Not only do they try to restrict the scale of the land, and restrict the numbers of people living there in Book of Mormon times, we find that the Mesoamerican attack is being directed against all other areas as a possible location for the Land of Promise. This is quite interesting, since the Mesoamerica area does not meet even most of the criteria in the scriptural record, not to mention all of the criteria.
Sorenson has written: “Ingenious and impassioned arguments have been mustered in support of other theorized areas (from the Great Lakes to Peru or encompassing the entire hemisphere) as the scene for Nephite history. But every proposed geographical setting other than Mesoamerica fails to meet the criteria established by the text of Mormon's account.”
The arrogance of claiming your model is the only possible location when it does not meet very many of the criteria set forth by Mormon in the scriptural record is a little beyond the pale. Look at the items Sorenson and the others ignore and all found in the Andean area of South America:
1. The cureloms and cumoms (Ether 9:19)2. Neas and Sheum (Mosiah 9:9)
3. Ziff (Mosiah 11:3)
4. Gold, silver and copper as a single ore (1 Nephi 18:25)
5. Growing of wheat and barley (Mosiah 9:9)
6. Working in metal and precious metals (2 Nephi 5:15)
7. Coins (Alma 11:3-20)
8. Forts or resorts (Alma 48:5, 8)
9. Plants and herbs to cure fever (Alma 46:40)
10. The Land of Promise was an island (2 Nephi 10:20)
11. Climate to grow seeds from Jerusalem (1 Nephi 18:24)
12. The great defensive wall built by the Nephites (Helaman 4:7)
13. Circumcision (Helaman 9:21)
14. Mountains whose height is great (Helaman 14:23)
15. Four seas (Helaman 3:8)
16. Winds and currents leading to their land (1 Nephi 18:8-9)
17. A narrow neck that is really narrow (Alma 22:32)
Sorenson also writes: “So while it is theoretically possible that another area of the New World could meet the criteria to be the historical Nephite and Lamanite lands, it has proved impossible to identify any such territory. All proposed locations other than Mesoamerica suffer from fatal flaws.”
Actually, such a statement is both false and fallacious. There is at least one area that is a far more viable location than Mesoamerica, that agrees with all the statements of Mormon’s map either now or at an ancient time, and has the 17 points stated above as well as the 65 actual descriptive statements or descriptions in the scriptural record.
That area is the one Sorenson so belittles and excuses out of hand with his: “Ingenious and impassioned arguments have been mustered in support of other theorized areas (from the Great Lakes to Peru or encompassing the entire hemisphere) as the scene for Nephite history. But every proposed geographical setting other than Mesoamerica fails to meet the criteria established by the text of Mormon's account.”
All right, let’s first put Peru (the Andean area) to the test shown above. These points and all 65 are covered in great detail in the book “Lehi Never Saw Mesoamerica,” but briefly, these points will be covered in the next post.
(See the next post, “Lands of Appropriate Scale -- Part IX,” for the list of the above points regarding the Andean area)
I received this in an email.
ReplyDeletePaul
"The Sea on the East" by George Potter
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In my book Nephi in the Promised Land, I propose that the Nephites' "sea on the east" is the 118-mile-long freshwater Lake Titicaca. The age and location of the ruins surrounding the lake are consistent with the Book of Mormon account. Throughout their oral history and up to the present day, the Aymaran Indians on the south side of the lake hate the taller Quechua Indians on its north side. This hatred has led to countless wars between the two peoples. The Book of Mormon describes the Nephites and Lamanites as having been separated by the sea on the east.
Lake Titicaca
Thor Heyerdahl was initially drawn to construct his raft the Kon-Tiki and sail it from Peru to Polynesia to test his theory that white-skinned people from Peru colonized parts of the Pacific. In fact, the name of his raft, the Kon-Tiki, came from the Peruvian legend that inspired his theory. He wrote:
As I pursued my search, I found in Peru surprising traces in culture, mythology, and language which impelled me to go on digging ever deeper and with the greater concentration in my attempt to identify the place of origin of the Polynesian tribal god Tiki.
And I found what I hoped for. I was sitting reading the Inca legends of the sun-king Virakocha, who was the supreme head of the mythical white people in Peru. I read:
....Virakocha is an Inca (Ketchua [Quechua]) name and consequently of fairly recent date. The original name of the sun-god Virakocha, which seems to have been more used in Peru in old times, was Kon-Tiki or Illa-Tiki, which means Sun-Tiki or Fire-Tiki. Kon-Tiki was high priest and sun-king of the Incas' legendary 'white men' who had left the enormous ruins on the shores of Lake Titicaca. The legend runs that the mysterious white men with beards were attacked by a chief name Cari who came from the Coquimbo Valley. In a battle on an island in Lake Titicaca the fair race was massacred.... 1.
There are many similar legends of a tall fair-skinned people having lived around the northern shores of Lake Titicaca and on the lake's Isle of the Sun.
But how can a fresh-water lake be a sea? In the Quechua language, Lake Titicaca is called "Cocha Titicaca." Cocha means sea, not lake. For example, the Incas called the Pacific Ocean a "cocha." The same is true in the Hebrew language where a fresh water lake is also a sea (Sea of Galilee, see Matthew 4).