Nibley Quotes Below
“Blinded by the gold of the pharaohs and the mighty ruins of Babylon , Book of Mormon students have declared themselves “not interested” in the drab and commonplace remains of our lowly Indians. But in all the Book of Mormon we look in vain for anything that promises majestic ruins.” (Hugh Nibley, An Approach to the Book of Mormon (Melchizedek Priesthood manual, 1957
“Now you know, how the Nephites could have had sheep in North America brought to this land by the Jaredites. The Nephites could continue practicing the Law of Moses in the land of The New Jerusalem.” (2 Nephi 25:24 Mosiah 2:3) Hugh Nibley from Lehi in the Desert; The Great Open Spaces
“What most impressed me last summer on my first and only expedition to Central America was the complete lack of definite information about anything. Never was so little known about so much… It is just a fact of life that no one knows much at all about these oft-photographed and much-talked-about ruins…
Counterparts to the great ritual complexes of Central America once dotted the entire eastern United States, the most notable being the Hopewell culture centering in Ohio and spreading out for hundreds of miles along the entire length of the Mississippi River. These are now believed to be definitely related to corresponding centers in Mesoamerica…
The idea that divine power can be conveyed to men and used by them through the implementation of tangible earthly contrivances and that these become mere antique oddities once the power is shut off is surprisingly confirmed and illustrated by the Book of Mormon. Thus the Liahona and the Urim and Thummim were kept among the national treasures of the Nephites long after they had ceased their miraculous functions…
“The Book of Mormon is a history of a related primitive church, and one may well ask what kind of remains the Nephites would leave us from their more virtuous days. A closer approximation to the Book of Mormon picture of Nephite culture is seen in the earth and palisade structures of the Hopewell and Adena culture areas than in the later stately piles of stone in Mesoamerica...Though such piles as the great pyramid-temple of Chichén Itzá yield to few buildings in the world in beauty of proportion and grandeur of conception, there is something disturbing about most of these overpowering ruins. Writers describing them through the years have ever confessed to feelings of sadness and oppression as they contemplate the moldy magnificence—the futility of it all: “They have all gone away from the house on the hill,” and today we don’t even know who they were.
The great monuments do not represent what the Nephites stood for; rather, they stand for what their descendants, “mixed with the blood of their brethren,” descended to. But seen in the newer and wider perspective of comparative religious studies, they suggest to us not only the vanity of mankind and the futility of man’s unaided efforts, but also something nobler; the constant search of men to recapture a time when the powers of heaven were truly at the disposal of a righteous people.” Ancient Temples: What Do They Signify? By Hugh Nibley September 1972
“If my insistent harping on central Asia annoys you, let me remind you again that the book of Ether gives us no choice. It never lets us forget that what the Jaredite kings did was a conscious imitation and unbroken continuation of the ways of “the ancients,” of “them of old” on the other side of the water. This, incidentally, is another indication that we are not to regard the Jaredite migration as taking place immediately after the flood, for the fall of the tower saw the destruction of an ancient and established order. The Jaredites left their homeland driving great herds of cattle before them in the immemorial Asiatic manner, and even if they had never been nomads before, they certainly lived the life of the steppes during those many years before they set sail (Ether 3:3), and when they embarked, they crammed all they could of their beasts into their small boats, “flocks and herds” and other beasts (Ether 6:4), and upon reaching the New World continued to cultivate “all manner of cattle, of oxen, and cows, and of sheep” just as their ancestors had in the old country (Ether 9:18). Now you know, how the Nephites could have had sheep in North America brought to this land by the Jaredites. The Nephites could continue practicing the Law of Moses in the land of The New Jerusalem.” (2 Nephi 25:24 Mosiah 2:3) Hugh Nibley from Lehi in the Desert; The Great Open Spaces
Ancient People Almost Never Built of Stone
