But we are training lay leaders. 

Which is all the more reason to educate and prepare them at BYU to address issues of conversion, retention, and activity that they will face their entire lives. 

Last May I posted a discussion titled “Perspectives, inside and outside.” 

http://bookofmormonwars.blogspot.com/2017/05/perspectives-inside-and-outside.html

There, I observed that people who have left the Church (as well as nonmembers) have objections that include these: “Book of Mormon not ancient,” “Church lies about its history,” “Prophet never speaks prophetically,” and so on.  

Consider those issues in light of what’s going on at BYU.

Using a fantasy map to teach the Book of Mormon–especially declaring it is the best fit to the text–cements the idea that the Book of Mormon did not take place in the real world, which of course also means it is not ancient. 

Suppressing and denigrating President Cowdery’s letters, along with the teachings of other prophets and apostles about the New York Cumorah, cements the idea that the Church lies about its history and that prophets don’t speak prophetically.

IOW, BYU is currently teaching students exactly those ideas that the former Mormons and nonmembers cite as justifications for their rejection of the Church.

Ironically, these are all issues that President Cowdery specifically addressed in his letters. Students who study Letter II, for example, understand that prophets are not perfect men and never have been. Students who study Letter VII learn the depth of the temptations Joseph struggled with before he took possession of the plates. Moroni’s teachings about the Old Testament are invaluable for understanding the Restoration in the context of ancient prophecy. And, of course, Letters VII and VIII establish the real-world reality of the Book of Mormon and the New York Cumorah.  

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While we’re discussing curriculum, look at Lesson 2 in the Institute manual for the Book of Mormon:

 

In case you can’t read it, the Introduction says “The Book of Mormon teaches that those who heed these prophets are blessed, while those who oppose them
experience regret and sorrow.”

And yet, the same BYU professors who teach this principle are the ones telling the students that the prophets and apostles were wrong when they taught that there is one Hill Cumorah and it is in New York.

Now, look at the cover of the manual. It’s a wonderful painting, of course, but what is it teaching?

The debate over Cumorah boils down to palm trees vs pine trees. This painting chooses palm trees, imprinting that idea on the students.

I’m not saying Christ visited the Hill Cumorah, but this painting does convey a specific geographic area; i.e., Central America.

(Okay, it could be Florida or maybe California, but it’s definitely not the Midwestern United States, which means it’s not neutral on the geography question.)

 Do you see why students are confused? Do you see the fulfillment of Joseph Fielding Smith’s prophetic warning that M2C would cause members to become confused and disturbed in their faith in the Book of Mormon?
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On the topic of curriculum, I’ll address the Seminary/Institute issues in a subsequent installment.

For this post, I just want to reiterate that it’s time to take Cumorah seriously, and to accomplish that at BYU, President Cowdery’s letters ought to be part of the curriculum of Church History and the Book of Mormon.

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BYU religion courses:

Rel A – Ancient Scripture

Rel C – Church History and Doctrine

In this post, we’ll look at BYU Studies. It’s a good place to start because BYU Studies not only promotes M2C, it doesn’t even acknowledge alternative points of view. In fact, it rejects them out of hand.

This is an absurd approach for a supposedly academic journal to begin with, but it’s even worse when the editorial point of view requires readers to reject the consistent and clear teachings of LDS prophets and apostles for over 150 years.

If we got real about Cumorah, BYU Studies would begin by changing its web page by removing maps of Mesoamerica showing “Cumorah” in southern Mexico as the “plausible” location. Look at this link:

https://byustudies.byu.edu/charts/159-plausible-locations-final-battles

We have to give them credit for clever semantics. Consider the heading:

Plausible Locations of the Final Battles

By implication, Cumorah locations other that those shown here, such as the New York Cumorah, are “not plausible.” At a minimum, the title should read “Some Plausible Locations of the Final Battles once you reject Letter VII” or “Possible Locations of the Final Battles assuming LDS prophets and apostles are wrong.”

At least those titles would explain in what sense the locations shown are “plausible.” I think many, hopefully most, LDS would not agree with the premise that Letter VII is wrong. They would not consider these M2C locations plausible at all.

