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==Name parallels?== | ==Name parallels?== | ||
− | Finding "parallels" between almost any subject is usually easy to do. Such parallels become more impressive if data which do not support the parallel are ignored, if only parallels are considered (instead of parallels and "UNparallels"), and if one does not consider alternate explanations.{{ref| | + | Finding "parallels" between almost any subject is usually easy to do. Such parallels become more impressive if data which do not support the parallel are ignored, if only parallels are considered (instead of parallels and "UNparallels"), and if one does not consider alternate explanations.{{ref|source}} |
===A vast area=== | ===A vast area=== | ||
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==Endnotes== | ==Endnotes== | ||
{{BoMPortal}} | {{BoMPortal}} | ||
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#{{note|source}} This wiki article was initially based on a webposting made by Jeff Lindsay, and with his kind permission was used as the base text for the wiki article. Due to the nature of a wiki project, the article may have been substantially modified from the original text. Jeff Lindsay, "Book of Mormon Plagiarism: The Hawaiian Connection," ''mormanity'' blog, (29 July 2007). {{link|url=http://mormanity.blogspot.com/2007/07/book-of-mormon-plagiarism-hawaiian.html}} | #{{note|source}} This wiki article was initially based on a webposting made by Jeff Lindsay, and with his kind permission was used as the base text for the wiki article. Due to the nature of a wiki project, the article may have been substantially modified from the original text. Jeff Lindsay, "Book of Mormon Plagiarism: The Hawaiian Connection," ''mormanity'' blog, (29 July 2007). {{link|url=http://mormanity.blogspot.com/2007/07/book-of-mormon-plagiarism-hawaiian.html}} | ||
#{{note|angola1}} "Angola, New York" ''wikipedia'' (accessed 31 July 2007). {{link|url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angola,_New_York}} | #{{note|angola1}} "Angola, New York" ''wikipedia'' (accessed 31 July 2007). {{link|url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angola,_New_York}} |
Critics claim that Joseph Smith is clearly the author of the Book of Mormon because many Book of Mormon place names supposedly have clear evidence of "borrowing" from geographic locations in the United States and Canada.
To see citations to the critical sources for these claims, [[../CriticalSources|click here]]
Examples of this include:
Book of Mormon City | Claimed Source | Book of Mormon City | Claimed Source |
---|---|---|---|
Teancum | Tecumseh | Ramah | Rama |
Moron | Morin | Ogath | Ste Agathe |
Moriancum | Moravian | Angola | Angola |
Onidah | Oneida | Kishkumen | Kiskiminetas |
Jacobugath | Jacobsburg | Jerusalem | Jerusalem |
Alma | Alma | Land of Lehi-Nephi | Lehigh |
Shilom | Shiloh | -- | -- |
We now pass to the question of parallels in the Book of Mormon place names.
Finding "parallels" between almost any subject is usually easy to do. Such parallels become more impressive if data which do not support the parallel are ignored, if only parallels are considered (instead of parallels and "UNparallels"), and if one does not consider alternate explanations.[1]
Joseph Smith was not well-traveled, and he almost certainly did not have access to detailed maps.
Despite these facts, to obtain this list of parallels, a huge geographical area has been scanned to obtain names like Rama, Ontario (over 100 miles north of Toronto, Canada); Ste. Agathe, Quebec (full name is Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts; it is north of Montreal and Ottawa); Shiloh, New Jersey; Jerusalem and Jacobsburg, Ohio; and Alma, West Virginia. Five states and two Canadian provinces yield this little list of strained parallels.
Some of the names listed by the critics are, in fact, Biblical names. If one is going to suggest that Joseph plagiarized the names, why rely on obscure and sometimes distant American towns? It is clear that whoever wrote the Book of Mormon was familiar with the Old Testament, and so it is not surprising that some Biblical names were used:
Critics scour modern maps looking for "parallels," and, without realizing it, use some place names that didn't exist at all during the period of time that the Book of Mormon was being translated in 1829.
This name is identical, and located within New York state. This would seem to be an excellent candidate for the critics' theory. However, the settlement at that site was not named "Angola" until 1855![2]
There's a chance Joseph could have heard of the little Angola post office, or of the territory of Angola in Africa, but it seems far-fetched to think that modern Angola, New York could have any direct bearing on the Book of Mormon.