“The Nephites vastly preferred wood to any other building material, and only worked in cement when they were forced to by shortage of timber. Indeed, they refused to settle otherwise good lands in the north if timber for building was lacking (Helaman 3:5). Where they reluctantly settled in unforested areas they continued to “dwell in tents, and in houses of cement,” while they patiently waited for the trees to grow (Helaman 3:9). Since cement must be made of limestone [see. p. 63], there was no lack of stone for building in the north. Why then did they not simply build of stone and forget about the cement and wood? Because, surprising as it may seem, ancient people almost never built of stone. Even when the magnificent “king Noah built many elegant and spacious buildings,” their splendor was
that of carved wood and precious metal, like the palace of any great lord of Europe or Asia, with no mention of stone (Mosiah 11:8-9). The Book of Mormon boom cities went up rapidly (Mosiah 23:5; 27:6), while the builders were living in tents. And these were not stone cities: Nephite society was even more dependent on forests than is our own” – Hugh Nibley, An Approach to the Book of Mormon, 2nd Edition, Chapter 29, Building Materials, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co. [1964]. As quoted in Annotated Book of Mormon page 349
“Blinded by the gold of the pharaohs and the mighty ruins of Babylon , Book of Mormon students have declared themselves “not interested” in the drab and commonplace remains of our lowly Indians. But in all the Book of Mormon we look in vain for anything that promises majestic ruins.” (Hugh Nibley, An Approach to the Book of Mormon (Melchizedek Priesthood manual, 1957
Hugh Nibley and Book of Mormon Geography
Article below by Kirk Magleby of Book of Mormon Central whose words appear in black below, and Rian Nelson’s or Jonathan Neville’s words in Red.
Each year at its annual Book of Mormon Lands Conference, the Book of Mormon Archaeological Forum gives the “Father Lehi Award” and the “Mother Sariah Award” to a couple who have contributed significantly to Book of Mormon studies and research. Many months ago, as the BMAF Board of Trustees and Advisory Board discussed the possible options for these awards at the forthcoming eighth annual conference, Kirk Magleby nominated Dr. Hugh W. Nibley for the Father Lehi Award.
After discussing the nomination, everyone unanimously approved Dr. Nibley and his wife, Phyllis, for the awards. Uniquely, the year 2010 marks the one-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Dr. Nibley. More than that, however, everyone liked the choice because of the outstanding contributions of Dr. Nibley and his wife in all aspects of Book of Mormon scholarly endeavors. A few years ago they gave the award to Jack Welch who of course is the one who invented the award.
Not long after BMAF began advertising the 2010 conference, the following email was received from Lenny Goodwin, a Book of Mormon aficionado in his own right:
It’s interesting that you’re giving the Father Lehi Award to Dr. Hugh Nibley. He didn’t believe the Book of Mormon happened in Mesoamerica. I agree with that assessment
Brother Goodwin’s conclusion was drawn from Nibley’s sympathetic description of Hopewell and Adena ruins in the Midwestern United States as representative of what we could expect from the Nephites. As you read Dr. Nibley’s quotes, it indeed supports his belief in the Heartland Theory. I believe Dr. Nibley didn’t live long enough to fully discover the Heartland Theory. He was caught up with the many Historians and Professors who only believed the Mesoamerican Theory. You will see by many of Dr. Nibley’s quotes, he only supports the Mesoamerican Theory as much as they have proven or not yet proven details about the Book of Mormon’s location.
Lenny’s email prompted BMAF executives to ask Kirk Magleby to share his insights about the issue—especially because Kirk had worked so closely with Dr. Nibley during the formative years of the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS). Kirk’s response follows:
Hugh W. Nibley’s defining statement on Book of Mormon geography was published in 1957:
It is our conviction that proof of the Book of Mormon does lie in Central America, but until the people who study that area can come to some agreement among themselves as to what they have found, the rest of us cannot very well start drawing conclusions. (An Approach to the Book of Mormon, Collected Works of Hugh Nibley, 6:442) This in not an endorsement of the Meso Theory, but seems to be the only area that has drawn any interst at this point was in Central american and nooone culd agree on much.
