Cumorah

[Returning_Home]

This is where I have to play devil’s advocate; I’ve seen the Holley map before and before and have this to say about it: first, before anyone accepts it as evidence that Smith used names of his surrounding area as supporting material for his BOM, the places need to be authenticated as being used prior to the publishing of the BOM, and second, I read the FAIR response to it, which was typically laughable. FAIR took the sideways approach to it in that it was incorrect based on the proximity of one fictional place to another. I don’t believe that was Holley’s point, but rather to show that the names of people in places in the text were largely taken from real names.

My BOM student manual shows another map with things here and there and curiously, Adam-ondi-Ahman and the Hill Cumorah are absent, which brings me to my next point.

Mormon apologists will sometimes claim that the Hill Cumorah, conveniently located on the Smith family farm, was named for the real Hill Cumorah or is one of several that existed. This is nonsense because the BOM always uses the name in the singular, never the plural. There is only one (so please visit the gift shop and visitor’s center at the base for some great deals!).

My 1971 edition of the BOM shows on page five an aerial view of the hill and it plainly reads C-U-M-O-R-A-H in foliage on the side. The caption simply reads “The Hill Cumorah,” not a Hill Cumorah.

The Jaredites were allegedly wiped out there. Ether chapter 15’s heading says that "Millions of Jaredites are slain in battle and 15:2 states “He saw that there had been slain by the sword lready nearly two millions of his people…” Okay, let’s call it an even two million people. And then later the Nephites go to the same place and are wiped out, too, some quarter of a million people or so. Thus, we have the corpses of some 2.5 million people stinking up the place and yet the church has located exactly nothing of any of them, in spite of owning most of the land in the area.

This begs the question: why, if the BOM events occured in Meso-America, did the Jaredites, Nephites, and Lamanites go all the way to upper New York to have battle? Why travel some 3,000 miles to die on the future site of Joseph Smith’s family farm?

The fact of the matter is that Smith likely intended the setting for the BOM to be in familiar locales but when he read John Lloyd Stephens’ Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan in 1842, it made more sense to him and he simply adopted the idea of using real places as the setting for his fictional book. The “narrow neck of land” then makes much more sense between the lakes.

I’m originally from Pennsylvania and the name Lehigh is very common there; there’s the Lehigh River, Lehigh Valley, Lehigh Gap, Lehigh County, and Lehigh Township in Carbondale County. That doesn’t prove that Smith was exposed to the name while living in the area. The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company, however, does because it was established in 1820.

My great-grandfather was fascinated by Indians and collected artifacts and arrowheads, some of which I still have though sadly none of which were made out of fine steel, but the Indian influence is still very strong in the area; I grew up not far from the local burial mounds and knew where places named Allegheny, Monongahela, and Aliquippa were located.

This is but one more bit of evidence to outweight the church’s claims.

 

[PaulDupre]

Mormon apologists will sometimes claim that the Hill Cumorah, conveniently located on the Smith family farm, was named for the real Hill Cumorah or is one of several that existed. This is nonsense because the BOM always uses the name in the singular, never the plural. There is only one (so please visit the gift shop and visitor’s center at the base for some great deals!).

My 1971 edition of the BOM shows on page five an aerial view of the hill and it plainly reads C-U-M-O-R-A-H in foliage on the side. The caption simply reads “The Hill Cumorah,” not a Hill Cumorah.

And, as I pointed out earlier, the Mormon prophets and apostles have consistently maintained that the one and only hill Cumorah is the one in New York where Smith claimed to have found the gold plates. BYU professors or other lay apologists cannot trump the teachings of Joseph Smith and all the other GA’s.

So again, I ask "why is there no archeological evidence of the battles that took place at Cumorah? An why does the LDS church not excavate the hill and the surrounding area, most of which they own?

 

[Returning_Home]

There was another thread started by SirTMore I believe about a man that was spending his time trying to prove the BoM through excavation and was hoping the Mormon church would continue his work after he died. Some Mormons had been working to prove the BoM true, but have stopped for whatever reason.

