A reader sent me a copy of Joseph Warren
Grammer’s work Book of Mormon Evicdences Revisited (2009), containing 14
chapters and 3 appendices. Much of his first so-called “matching point” was
covered in the previous post. In this post we look at the final part of Point
One, and his fourth matching point, that of the mound builders.
The green area suggests where mounds
have been found throughout the eastern United States, most attributed to the
Adena and Hopewell Cultures
Point Four: Grammer: “We know that the Hopewell and Adena people
both built gigantic mounds and earthen enclosures, as did the Nephites and
Jaredites of the Book of Mormon.”
Response: It is
always a curious argument that Mound Builder Theorists keep coming up
with—there are mounds built in the eastern U.S., ergo, they must have been
built by the Jaredites and Nephites. Where on earth does such logic stem? There is
not a single mound built in the Old World in the area from which the Jaredites
came—very extensive pyramids, true, but no mounds. Nor are there any mounds
built in the entire area of Israel, actually not even a pyramid. Where does
such a connection get started?
Mounds are found all over the eastern United
States. Some are large, some are decorative, but most are simple mounds with no
room on top for much of anything. Within the mounds are burials of skeletons as
well as artifacts. There is no match to such mound-building anywhere the
Jaredites or Jews lived in the Old World
After all, mounds are
not pyramids. They are completely different. There are ancient mounds found
around the world—but not in the same countries or regions where pyramids are
found. Egypt has no mounds. And when we say mounds, we are talking mostly about
burial mounds and sometimes decorative or maybe religious mounds—but not
pyramids or anything like them.
Hopewell mound locations. There is nothing
like it anywhere else in the world, suggesting a unique people with no history
elsewhere
As for mounds in the
Book of Mormon, there is no such thing. Earthen banks were cast up by Moroni’s
army as a means of defense against Lamanite attack, as well as stone walls, ditches,
etc. These are not the mounds found around the eastern U.S.
The only comment in the scriptural record of
building up earth, is found where Moroni “had been strengthening the armies of
the Nephites, and erecting small forts, or places of resort; throwing up banks of earth round about to
enclose his armies, and also building walls of stone to encircle them
about, round about their cities and the borders of their lands; yea, all round
about the land” (Alma 48:8, emphasis mine). This does not say they build mounts
of earth in any way, but built walls out of earth “banks” and stone walls in
order to “enclose his armies.” This is repeated when the Lamanites tried to
throw down the banks of earth in order to get to the Nephites behind these
earthen banks (Alma 49:22), back into the ditches from which the earth had been
dug, but ended up only filling the ditches with their dead and wounded bodies.
It is fallacious to
say that “We know that the Hopewell and
Adena people both built gigantic mounds and earthen enclosures, as did the
Nephite and Jaredites of the Book of Mormon” as Grammer does. When one
becomes so infaturated with their own ideas that they completely misrepresent
the scriptural record, their research is pointless.
Point Five: Grammer: “We know that the Hopewell did not use stone
in building their dwellings, but did use stone in some of their mounds, as did
the Nephites of the Book of Mormon.”
Response: Here is
another fallacious statement. Nowhere in the scriptural record does it say or
even suggest that the Nephites used stone in building mounds. Again, the only
area where this type of thing is mentioned is in Alma 48:8, quoted above and
again here: “Yea, he had been strengthening the armies of the Nephites, and
erecting small forts, or places of resort; throwing up banks of earth round
about to enclose his armies, and also
building walls of stone to encircle them about, round about their cities
and the borders of their lands; yea, all round about the land” (emphasis mine).
For the reading impaired, evidently like Grammer, the scriptural record that stone was
used to build walls to encircle them about—defensive walls, defensive
positions, for the protection of the Nephite army against Lamanite attack.
These are not mounds! Saying they are does not alter the scriptural record!
Point Six: Grammer: “We know that at the height of the Hopewell
culture, the people were not only spread over much of the Midwest, but from the
Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence, from Minnesota and
North Dakota to the Mississippi and Florida, and from Yellowstone and the
Rockies to the Appalachians of Virginia.”
Response: Granted,
the Hopewell Culture was spread over most of the eastern United States. To
consider that the Nephites covered such a large area in size is to misread and
misquote the scriptural record, for nowhere in the record do we find the
Nephites occupying an area about half the size of the present United States.
Point Six (cont):
Grammer: “— which brings us to the Zelph enigma. Zelph, being a rather strange
name, comes from the experiences of a few Latter-day Saints (Mormons) who
visited several high mounds in Illinois created by former inhabitants. About
one of the mounds Joseph Smith said,"On the top of the mound were stones
which presented the appearance of three altars having been erected one above
the other...; and the remains of bones were strewn over the surface of the
ground. The brethren procured a shovel and a hoe, and removing the earth to the
depth of about one foot, discovered the skeleton of a man, almost entire, and
between his ribs the stone point of a Lamanitish arrow, which evidently
produced his death.”
Response: This event
is well recorded, though each written record of it is different and no common
factors agree other than the basic information: 1) Within a mound, about a foot
deep was the burial site of a skeleton; 2) stones had been placed upon the top
of the hill like three altars, one above the other; 3) Joseph stated that the
skeleton belonged to a white Lamanite named Zelph, “a warrior and a chieftan
under the great prophet Onandagus, who was known from the eastern sea to the
Rocky Mountains” History of the Church
Vol. 2: 79-80, June 3, 1834, 1948 edition). We have reported here in the past
about the different and conflicting comments of last battles, hill Cumorah,
etc., and that they were not what Joseph Smith, himself said.
The mound called
Zelph’s Hill, located during Zion’s Camp they passed on their journey from
eastern Ohio through Illinois to Missouri on June 4, 1834
The fact remains that these
men of Zion’s Camp found a burial site of an ancient skeleton belonging to a
White Lamanite Joseph named Zelph,who was a great warrior during the time of the prophet Onandagus, who was known from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains. Nothing more about the burial mounds was
discussed or written. And the fact that burial mounds have been found all over
the world by just about every Culture that has ever existed is, in and of
itself, dully unremarkable. The fact that the Lamanites were located in the
upper United States shows the important fact, that those who left the Book of
Mormon Land of Promise in Hagoth’s ships ventured into Central America,
Mesoamerica where a large contingency settled and built magnificent buildings
as they had in Andean Peru, and eventually their descendants traveled even
further northward covering the area from the Eastern Sea (Atlantic Ocean) to
the Rocky Mountains. This should show to everyone that the entire Western Hemisphere
is indeed the land of the Nephites and Lamanites, or the Land of Promise.
(See the next post,
“Fallacy of Seven Matching Points-Part IV,” of Joseph Warren Grammer’s work Book of Mormon
Evidences Revisited (2009), containing 14 chapters and 3 appendices, for
the last of his so-called “matching” points)
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