Dr. Nibley maintained that opinion throughout his life. He often repeated a challenge to all comers to produce a book as marvelous as the Book of Mormon, and he frequently referenced Central America in his dare. Typical is this quote from a presentation at a Portland, Oregon, institute symposium: “Write on anything you want, because that is where you give yourself away. Joseph Smith could write anything at all; no one knew about Central America in those times long ago.” (“The Book of Mormon: True or False?” Millennial Star 124, November 1962, 276)
In the third of his four major works on the Book of Mormon, Since Cumorah, first published in 1967, Nibley says: “For example, the book describes in considerable detail what is supposed to be a major earthquake somewhere in Central America, and another time it sets forth the particulars of ancient olive culture. Here are things we can check up on; but to do so we must go to sources made available by scholars long since the days of Joseph Smith. Where he could have learned all about major Central American earthquakes or the fine points of Mediterranean olive culture remains a question.” (“Some Fairly Foolproof Tests,” Since Cumorah, Collected Works of Hugh Nibley, 7:231) BOMC has not found a major earthquake in Central America that could ever compare with the earthquake when the death of Christ happened in Jerusalem. In contrast there is a seemingly forgotten earthquake of 1811 called the New Madrid Earthquake near St. Louis in the USA. See blog here: It seems Nibley was correct.
In the summer of 1971, Hugh traveled to Mexico and Guatemala. He wrote about his trip in his article, “Ancient Temples: What Do They Signify?” published in the September 1972 Ensign. In his article, he alludes to Teotihuacan outside Mexico City as one of the great temple centers of antiquity and describes the imposing architecture of El Castillo and El Caracol at Chichen Itza. Nibley then summarizes by saying, “The great monuments do not represent what the Nephites stood for; rather, they stand for what their descendants, ‘mixed with the blood of their brethren,’ descended to.”
His point is that golden-age Nephite culture would not have produced the sumptuous ruins tourists visit today in Mesoamerica but rather something less grandiose. Therefore, in our search for physical remains of Book of Mormon civilizations, we should be content with modest structures. It is in this context that Nibley mentions the Hopewell and Adena earthworks along the Ohio and Mississippi river systems. These simple earth and timber structures are closer to Nibley’s vision of the Nephites in their heyday than are the Tikals, Copans, or Palenques of the world. Nibley has repeated this theme a number of times over the years—that the pedestrian nature of Moundbuilder cultural remains is representative of what we should expect to find from Classic Nephite civilization. I can’t follow the reasoning here. It seems to me that the fact that Dr. Nibley spoke about finding only Lamanite or evil Nephite ruins. Magleby seems to show here that Nibley is far more interested in the simple ruins of North America, as he sees all the ruins in North America that show the sacred nature of the Nephites building with earth and wood, and never wanting the appearance of some grandiose stone buildings like in Mesoamerica?
This thinking does not mean Nibley thought the land southward was along the Ohio or the Mississippi. In the Ensign article referenced above, he makes sure his readers realize that the Moundbuilders were not autochthonous (Let me simplify Magleby’s big word, which means indigenous, or native) but rather were culturally dependent on “corresponding centers in Mesoamerica.” (How about Mesoamerica being so small compared to the Mississippi River Valley, being dependent on North America?) His writings make clear that in Book of Mormon lands, we will find imposing ruins, but they will be from religiously apostate cultures. (What about having a hard time finding religiously built buildings of the Nephites as they were built simply with earth and wood?) He uses the analogy of a modern Latter-day Saint ward meetinghouse compared with a medieval European cathedral to further emphasize his point. Nibley consistently brings his readers back to the central message of the Book of Mormon, to “come unto Christ” in all of its glorious plainness and simplicity. I agree with this, but Magleby seems to be looking in the wrong place for simple and plain built buildings. They don’t exist in Mesoamerica.