Nor should they.

The web page shows this map:

Here is the justification published along with the map, with the original in blue and my comments in red:

Though evidence from the Book of Mormon is not conclusive, (this is their nod to neutrality, but the rest of this sentence betrays them) final battles of the Nephites and the Jaredites probably took place not far north of the narrow neck of land. Basic M2C interpretation conflates “narrow neck” (Alma 63:5) with “small neck” (Alma 22), “narrow neck of land (Ether 10:20), and “narrow passage.” (Mormon 2:29). Most students of the Book of Mormon find significance in the use of terminology. They wouldn’t think of substituting words for what appears in the text, except maybe where explicit synonyms are explained, as when Nephi explained that Irreantum means both sea and many waters. But to make their geography theories work, M2C proponents such as BYU Studies have to assume these different terms all relate to the same geographic feature. Maybe they do. I won’t exclude that as a possibility. But maybe they don’t, and if your reason for rejecting Letter VII is that you conflate these terms as a given, then you need to rethink your approach. This is one of the reasons why I think the M2C promoters make such a hash out of Book of Mormon geography.

As shown, the Nephites marched from Angola, through David, and eventually came to the city of Joshua (see Mormon 2:4–6). Nephite defense lines lay in Joshua for fourteen years; finally they collapsed, and Nephites retreated across the narrow neck of land, fleeing to various sites (see Mormon 2:16). You can read Mormon 2 as many times as you want but you won’t find a reference to the “narrow neck of land.” The only reference in the entire text to that feature is Ether 10:20. It was a Jaredite term. Of course, BYU Studies wants people to think the “narrow neck of land” is the 137-mile wide, 120-mile long Isthmus of Tehuantepec. This is the kind of evidence that, shall we say, falls a wee bit short of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. When you rely on this sort of flimsy evidence as the reason why you reject the prophets and apostles, it appears you’re trying extra hard to reject the prophets and apostles.

The hill Ramah/Cumorah, upon which both the Jaredites and Nephites fought their last battles (see Ether 15:11; Mormon 6:4–6), is shown here on the northwestern edge of the Tuxtla Mountains in Mexico, about ninety miles from a narrow pass (see Mormon 3:5). Other Jaredite locations, including Omer’s flight to Ramah (see Ether 9:3), are also shown here. Again, these locations are plausible, but not definite. These locations are only “plausible” once you reject the prophets and apostles. For that reason, if we’re going to get real about Cumorah, BYU Studies needs to remove these maps and everything else on its page that reflects M2C.
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There is an alternative that BYU Studies could consider. If they want to align with the Church’s neutrality policy (whatever that really means), they could include the New York Cumorah as an alternative to their M2C theory.

IOW, they could let their readers know that maybe, just maybe, there’s a teeny tiny outside chance that Letter VII and all the prophets and apostles who have affirmed the New York Cumorah had it right after all.

Actually, I’d like to see this dual approach displayed not only at BYU Studies but throughout the world of LDS intellectuals. Let the people see that there are two choices about Cumorah. Either it’s in New York as the prophets and apostles have said, or it’s somewhere else.

In my view, if it’s somewhere else, it doesn’t really matter where that somewhere else is, but I recognize that many people have other settings for Cumorah that are important to them.
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I won’t take the time to examine the editorial slant in the content of BYU Studies, but you can peruse it and see for yourself whether it supports or opposes the prophets and apostles on the Cumorah question.

As you consider the evidence, recall that these intellectuals are telling their students, and members of the Church generally, to disbelieve all the prophets and apostles who have reiterated what President Cowdery wrote about the New York Cumorah. This is the editorial position at BookofMormonCentral, the Interpreter, BYU Studies, and other promoters of the M2C (Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs) ideology. You can go to these links and see who is involved:
https://bookofmormoncentral.org/directory and http://interpreterfoundation.org/foundation/

For these groups, it doesn’t matter that the New York Cumorah was taught in General Conference by members of the First Presidency. These intellectuals insist all the prophets and apostles who have spoken about Cumorah were wrong.

I think it is the M2C intellectuals who are wrong. In my view, the textual and physical evidence vindicates the prophets and apostles, not the other way around.

