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WarriorAngel
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And …
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WarriorAngel
Guest
Now presupposing these evidences did not exist [which they do] There is still NOT one ounce, no not even one shred of evidence of any city or town that Smith claimed were on some golden tablets.
No, not even one piece of pottery to show they existed.
Yet archeology has been able to trace back into history USING the Bible as a guide.
That’s the significant difference between the truth of the Bible and the falsehood of the Golden tablets.
WHERE is the evidence ??
The Bible is not under fire here - but even if it were - there is evidence.
However; the position MUST BE turned around against the Bible - simply because there isnt an ounce, nor inkling of proof that what Smith said was true.
Show the evidence please.
Mormon archeologists looked in earnest… but yet have lost hope the great myth will ever be proovable.
What sort of answer is this?
Moroni eventually told Smith of the location of buried golden tablets with … Today the LDS claim not to have them, saying that they were returned to divine care. …
An Apostle to the Mormon Church, Joseph Fielding Smith, commenting on the Joseph Smith Jr., claims and revelations writes.,
a false prophet
Jesus said in Matthew:
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"Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it.
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"For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
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"See, I have told you beforehand.
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"Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. Matthew 24:23-26
No, not even one piece of pottery to show they existed.
Yet archeology has been able to trace back into history USING the Bible as a guide.
That’s the significant difference between the truth of the Bible and the falsehood of the Golden tablets.
WHERE is the evidence ??
The Bible is not under fire here - but even if it were - there is evidence.
However; the position MUST BE turned around against the Bible - simply because there isnt an ounce, nor inkling of proof that what Smith said was true.
Show the evidence please.
Mormon archeologists looked in earnest… but yet have lost hope the great myth will ever be proovable.
What sort of answer is this?
Moroni eventually told Smith of the location of buried golden tablets with … Today the LDS claim not to have them, saying that they were returned to divine care. …
An Apostle to the Mormon Church, Joseph Fielding Smith, commenting on the Joseph Smith Jr., claims and revelations writes.,
Deuteronomy 18:20-21
a false prophet
- Speaks in the name of other gods
- Presumes to speak a word in “My name”, which I have not commanded
- If the word does not come to pass….the Lord has not spoken it.
Jesus said in Matthew:
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"Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it.
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"For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
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"See, I have told you beforehand.
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"Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. Matthew 24:23-26
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ReligiousQuest
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WarriorAngel, the History Channel started out by investigating it as a possibility, later to only find that it wasn’t legitimate, and investigated the claim. They have not found scientific evidence backing up the claim of Noah’s Ark on Mount Ararat en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Searches_for_Noah%27s_Ark
I also emailed the Smithsonian for what they have to say about the Bible. Although they said that parts of the Bible have a lot of support, one of their comments is that to this day, no one knows the exact Mountain that was Mount Ararat, there are different proposals. They also said that they’ve found no geological layers of a universal global flood in Earth’s history. They said that although many parts of the Bible are more accurate than Greek and Egyptian history, there are still parts of the Bible that have serious problems, and “In the best analysis, the Bible is a religious book, not an historical document.” They said about the Flood, “Most Biblical scholars and Near Eastern archeologists and historians regard the Biblical story of the flood and Noah’s Ark as a story handed down by oral tradition.” That was from email address KAUPPA@si.edu from anthropology.si.edu//outreach/outrch1.html of the Smithsonian (you can verify). I consider the Smithsonian to not be a random Internet site.
From what I’ve found, those were actually coral reefs that resembled chariot wheels in photographs, similar to how Loch Ness Monster sitings happen. Ron Wyatt, who made the claim he saw and photographed them, claimed that he removed a wheel and an Egyptian authority told him it was real, but no one can publicly verify or locate the wheel that he claimed he had found (Science and Archaeology requires public verification, not anecdotal evidence, where others can verify and replicate their findings). Can you tell me which museum the wheel is found at? Everything I can find on Ron Wyatt is that he is accused of being a pseudoarchaeologist by mainstream Archaeology. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Wyatt#Reception
If he’s not, then why can’t Mormons believe all of their Book of Mormon archaeologists are real archaeologists?