As a research assistant to Paul R. Cheesman in 1975–1977, I had many occasions to consult with Dr. Nibley because our offices were adjacent in the old Joseph Smith Building on the Brigham Young University campus. Nibley was impressed with John L. Sorenson’s manuscript (hundreds of copies were then in informal circulation), which was published as An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon in 1985. He liked John’s idea that the Cumorah of the final battles was in the Tuxtla Mountains of southern Veracruz. He once expressed satisfaction that Sidney B. Sperry had eventually come around to realizing that the text of the Book of Mormon itself precludes a Cumorah of the final battles anywhere north of Mexico City.
Why would Cheesman then be quoted defending a North American setting for the Book of Mormon by saying, “We see through the light of revelation that the wicked of this nation will someday be destroyed in that very area, repeating the same pattern over and over again. The Nephites were destroyed there. The Jaredites were destroyed there. Will our nation go to Mexico to be destroyed at Cumorah? Of course not. Can there be any doubt that these lakes referred to are the Great Lakes? Brigham Young said: This book, which contained these things, was hid in the earth by Moroni, in a hill called by him, Cumorah, which hill is now in the state of New York, near the village of Palmyra, in Ontario County.“ Cheesman, Paul R., 1978, The World of the Book of Mormon, Horizon Publishers, Bountiful, Utah, p. 24
John W. Welch, John L. Sorenson, and I began building FARMS in 1979–80. Hugh was never involved administratively in the organization, but he was a powerful force who influenced much of what we did. We consulted with him often. On one occasion, he expressed delight that Dr. Sorenson was on board. Nibley viewed Sorenson as our best hope to replace the pseudo scholarship of previous generations with substantive insights from Mesoamerica. (Where are those substantive insights they have spent millions looking for? Do we find ancient animals that could be used for the Law of Moses such as sheep, goats, bullocks, doves, or wheat and barley, and there is no wine in ancient Mesoamerica either. What about any migrating beasts in Mesoamerica like is called for in Ether9:34 saying, “And it came to pass that the people did follow the course of the beasts, and did devour the carcasses of them which fell by the way, until they had devoured them all. Now when the people saw that they must perish they began to repent of their iniquities and cry unto the Lord.” In North America we have the Bison, and the Elk. In Mesoamerica the only thing the Jaredites could live off of that are migrating animals are butterflies and turkey’s). Dr. Sorenson’s book was hot off the press in 1985, I personally gave a copy to Dr. Nibley. Holding it, he lit up, saying, “At last, something I can sink my teeth into.” He really liked the maps that John and I had commissioned from cartographers in the University of Utah Department of Geography. (Look below what all of those wonderful maps of Mesoamerica turned into. Today it is called the CES Fantasy Map). Nibley sank his teeth into it as it was so huge and Nibley loved to read, but Nibley seemingly found nothing about Mesoamerica that was tied to the text of the Book of Mormon.
My last visit with Hugh was with Jack Welch in 2003. We met in the Nibley home on Seventh North in Provo. We talked about the many trips Hugh had made to the Hopi villages in northern Arizona. He reiterated his belief that the Book of Mormon took place in Mesoamerica with echoes and remnants filtering up into the native cultures of the continental United States. (The Hopi and Navajo came from way up north in Alaska, they did not migrate north from Mexico to New Mexico). The Navajo are of an Asian DNA like those in Mesoamerica, but the Iroquois and Algonquin Native Americans from the Great Lakes area, have matching DNA with Jews in Israel and Iraq. See Article from National Geographic here).
As a side note about BYU religion professors, during the first few years of FARMS, most members of the BYU religion faculty were skeptical and remained aloof in their attitudes toward Mesoamerica. Hugh Nibley, of course, was on board from the beginning, and John P. Fugal quickly became a supporter. Neal A. Maxwell began donating all the royalties from his books to FARMS in the early 1980s, which is why the organization today is named The Maxwell Institute after Elder Maxwell. Dallin H. Oaks soon became a supporter as well. And after the Mark Hoffman forgery saga rocked the Church in the middle 1980s, more and more BYU religion faculty embraced FARMS and its rigorous approach to ancient scriptural studies. By the end of the 1980s decade, most of the religion faculty were comfortable with the materials produced by FARMS, Robert J. Matthews being a notable exception. Rod Meldrum and Bruce Porter have a book called Prophesies and Promises that was dedicated to the late Dr. Robert J. Matthews who, after reading this manuscript, said with a twinkle in his eye— “I am a one-hill man. I’ve always been a one-hill man just like the Prophet Joseph Smith was, and if I’m wrong…well, at least I’m in good company!” I agree with that explanation completely.
