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< Book of Mormon | Lamanites
(→Other possible connections between the Pacific islands and the New World: Expanded) |
(→Endnotes: Note) |
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#{{note|livesci}}[http://www.livescience.com/history/070604_polynesian_chicken.html "Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas Before Columbus"], ''LiveScience'', June 4, 2007. | #{{note|livesci}}[http://www.livescience.com/history/070604_polynesian_chicken.html "Chicken Bones Suggest Polynesians Found Americas Before Columbus"], ''LiveScience'', June 4, 2007. | ||
#{{note|latimes}}[http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jun/05/science/sci-chickens5 "Study: Spaniards didn’t get to South America first"], ''Los Angeles Times'', June 5, 2007. | #{{note|latimes}}[http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jun/05/science/sci-chickens5 "Study: Spaniards didn’t get to South America first"], ''Los Angeles Times'', June 5, 2007. | ||
+ | #{{note|sorenson1}}John L. Sorenson, [http://farms.byu.edu/publications/bookschapter.php?bookid=&chapid=671 "New Technology and Ancient Voyages"] from ''Pressing Forward with the Book of Mormon'',pp. 177-179 | ||
==Further reading== | ==Further reading== |
This article is a draft. FairMormon editors are currently editing it. We welcome your suggestions on improving the content.
Simon Southerton, Losing a Lost Tribe: Native Americans, DNA, and the Mormon Church (Salt Lake City, UT: Signature Books, 2004) 37–39, Chapter 4. ( Index of claims )
Critics have correctly pointed out that many Latter-day prophets and apostles have stated that the inhabitants of the islands of the Pacific are considered to be Lamanites. In addition, they have also correctly noted that this belief, at least in part, stems from the story of Hagoth in the Book of Mormon, who built ships which eventually carried an undetermined number of people to geographical regions outside the scope of the Book of Mormon narrative. Critics insist, however, that modern evidence, including DNA data, precludes the islanders from being descendants of Book of Mormon people.
The Book of Mormon talks of groups of people who set sail in ships and were never seen again.
This story has traditionally been used to explain why the Pacific islanders are considered to be Lamanites.
Elder Spencer W. Kimball, while he was the Acting President of the Council of the Twelve, said in 1971,
The approach by the critics, therefore, is very simple: If the islanders can be proven to have no connection to the New World, then Polynesians cannot be considered to be Lamanites. The statements made by Elder Kimball and other Church leaders would therefore be incorrect, thus proving that these leaders are not inspired. Proving a negative, however, is extremely difficult to do. Many critic's arguments against the Book of Mormon rely upon proving that something does not exist. In the case of Polynesia, there is at least one well known anomaly tying Polynesia to the New World that is acknowledged by non-LDS scientists.
An anomaly long puzzled over by botanists is the presence of the sweet potato in Polynesia. The Sweet Potato is native to New World, and it is believed to have originated in either the Central or South American lowlands.[2] The subject of how and when the sweet potato traveled from the New World to Polynesia has long been the subject of debate among scientists. Dr. Roland B. Dixon, a cultural anthropologist who organized one of the world’s most comprehensive and functional anthropological libraries, noted three theories that have been proposed to explain the presence of this New World plant in the islands:[3]
An even more intriguing is the name of this plant: In Peru, the Quechua name for a particular type of sweet potato is “kumar.” In Polynesia, some of the names used are “kumala” and “kumara.” Dr. Dixon concluded in 1932 that,
Molecular biologist Dr. Simon Southerton, in his critical book Losing a Lost Tribe: Native Americans, DNA, and the Mormon Church, takes the position that the similarity in names must have been the result of European colonization.[5] The theory that the sweet potato's arrival was due the the Spaniards was proven to be incorrect, however, with the discovery of carbonized sweet potato remains in excavations at Mangaia, in the Cook Islands. The remains were dated to 1000 A.D., a full 500 years before the arrival of the Spaniards.[6][7][8] Additional sweet potato remains which pre-date European contact have also been discovered in Hawaii, Easter Island and New Zealand, indicating that the plant was widely dispersed before the Europeans arrived.[9]
Dr. Dixon rejected the idea that South Americans could have traveled to Polynesia because they did not have the skill to build ships capable of making the voyage. More recently, however, scientists have noted that possibility that the plant may have arrived in the islands accidentally, either on a disabled craft or by means of seed capsules that drifted to the islands from the New World. It is even more interesting to note that during drift tests conducted to investigate this possibility, that the most probable drift route was found to be between Central America and the Marshall Islands.[10]
The possibility of plants (and people), drifting to the islands from the New World certainly fits well with the story of Hagoth.
The island of Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island), there are stone walls which were built and without the aid of mortar. The stones fit so precisely together than there are no visible gaps. The workmanship of these stone walls very closely resembles that of similar walls found in Peru.[11] Another connection between Polynesia and South America came to light in 2007 when the bones of a chicken native to Polynesia were found in an archaeological dig in El Arenal. The bones pre-date the arrival of the Spaniards by approximately 100 years.[12][13] A variety of cotton in Hawaii has been genetically linked to the most common variety of cotton grown in Mexico.[14]
So, what does this prove? The presence of a New World plant in pre-Columbian Polynesia does not prove anything with respect to the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon is to be believed based upon faith rather than circumstantial evidence. The data that is coming to light, however, continues to support the possibility of multiple pre-Columbian connections between Polynesia and the New World. More importantly, this data is eliminating "absence of evidence" as a critical argument against a Polynesian connection with the New World.
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