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ReligiousQuest
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WarriorAngel, I appreciate your attempts to support the Bible’s history before King David’s time (Latter-day Saints and all Abrahamic Religions believe the Bible is the Word of God even if the different denominations have different interpretations, and some see different parts as literal or metaphor). However, the archaeologists who believe in the history of the Bible before King David’s time are the religious conservative ones.
The carbon dating of Ai at 2200 B.C., Jericho at 1500 B.C., and Hazor at 1200 B.C. (all three found in the Book of Joshua) also don’t match up with the proposed Pharaohs of Egypt, as far as chronology goes.
If the Egyptians “wanted to erase the Hebrews and economic crisis from Egyptian written history” is evidence of the Exodus, then why is it not any less plausible when Mormon archaeologists claim the Lamanites hated the Nephites and so they erased all their records?
Archaeologists claim that many of the 30 cities mentioned in the Book of Jericho didn’t exist until the 600’s B.C., rather than the time of Joshua, and that the Chaldeans/Philistines/nomads on camels/etc didn’t exist 2000 B.C. during Abraham’s time.
This doesn’t prove/disprove the Bible/Book of Mormon. It’s just showing that the same criticisms are used for the Bible’s history before King David’s time. Obviously after 600 B.C. there is really good archaeological evidence, and some after King David’s time (many secular archaeologists say it has to be moved to after Solomon’s time). It doesn’t matter if everything after 600 B.C. is totally correct and everything before King David is totally incorrect. However, if mainstream archaeology (not from the field of actual religious adherents) alone is the way to tell if a religious text is valid, the Bible would get thrown out also.
The Ipuwer Papyrus is usually believed to describe ecological calamities that happened over decades of time, not a short period of time like the Book of Exodus requires. The Ipuwer Papyrus is also dated to long before all the dates proposed for the Exodus. If events not lining up with the dating of items doesn’t matter, the Book of Mormon mentions Elephants, and Mammoth skeletons have been found in the Americas (although it’s difficult to prove a negative and so there could be some mammoths that lived late enough to meet the Jaredites). So mammoths prove the Book of Mormon, right? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagues_of_Egypt#Historicity Says the secular don’t believe in the Plagues of Egypt, and that there are some empirical suggestions, but they are not accepted by mainstream archaeologists, just individuals. (There are individual Latter-day Saint archaeologists who believe in the Book of Mormon)
There were always children dying in ancient history from diseases. That’s why “secular” archaeologists don’t accept that as evidence. Likewise, the Book of Mormon mentions wars, and wars are found by archaeologists for ancient Native Americans.
The carbon dating of Ai at 2200 B.C., Jericho at 1500 B.C., and Hazor at 1200 B.C. (all three found in the Book of Joshua) also don’t match up with the proposed Pharaohs of Egypt, as far as chronology goes.
That Stele was found 1213-1203 B.C., and the earliest mention of Israel, where it says they caused destruction to Israel. If the Exodus happened hundreds of years earlier, encyclopedias and archaeologists say that the land of Canaan was a province of Egypt until the 1200 B.C. (1150 when the last garrisons removed), and they kept records of groups of people who settled, then why was that the first mention they had of Israel? A large group of over a million Hebrew slaves departing from Egypt would have also made a huge economic gap in Egyptian history that they would have for sure noticed, but they never mentioned the Hebrews during that time nor the economic crisis. This from the “History Channel” is why secular archaeologists don’t believe in Moses or the Exodus: youtube.com/watch?v=v2HqrIwz0Pw&NR=1
If the Egyptians “wanted to erase the Hebrews and economic crisis from Egyptian written history” is evidence of the Exodus, then why is it not any less plausible when Mormon archaeologists claim the Lamanites hated the Nephites and so they erased all their records?
Archaeologists claim that many of the 30 cities mentioned in the Book of Jericho didn’t exist until the 600’s B.C., rather than the time of Joshua, and that the Chaldeans/Philistines/nomads on camels/etc didn’t exist 2000 B.C. during Abraham’s time.
This doesn’t prove/disprove the Bible/Book of Mormon. It’s just showing that the same criticisms are used for the Bible’s history before King David’s time. Obviously after 600 B.C. there is really good archaeological evidence, and some after King David’s time (many secular archaeologists say it has to be moved to after Solomon’s time). It doesn’t matter if everything after 600 B.C. is totally correct and everything before King David is totally incorrect. However, if mainstream archaeology (not from the field of actual religious adherents) alone is the way to tell if a religious text is valid, the Bible would get thrown out also.