The following article is by Rod Meldrum.
FARMS Founded to Promote Mesoamerican Theories
“During an interview with PBS in 2006, FARMS board member and now former Chief Editor of the FARMS Review, Daniel Peterson, briefly described the beginnings of FARMS by stating, “We wanted to use the training we were getting in ancient languages, ancient history, Middle Eastern studies and so on to examine the Book of Mormon on the assumption that it really is an ancient text with roots in the Middle East or in Mesoamerica.”
FARMS was founded by individuals who fervently believed that the lands of Mesoamerica were the primary lands of the Book of Mormon. They set out “on the assumption” that evidences there would support the Book of Mormon’s historical authenticity or historicity. The organizations logo (see in the article graphic above) featured a Mayan glyph as the upper right character which represented “Mesoamerican studies.” Clearly the organizations focus as related to Book of Mormon research was an underlying assumption that the history occurred in Mesoamerica. In the PBS interview, Peterson draws several parallels from his knowledge of Mesoamerican culture and archaeology. Ultimately FARMS was organized and funds were solicited and raised, in large part due to the efforts of Peterson, in its support. Over a number of years it became one of the premier apologetic organizations outside of the Church and their influence grew as did their promotion of Mesoamerica as the setting for the Book of Mormon.
In 1984 FARMS partnered with Deseret Book and began publication of the collected works of Dr. Hugh Nibley. A year later John Sorenson’s book, An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, which proposed a theory based in Mesoamerica, debuted as one of the foremost studies on Book of Mormon geography and was heavily promoted by both FARMS and Deseret Book. FARMS grew to prominence within the scholarly community at BYU and was approached by the university in late 1997 to join with them under a newly formed organization called the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship (hereinafter MI). Agreements were negotiated such that FARMS could continue on much as it had, but now with the support of the university…and under their direction. The board of FARMS was dissolved and the university appointed directors to oversee operations. Many former FARMS board members retained positions within the new organization.
Even while under the direct control of BYU management, the former FARMS board members turned from defending the official positions of the Church to defending their own theories, specifically the ongoing promotion of their own Mesoamerican theories over the Church’s official position of neutrality on the subject. Following their assimilation into the Maxwell Institute, they began again aggressively criticizing alternative theories that were not in alignment with the now defunct FARMS favored Mesoamerican ideologies. They developed their own interpretations of the geographic passages in the text and held that every other theory must comply with their interpretations or face a hostile negative “review” in their flagship publication, the FARMS Review. However, this time they were in association with and under the auspices of the Church’s BYU controlled Maxwell Institute. Under Peterson’s direction they launched Mesoamerican theory based criticisms against faithful members of the Church whose desire was simply to defend the gospel, but using alternative theories to those of FARMS. The culmination and climax of these critical reviews were those perpetrated against Rod L. Meldrum and his Heartland Model colleagues Wayne N. May and Bruce Porter and many others (all faithful Church members) which were included in the last, and final, three issues of the now defunct FARMS Review…
In FARMS Review, Volume 22, Issue 2, it devoted 107 of 219 pages of articles to critiques against the Heartland Model. Combined, these two issues included 306 pages of anti-Heartland articles in an historic and monumental effort to discredit this invigorating new research and discourage Church members from objectively considering it. This is because it seriously challenges the many years of heavy promotion of Mesoamerican theories by FARMS, especially since a significant paradigm shift was already occurring only months after the release of Meldrum’s first DVD, DNA Evidence for Book of Mormon Geography.” Rodney L. Meldrum
Magleby continues from above, “From my perspective, the number one Book of Mormon scholar of our dispensation is Joseph Smith Jr. After reading about the exploratory work of John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Catherwood in Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan, Joseph modified his prior generalizations and speculations to make them much more geographically precise and concrete as he advocated a Mesoamerican setting for the Nephite scripture.