In fact, this isn’t even a close case.

And even if it was, the intellectuals should be held to a high standard of proof to justify their rejection of the prophets and apostles. In legal terms, they need to produce proof beyond a reasonable doubt before they teach people that the prophets and apostles are wrong. 

Here’s a preview of my conclusion:

Your BYU/CES intellectuals are trying to persuade you to disbelieve the prophets and apostles because they insist that a site in Mesoamerica is such a better fit with the text–so much more of a land among seas and a land of seas–than western New York is, that President Cowdery could not possibly have been telling the truth.

See what you think.
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There is a remarkable sentence in 1 Nephi 17:5: “And we beheld the sea, which we called Irreantum, which, being interpreted, is many waters.”

This tells us that sea = Irreantum = many waters.

There are 11 verses in the Book of Mormon that refer to “many waters” and 81 that refer to “sea.”

I don’t know why these terms were used in these frequencies,* but they were used interchangeably as synonyms.

Nephi called the sea they crossed Irreantum or many waters, while the Lamanites believed “they were also wronged while crossing the sea“ (Mosiah 10:12). The brother of Jared asked the Lord to touch the stones that “we may have light while we shall cross the sea“ (Ether 3:4) and the Jaredites “did build barges, in which they did cross many waters“ (Ether 2:6).

Because they are synonyms, conceptually we could replace instances of sea and many waters with Irreantum throughout the text. Or we could change many waters to sea. The point here is that many waters is a specific term, a synonym for sea.

Let’s see how this relates to Cumorah.
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One caveat. On principle, I don’t like semantic arguments because words can be easily redefined to confirm whatever bias one has. Just look at the M2C sophistry about what is a promised land, a country, and a great nation. Semantic arguments boil down to whether you agree with or oppose the bias being confirmed.

But I think this is an exception because Nephi himself gave us specific definitions, and the M2C intellectuals are insisting their case is so strong that it justifies disbelieving our prophets and apostles.
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We have one description of Cumorah that specifically mentions many waters: Mormon 6:4.

4 And it came to pass that we did march forth to the land of Cumorah, and we did pitch our tents around about the hill Cumorah; and it was in a land of many waters, rivers, and fountains; and here we had hope to gain advantage over the Lamanites.

We have another likely reference to the land of Cumorah that also uses the term: Mosiah 8:8.

8 And they were lost in the wilderness for the space of many days, yet they were diligent, and found not the land of Zarahemla but returned to this land, having traveled in a land among many waters, having discovered a land which was covered with bones of men, and of beasts, and was also covered with ruins of buildings of every kind, having discovered a land which had been peopled with a people who were as numerous as the hosts of Israel.

If we use the synonym, we get these descriptions:

– a land of seas, rivers and fountains

– a land among seas

The 1828 Webster’s dictionary defines “among” this way: “In a general or primitive sense, mixed or mingled with; as tares among wheat.”

Where in the Americas is there a land that is mixed or mingled with seas?

Let’s compare western New York with Mesoamerica and see.
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The New York Cumorah is literally surrounded by seas. Lake Erie and Lake Ontario are most obvious, but the finger lakes also qualify as seas.

It’s difficult to tell on this map how large the finger lakes are, so look at the close-up below.

The Sea of Galilee in Israel is 64 square miles. Lake Seneca is 67 square miles. Cayuga Lake is 66 square miles. Oneida Lake (upper right) is 80 square miles. Even Canandaigua Lake is 17 square miles.

The Hill Cumorah is located near the “E” in FINGER.

Of course, all the land within the area of the Great Lakes could be called “a land among seas” and “a land of seas.” We know this because we look at satellite photos and maps derived from them.

But for someone on the ground, especially ancient explorers new to the area, the Great Lakes are much too vast for exploration. The shoreline of Lake Erie alone is 871 miles, so you’re not going to travel all the way around that in a few days. The shoreline of Lake Superior is 2,726 miles. Limhi’s explorers could not possibly have explored the entire Great Lakes, let alone Lake Erie.