I haven’t seen that thread but he could only be referring to Thomas Stuart Ferguson, a born-and-bred Mormon who got the church to establish the New World Archaeological Foundation (NWAF). He was absolutely convinced of the authenticity of the BOM, that it was the true history of the Americas and as he spent some 25 years digging in Mexico and the Yucatan, finally came to the realization that it was all a sham.

Mr. Ferguson lost his faith but stayed with Mormonism for the reason that many closet doubters likely do: the sense of community, family, the benefits, and so forth.

There’s a good book about him called Quest for the Gold Plates: cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Quest-Gold-Plates-Stan-Larson-/350370246465?cmd=ViewItem&pt=US_Nonfiction_Book&hash=item5193b1af41. In it, Ferguson’s evolution of opinion is shown to be gradual but drastic because in his 1950 book (noted below), he draws all kinds of ridiculous parallels between Mormonism and the Aztec, Mayan, and Toltec civilizations, going so far as to tentatively name specific sites as their BOM counterparts compared to his later disappointment and denouncement of Joseph Smith.

The first book is called Ancient America and the Book of Mormon (1950, Kolob Book Co., Oakland, CA with Milton R. Hunter).

I guess I am so frustrated because after reading the posts of Diana, Parker and others, it is evident that they are very intelligent individuals and I know they have looked at the Catholic faith with a very critical eye.

Why not turn that same critical eye to the LDS faith? Anything that is true will hold up. There shouldn’t be anything to hold one back from asking questions.

Don’t be. Mormonism is a cult and like all cults, it reinforces itself *with *itself; that’s one reason that members are ‘called’ to do this and that for the church, all without getting paid. It reasons that if members are busy, they have little time to look into the claims of dissenters. All cults share certain characteristics: the teaching that they alone have the correct interpretation of the Bible and understanding of God, that they alone can save the rest of humanity by getting them into the fold, and that they are part of something much bigger than them since they are all part of a much larger plan. This applies to the Branch Davidiots, The Lord Our Righteousness Church in New Mexico, and even Nazi Germany. The biggest control mechanisms, however, are the threat of ostracism and the constant reminder that the devil is only a step away if they leave the church.

They are told to simply believe and if members have problems doing that, they have their own creative version of God’s plan, culled from the Bible and LDS sources.

Mormonism is one part wishful thinking, one part greed, and one part creative writing, all of which amount to a false religion promoted by false prophets.

All we can do it continue to spread the facts about Mormonism like seeds and pray that God makes one of those seeds grow. Our job isn’t to pick the green fruit.

 

[lax16]

And, as I pointed out earlier, the Mormon prophets and apostles have consistently maintained that the one and only hill Cumorah is the one in New York where Smith claimed to have found the gold plates. BYU professors or other lay apologists cannot trump the teachings of Joseph Smith and all the other GA’s.

So again, I ask "why is there no archeological evidence of the battles that took place at Cumorah? An why does the LDS church not excavate the hill and the surrounding area, most of which they own?

Yes, they have consistently taught that the Hill Cumorah is in New York. There is no way they can back down on that teaching now just because they know it is not true.

Are BYU professors now saying otherwise?

Yes, please someone answer the question!!! Billions of dollars for a downtown shopping district but no excavating going on…

 

[Returning_Home]

Yes, they have consistently taught that the Hill Cumorah is in New York. There is no way they can back down on that teaching now just because they know it is not true.

Are BYU professors now saying otherwise?

Yes, please someone answer the question!!! Billions of dollars for a downtown shopping district but no excavating going on…

I don’t think it’s anyone sanctioned by the church in any way; the church disseminates its opinion through sources like FAIR and FARMS so it can get its side of the story out there for the faithful. That way, they can go and refute people like us here but if they make assumptions or errors, the church can simply distance itself by saying that it was just so-and-so’s opinion. That said, why doesn’t the church defend itself? Simple; they know it’s all a lie and to debate it would simply make them look worse so they largely ignore us.