There is no proof Joseph Smith ever read the Stephens & Catherwood book. Below is an article by Jonathan Neville.
“This is another critical mistake in Church history. The only evidence that Joseph ever read these books is a polite, generalized thank-you note to Dr. Bernhisel, written (not in Joseph’s handwriting) just a few days after Joseph could have (but may not have) received these two books totaling over 900 pages.
The only person who discussed having read these books was Wilford Woodruff, who picked them up from Dr. Bernhisel in New York and read them during the long journey to Nauvoo. (Bernhisel bought the books for Joseph Smith after receiving a visit from Benjamin Winchester.)
The first time Woodruff mentions meeting Joseph was October 31, 1841. The letter to Bernhisel was written a few days later. No one mentioned Joseph having read the books, even if he had the time to do so. The letter uses words and phrases common to Woodruff. I’ve written an entire chapter about this in The Editors: Joseph, William, and Don Carlos Smith
Another point: even if Joseph dictated the Bernhisel letter (instead of directing that Woodruff send a thank-you note), he wrote the Wentworth letter afterward, and the Wentworth letter expressly rejects the hemispheric model (including” Mesoamerica).” Blog titled The Worlds of Joseph Smith updated by Jonathan Neville
Magleby continues, “The number two Book of Mormon scholar of our dispensation is Hugh W. Nibley, who consistently taught a Mesoamerican setting for the Book of Mormon throughout his long career. Not according to the red notes above and Dr. Nibley’s quotes.
The number three Book of Mormon scholar of our dispensation is John W. Welch, who is a forceful proponent for a Mesoamerican setting. Forceful is an understatement. He won’t even consider looking at any evidence in any other place. He has never allowed any Heartland information to even be looked at. He is very closed minded, but I want you to know I have no personal issue against him. I love these devoted scholars Welch and Magleby and so many others who have tried hard to help others understand the Book of Mormon better.
And the number four Book of Mormon scholar of our dispensation is John L. Sorenson, who literally wrote the book on a Mesoamerican setting. Another important scholar who is a great advocate of Mesoamerica but won’t consider any other place.
“Heartland” theorists such as Rodney Meldrum, Bruce Porter, and Wayne May get so many things wrong that they cannot be taken seriously: I take them very seriously and consider their work amazing. They don’t have the three letters after their names like the Meso-Scholars, but their love of the Gospel and dedication to openness and spiritual direction is a blessing for me to see.
- They get the Book of Mormon wrong. They fail to read the entire text as carefully as it deserves to be read, and they fail to distinguish between prophetic generalizations and cultural specifics in the text. Their methodology is classic proof texting.
- They judge Joseph Smith incorrectly. They deny the Prophet his freedom to grow and mature in his ideas as new information became available to him.
- And they get their science wrong. Genetics, meteorology, geology, anthropology—you name it, and the Heartland group of pseudo scholars shows an amateurish tendency to cherry pick data out of context. http://www.bmaf.org/articles/hugh_nibley_geography__magleby
- This is one man’s opinion: Magleby vs one man’s opinion: Nelson. It’s up to you to study, pray and ask the Lord for assistance. May the Lord bless you.
Support for a New England or Heartland Theory
Below is an article by the organization called More Good Foundation, who runs a website called mormonwiki. They are not affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints nor with the Firm Foundation, however they seem to be fairly accurate in how they speak about the Heartland Theory, which they call the New England Theory of the Book of Mormon.
“The Heartland Theory for the Book of Mormon geography suggests that events took place in the heartland of North America and culminated in upstate New York. A strength of the theory is the belief that Cumorah mentioned in the Book of Mormon where Moroni buried the engraved records kept by himself and his father Mormon (see Mormon 6:6) is the same Hill Cumorah from which Joseph Smith removed the record. Rod L. Meldrum has been one of the most notable proponents of this theory.