Likewise, one of the reasons Jews don’t accept the New Testament, the Messiah being the Son of God or a Savior & Redeemer, or Jesus Christ being the Messiah, is because Deuteronomy talks about the Law of Moses. Deut. 4:2 says that no one should add or take away from the Law of Moses. Jews see Jesus as doing that to the Law of Moses, and thus not the Messiah (they believe the Messiah will be a powerful prophet). Deut. chapter 13 talks about watching out for those who show signs, so because of that many Jews consider Jesus a deceitful magician, to be ignored. For the same reasons you don’t let Deut. 4:2 and chapter 13 bother you about the New Testament, Latter-day Saints don’t let Galatians chapter 1 bother them.
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PaulDupre
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And where is the Hebrew and Egyptian writing at those Mayan, Inca, Aztec and Olmec sites? Where are the metal tools and weapons? There isn’t any, because those civilizations had nothing to do with the fictional people in the BOM. There is no trace at all of the Nephite civilization.
Civilizations leave artifacts, even relatively small civilizations. There are great artifacts from the small bands of Vikings who visited Newfoundland and parts of the American mainland, and those Vikings were only there for a few years. Why are there no artifacts from the Nephites, whom the BOM claims were here for 1000 years? The Nephites were highly literate. They built ocean-going ships, cement cities, roads to connect those cities, and fortresses and temples. They made tools and weapons out of metal. They fought huge wars with armored infantry and horse-drawn chariots. Where are all these things?
If archaeologists found a Nephite city, they would find lots of Hebrew writing and perhaps “reformed Egyptian” as well. They would find traces of metal tool- and weapon-making, and there would be no doubt that this civilization was vastly different from the Mayan, Inca, Aztec and Olmec peoples, who never got out of the stone age and never invented the wheel.
But nope, not a trace, because the Book of Mormon is a 19th-century work of fiction.
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ReligiousQuest
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And where is all the evidence for everything before King David’s time in the Bible? Why wouldn’t it be any less reasonable for a Latter-day Saint to believe in the Book of Mormon than anyone to believe in the history of the Bible before King David’s time? Most secular archaeologists don’t believe in the history before that time, while it’s the religious conservative ones who do.
The Book of Joshua mentions 30 cities that were destroyed. Archaeologists say that many of them didn’t come into existence until the 600’s B.C. Don’t real civilizations leave their mark? Archaeologists don’t consider some cities existing while many did not, when there are very specific locations in Canaan with real names given, as real evidence. Archaeologists also say that the destruction of Jericho was carbon dated to 1500 B.C., the City of Ai abandoned 2200 B.C., and Hazor by fire 1250 B.C. Most archaeologists over in Israel who are not the conservative religious ones don’t believe in Joshua’s Conquest, because they believe all those cities should have existed at the time, and that Jericho, Ai, and Hazor would have had to be conquered within a lifetime.
Archaeologists and most encyclopedias say that the land of Canaan was an Egyptian province until 1200 B.C. (last garrisons out at 1150 B.C.). If you wanted to settle the area at that time, you needed permission from the Egyptians. Archaeologists say that the first mention of the Israelites from the Egyptians was about 1200 B.C., and that is something that should have shown up in Egyptian records if over a million Hebrews left Egypt as slaves and then as an Exodus went into Canaan. There were also Egyptian posts all over the Sinai Peninsula and they kept records of those who went through. There are not Egyptian records that the Hebrews passed through. Archaeologists believe it’s possible that small groups of Canaanite slaves passed through, but not an Exodus of Hebrews.
Genesis mentions the Chaldeans, Philistines, and camels on nomads being around when Abraham was around. Archaeologists say these three, among many other mentioned items/places in Genesis didn’t exist 2000 B.C. when Abraham should have been around.
For the same reason non-Mormon Christians believe the Bible to be the word of God despite archaeology for before King David’s time, is why Latter-day Saints consider the Book of Mormon to also be the Word of God.
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LutheranDK
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I didn’t know that English also has this expression?
