Continuing with Joseph L. Allen’s descriptive information in
his book Exploring the Lands of the Book
of Mormon, that poses as Land of Promise discussion but really is meant to
solidify his Mesoamerican model. As concluded in the previous post, it cannot
be said that the Jaredites lived until sometime after Mulek landed. Nor does
the condition of the artifacts found by Limhi’s expedition prove anything, for
there are several answers to this concern, such as:
• Copper is one of the
oldest known metal ores used for making objects, including instruments of war.
It was first smelted from ore around 4000 B.C., and use of molded copper soon
followed. While it can be bent, it cannot be chipped. Cold-hammering of copper results, after a
time, in stressing the metal until it cracks and breaks; however, once annealing
(heating) was learned, copper became easy and useful to join together, fashion,
form, and shape. That copper has longevity is shown by the artifacts that have
been found all over the world, dating back to prehistoric times. One such artifact is a cow of copper found in
Mesopotamia dating to 2500 B.C. Also in
Mesopotamia, the area from which the Jaredites came, the firing of bricks for
use in kilns was developed, rather than using mud bricks. This allowed for
higher kiln (oven) temperatures and, thus, better molded products.
• About the time the
Jaredites left Mesopotamia, a subtle change was taking place there in the field
of metallurgy. Smiths were finding that
greater control of copper could be achieved with the addition of tin which
created bronze. This may explain why the Jaredite copper breastplates were
still sound hundreds of years later, for pure copper does not deteriorate like
steel or iron.
• Also, if steel or
iron was used in the sword handles, which was common in Mesopotamia in 2500
B.C., it would show why the handles had perished, but the sword remained
(Mosiah 8:11), though cankered. The Jaredite brass mentioned in Mosiah was made
of zinc and copper, and like copper, was likely to hold its form and durability
over hundreds of years. Though after time, the zinc or tin could canker (rust
or oxidize), a term typically applied in Joseph Smith's day to the small
ulcer-like rust or oxidized pockets in certain metals.
• It is probably true
that preservation within Mesoamerica is poor because of the tropical
atmosphere, etc., as Allen points out.
However, South America, in the Andean regions, boasts one of the great
archaeological areas of the world. Here, sites show remains abetted in some
geographical zones by incredible
preservation. The desert coast, as
an example, has a dryness of climate that has created an American Egypt, an archaeologist's paradise. At
Puruchuco-Huaquerones, a site of antiquity on the eastern outskirts of Lima,
recent discoveries of mummies in a graveyard have produced exceptional finds
because of their preservation in the bone-dry soil. A pre-Inca copper star,
part of a warrior's ensemble, was found in almost perfect condition, preserved
by the dry climate that has helped maintain numerous treasures. These regions
provide conditions for preservation probably as good or better than any place
in the world. Obviously, if this is the location of the Land of Promise, as we claim, then
weapons, bones and buildings would be well preserved for long periods of
time--certainly hundreds of years.
There is also the fact that the Lord may well have preserved
these bones, buildings and weapons of war despite the time frame involved for
the sole purpose of impressing upon those who found them of a previous
civilization who it was learned, once the plates were translated, were wiped
out because they would not remain righteous.
Continuing, Allen states: “The
people of Zarahemal (Mulekites) cared for the last Jaredite king, whose name
was Coriantumr, which requires the Mulekites to be in the Promised Land. That
could not have been prior to the destruction of Jerusalem (586 BC). The last Jaredite
battle could not have been later than 200 B.C., because the people of Zarahemla
had already cared for Coriantumr prior to the coming of Mosiah.”
As mentioned earlier, this does not mean that the Jaredite nation
overlapped the Mulekites. It only means that Coriantumr was alive when, and
just after, the Mulekites arrived in the land. Based on the suggestions above,
the last Jaredite battle could have taken place prior to the arrival of the
Mulekites. And since Ether, himself, living during Coriantumr's lifetime and
surviving the last, great battle, twice stated in the future tense that Lehi and those who would inherit the land from
the Jaredites, it might be suggested that the Jaredites were gone from the Land
of Promise prior to the arrival of Mulek. While this might seem a minor point,
it should be kept in mind that Ether wrote of these events as yet to occur, Moroni translated that future tense into the record and Joseph Smith, with the help of the
Spirit, translated it future tense.
