Questions That Have to be Answered About the Land of Promise – Part I

In the previous five posts 21 scripture-based points were outlined to show geographical and archaeological findings that MUST exist for any location to be considered as the Book of Mormon Land of Promise. In these following posts are numerous questions that any honest theorist should ask himself in verifying his beliefs, or in seeking the correct location for Lehi’s isle of promise!

Therefore, ALL of these questions in the following posts have to be answered if one is to believe in a certain location for the Book of Mormon Land of Promise. Each question has to do with specific information in the scriptural record, and cannot be ignored or explained away. Either it currently can be shown, or it can be shown to have existed during the time of the Book of Mormon era.

Question 1: “Where did Lehi land and how did he get there from Arabia?”

Answer: The landing site was along the 30º South Latitude in Chile, South America, where winds and sea currents die down within the Tropic of Capricorn as the winds move upward, creating great calms on the waters. The wind and sea currents moving from the Arabian Peninsula move southward, away from land, into the Arabian Sea, then into the Indian Ocean, curving eastward into the Southern Ocean which flows south of Australia and New Zealand and either pass through the Straits of Magellan or curve upward along the South American coast. This has always  been the most direct and simple way between these two points with wind constantly driving a ship forward and currents moving in that specific direction. No other area in the Western Hemisphere can easily and directly be reached from the Arabian Sea by a weather ship “driven forth before the wind.” Certainly not the Great Lakes, Eastern U.S., Heartland, Caribbean, Central or Mesoamerica, or Baja California. The Malay Peninsula is the only other proposed location for the Land of Promise that could be reached from the Arabian Sea without going against ocean currents and winds.

Question 2: “What was the purpose of the Lord directing Nephi to build a ship unlike ships made by man of his day? What difference in the kind of vessel if the voyage was to be along the coast of the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean to Indonesia, then island hopping across the Pacific?”

The types of ships of Lehi’s day and for centuries afterward was that they employed steering oars, and even later, despite their greater size and the ability to sail close hauled, their shallow draft and steering oars gave little resistance to the wind. These ships made a tremendous amount of leeway (drifting with the wind) and could spend several days going nowhere, losing to leeway, what progress they made sailing. A record dated to 1183 A.D. by a ship sailing from Sicily reports passing Crete three times. Needless to say this played havoc with navigation, and was downright dangerous in close waters.

The Caravela Redonda sailing ship of the fifteenth century was the forerunner of all later European sailing ships of exploration

Not until the fifteenth century with the development of the highly maneuverable caravela redonda, built by the Portuguese, was a much more stable and flexible rig without the lateen sails, using square rigging. The first caravelas mounted square sails on the fore mast, and when this proved successful square rigged the main mast too. This rigging became very popular and most later carracks adopted the redonda rigging as well. However, in Lehi’s day, ships (including the Arab, Indonesian and Chinese traders often used as examples by Mesoamerican Theorists), did not sail into deep water for three reasons: 1) their ships were not strong enough to withstand the constant pounding of waves and currents, 2) they were not deep-hulled to withstand capsizing in heavy seas, and 3) their boats were not only fragile, but carried only one mast with a fixed square sail that could not overcome the navigational difficulties of Southward oceanic exploration, as the strong winds, shoals, and ocean currents easily overwhelmed their abilities. Of course, large lateen sails required far more crew to man than large square sails did, and were far more dangerous to work in rough seas. Thus, the caravel was the original pathfinder of European ship design. It was caravels that first doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and first sailed to the West Indies—but as voyages of exploration became longer her small size became a liability. Obviously, the Lord knew that the type of ships of Lehi’s day, nor even the early European ships of 2000 years later, were not capable of crossing the deep oceans, thus he showed Nephi how to build a ship that would.

Question 3: “What sea and wind currents would have driven a ship “before the wind” to this landing site in the Western Hemisphere?”

Answer: The Arabian Sea to the Indian Ocean to the Southern Ocean and up along the Humboldt (Peruvian Current) of the Pacific Ocean. This is not only where the winds and currents directly flow and would have taken a weather ship “driven forth before the wind,” but it is also the shortest distance and fastest path from Arabia to the Western Hemisphere.

Lehi’s course from Arabia to the Land of Promise. Nephi made it clear his ship was “driven forth before the wind,” and this would be the only course that such was possible, especially to inexperienced sailors manning a ship none had ever before sailed

Question 4: “What caused the great storm that turned Lehi’s ship back the way it had come and where would the ship have been when the storm struck?”

Any great storm in the Arabian Sea would be a tropical storm being just a few degrees north of the Equator. According to the U.S. Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center, a tropical storm in the Arabian Sea, called a cyclone, is a storm system with a closed circulation around a center of low pressure fueled by the heat released when moist air rises and condenses. The name underscores its origin in the tropics and their cyclonic nature. Tropical cyclones are distinguished from other cyclonic storms such as nor’easters and polar lows by the heat mechanism that fuels them, which makes them "warm core" storm systems. It should be noted that cyclonic storms originate out to sea, typically about 300 miles north (or south) of the Equator, which would place a storm in the Arabian Sea about 10º north latitude, in the middle of what is called the Arabian Sea Gyre, a clockwise movement of water between the Peninsula and the sub-continent of India, and from there it moves northwesterly towards the Arabian Peninsula, and inland. However, most tropical cyclones over the past centuries in this region were in the south of the Indian Ocean, more than 300 miles south of the Equator. In this area, around the 15º to 20º South Latitude, and ranging from November to April, the most severe cyclonic storms have occurred—with a peak period from mid-February to early March. When the storm Nephi described became so severe, the ship floundered and careened about under the weight of the winds and high seas, and the gunnels threatened to sink beneath the waves, Laman and Lemuel and the sons of Ishmael were cowered to such an extent, they eventually untied Nephi in hopes he might save them. At this point, the storm that “drove them back upon the waves” was in its fourth day and becoming quite violent. When released, Nephi prayed, “and after I had prayed the winds did cease, and the storm did cease, and there was a great calm” (1 Nephi 18:21).

An example of the storm that struck Lehi’s ship and drove it backward the way it had come for some four days before Nephi took over once again and guided it back on course

A most important fact here is that at this point that storm was moving toward land as Nephi’s ship was being driven back in the direction from which he had come. Since ships move bow first, the ship was obviously turned to run before the storm and head back from whence it had come. It should also be noted that in the center of the southern Indian Ocean is the South Indian Ocean Gyre, which moves counter-clockwise. And in the center of this gyre is a low where storms originate, swirling counter-clockwise in direction, heading back toward the northwest. Thus, when the ship was sailing to the east of this inner current, the rebellious brothers took over the ship, but "did not know where to steer it" and became caught in the center of the storm area, which whirled the ship around and headed it back the way it had come. Since Nephi writes that their ship was “driven back upon the waters for the space of three days” (1 Nephi 18:13), and that the storm lasted into the fourth day (1 Nephi 18:14), it would be impossible for their ship to have been in coastal waters along the trade routes, as many Theorists claim, when this storm arose, for their ship would have been dashed to pieces against the shore—not “driven back” as Nephi tells us. Thus, the Lehi Colony had to have been deep into the Arabian Sea, and most likely far into the Indian Ocean when this storm hit—otherwise they would have been run aground as the storm moved inland.

(See the next post, “Questions That Have to be Answered About the Land of Promise – Part II,” for the continuation of these all-important questions)