The fifth point on his list was covered in part in the last post. Below we continue with that point—The land of Nephi and the land of Zarahemla were divided by a narrow neck of land—to show there is no confusion about the narrow neck, nor is there any misunderstanding when one follows Mormon’s clear and precise description.
As shown in the last post, J. Theodore Brandley completely misunderstands the statement that the city of the Jaredites was built by the sea that divides the land.
An example of a sea that divides the
land where a gulf cuts into the land, creating a narrow neck of land on one
side (Gulf of Bothnia between Finland and Sweden—no hourglass shape is
involved)
Seemingly not understanding this concept, Brandley goes on to state: “As the eastern boundary of the land of Bountiful was on the east sea (Alma 22:33), in the scenario of the river Sidon being the Mississippi River this East Sea would be the Atlantic Ocean. The obvious candidate for the narrow neck of land would be the Delmarva Peninsula, which is only 20 miles wide at the neck and the sea of Chesapeake Bay divides the land for 200 miles. Hagoth then launched his ships into the sea on the west side of the narrow neck of land, or into Chesapeake Bay of the Atlantic Ocean.”
This is another complete stretch of the imagination that has no bearing in fact. First of all, the Delmarva Peninsula is a land mass that includes the entire state of Delaware, and the eastern portion of Virginia, and being a peninsula, is not connected to what would be the Land Southward, only to what would be the Land Northward in this scenario. While the peninsula is about 25miles in width at its point of connection to the mainland (in the north), it is actually 50 to 65 miles in width for most of its length, narrowing in the south to a mere 10 miles and ultimately to about two miles across from Newport News, Virginia.
Secondly, ignoring these facts, Brandley goes on to write “The confusion about the narrow neck of land is generated from Alma 22:32 where it speaks of a “small neck of land.”
There is no confusion when we follow the simple language Mormon provides, stating: “and thus the land of Nephi and the land of Zarahemla were nearly surrounded by water, there being a small neck of land between the land northward and the land southward, and nowhere is there a statement or a suggestion that the “small” or “narrow” neck of land is disconnected from the Land Southward or the Land Northward—a fact that discredits Brandley’s idea to begin with.
However, overlooking that point for the moment, Mormon’s statement also agrees with the “place where the sea divides the land” as an extension of the sea into a large gulf, cutting into the land and separating the larger land mass to the north from the larger land mass to the south. This points out that the narrow neck of land was the connecting point, and the only one mentioned, that kept the entire Land Southward from being completely surrounded by water, since the narrow neck of land connected the Land Southward with the Land Northward.
An
example of the map Brandley suggests for the narrow neck of land
Fourthly, and most importantly, to launch a ship into the East Bay of the Chesapeake would now allow a ship “to take their course northward” (Alma 63:6,7), since the Bay ends to the north in less than 50 miles from where the launching would have taken place in Brandley’s scenario, and since. And since it was no wider than about ten miles north of the launching area, there is no possibility that the ship and its crew and passengers would “never had been heard from more” (Alma 63:8) since that area was heavily populated.
Of the “small neck of land” (Alma 22:32), Brandley states: “This is the only verse in the Book of Mormon where the phrase “small neck of land” is mentioned. It is not to be confused with the “narrow neck of land” referred to above.
There is absolutely no suggestion, comment, or indication by Mormon or any other writing in the Book of Mormon to substantiate this claim. Nor does Brandley suggest a reasoning for this—he simply makes the statement and then goes on as though that statement, there being two necks of land, is factual.
Brandley continues with this idea, “This verse [small neck] explains that the land of Nephi (all of the Lamanite territory) and the land of Zarahemla (all of the Nephite territory), together, were nearly surrounded by water, except for a small neck of land on the south of them that led to another land southward.”
This is a misstatement of Mormon’s description. His reference here has to include the entire Land Southward, since that is what he is describing, from the “the place of our Father’s first inheritance” (Alma 22:28), meaning where Lehi landed, lived and died (before Nephi fled northward and settled the city of Nephi), to the land that was “so far northward that it came into the land which had been peopled and been destroyed” (Alma 22:30), which is in the Land Northward. In between those two lands, he describes the division between Bountiful, in the Land Southward, and Desolation in the Land Northward (Alma 22:31).
Thus, Mormon is describing the entire Land of Promise in these 8 verses (Alma 22:27-34), but centering on the Land Southward, where was located the Land of Nephi (his principle point of view) and the land of the Nephites, which he states collectively as the Land of Zarahemla, including Zarahemla (vs 27-29) and Bountiful (vs 29), which he refers overall to as “the land of Zarahemla.”
The
narrow neck was between the lands of Bountiful and Desolation, which separated
the Land Northward from the Land Southward; the land between Zarahemla and
Nephi was a strip of wilderness that ran the same width as the Land of Nephi,
from sea tot seas
There is no claim that a small or narrow neck existed between the Land of Neph and the Land of Zarahemla. What Mormon tells us is that the Land of Nephi (the king’s land to which a proclamation was being sent) “was divided from the land of Zarahemla by a narrow strip of wilderness, which ran from the sea east even to the sea west, and round about on the borders of the seashore…and thus were the Lamanites and the Nephites divided” (Alma 22:27).
Unaware of this point, Brandley states: “There is no hourglass shaped territory between the lands of the saga of the Book of Mormon.” Once again, in showing Brandley has no idea what he is talking about, Mormon tells us: “the land of Nephi and the land of Zarahemla were nearly surrounded by water, there being a small neck of land between the land northward and the land southward” (Alma 22:32, emphasis added).
In conclusion, Brandley makes a startling and extremely unjustified comment, saying: “This small neck of land can only refer to the Isthmus of Panama, and the land northward in this verse is North America, and the land southward is South America. Although there were very likely migrations of Lamanites into South America the text does not mention it.”
It is amazing that anyone who claims to know enough about the Book of Mormon as Brandley does, can and would write such inaccurate and far-fetched information that is so erroneous as to be clearly misleading. It is so unreasonable and nonsensical, that it hardly deserves a response. Let is rest with the fact that Lehi landed in the land to the extreme south of the Land Southward. From there Nephi, after Lehi’s death, fled from his brothers (2 Nephi 5:6-7) and went northward, where he settled and founded the City of Nephi in the land they called the Land of Nephi (2 Nephi 5:8). And from that point onward, there is never any mention of migrations to the south, of movement of Nephites toward the south—only north and northward. The idea that Lamanites might have gone southward, without a shred of evidence, comment, or suggestion, is merely a lack of knowledge of the Book of Mormon events.
Thus, it is not difficult to see that misconceptions that Brandley claims about the Book of Mormon do not exist as Mormon and others recorded their history. The misconceptions are in Brandley’s mind and have absolutely no scriptural support at all.
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