That all said, the apologists have free reign to come up with some of the most moronic explanations for these major problems because the fact that it’s all a sham simply isn’t open to them.

 

[lax16]

I haven’t seen that thread but he could only be referring to Thomas Stuart Ferguson, a born-and-bred Mormon who got the church to establish the New World Archaeological Foundation (NWAF). He was absolutely convinced of the authenticity of the BOM, that it was the true history of the Americas and as he spent some 25 years digging in Mexico and the Yucatan, finally came to the realization that it was all a sham.

Mr. Ferguson lost his faith but stayed with Mormonism for the reason that many closet doubters likely do: the sense of community, family, the benefits, and so forth.

There’s a good book about him called Quest for the Gold Plates: cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Quest-Gold-Plates-Stan-Larson-/350370246465?cmd=ViewItem&pt=US_Nonfiction_Book&hash=item5193b1af41. In it, Ferguson’s evolution of opinion is shown to be gradual but drastic because in his 1950 book (noted below), he draws all kinds of ridiculous parallels between Mormonism and the Aztec, Mayan, and Toltec civilizations, going so far as to tentatively name specific sites as their BOM counterparts compared to his later disappointment and denouncement of Joseph Smith.

The first book is called Ancient America and the Book of Mormon (1950, Kolob Book Co., Oakland, CA with Milton R. Hunter).

Don’t be. Mormonism is a cult and like all cults, it reinforces itself *with *itself; that’s one reason that members are ‘called’ to do this and that for the church, all without getting paid. It reasons that if members are busy, they have little time to look into the claims of dissenters. All cults share certain characteristics: the teaching that they alone have the correct interpretation of the Bible and understanding of God, that they alone can save the rest of humanity by getting them into the fold, and that they are part of something much bigger than them since they are all part of a much larger plan. This applies to the Branch Davidiots, The Lord Our Righteousness Church in New Mexico, and even Nazi Germany. The biggest control mechanisms, however, are the threat of ostracism and the constant reminder that the devil is only a step away if they leave the church.

They are told to simply believe and if members have problems doing that, they have their own creative version of God’s plan, culled from the Bible and LDS sources.

Mormonism is one part wishful thinking, one part greed, and one part creative writing, all of which amount to a false religion promoted by false prophets.

All we can do it continue to spread the facts about Mormonism like seeds and pray that God makes one of those seeds grow. Our job isn’t to pick the green fruit.

ReturningHome-

Yes, thank you, that is the man I was thinking about. I didn’t know that he lost his faith. I thought before he died he was able to get a Mormon sponsor (Marriott??) to give money to continue his work. Is that incorrect?

I am glad you referenced his books. They sound very interesting. It is obvious that he was very sincere and devout when he began his work.

Yes, you are right about spreading the facts…sometimes I get so frustrated with the obvious problems with Mormonism and (smart) people acting like there aren’t problems.

Were you LDS?

 

[Javl]

One question I have asked and have never received an answer to is that if the Nephites, Jerudites, etc. are peoples from the near east ( Israel, Arabia, and thereabouts ) howcome none of them spoke any of the semitic languages ( Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, etc. )???

PAX DOMINI

Shalom Aleichem

 

[lax16]

I don’t think it’s anyone sanctioned by the church in any way; the church disseminates its opinion through sources like FAIR and FARMS so it can get its side of the story out there for the faithful. That way, they can go and refute people like us here but if they make assumptions or errors, the church can simply distance itself by saying that it was just so-and-so’s opinion. That said, why doesn’t the church defend itself? Simple; they know it’s all a lie and to debate it would simply make them look worse so they largely ignore us.

That all said, the apologists have free reign to come up with some of the most moronic explanations for these major problems because the fact that it’s all a sham simply isn’t open to them.

Does the LDS church discuss the lack of excavating work on FAIR and FARMS?

 

[lax16]

One question I have asked and have never received an answer to is that if the Nephites, Jerudites, etc. are peoples from the near east ( Israel, Arabia, and thereabouts ) howcome none of them spoke any of the semitic languages ( Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, etc. )???

