Land of Promise Surrounded by Water

Lehi’s son Jacob, speaking as a prophet to the Nephites while his older brother, Nephi, wrote down his words, stated: “…for we are not cast off..for the Lord has made the sea our path, and we are upon an isle of the sea” (2 Nephi 10:20), and “But great are the promises of the Lord unto them who are upon the isles of the sea; wherefore as it says isles, there must needs be more than this, and they are inhabited also by our brethren” (2 Nephi 10:21).

So Jacob told the Nephites that they were on an isle of the sea, and Nephi wrote down his words. According to Noah Webster in his 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language, an isle is the correct word for island—so an isle to Joseph Smith is the word “island” to us. And since the Land of Promise was an isle or island, and as such, surrounded by water, what kind of water surrounded the Land of Promise? Was it a river, a lake, or an ocean? And how do we know it was nearly surrounded by water?

Mormon, inserting a geographical explanation into Alma’s writings in Alma 22:27, says that his land, the Land of Nephi, “bordered even to the sea, on the east and on the west.” That is, the Land of Nephi stretched from the west sea to the east sea. And that land was separated from the Land of Zarahemla (to the north) by a narrow strip of wilderness, which “ran from the sea east even to the sea west, and round about on the borders of the seashore. Thus, we find that the Land of Nephi and the narrow strip of wilderness to the north (between the Land of Nephi and the Land of Zarahemla) stretched from sea to sea—from the sea west to the sea east. We also find that both “the land of Nephi and the land of Zarahemla were nearly surrounded by water, there being a small neck of land between the land northward and the land southward” (Alma 22:32). Thus, it can be seen that the Land of Zarahemla and the Land of Bountiful, as well as the Land of Nephi, stretched from the east sea to the west sea and were completely surrounded by water except for a narrow land bridge (narrow neck of land) between the Land Southward and the Land Northward. We also know that the West Sea stretched the length of the Land Southward, from the narrow neck of land (Alma 22:32; 63:5), that extended along the West Sea south (Alma 53:8) to the land of First Inheritance (Alma 22:28), or where they first landed.

An example of matching Jacob’s Isle and Mormon’s description

We also find that the Land Northward was surrounded by water, since there was a north sea, an east sea, and a west sea adjacent to it (Helaman 3:8), and that they spread out “from the sea west to the sea east” (Helaman 3:20). We also know that the Land Northward had a North Sea (Helaman 3:8) that was called Ripliancum, that is “waters to exceed all” (Ether 15:8).

For those who keep wanting to limit or call the “seas” in the Book of Mormon “lakes,” such as Lake Ontario (Sea East) and Lake Erie (Sea West), which could not be called “seas,” we also need to understand that the use of the term seashore meant the shore along an ocean, such as Irreantum that bordered Bountiful. As Nephi wrote: “we came to the seashore; and we called the place Bountiful, because of its much fruit” (1 Nephi 17:6). This is the same “seashore” which they launched their ship into that was “driven before the wind to the promised land” (1 Nephi 18:89; 19:22).

An example of a Land to the South nearly surrounded by water except for a Narrow Neck (Alma 22:32)

In the plain and simple language in which Nephi delighted, and the simple translation of Joseph Smith in the language “to our understanding,” the land of promise was an island, completely surrounded by water, with a narrowing that separated the Land Northward from the Land Southward, where there were four seas, the Sea North, Sea South, Sea East and the Sea West.

An example of a long and narrow Land to the Southward and a smaller Land to the Northward, making up an island completely surrounded by water. Note that in this example, there is a sea (Gulf) to the south of the Land Northward to satisfy Helaman 3:8.

Unfortunately, scholars and “theorists” want to create outlandish ideas and interpretations of simple language to justify and support their ludicrous models—an act that has not served the Church, its members, or the Book of Mormon any good will. Joseph Smith translated language written in Reformed Egyptian, which no man could know without the aid of the spirit of God, into the English language known to him in his day (1829) that is not dependent upon Hebrew, nor any other language or writing. A fete impossible for anyone unless inspired by the Spirit which, in this case, testified to every statement Joseph dictated and the scribe wrote down. To place obscure ideas within such writing is disingenuous.