Answering a Reader's Eastern U.S. Model – Part VI: Mountains, Whose Height is Great – Part II

Continuing from the last post in which we discussed several instances of the Gadianton Robbers occupying mountains in the Land of Zarahemla and how the Nephites were unable to eradicate them from their mountain hideouts. We might want to keep in mind that if these were hills of the kind that David McKane claims exist in the east under the guise of mountains, the tallest of which in the Land of Zarahemla is under 2000 feet, it would not be difficult to locate and find their hideouts. If one has ever driven through these mountains, as I have done, you would find they are basically rolling mountains, which is defined as “having gentle rising and falling slopes; undulating: rolling country.” Gentle mountains are described as “gradual slopes, with no steep slopes or sudden change in direction,” and “rolling” are described as “Rolling land with gentle slopes continuing for a long distance.

The low-lying, rolling Catskill Mountains in New York: The closest mountains to McKane’s Land of Promise and far east of his Land of Zarahemla

 

    The mountains east of the Mississippi are generally referred to as gently rolling mountains, or, like the Catskills, a mature dissected plateau (Appalachian Plateau), a once-flat region subsequently uplifted and eroded by watercourses, and are like the Kittatinny Mountain in New Jersey and the Blue Mountains in Pennsylvania, with the Poconos a continuation of the Catskills under a different name—however, both of these, and all those mountains of any height in the east are not within the Land of Zarahemla or Bountiful or the Land Northward of McKane’s Land of Promise map.
    In addition, the Catskills decline gradually in height and grade into the plateau in the West.
    It is interesting that David McKane uses the argument that height is relative when it comes to mountains and Samuel’s language. When Samuel said mountains would rise up out of valleys “whose height is great,” the term great is both unnecessary and misleading if he was talking about a rise of only 1979-feet, or 1237-feet. That would require a comment of “mountains would rise from valleys,” not “whose height is great.”
    Also, words have meaning.
• The word “height” means: “the measurement from base to top.” Thus we are talking about the summit (peak) of a mountain and how high it is.
• The word “great” means: “of an extent, amount, or intensity considerably above the normal or average.
    So what would have been “normal” or “average” to the Nephites in the height of mountains?
    To understand this, we need to keep in mind that judging a mountain after 34 A.D. is not a stand-alone idea—the Nephites had mountains before that time, and they were sufficiently high enough to “tumble down” or, as Nephi stated upon seeing their destruction: “I saw mountains tumbling into pieces” (1 Nephi 12:4). Now “tumble” means to “roll down violently, to fall.” And into “piece” means “fragment, part of,” and in the plural, means “several fragments, or several parts.” Thus, the mountains the Nephites knew had broken up violently into numerous fragments and thrown down—as Samuel states it; the mountains were “laid low, like unto a valley” (Helaman 14:23)—that is, the existing mountains were broken up, violently torn apart, and thrust down to the level of a valley.
Consequently, the Nephites had a comparison to judge “whose height is great” against.
    Thus, taking Samuel’s comments as a whole, the land of Promise must have many mountains (not just a few), for Samuel said: “there will be many places which are now called valleys which shall become mountains. Many places. That is, many mountains “whose height is great.”

The area through the heartland of the U.S. and the area of the Great Lakes, including the area of McLane's Land of Zarahemla and nearly all of his land of Nephi, have no mountains at all, often not even hills

    Now in McLane's area of the eastern U.S., like all of the U.S. east of the Rocky Mountains, has no mountains whose height is great—in fact, most of the area, certainly all of your Land of Zarahemla, has no mountains at all! In fact, the highest points in the six states where McKane places his Land of Zarahemla is 1979 feet, 1772 feet, 1670 feet, 1549 feet, 1257 feet, and 1237 feet--hardly a bump in the road!
    David, before you go off on other issues without responding to this and acknowledging that your model does not fit Mormon's description and Samuel's prophecies, which you typically do, you need to find a place for your Land of Promise that matches this single issue of Samuel’s prophecy that the Lord prompted him to speak (Helaman 13:3). After all, mountains do not just disappear or erode tens of thousands of feet in a couple of thousand years unless the Lord is involved, and since this was to be a testament to the Nephites, it is hardly something that would have disappeared.
    However, as far off as that places your location, we will still respond to your comments and However, as far off as that places your location, we will still respond to your comments and critique of our site and of your statements about your maps, with which no one “has ever found a discrepancy." 
    First on this, is a comment about your six Seas you so strongly advocate. 