PAX DOMINI

Shalom Aleichem

You know, we are just trying to be logical about the whole thing. Every question that is asked is a LOGICAL question!!!

 

[CatholicGuyNY]

All cults share certain characteristics: the teaching that they alone have the correct interpretation of the Bible and understanding of God, that they alone can save the rest of humanity by getting them into the fold, and that they are part of something much bigger than them since they are all part of a much larger plan. This applies to the Branch Davidiots, The Lord Our Righteousness Church in New Mexico, and even Nazi Germany. The biggest control mechanisms, however, are the threat of ostracism and the constant reminder that the devil is only a step away if they leave the church.

Before dianaiad says it, I’ll just go ahead and say just be careful with this, since some evangelicals say the exact same thing about the Catholic Church for the same reasons. Especially about correct Biblical interpretation (and who is/are the authoritative interpreter(s)), EENS (thought the Church today, as we see in the Catechism, doesn’t view this in a very rigid way), and the effects on salvation of someone that leaves the Catholic Church.

Just saying it before dianaiad comes in and pulls a “tu quoque” fallacy.

 

[Returning_Home]

ReturningHome-

Yes, thank you, that is the man I was thinking about. I didn’t know that he lost his faith. I thought before he died he was able to get a Mormon sponsor (Marriott??) to give money to continue his work. Is that incorrect?

I am glad you referenced his books. They sound very interesting. It is obvious that he was very sincere and devout when he began his work.

Yes, you are right about spreading the facts…sometimes I get so frustrated with the obvious problems with Mormonism and (smart) people acting like there aren’t problems.

Were you LDS?

Ferguson was able to get the church to finance his research and while he didn’t find anything to confirm Mormonism, the legitimacy of the work he did is still overlooked. The man was a consumate professional and wanted to run his work without the stigma of it being a Mormon trying to confirm Mormonism; some of the people he aligned himself with weren’t Mormons at all and he wisely did so to lend an air of impartiality.

I don’t recall any Marriots contributing funds, but he did some independent fundraising of his own to supplement what the church gave him. Marriot, like Romney, is a long-time family name involved with the church.

Yes, Mr. Ferguson was a sincere member of the church, convinced that he would vindicate it and Joseph Smith. The greatest blow to his faith wasn’t the actual field research, however; it was the debunking of the Book of Abraham. He was very proactive about that and got the top Egyptologists of his day to look at the papyrus that Joseph Smith “translated.”

Frankly, I admire his tenacity and his ability to look for the truth, even when it lead him to lose his faith.

No, I was never LDS, but I had experiences with friends who joined. The more I learned, the more clear it became that something was very wrong with it. I managed to get my friend out but he promptly joined the Jehovah’s Witnesses. I felt like I failed him but my interest was piqued and I’ve been on this trajectory since. That was 15 years ago, I guess.

I’m a ‘cradle Catholic,’ born and raised in a strict Irish/Italian/Polish RCC family. I left the church at age 14 and have now come back, thus my user name. I hope I’m wiser and better prepared for my new spiritual life, perhaps bringing something new to the table; I still have some problems with Catholicism but don’t want to stir the pot when I have a mountain to move.

 

[lax16]

Ferguson was able to get the church to finance his research and while he didn’t find anything to confirm Mormonism, the legitimacy of the work he did is still overlooked. The man was a consumate professional and wanted to run his work without the stigma of it being a Mormon trying to confirm Mormonism; some of the people he aligned himself with weren’t Mormons at all and he wisely did so to lend an air of impartiality.

I don’t recall any Marriots contributing funds, but he did some independent fundraising of his own to supplement what the church gave him. Marriot, like Romney, is a long-time family name involved with the church.

Yes, Mr. Ferguson was a sincere member of the church, convinced that he would vindicate it and Joseph Smith. The greatest blow to his faith wasn’t the actual field research, however; it was the debunking of the Book of Abraham. He was very proactive about that and got the top Egyptologists of his day to look at the papyrus that Joseph Smith “translated.”