However, the finger lakes are close together. It’s only 9 miles from Cumorah to Canandaigua Lake, and about 15 miles from Cumorah to Seneca Lake. Those two lakes are 13.5 miles apart, and it’s only another ten miles from Seneca Lake to Cayuga Lake. These are relatively short distances that Limhi’s explorers could have easily covered. From their respective shores, you can see the finger lakes are distinct and have natural boundaries. Because they are larger than the Sea of Galilee, they qualify as seas, or many waters. (Canandaigua Lake, at only 17 square miles, might not technically qualify as a sea, but unless you circumnavigate it, you can’t tell how big it is.)

This means that when you are at Cumorah, you have major seas on the north (Lake Ontario, 17 miles away), west (Lake Erie, 80 miles away), east (Oneida Lake, 60 miles away), and south (Lakes Seneca, Cayuga, and Canandaigua). By any measure, this is a land among seas and a land of seas, just as the Book of Mormon describes.
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Now, let’s look at Mesoamerica. Remember, this has to be such a perfect fit for the text of the Book of Mormon that we’re supposed to disbelieve our prophets and apostles who teach that Cumorah is in New York. We’ve already seen that New York perfectly matches the description in the text. Mesoamerica must be an even more perfect fit.

The red circle is the exact same size, on the exact same scale, as the map of New York above. This is the proposed M2C location for Cumorah, according to BYU Studies and the other M2C theories.

You have a sea to the north, for sure; it’s part of the Gulf of Mexico. But then what?

Is this location a land among seas and a land of seas as the Book of Mormon describes?

Let’s look closer. Here, we see there is, in fact, a body of water near the Mesoamerican “Cumorah.” It’s called Lago or Laguna Catemaco. It’s surface area is 28 square miles, about the same as Lake Canandaigua (which I suggested might not even qualify as a sea).

Catemaco’s water level is controlled by dams, yet it is still shallow, averaging 25 feet deep. (Lake Canandaigua has an average depth of 127 feet, with a maximum depth of 276 feet.)

Let’s say Catemaco qualifies as a sea despite its size and depth. Does that put this M2C Cumorah in a land among seas and a land of seas? It would qualify as a land on the seashore, or a land near the sea, but I don’t see any way, using plain English, that it qualifies as either a land among seas or a land of seas. 

It’s merely a coastal location with one lake. If this is a land among seas and a land of seas, then every site along a coastline is also. Such an interpretation means the terms are not only not descriptive, but they are meaningless.

And yet based on this, our intellectuals expect us to reject the prophets and apostles.

Seriously?

BTW, there is a body of water to the southwest, next to the mountains. This is 85 miles away, but that doesn’t matter because it was formed in 1954 by the construction of a dam.
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Here’s the main point.

Your BYU/CES intellectuals are trying to persuade you to disbelieve the prophets and apostles because they insist this site in Mesoamerica is such a better fit with the text–so much more of a land among seas and a land of seas–than western New York that President Cowdery could not possibly have been telling the truth.

In fact, according to the intellectuals, this site in Mexico is so much better than western New York that you have to disbelieve not only President Cowdery, but also Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, Wilford Woodruff, Orson Pratt, Parley P. Pratt, Joseph Fielding Smith, James E. Talmage, Anthony Ivins, LeGrand Richards, Marion G. Romney, Mark E. Petersen, etc.
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In my view, our intellectuals have it completely backwards.

I think the maps demonstrate that President Cowdery and all the other prophets and apostles somehow (presumably by luck according to our intellectuals) happened to identify the single best location in the western hemisphere, if not the world, that qualifies as a land among seas and a land of seas, especially from the perspective of people living between 200 BC and 400 AD.

Without even referencing these details about the seas, President Cowdery and the prophets and apostles who believed him have authenticated the historicity of the Book of Mormon in a real-world setting.

But because our BYU/CES intellectuals have persuaded so many LDS to disbelieve the prophets and apostles, they are looking for Cumorah in the wrong place.

And our own visitors centers are depicting this Mexican “Cumorah” to millions of people every year.

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* People have published articles on the etymology of Irreantum, but I’m not aware of anyone who has suggested an explanation for the relative frequency of these terms.