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ReligiousQuest
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Where is the evidence for King David’s Kingdom? Does that mean he was fictional? (There be little evidence for his Kingdom from National Geographic’s website news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/10/081028-king-solomon-copper-mine-missions_2.html under the Section “Historical Extremes”)
The same type of evidence that religious conservative archaeologists use for the Bible before King David’s time is the same type of evidence that Book of Mormon archaeologists use. Even after David’s time some of it is comparable. Some say that the Tel Dan Stele is evidence for King David because years later they find a victory stone where the King of Damascus says he killed the king of the House of David. Quite a few archaeologists say it also translated as “House of Dod”, etc. They say that is the only evidence of King David is considered noteworthy, and so the House of David doesn’t really prove anything, because of the context it’s in. They say that there are writings in Norse culture saying “House of Odin”, with Odin being a Norse god, and they argue that doesn’t prove the god Odin. They say that given the lack of evidence of King David, they think the Israelites claiming a lineage to the house of David is the same as House of Odin, and what the King of Damascus said could have just as easily been “House of Dod”.
Likewise, the Book of Mormon says that they buried Ishmael at a place called Nahom in the Arabian Peninsula area. Archaeologists found an altar called “NHM” dated a little before 600 B.C. They didn’t have vowels in ancient Hebrew, so it was spelled the same way that “Nahom” should be and dated to the correct time. Critics always say that it could have been pronounced “Nihm”, “Naham”, etc. Honestly, what’s the difference between the Tel Dan Stele and NHM as being real evidence? As far as context, non-religious archaeologists don’t believe in the Bible before King David, so is there evidence that the Tel Dan Stele means anything? Skeptics say it can be translated different ways, and is comparable to House of Odin, and is the only shroud of evidence for King David which really shouldn’t be considered evidence. That what many critics say. Noticed I said that secular archaeologists don’t believe the time period before King David, meaning some secular archaeologists actually believe the Tel Dan Stele, which doesn’t make sense why they would if they don’t believe in NHM being Nahom 600 B.C. However, there are quite a few secular critics on the Tel Dan Stele for David.
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tundramom
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And here, we have a fine example of Mo-pologetics.
Keep the Christians guessing. After all, the Bible hasn’t really been translated correctly so if we hurry up and put doubt in the mind of a Christian about the Bible then we can cast yet more doubt on them that they don’t have the fullness of the truth and we can add more converts to our lists! Brilliant plan!!
the previous paragraph was of course all sarcasm–
The Bible is the Bible. In it is Truth.
The Book of Mormon is NOT the Bible. Any truth found within it’s pages are the ones that were lifted (mostly out of Isaiah) anyway.
we cannot compare the two.
in Christ
Steph
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PaulDupre
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This is an invalid argument. We are discussing the BOM vs the Bible. Most of the bible has been verified as historically accurate. The fact is that the bible exists in thousands of ancient manuscripts and is corroborated by the writings of non-biblical authors who refer to the bible and quote it. The bible is universally accepted to be what it claims to be - a collection of ancient documents written during the timeframes in which they claimed to be written. Whether a person accepts the theological teachings in the bible or not does not change the fact that the bible is universally accepted as a collection of truly ancient documents, and not the imaginitive creation of a 19th century con-man.
Biblical and secular archaeologists have uncovered proof of most of the people and cultures reported in the bible (many of which still exist today), and more evidence comes to light year by year. In fact, the discoveries are accelerating with time, not slowing down. So we can reasonably expect that evidence will continue to come forth as it has up until now, and eventually everything in the bible will be documented through archaeology and other sciences.
By contrast, NOTHING has EVER been found to corroborate the Book of Mormon as an ancient document. There is absolutely not one shred of evidence that the BOM is anything but a 19th century fraud. So we can reasonably expect that nothing will ever come forth to support the LDS view of the BOM as ancient scripture.
That is the difference. The notion that, because one individual or event in the bible has not yet been proven by archaeology, the entire bible is as invalid as the BOM is just plain silly.
If that’s the best you’ve got, you’d best give up trying to convince people of the historicity of the BOM.
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mark_a
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ricko
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Very interesting. Looks like another biblical story proven true by science. Still waiting for the evidence of all the great cities with millions of people in the BOM.