Tecumseh, the supposed origin of Teancum, requires considerable creativity to even make the words the same. (The critics rely on the fact that words which start with the same letter seem "the same" to us on a cursory glance.) To get Teancum from Tecumseh, one has to take off the last syllable, add "an" after the "Te," and there you have it. Tecumseh = Teancum. Kind of like John = Joshua!
But could Joseph have known about Tecumseh, Ontario? As a prophet of God, yes, but as a plagiarizer, unlikely. Tecumseh, Ontario did not get this name until 1912. As Wikipedia explains:
Desperate to save this idea, other critics have suggested the town of Tecumseh, Michigan instead of the Tecumseh, Ontario, replacing a ridiculous candidate with one that is merely silly (and even further from Joseph Smith than its later Canadian cousin).
A check of the Michigan location reveals that this tiny Western suburb of Detroit had just barely been settled by a tiny handful of people in the late 1820s, but at least there was a village of Tecumseh in 1824. Insignificant and remote for those in Joseph Smith's area, it's hard to imagine Joseph being aware of that village and feeling some need to stick it on a mental map of the Book of Mormon. And while he may well have heard of the Indian warrior Tecumseh, it's still quite a stretch to get Teancum from that name.[5]
Some of the supposed "parallels" are extremely weak.
It seems no evidence is too weak when attacking Joseph.
Alma, West Virginia is another interesting name. Unfortunately, the town is so small that there is almost no information about it on the Web - not even a stub in Wikipedia. The satellite image of the town suggests that there might be a couple of businesses in the area, but there seems to be little there even in modern times.
With so many other sources of "Alma" to choose from - like "alma mater" or the female Latin name Alma, why do we have to drop down to West Virginia to find this "incredible" parallel? Alma isn't a city in the Book of Mormon - it's a prominent name for a couple of prophets. True, there was a valley that Alma's group encounters in Mosiah 24 that his people briefly called the valley of Alma on their way back to the main land of the Nephites, but this is nowhere close to a notable landmark in Book of Mormon geography. The reality is that nothing available to Joseph Smith would have informed him that Alma was not a female name, but was actually an authentic male Jewish name in Nephi's day, a name that could have been brought to the New World by Nephi's group.
See FAIR wiki article: Book of Mormon "anachronisms"—Alma as a male Hebrew name
As indicated above, Ramah is a perfectly good Biblical name.
Critics claim, however, that "Rama, Ontario" was Joseph Smith's source for this name. However, it is on the opposite side of Lake Huron, and today holds only a casino and about 500 inhabitants.[6] How likely is it that Joseph would have even heard of this obscure spot? Ramah is also the Jaredite name for Cumorah, yet Holley's map does not place it at the New York Cumorah location, but in Ontario. This would seem to be more evidence that he created his "Book of Mormon map" by looking at New England placenames, and not by looking at the Book of Mormon text.
A modern survey of thousands of square miles and hundreds of small townships can doubtless turn up a few coincidental matches to Book of Mormon place names—or place names from any other source.
Cognates and similar names occur easily by chance and can readily be found anywhere one looks. (One LDS author has compiled a list of Hawaiian "parallels" that are at least as convincing as the critics', to demonstrate how pointless this exercise is.)[7]
The examples provided by the critics fail on multiple grounds, as this color-coded chart demonstrates:
Book of Mormon City | Claimed Source | Book of Mormon City | Claimed Source |
---|---|---|---|
Teancum | Tecumseh | Ramah | Rama |
Moron* | Morin* | Ogath | Ste Agathe (des Monts) |
Moriancum | Moraviantown | Angola | Angola |
Onidah | Oneida | Kishkumen | Kiskiminetas |
Jacobugath | Jacobsburg | Jerusalem | Jerusalem |
Alma | Alma | Land of Lehi-Nephi | Lehigh |
Shilom | Shiloh | -- | -- |
Key
Critics are desperate to discredit Joseph, and so even resort to suggesting place names that did not exist in his day. They also resort to extremely small, distant sites about which Joseph almost certainly could have had no knowledge.
They also overlook the Biblical source for their American "parallels," which are far more likely and plausible than giving Joseph an encyclopedic knowledge of North American place names. Even if they insist that he forged the Book of Mormon, isn't the Bible a far more likely source for these names than obscure hamlets hundreds of miles away?
And, for any of this to work at all, they must develop a map based on New England; they cannot reconstruct their map from the Book of Mormon text itself--the Book of Mormon's geography is coherent and consistent, and it does not match Holley's efforts at all.
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