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David A. Palmer, In Search of Cumorah: New Evidences for the Book of Mormon from Ancient Mexico (Bountiful: Horizon, 1981) 22, 81-86 | David A. Palmer, In Search of Cumorah: New Evidences for the Book of Mormon from Ancient Mexico (Bountiful: Horizon, 1981) 22, 81-86 | ||
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Revision as of 16:33, 30 June 2008
This article is a draft. FairMormon editors are currently editing it. We welcome your suggestions on improving the content.
Contents
Criticism
Critics claim that Joseph Smith wrote the Book of Mormon to explain local legends associated with the "Moundbuilders" of the Eastern United States.
Source(s) of the criticism
- Fawn M. Brodie, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1945), Chapter 3. ( Index of claims )
- Robert Silverberg, The Mound Builders (Ohio University Press, 1986), 68-73.
- Stephen Williams, Fantastic Archaeology: The Wild Side of North American Prehistory (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991)
Response
Joseph Smith never connected the Moundbuilders with Book of Mormon lands.
John Loyd Stephens wrote a book in 1841 about his explorations to some ruins. Joseph Smith editorialized, " It would not be a bad plan to compare Mr. Stephens' ruined cities with those in the Book of Mormon: Light cleaves to light and facts are supported by facts. The truth injures no one...." (Times and Seaons Vol 3, No. 23, p 927)
It is true that the moundbuilders culture was the most advance one, but critics should consider that if someone attemp to write a book about a history of the North American indians, he or she would not write about advance civilizations with advance technology due that there were no known remains of it in the 1830s.
Critics should also reconsider that if Joseph Smith taugh the Book of Mormon was a history of the Moundbuilders, it would give greater authencity to the Book of Mormon due to that there were advance civilizations with advance technology in America. There is no church doctrine, position, nor Book of Mormon statement that Book of Mormon events took place in the United States.
Conclusion
Endnotes
David A. Palmer, In Search of Cumorah: New Evidences for the Book of Mormon from Ancient Mexico (Bountiful: Horizon, 1981) 22, 81-86
Further reading
FAIR wiki articles
FAIR web site
- FairMormon Topical Guide: Zelph FairMormon link
- FairMormon Topical Guide: Archaeology and the Book of Mormon FairMormon link
External links
- Diane E. Wirth, "Review of Fantastic Archaeology: The Wild Side of North American Prehistory by Stephen Williams," FARMS Review of Books 4/1 (1992): 251–253. off-site
- John L. Sorenson, "Review of Fantastic Archaeology: The Wild Side of North American Prehistory by Stephen Williams," FARMS Review of Books 4/1 (1992): 254–257. off-site
Printed material
- David A. Palmer, In Search of Cumorah (Bountiful, Utah: Horizon, 1981),82 ISBN 0882907832