Frankly, I admire his tenacity and his ability to look for the truth, even when it lead him to lose his faith.

No, I was never LDS, but I had experiences with friends who joined. The more I learned, the more clear it became that something was very wrong with it. I managed to get my friend out but he promptly joined the Jehovah’s Witnesses. I felt like I failed him but my interest was piqued and I’ve been on this trajectory since. That was 15 years ago, I guess.

I’m a ‘cradle Catholic,’ born and raised in a strict Irish/Italian/Polish RCC family. I left the church at age 14 and have now come back, thus my user name. I hope I’m wiser and better prepared for my new spiritual life, perhaps bringing something new to the table; I still have some problems with Catholicism but don’t want to stir the pot when I have a mountain to move.

You know a lot about Mormonism for a Catholic!
I have been around Mormonism for about 20 years. Now that I live in Utah I have been trying to get to the meat and potatoes of it all.

We have a similar background (minus the Polish part). I have never left the CC but have always tried to study it with an open mind, much like the gentleman we have been discussing, Mr. Ferguson. So far, my “digging” has made my faith stronger!

Was he an actual archaeologist - he was very professional in his approach. Being impartial on digs is critical. I remember the whole “Cave of John the Baptist mess” that happened several years ago.

 

[ParkerD]

Hi Parker - Where do YOU say Cumorah is?

Hi, Lax16,
My thoughts have run as follows about the hill called in the Book of Mormon “Cumorah”:

As a child and young adult, I thought it was the hill in upstate New York that the LDS are familiar with as being the “Hill Cumorah”.

During college and beyond, I was comfortable with the possibility that there might be a “Cumorah” in Mexico or Central America that was the place where Moroni originally hid the records and the Liahona, and that he carried the plates while he was still alive and wandering while staying in hiding, to the location where Joseph Smith was shown they were buried. If during those years, I read someone’s writing who said they believed there was definitely only one “Cumorah”, then I was comfortable that this was a viable opinion but need not be the one way to view the situation.

Lately, I tend to lean to the “one Cumorah” position, but am not passionate about that one way or the other. I think either position is plausible, and I haven’t seen a reason to have to think either one can’t be acceptable.

As to why there is “no excavation” at or around the Hill Cumorah, the battles that took place were in the vicinity but that doesn’t mean they were on the Hill Cumorah, besides which the Lamanite and Nephite armies were described as being plunderers continuously, and there was a situation described that people would “sleep with their weapon in their hand” because if they placed it on the ground, in the morning it would be gone–evidently having been stolen immediately. So the winning side would not leave any weapons laying around, at all–not one piece of evidence would show there had been a battle. Any weapons left laying around would have been taken as soon as it was seen by someone.

The description also depicts the “Lamanite” group as wanting to destroy all religious symbols of the people they warred against, and any of their writings–so any such archeological evidences would have been carried off or burned and destroyed, thus leaving no trace of having existed, and those “Lamanite” groups were described as being passionate about doing that, so it was not a happenstance thing–it was a deliberate action that continued for years and evidently for centuries of time. This was their way of life. It was what they taught their children to do.

As to languages, there are hundreds and even thousands of languages among the native American tribes, and the Book of Mormon describes a group of people (the Mulekites) who came to the New World about the same time as the Nephite group, but whose language became so changed during 500 years time that the two groups didn’t understand each other when they encountered each other after 500 years of not knowing the other group was on the continent with them. So to have an expectation that language similarity should be a clue to their origins, would neither be borne out by the Book of Mormon nor is it borne out by a study of, say, the evolution of the English language from AD 1 to 2000 AD.

 

[Returning_Home]

One question I have asked and have never received an answer to is that if the Nephites, Jerudites, etc. are peoples from the near east ( Israel, Arabia, and thereabouts ) howcome none of them spoke any of the semitic languages ( Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, etc. )???