McKane has an area labeled East Wilderness, which he labels "Lamanites" on another map, that is east of the SeaEast, which means the Nephites owuld have named a place to the West of the EastWilderness with an East name--not consistent with Hebrew/Jewish direcitonal naming and not at all reasonable; Yet, he is not finished, for he labels an area to the North of this East area of Lamanites with the directional name "East Sea." Directional naming is to use directions in their proper order—McKane uses this labeling improperly and without any system at all as he tries to force directions into his map

 

    Without an understanding of the Hebrew method of naming directional areas, you err in thinking Sea East is different than East Sea, when in reality it is the difference of the translation, since the Hebrews never gave two identical directional locations the same directional label. This is especially true of the “east” which is a significant term in the Hebrew way of thinking that it is the location of God. They would never label God as being in or coming from two separate areas in the same overall location—since the term “east” is never differentiated in the Hebrew language or thinking
    “East” is where God is—and encompasses the entire concept of East—it is never considered in separate parts. To them East is a sacred location, as seen by the method of the Arabs facing east in their daily prayers, our LDS temples with Moroni facing east, etc. Something to the east is in the east; and something as large as a land, or a sea, is not given two separate meanings.
    Consider for a moment that even in our terminology today, there is no different in someone living along our East Coastal area saying "there is a sea to the east," or "there is an Eastern Sea." Both describe the same thing. While we use Atlantic Ocean in our language, before names were given, a sea to the east was a sea in the east, sea east, eastern sea, east sea, etc. It is best not to try and play semantics with words and expressions you seem to not understand.
    Sea East, East Sea, Sea of the East, and the East, Eastern, and even eastward sea, etc., all have the same meaning and connotation to the Hebrew as well as to us. When you try to separate these terms to Sea East being different than East Sea, you are not dealing with a Hebrew way of thinking, but of a westerner—us, and an uninformed us, at that. And in that you do err. But you would not know that unless you were well acquainted with the Hebrew way of thinking, or even an ancient way of talking and thinking. 
    Even when Mormon is giving us locations in his insertion in Alma 22, he does not double up on directions, i.e., even though the area of First Inheritance was west and south  of Zarahemla, he does not clarify that specific direction, sticking with the Hebrew tendency to use on direction at a time to describe a location. When discussing where the Lamanites were located, which at the time (before Capt. Moroni drove them out of the areas north of the narrow strip of wilderness) when Mormon writes: “Now, the more idle part of the Lamanites lived in the wilderness, and dwelt in tents; and they were spread through the wilderness on the west, in the land of Nephi; yea, and also on the west of the land of Zarahemla, in the borders by the seashore, and on the west in the land of Nephi, in the place of their fathers' first inheritance, and thus bordering along by the seashore” (Alma 22:28)—obviously, he could have been more specific and said “and on the west in the land of Nephi, [to the south] in the place of their fathers' first inheritance, and thus bordering along by the seashore,” but he did not because that is not a Hebrew way of speaking.

Mckane’s Land of Promise, which we will show more discrepancies between his map and the scriptural record in the next article…
    Note: On the above maps we have added info from other of Mckane’s maps on his website to make the viewing easier and more understandable. On his site, you have to look at several maps to get an understanding of his map information that he shows piecemeal
(See the next post, ”Answering a Reader – Part V,” for more information on David Mckane’s model around the Great Lakes of his Land of Promise and our responses to his comments on our blog)