One More Time—Malay is Not the Land of Promise Part V

Continuing from the last four posts regarding the clues Nephi and Mormon gave us to find their Land of Promise, and seeing that the winds and currents that drove their ship to the promised land (1 Nephi 18:2), we also have to see where those currents and winds took them and, therefore, where they landed, and what they found there.)

Ralph Olsen in his Malay Theory, claims that “Mesoamerica didn't have many of the things mentioned in the Book of Mormon, the Malay Peninsula area did (ie. silk, metallurgy, peninsular setting, an inlet of the sea for Hagoth, wheeled vehicles, script on gold sheets, mideast writing, similar place names in appropriate locations, etc.)”

First, Olsen compares his Malay Theory only with Mesoamerica and attempts to paint a wide swath by lumping all of the Americas into the same bag. However, while Mesoamerica did not have these things, South America did.

Secondly, the Andean area of Peru and Ecuador are widely known for its textiles and silk that equaled that of the Old World according to the early Spaniards—even though the Andes did not have the silk worm, the silks they produced from other means (see earlier posts) were compared by the conquistadores with those of Seville and elsewhere as being even finer. According to the Cambridge University, “Peru has the longest continuous textile record in world history. Simple spun fibers almost 10,000 years old provide evidence of the first human occupation in western South America. Elaborate fabrics, dating from 3000 BC up to the present, survive in large numbers.”

Thirdly. The metallurgy of the Andes outclassed most Old World accomplishments, using skills and techniques not known in the Old World until long after the period of use in America. Recent finds show that the Andean people were smelting copper a thousand years before the Spaniards arrived. Even today, according to the GSA (Geological Society of America), Peru is the world's leading producer of silver, the world's second leading producer of copper, and the leading producer of gold in Latin America. According to the Institute of Anthropological Investigations Pueblo Libre, Lima, Peru, the country’s importance in Pre-Columbian metal producing extended to centuries in the past, including metallurgy, alloys, metalworking and fabrication, and mirrors.

Fourth,” peninsular setting.” Actually, there is no “peninsular setting” in the scriptural record. The word peninsula or its descriptions is not found in Mormon’s writings. Jacob, on the other hand, describes the Land of Promise as an island—not a peninsula.

Fifth, “an inlet of the sea for Hagoth,” is an interesting idea. In Malay, there is an inlet in Olsen’s Narrow Neck area (around Hat Yai in Thailand), but it is on the east coast. The inlets on the west coast are merely inward curvatures of the coast—the best of these would be at Hat Samran off the Malacca Strait. Further north, from Ko Lanta to Mueang Phuket, there are areas where a ship building industry could have existed, but none fully protected from the sea sufficient to warrant a large shipbuilding center. However, in South America, there is a complete bay that is protected by a central island (Bay of Guayaquil) and providing enormous space and facilities for shipbuilding, docks, and launching and recovering ships. Even today, this area is the location of such ship building and shipping. From the eastern edge of this bay to the one-time location of the Atlantic Ocean before the rest of the continent was driven upward by the plate action, is 26 miles—Mormon’s day and a half distance for a Nephite (Alma 22:32). This area also creates a real “narrow neck,” an area that narrows from its southern and northern lands from about 150 miles to 26 miles in width and is described as a narrow neck even today between the sea and the Andes Mountains. It also has a pass through it from the south to the north, and named after an ancient battle that took place there.

Sixth, “Similar place names in appropriate locations.” This is an interesting claim. Where in Malay, one might ask, are the city names: Bountiful, Zarahemla, Jerusalem, Moab, Onidah, Cumorah, Nephihah, Moroni, Aaron, etc., etc., etc.? Compare Book of Mormon names to those of Malay: Kuala Lumpur, Iph, Kuching, Johor Bahru, Kota Kinabalu, Shah Alam, Alor Setar, Miri, Petaling Jaya, Palembang Singapura, Kelang, Serembang, Melaka, Batu Pahat, etc. Anthropologists say the peninsula was inhabited as early as 40,000 years ago, and first settled by negritos. The original name of the land was “Suvarnadvipa,“ meaning Golden Peninsula, and listed on Claudius Ptolemy’s map found in his “Geographia” around 150 A.D., was known as “The Golden Khersonese,” which he claimed to have relied on the work of an earlier geographer, Marinos of Tyre, and on gazetteers of the Roman and ancient Persian Empire. Thus making the Malay Peninsula known to most of the world’s nations in late B.C. times and especially in the golden age of the Nephites after Christ’s appearance—a 200-year period of peace and tranquility where there were no divisions of people. In fact, during the Roman period, Chersonesos (Malay Peninsula) had an international reputation as a source of gold. So much for keeping the area hidden from other nations.

Seventh, “wheeled vehicles, script on gold sheets, mideast writing.” It is true that no wheeled vehicles or writing on gold plates has been found in South America (or anywhere in the Americas for that matter).

Lastly, though Olsen does not mention it, the map of Malay shows a southwestern coastline that would be almost impossible to reach through the myriad of islands blocking that area, creating what is known today as the Singapore Strait. Also, the area of Olsen’s Narrow Neck is approximately three hundred miles long from north to south—hardly a math of Mormon’s description.

(See the next post, “One More Time—Malay is Not the Land of Promise Part VI,” for more on the clues Nephi and Mormon gave us and to see what happened to the Nephite wheeled vehicles in the present location of the Land of Promise)