They supposedly did because the Nephites were Jewish but for some reason, they put their holiest of books into the language of their captors, the Egyptians, which, when ‘translated’ by Joseph Smith, shows that they actually spoke in Elizabethan English.

Does that make sense to you? Yeah, me neither.

 

[Returning_Home]

You know a lot about Mormonism for a Catholic!
I have been around Mormonism for about 20 years. Now that I live in Utah I have been trying to get to the meat and potatoes of it all.

We have a similar background (minus the Polish part). I have never left the CC but have always tried to study it with an open mind, much like the gentleman we have been discussing, Mr. Ferguson. So far, my “digging” has made my faith stronger!

Was he an actual archaeologist - he was very professional in his approach. Being impartial on digs is critical. I remember the whole “Cave of John the Baptist mess” that happened several years ago.

I devour anything about Mormonism that I can get my hands on; I prefer the pro-LDS and Mormon produced literature when I can find it. I subscribe to FAIR, FARMS, and other LDS sites so I get the inside track on what they believe and think.

Mr. Ferguson was an amateur archaeologist but had people who knew more about the discipline working with and advising him.

Living in Utah as a non-Mormon can be tough, I understand. What do you think of the language barrier between us and them?

 

[campeador]

…So the winning side would not leave any weapons laying around, at all–not one piece of evidence would show there had been a battle…

…so any such archeological evidences would have been carried off or burned and destroyed, thus leaving no trace of having existed…

…and the Book of Mormon describes a group of people (the Mulekites) who came to the New World about the same time as the Nephite group, but whose language became so changed during 500 years time that the two groups didn’t understand each other when they encountered each other…

Is P.T. Barnum an LDS prophet?

 

[Returning_Home]

As a child and young adult, I thought it was the hill in upstate New York that the LDS are familiar with as being the “Hill Cumorah”.

There’s never been more than one and there’s no evidence in the BOM to support any other conclusion.

During college and beyond, I was comfortable with the possibility that there might be a “Cumorah” in Mexico or Central America that was the place where Moroni originally hid the records and the Liahona, and that he carried the plates while he was still alive and wandering while staying in hiding, to the location where Joseph Smith was shown they were buried. If during those years, I read someone’s writing who said they believed there was definitely only one “Cumorah”, then I was comfortable that this was a viable opinion but need not be the one way to view the situation.

There’s no evidence that Moroni wandered anywhere but to the top of the hill where he buried the plates. The text absolutely doesn’t support this in any way, shape, or form.

Lately, I tend to lean to the “one Cumorah” position, but am not passionate about that one way or the other. I think either position is plausible, and I haven’t seen a reason to have to think either one can’t be acceptable.

Since Mormonism claims to have the ‘fulness of the gospel,’ your historical apathy is just a way to ignore the fact that since there’s always been just one Cumorah, the question will always arise to why not one single artifact has ever been found.

As to why there is “no excavation” at or around the Hill Cumorah, the battles that took place were in the vicinity but that doesn’t mean they were on the Hill Cumorah, besides which the Lamanite and Nephite armies were described as being plunderers continuously, and there was a situation described that people would “sleep with their weapon in their hand” because if they placed it on the ground, in the morning it would be gone–evidently having been stolen immediately. So the winning side would not leave any weapons laying around, at all–not one piece of evidence would show there had been a battle. Any weapons left laying around would have been taken as soon as it was seen by someone.

So the site of the Battle of Gettysburg long giving up artifacts testifying to the horrors is somehow different? With a mere 46,000 dead on that piece of land, it pales by comparison to the 2.5 million who died at Hill Cumorah. What’s the difference between the two? Is Cumorah peculiar in that it somehow magically absorbed all of those who died on its banks?

Your explanation is absurd at best but I’ll give you an A for creative writing.

The description also depicts the “Lamanite” group as wanting to destroy all religious symbols of the people they warred against, and any of their writings–so any such archeological evidences would have been carried off or burned and destroyed, thus leaving no trace of having existed, and those “Lamanite” groups were described as being passionate about doing that, so it was not a happenstance thing–it was a deliberate action that continued for years and evidently for centuries of time. This was their way of life. It was what they taught their children to do.