Book of Mormon Central indicates that the drumlin hill from which Joseph removed the plates was called Cumorah first by William W. Phelps in 1833 and Oliver Cowdery in 1835 and “there is ‘no historical evidence that Moroni called the hill “Cumorah” in 1823’ during his first encounter with the Prophet Joseph Smith.”(See more of the article on Cumorah here.)
- “The Book of Mormon is a history of a related primitive church, and one may well ask what kind of remains the Nephites would leave us from their more virtuous days. A closer approximation to the Book of Mormon picture of Nephite culture is seen in the earth and palisade structures of the Hopewell and Adena culture areas than in the later stately piles of stone in Mesoamerica” (Hugh Nibley, The Prophetic Book of Mormon, “Ancient Temples: What Do They Signify?”, page 272).
- From Ezra Taft Benson: “The prophecies pertinent to this holy land of America were not just directed to the ancient saints, but those of our day as well, that we, too, might know of our responsibility to keep the Promised Land free from sin. Thus, knowing which land is the Promised Land is far more important than we might otherwise have supposed. Not only is such information vital to our understanding of where Book of Mormon activity took place, but learning that those activities took place in what has since become known as the United States of America is therefore critical to our very survival as a nation and as individuals who may just suffer untold misery in years to come if we allow the nation to become ripe in iniquity. The Lord’s decree that all who inhabit this promised land must serve Him or be wiped away is an everlasting decree, and just as pertinent to those of our day as it was to the Nephites or Jaredites, for according to the Lord Himself, this glorious land of America, the place of the New Jerusalem, is the land of promise, and who shall dispute His word.” The Lord’s Base of Operations Elder Ezra Taft Benson, Conference Report, April 1962, pp. 103-106
- From Brigham Young: “This book which contained these things, was hid in the earth by Moroni, in a hill called by him, Cumorah, which hill is now in the State of New York, near the village of Palmyra, in Ontario County. (Cheesman, Paul R., 1978, The World of the Book of Mormon, Horizon Publishers, Bountiful, Utah, p. 24). (Scholars favoring a Mesoamerican location feel that Cumorah was in Mesoamerica, and Moroni carried the plates to the northeastern United States and buried them in a hill, later named after the one in the southern location.)
- From Lucy Mack Smith: “During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He 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 among them.”
- The Indian legend of a great white God: “After these great battles, it was heard that a holy man walked among them. This holy man was known as Etowah, who had come to give the People the Great Law! He taught peace. This was the essence of the religion.” Indian legend says Etowah was taken up into the clouds and that it happened near a place called “The Mountain of Muskoro,” near Lake Erie.
- Indian legends tell not only of a “great white God” who visited them and promised to return, but of their own origins in the land, which coincide well with the Book of Mormon narrative that they originated in the Mediterranean and traveled over the sea to the New World: “It is the belief of the Cherokee People that they came to the land of the New World from the direction of the East Ocean riding on a white cloud. There seems to be in the legend, the existence of some type of round instrument which directed the voyage.” The Cherokee like the Iroquois believe the ancient ones landed somewhere near present day New York State.
- The Book of Mormon narrative constantly refers to the “narrow neck of land,” which in the Algonquin, Huron, Eries, Mohawks, Tuslar, Oras and Oneidas languages is “Niagara.” Nowhere else is that term used. [Niagara means “narrow neck”]
- The Micmac Indians of the northeastern U.S. were discovered in the 1600’s to employ a script very much like Egyptian hieratic. The Book of Mormon was originally written in “reformed Egyptian.”
https://www.mormonwiki.com/Book_of_Mormon_Geography_-_New_England_Theory
Micmac Indian writing above
by Mormonwiki.com Managed by the More Good Foundation.
More Good Foundation is a privately funded 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that promotes and helps members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (often called Mormons) to share their faith online. It launched in 2005 to the solve the overwhelming need for accurate information about the Latter-day Saint faith on the Internet.