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PaulDupre
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Haven’t you heard? Bukowski and the other revisionist Mormons have decided that there were only 12 BOM people. All the others, like the hundreds of thousands killed in the epic BOM battles, were indigenous natives. Though how these 6 Nephites and 6 Lamanites could convince hundreds of thousands (or perhaps millions) of indigenous people to fight and die for them has yet to be explained.
Apparently the cities, highways, chariots, temples, horse stables, steel works and silk farms were built by these indigenous peoples under the spell of this tiny handful of Nephites and Lamanites (who must have been hypnotists or something).
It is truly amazing.
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WarriorAngel
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Haven’t you heard? Bukowski and the other revisionist Mormons have decided that there were only 12 BOM people. All the others, like the hundreds of thousands killed in the epic BOM battles, were indigenous natives. Though how these 6 Nephites and 6 Lamanites could convince hundreds of thousands (or perhaps millions) of indigenous people to fight and die for them has yet to be explained.
Apparently the cities, highways, chariots, temples, horse stables, steel works and silk farms were built by these indigenous peoples under the spell of this tiny handful of Nephites and Lamanites (who must have been hypnotists or something).
It is truly amazing.
WOW – and here we thought the Apostles were amazing when 3000 people converted the same day Peter with them spoke his own language and yet all the folks there heard it in their own native tongue. 3000 baptized that day.Yep - millions fought for 12. Now that’s some sort of hold they had…
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mfbukowski
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What is really really disgusting is that you know better and this is totally deliberate. You could not possibly be this stupid. I hope.Haven’t you heard? Bukowski and the other revisionist Mormons have decided that there were only 12 BOM people. All the others, like the hundreds of thousands killed in the epic BOM battles, were indigenous natives. Though how these 6 Nephites and 6 Lamanites could convince hundreds of thousands (or perhaps millions) of indigenous people to fight and die for them has yet to be explained.
Apparently the cities, highways, chariots, temples, horse stables, steel works and silk farms were built by these indigenous peoples under the spell of this tiny handful of Nephites and Lamanites (who must have been hypnotists or something).
It is truly amazing.
Obviously there were millions of people called Lamanites and Nephites in the BOM
12-20 or whatever came on the boat with Nephi. Soon after they arrived THEY INTERMARRIED WITH THE THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE WHO WERE ALREADY THERE WHO WERE OF ASIAN DESCENT AND CAME ACROSS ON THE LAND BRIDGE FROM SIBERIA.
THE LAMANITES AND NEPHITES WERE THE NATIVE AMERICANS WHO INHABITED NORTH AND SOUTH AMERICA, and the cities discussed in the BOM were the cities of those civilizations.
Some think the BOM peoples were restricted to a small area, others think they inhabited large areas. But the bottom line is that they intermarried with the inhabitants.
Over the next 1500 years the population of the believers grew obviously. How large did Catholicsm grow in 1500 years?
And how many Catholics were descendents of the apostles and carried their DNA? Or if you believe they were celibate, what proportion of those who were Catholic after 1500 years could have been descended from about 12 people? THAT is the analogy here
And for the use of metals in the BOM see below link:
en.fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon_anachronisms/Metals
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mfbukowski
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Cement in the BOM:
en.fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon_anachronisms/Cement
Unfortunately for the critics, hanging their attacks on an ‘absence of evidence’ backfires. In fact, there is excellent evidence for the use of cement in Mesoamerica:
en.fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon_anachronisms/Cement
Unfortunately for the critics, hanging their attacks on an ‘absence of evidence’ backfires. In fact, there is excellent evidence for the use of cement in Mesoamerica:
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PaulDupre
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Please cite the relevant passages in the BOM that document these inter-marriages, or any passage in the BOM that infers the existence of Asian populations in the Americas.
Thanks in advance.
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PaulDupre
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Great! I can understand why there would be scant evidence for the existence of Lamanites, since they were a very low-tech people (dark-skinned and loathsome as they were
), but the millions of high-tech “white-and-delightsome” Nephites should have left a wealth of similarly high-tech artifacts. Back to the original question: where are these artifacts?
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PaulDupre
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Sorry, but FAIR is hardly a credible source, since they start from the conclusion that the BOM is historical and then try to back into evidence that supports that conclusion. When they can’t, they streeeeeeetch the available science beyond all reason to try to fit their pre-conceived conclusion.
No non-Mormon takes them seriously.
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