All we glean from the record is that Coriantumr was alive when
the Mulekites were in the Land of Promise.
Allen further states: “We
can appeal to the Mesoamerica calendar system to see if it can aid us in
understanding more precisely some of the Book of Mormon dates.”
It would be well worth someone's while to read Allen's
explanation of the Maya calendar (pp 15-19).
While Mesoamericanists love this calendar, it seems fraught with
difficulty interpreting it, and there is no way to know for sure if the
interpretation is accurate or not. Let's
state just one area of difficulty: According
to Allen, the Maya calendar, contrary to
popular opinion, was not functional as our calendar dating is today. It was
necessary therefore, to number both the day symbols and the month symbols and
then to correlate them with the Baktuns—Baktun is a symbol interpreted to
mean 144,000 days (that's 4,800 30-day months, or about 400 years, and
according to this calendar system, the Maya used a 20-day month, 18 months to
the year, with a 5-day month carry over to make up the exact rotation of the
planet. That would make it 7,200 months, or 400 years—the Katuns (7,200 days)—the Katun is a symbol interpreted to mean 7,200
days (that's 240 30-day months, or about 20 years, and in the Maya calendar,
that would be 360 months, or 20 years)—including other numbers such as Tun (360
days), Uinal (20 days), and Kin (one day).
Thus, the date reading 6 BEN and 16 XUL—interpreted to
mean 16 December 36 B.C.—means that on the 6th calendar rotation of the day BEN
(Reed) with the 16th calendar rotation of the month XUL an event happened.
Because these rotations continue on forever in their calendar, they placed
numbers in front of each day name and each month day.
Now, what if there was a miscalculation or
deliberate error incorporated into the interpretation of the Maya calendar, as
there is in the case of Carbon-14, or the tree of life Stela (left)? While each
numbering system would produce an accurate date, that date would be based upon
inaccurate determinations. Further, the day
symbol, called Kin, actually means sun; the month symbol, called Uinal,
actually means man; and the year symbol, called Tun, actually means stone.
In addition, one of the important discoveries from these ruins
is that the Maya had several calendars. One is known as the Long Count Calendar, which is reset to day 0 every 1,872,000
days, which is a period of about 5128.7 years, and known as The Great Circle—that
is, their calendar time was a circle, repeating itself about every 5,128
years). The last reset date, by some calculations, was December 21, 2012 (when many claimed the Maya thought the world would end on that day).
Obviously, this calendar is of no interest to the Maya
any longer, since their civilization collapsed over a thousand years ago.
(Though there are people today who are the descendants of the Maya and the
culture lives on through them). The Mayan glyphs and hieroglyphs aren't crystal
clear about what the calendar means—and though many had interpreted it to mean
the end of the world will occur on December 12, 2012 (which, of course did not
happen), the Maya could not even predict their own demise some 500 years
earlier. This Maya Long Count calendar begins on August 11, 3114 B.C.—just as
our own calendar begins on January 1 of the first year of the Christian era.
Presumably, the Maya attached some significance to their own day zero, but we
don't know what it was (Jared Diamond, Collapse: How Societies Choose to
Fail or Succeed. Viking. New York, 2005, p167).
In addition, the counting system of the Maya
was based on multiples of 20, thus a month has 20 days, not 30 or 31. One of the more interesting ideas in this, is
that beyond year, the Maya used concepts beyond even our present counting
system. That is, today we use hundred,
thousand, million and added in recent years, the word trillion—the Maya, on the
other hand, with a far more primitive need for numbering than present day man
with computers, financial empires and huge government debt, yet had two words
to describe numbers beyond million. All of this might cause one to wonder at
the accuracy of the interpretation of the Maya calendar, especially when it
began, supposedly, in 3114 B.C. No date in Hebrew, Jaredite, or Nephite history
suggests such a date, even remotely, other than perhaps events during Enoch’s
time.
One last thought. Another, perhaps extremely important point, is
that even though the Maya calendar supposedly has a start date of 3114 BC, the
oldest long count in the Maya calendar is the one given earlier about 6 Ben and
16 Xul, or 36 B.C. That would be just
about the year that Hagoth's immigrants sailed northward from his shipyard on
the Sea West and landed in the Land which
was Northward and never heard from again. If this land northward was, in fact Central America, going north from Andean South America, then it might be understood that they would indicated that date of some importance, i.e., landing in their new home.
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