So I gather that they destroyed all evidence of themselves, too, right? Of course that doesn’t make sense. In fact, if the American Indians are the descendants of the Lamanites, one would assume that we’d still see some remnants of their Hebrew origins such as language, religious practices, or even the names of famour Lamanite heroes, none of which have anything to do with the Indians.

It would be impossible to, short of a massive nuclear strike, wipe out all evidences of any given civilization; something somewhere would survive. We know of obscure civilizations that have long gone the way of the Dodo like the Picts and the Formorians, groups much less advanced than the enlightened Nephites and Lamanites who made glass and steel weapons long before anyone else.

You’re digging yourself a hole that you can’t climb out of; none of this makes any sense.

As to languages, there are hundreds and even thousands of languages among the native American tribes, and the Book of Mormon describes a group of people (the Mulekites) who came to the New World about the same time as the Nephite group, but whose language became so changed during 500 years time that the two groups didn’t understand each other when they encountered each other after 500 years of not knowing the other group was on the continent with them. So to have an expectation that language similarity should be a clue to their origins, would neither be borne out by the Book of Mormon nor is it borne out by a study of, say, the evolution of the English language from AD 1 to 2000 AD.

Since “Reformed Egyptian” evolved from the original Egyptian glyphs, we should see some intermediate forms of this, either in the New or Old Worlds, and yet nothing even comes close except modern symbols for numbers, letter, and musical figures.

In fact, we find no such indication that anything resembling Hebrew or Egyptian can be found in the New World prior to Columbus. Had the early European explorers found anything confirming your claims, surely there would have been a mention of it in the extensive records and journals that they kept. Instead, Columbus, Ponce Deleon, and Henry Hudson are all silent on this matter.

 

[ParkerD]

Is P.T. Barnum an LDS prophet?

Campeador,
Thanks for the link. Fun information–I enjoyed reading it. Several good points were made in such a short article, such as this one:

“According to David W. Maurer, writing in ‘The Big Con’ (1940), there was a similar saying amongst con men: “There’s a mark born every minute, and one to trim 'em and one to knock 'em”. Here ‘trim’ means to rip off, and ‘knock’ means to persuade away from a scam. The meaning is that there is no shortage of new victims, nor of con men, nor of honest men.”

That last sentence is certainly true, and thus the question becomes “who is being victimized by whom?” or “who is being honest?”–and those who believe the Spaulding theories can easily be figured out as having been victimized if any of those same people seriously reads the Book of Mormon with a sense of honesty in their heart of hearts and any knowledge at all about the complexity of creating literary tone, voices, flash-backs, and authenticity…

 

[ParkerD]

Lax16,
Since you may or may not have read the Book of Mormon itself, here is a help for you to understand the scene around the Cumorah area described as the last battle area:

Mormon 6:2 And I, Mormon, wrote an epistle unto the king of the Lamanites, and desired of him that he would grant unto us that we might gather together our people unto the land of Cumorah, by a hill which was called Cumorah, and there we could give them battle.
3 And it came to pass that the king of the Lamanites did grant unto me the thing which I desired.
4 And it came to pass that we did march forth to the land of Cumorah, and we did pitch our tents round 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.
5 And *when three hundred and eighty and four years had passed away, we had gathered in all the remainder of our people unto the land of Cumorah.
6 And it came to pass that when we had gathered in all our people in one to the land of Cumorah, behold I, Mormon, began to be old; and knowing it to be the last struggle of my people, and having been commanded of the Lord that I should not suffer the records which had been handed down by our fathers, which were sacred, to fall into the hands of the Lamanites, (for the Lamanites would destroy them) therefore I made this record out of the plates of Nephi, and hid up in the hill Cumorah all the records which had been entrusted to me by the hand of the Lord, save it were these few plates which I gave unto my son Moroni.
7 And it came to pass that my people, with their wives and their children, did now behold the armies of the Lamanites marching towards them; and with that awful fear of death which fills the breasts of all the wicked, did they await to receive them.
8 And it came to pass that they came to battle against us, and every soul was filled with terror because of the greatness of their numbers.
9 And it came to pass that they did fall upon my people with the sword, and with the bow, and with the arrow, and with the ax, and with all manner of weapons of war.
10 And it came to pass that my men were hewn down, yea, even my ten thousand who were with me, and I fell wounded in the midst; and they passed by me that they did not put an end to my life.
11 And when they had gone through and hewn down all my people save it were twenty and four of us, (among whom was my son Moroni) and we having survived the dead of our people, did behold on the morrow, when the Lamanites had returned unto their camps, from the top of the hill Cumorah, the ten thousand of my people who were hewn down, being led in the front by me.
12 And we also beheld the ten thousand of my people who were led by my son Moroni.
13 And behold, the ten thousand of Gidgiddonah had fallen, and he also in the midst.
14 And Lamah had fallen with his ten thousand; and Gilgal had fallen with his ten thousand; and Limhah had fallen with his ten thousand; and Jeneum had fallen with his ten thousand; and Cumenihah, and Moronihah, and Antionum, and Shiblom, and Shem, and Josh, had fallen with their ten thousand each.
15 And it came to pass that there were ten more who did fall by the sword, with their ten thousand each; yea, even all my people, save it were those twenty and four who were with me, and also a few who had escaped into the south countries, and a few who had deserted over unto the Lamanites, had fallen; and their flesh, and bones, and blood lay upon the face of the earth, being left by the hands of those who slew them to molder upon the land, and to crumble and to return to their mother earth.

So 230,000 Nephites were killed during that last battle scene, having fought against millions of Lamanites. Those Lamanites are depicted as having many wars among them thereafter–so there was continual need for the weapons (of course):

Mormon 8: And now it came to pass that after the great and tremendous battle at Cumorah, behold, the Nephites who had escaped into the country southward were hunted by the Lamanites, until they were all destroyed.
3 And my father also was killed by them, and I even remain alone to write the sad tale of the destruction of my people. But behold, they are gone, and I fulfil the commandment of my father. And whether they will slay me, I know not.
4 Therefore I will write and hide up the records in the earth; and whither I go it mattereth not.
5 Behold, my father hath made this record, and he hath written the intent thereof. And behold, I would write it also if I had room upon the plates, but I have not; and ore I have none, for I am alone. My father hath been slain in battle, and all my kinsfolk, and I have not friends nor whither to go; and how long the Lord will suffer that I may live I know not.
6 Behold, *four hundred years have passed away since the coming of our Lord and Savior.
7 And behold, the Lamanites have hunted my people, the Nephites, down from city to city and from place to place, even until they are no more; and great has been their fall; yea, great and marvelous is the destruction of my people, the Nephites.
8 And behold, it is the hand of the Lord which hath done it. And behold also, the Lamanites are at war one with another; and the whole face of this land is one continual round of murder and bloodshed; and no one knoweth the end of the war.

 

[ParkerD]

Lax16,
Here also are Moroni’s words describing how he kept hidden from the Lamanites during the many years from when his father was killed in about 385 AD until he hid up the abridged plates (a smaller set of records than the records described as having been hidden by Mormon) for the final time in 421 AD:

Moroni 1:1 NOW I, Moroni, after having made an end of abridging the account of the people of Jared, I had supposed not to have written more, but I have not as yet perished; and I make not myself known to the Lamanites lest they should destroy me.
2 For behold, their wars are exceedingly fierce among themselves; and because of their hatred they put to death every Nephite that will not deny the Christ.
3 And I, Moroni, will not deny the Christ; wherefore, I wander whithersoever I can for the safety of mine own life.
4 Wherefore, I write a few more things, contrary to that which I had supposed; for I had supposed not to have written any more; but I write a few more things, that perhaps they may be of worth unto my brethren, the Lamanites, in some future day, according to the will of the Lord.