|
|
| (12 intermediate revisions by 3 users not shown) |
| Line 1: |
Line 1: |
| − | {{Articles FAIR copyright}} {{Articles Header 1}} {{Articles Header 2}} {{Articles Header 3}} {{Articles Header 4}} {{Articles Header 5}} {{Articles Header 6}} {{Articles Header 7}} {{Articles Header 8}} {{Articles Header 9}} {{Articles Header 10}}
| + | #REDIRECT [[Question: Is the description in the Book of Mormon of a "river running into a fountain" absurd?]] |
| − | {{Resource Title|Critics claims that description of "a river’s running into a fountain" in 1 Nephi is absurd}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | == ==
| |
| − | {{Criticism label}}
| |
| − | Critics claims that description of "a river’s running into a ''fountain''" in 1 Nephi is absurd.{{ref|bachelor.1}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | {{CriticalSources}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | == ==
| |
| − | {{Conclusion label}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | The criticism is based on a shallow reading of the text. In the ancient Near East, the "fountain of a river" was perceived to be the ocean, from which all waters originated.
| |
| − | | |
| − | == ==
| |
| − | {{Response label}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | [http://scriptures.lds.org/en/search?search=fountain&do=Search All instances] of "fountain" in 1 Nephi describe either: | |
| − | * the Red Sea (rivers surely run to the sea)
| |
| − | * the fountain near the Tree of Life in Lehi's dream, from which the river flows.
| |
| − | | |
| − | Paul Hoskisson explains,
| |
| − | <blockquote>
| |
| − | Finally, in an unusual passage in the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 2:9,
| |
| − | Lehi noted that the river which he named after his son Laman “emptied
| |
| − | into the fountain of the Red Sea.” Does a river empty into a fountain?
| |
| − | Is it not the other way around? That the passage is problematical is
| |
| − | indicated by the attempt to explain fountain in a footnote in the 1981
| |
| − | edition of the Book of Mormon. The problem fades, however, when
| |
| − | ancient Near Eastern lexical and cosmological considerations are taken
| |
| − | into account. In the ancient Near East there were two great bodies of
| |
| − | water, the saltwater oceans and the subterranean sweet waters, both of
| |
| − | which were thought by the ancients “to be the source of rivers and
| |
| − | streams.”[30] These “fountains of the great deep” (a phrase used by
| |
| − | the translators of the King James Bible in Genesis 7:11), as U.
| |
| − | Cassuto explained in commenting on the Hebrew word thwm, refer
| |
| − | “undoubtedly to the subterranean waters, which are the source of the
| |
| − | springs that flow upon the ground.”[31] The Hebrews shared this
| |
| − | Canaanite concept of the subterranean waters being the source of
| |
| − | springs.[32]
| |
| − | <br><br>
| |
| − | These subterranean and oceanic waters then are actually the source of
| |
| − | all rivers, streams, and springs. The ancient Semites did not conceive
| |
| − | of this, however, as we currently do, namely, through the chain of
| |
| − | evaporation, cloud formation, condensation, and precipitation. (No
| |
| − | doubt they also had some understanding of this process, but they did
| |
| − | not limit their perceptions to this one process.) It was S. N. Kramer
| |
| − | who, when first pointing out the remarkable and unusual ancient Near
| |
| − | East perception that the source of rivers is the oceanic waters, said:
| |
| − | <br><br>
| |
| − | The Sumerian “mouth” of the rivers, while it coincides geographically
| |
| − | with the actual mouth of the rivers as we understand it today, is
| |
| − | nevertheless not to be understood in terms of our modern usage, as the
| |
| − | place where the rivers “empty” their water (into the Persian Gulf) but
| |
| − | rather as the place where they “drink” the waters (from the Persian
| |
| − | Gulf). In the light of this conception, the “mouth” of the Tigris and
| |
| − | Euphrates may well be designated as their source, but not the real
| |
| − | source, i.e., in the mountains of Armenia, but the source as conceived
| |
| − | by the Sumerians.[33]
| |
| − | <br><br>
| |
| − | That is to say, the source of the rivers was the oceanic waters, not
| |
| − | in an ultimate sense as we conceive it, but in a more immediate sense,
| |
| − | in that the rivers drew directly either from the seas as springs, or
| |
| − | from the oceans through their mouths, depending on whether the
| |
| − | Canaanite concept or S. N. Kramer’s Sumero-Akkadian example applies.
| |
| − | <br><br>
| |
| − | Returning now to 1 Nephi 2:9, it is the statement that the river flows
| |
| − | into the fountain that is disturbing. As was just explained, in the
| |
| − | ancient Near East the fountain of a river was conceived of as being
| |
| − | the oceanic waters, the river actually drawing from the ocean or
| |
| − | fountain in a sense that is not clear to our occidental and empirical
| |
| − | understanding. Our Book of Mormon is in authentic ancient Near Eastern
| |
| − | tradition on this point; and the Prophet Joseph Smith could not have
| |
| − | known about it. This then seems to become sufficient evidence. {{ref|hoskisson}}
| |
| − | </blockquote>
| |
| − | | |
| − | =={{Endnotes label}}==
| |
| − | #{{note|bachelor.1}} {{CriticalWork:Bachelor:Mormonism Exposed|pages=9}}
| |
| − | #{{note|hoskisson}} Paul Y. Hoskisson, “Textual Evidences for the Book of Mormon,” in First Nephi, The Doctrinal Foundation, ed. Monte S. Nyman and Charles D. Tate Jr. (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1988), 283–95. {{link|url=https://rsc.byu.edu/archived/book-mormon-first-nephi-doctrinal-foundation/19-textual-evidences-book-mormon}}
| |
| − | {{Articles Footer 1}} {{Articles Footer 2}} {{Articles Footer 3}} {{Articles Footer 4}} {{Articles Footer 5}} {{Articles Footer 6}} {{Articles Footer 7}} {{Articles Footer 8}} {{Articles Footer 9}} {{Articles Footer 10}}
| |
| − | | |
| − | [[fr:Book of Mormon/Anachronisms/River runs into fountain]]
| |
