Difference between revisions of "Book of Mormon geography/Models/Limited/Goble 2004"

Revision as of 17:58, 29 January 2011

Edwin Goble was co-author of the book This Land: Zarahemla and the Nephite Nation in 2002. Goble previously believed in the general US Heartland model, now popularized by Rodney Meldrum.

Goble later became aware of the significance of Joseph Smith's statement in the Levi Hancock Journal during Zion's Camp. The statement seems to suggest that Joseph Smith believed that the area of the Zelph Mound in Illinois was in a northern part of the land of Desolation mentioned in the Book of Mormon. This, of course, contradicts the central idea in the US Heartland Model. That model puts forth the belief that the Land of Zarahemla was in the Midwestern United States, relying on questionable statements that allege that Joseph Smith believed that Manti was in Missouri, and so forth. Those that continue to back the US Heartland Model must explain away or deny the significance of this statement of Joseph Smith if they are to maintain their belief. Recognizing that this was not rational, Goble's faith was shaken in the US Heartland model. Goble realized the implication of that statement from Joseph Smith, that it actually pushed the Narrow Neck of Land into Mesoamerica. He ended up retracting his belief in the US Heartland model.

Goble calls his new model the Two-Heartland theory. The new model relies on the Book of Mormon text, according to his understanding of it. He recognizes that many will disagree with this interpretation. Now he says it doesn't matter what Joseph Smith believed, only what the Book of Mormon text says. Goble focuses on the fact that the Book of Mormon mentions an exceedingly great distance between the Land of Zarahemla and the Large Bodies of Water in the Land of Many Waters to the North. Most Mesoamerican theorists believe this exceedingly great distance is much shorter of a distance, preferring an interpretation that identifies these large bodies of water as something more southward. Goble interprets it the traditional way, identifying them as the Great Lakes.

Therefore, in this model, it is limited in scope in the sense that most of the Book of Mormon History takes place in Mesoamerica, and it is larger in scope only later in their history that the Book of Mormon peoples spread outward to the North. Therefore, in this model, there are two heartlands, one in the Land Southward comprising the heartland of the Preclassic Maya, and one in the Land Northward, comprising the heartland of the Hopewell/Adena, as archaeology has shown, in Illinois and Ohio. This emphasis on the second heartland and a Cumorah in New York in the theory is a hold-over from his previous beliefs in the US Heartland theory. So this theory is a hybrid between the limited Mesoamerican theory and the Great Lakes models, but identifies the Hopewell/Adena as Nephites and Lamanites that migrated northward. This is not a Hemispheric theory, because it does not place the Narrow Neck at Panama. It focuses on Limited Geography during the time periods where there was a limited geography, confined to Mesoamerica. It focuses on an expanded geography during the times that there actually was a more expanded geography. It focuses on the archaeological heartlands of the ancient cultures as the archaeologists have identified them, and does not push the naive idea that there were dense populations spread throughout the continents of the Americas. It is true that this is somewhat of a resurrection of the older external model of McGavin and Bean, who advocated a Land Southward in Mesoamerica, and a New York Cumorah. The difference is that this is more focused on the modern archaeology of the heartlands of both Mesoamerica and North America, and dismisses the old unsubstantiated traditions that McGavin and Bean regurgitate in their book.

Goble claims that the plausibility of a New York Cumorah actually comes from the fact that it is in the backyard of the Hopewell/Adena cultures. Goble says that most critics focus on solely the archaeology of New York state and say there were no high cultures in the area. But the Hopewell/Adena were in the area, he claims. Mesoamerican advocates still say that these cultures do not represent high cultures according to the Mesoamerican standards. Be that as it may, they are definitely what one would rationally expect in the Land Northward when the population in the Land Northward of the Book of Mormon was more spread out and more sparsely populated than the dense centers of the south. While Mesoamerican advocates say that the distance between Mesoamerica and the New York Cumorah is a weakness, Goble claims that is precisely what lends to its plausibility because of the exceeding distance as mentioned in the text. And he says, if we are looking to fulfill the requirements of the text, why then should we not interpret it literally, that there was an exceedingly great distance? We interpret the text as a limited geography beneath the neck of land, because that is what the text calls for. It calls for an area with an hourglass shape with cities in a limited area beneath that neck. Why then, can't the word exceedingly mean precisely what it says, and large bodies of water be large bodies of water? If Mesoamerica was such a high civilization that we know it was, and we find so much Mesoamerican influence in North America, as we do, according to archaeology, then why is it such a forbidden idea that the Great Lakes area was full of Mesoamerican transplants mixed in with others? And then, why should these Mesoamericans not have been Nephites that built the Hopewell centers?

Most critics of the New York Cumorah say the hill is archaeologically clean. Goble says that is immaterial because it is a short term battle site which has been picked over, not a long term settlement site. Or in other words, it is the place where people fled to, not where they lived for an extended period of time, and it is well within the domain of the Hopewell Interaction Sphere. In Goble's view, detailed archaeological digs have not been done at the New York Cumorah site, and until such things are done, dismissal of the site only on the basis of empty statements like "it is archaeologically clean" do not fly. It is only obvious that any artifacts on the surface have been removed, if old accounts are to be trusted, which claim just that. It's not that the old statements in themselves are to be trusted. But it shows the necessity of digging down deeper to get to the heart of the matter. If nothing is found after a real archaeological dig done there, then, Goble says, he can simply retract this theory too. The Nephites had already had population centers in the Land Northward, and those in Mesoamerica had to flee to those for protection. And so, they were already in the area by the time they fled to New York.

The model does not attempt to narrow down any specifics except for the general areas, a Narrow Neck of Land at Tehuantepec, and the traditional Cumorah in New York.

(See book entitled Resurrecting Cumorah)