Words in the Book of Mormon – Part II

As shown in the previous post, words in the Book of Mormon mean something. It might also be said that there were words Joseph knew well (unlike cumom, curelom, neas, sheum, and ziff outlined in the last post).

Wilderness is one of those words. While some scholars claim that the use of the word “wilderness” in scripture refers to a mountainous region, we need to know that the word conveys a far more descriptive meaning. Wilderness in the Book of Mormon refers to desert, seashore, valleys, meadows, mountains, plains, etc. As Joseph Smith would have understood the word, the 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language : “A tract of land or region uncultivated and uninhabited by human beings, whether a wide forest or a wide barren plain” (see former post).

Such other words like horse, chariot, building, bones, palace, etc., were well known to Joseph Smith and understood. Take the word building for instance.

When the prophet wrote the words of King Limhi, who sent a 43-man expeditionary force looking for Zarahemla and they became lost and wandered into the Land Northward where they found the bones and ruins of the Jaredites. It is written that the Jaredite lands were covered “with ruins of buildings of every kind” (Mosiah 8:8).

This description was given by a people who were familiar with magnificent buildings as their former king (Noah) had “many elegant and spacious buildings; and he ornamented them with fine work of wood, and of all manner of precious things, of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and of brass, and of ziff and of copper” (Mosiah 11:8).

In Joseph Smith’s time, the word “building” was defined as an “edifice constructed for use or convenience, as a house, a church, a shop, etc.” It is interesting that the word “mound” is not associated in any way with the concept of a building in the 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language.

Consequently, we can understand from their and Joseph’s description, this land was covered with magnificent and large buildings, palaces (Mosiah 11:9), and high towers (Mosiah 11:12). These buildings were built in at least two separate cities (Mosiah 11:13), including another high tower, as well as resorts (forts).

Thus, the Land Northward was covered with buildings “of every kind” which should have, in some condition, survived down through the ages as such buildings have survived in Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Chile in South America; and in Guatemala, Belize, Yucatan and Mexico in Central America. There are no such ruins of any kind in the area of the Great Lakes, the Heartland, or the New England area. No such ruins can be found now, or were any recorded by the early settlers of these areas about the same time that European settlers of Central and South America found and amply recorded.

The Great Lakes and surrounding areas have only some mounds and a few small artifacts as a testimony of an earlier civilization occupying that area. Mounds, after all, are not buildings. No building construction has ever been found within a mound through the east, Ohio and Mississippi valleys. We should also keep in mind that no unknown animals or unknown grains matching the scriptural description have been found in the Great Lakes, New England or Heartland area dating to such a period. So why do these theorists doggedly claim that was the area of the Book of Mormon?

That is such a good question.