Pre-Columbian Amazonian earthworks, geoglyphs, and signs of a massive civilization

Here is a collection of headlines and links about pre-Columbian earthworks found in the Amazon region of South America showing signs of an enormous civilization that was much more advanced than was previously understood.

• Pre-Columbian earth-builders settled along the entire southern rim of the Amazon
• Long Before Making Enigmatic Earthworks, People Reshaped Brazil’s Rain Forest
• Hundreds of ancient earthworks built in the Amazon
• Geometric Earthworks of Western Amazonia
• Hundreds of Geoglyphs Discovered in the Amazon
• "Lost" Amazon Complex Found; Shapes Seen by Satellite

More Evidence for Pre-Nephite/Pre-Jaredite American Inhabitants

One of the more aggravating objections to the Book of Mormon that I see from time to time on various online forums is this idea that all original inhabitants of the Americas came from a single source: the Bering Strait. It usually takes the form of a statement like, "there's no evidence that anyone but Asians are the predecessors of Native Americans found when Columbus arrived..." or some such nonsense.

I've already written about this recently, and also earlier, and see also Steve Smoot's excellent DNA and the Book of Mormon article. But here comes yet another bit of scientific discovery that blows this limited and antiquated Beringian population group idea out of the water.

Brazilian rock shelter proves humans inhabited Americas 23,000 years ago

"The “First Americans” are usually believed to be East Asian migrants that crossed the Bering Straits 15,000 years ago, members of the Clovis Culture (a reference to their stone tool technology). A small number of researchers have suggested that an earlier group of migrants, from Europe’s Solutrean culture, arrived in North America a couple of millennia before these Clovis settlers, a hypothesis which was hotly disputed by academics... 

It now appears that researchers favoring both the Clovis and Solutrean models have got it all wrong and supporting the claim of “First Americans” should be given to a mysterious population living in Brazil over 23,000 years ago."

While there is still some reasonable doubt about the Solutrean (European) arrival and whether it was before or after the Beringian/Clovis culture, it's hard to find a way to refute the findings of the Brazilian site.

"Scientists utilized three separate dating methods to investigate samples of charcoal, sediment, and the sloth bones. The revealed dates securely place people at the Santa Elina site well over 23,120 years ago. Humans groups abandoned the site after a short period, but later groups utilized the rock shelter again between 10,120 and 2,000 years ago... 

The new dates from Santa Elina further erode the consensus understanding that the first modern humans reached the Americas by walking across the land bridge between Northeast Asia and North America 15,000 years ago. The rock shelter is thousands of miles from the proposed entry site.  

Not only is Santa Elina located far from even the earliest Clovis sites, it is also over 1,000 miles from the Brazilian coast in a heavily forested region. This seems like an unlikely first point of entry as it is logical to suspect that humans lived initially along the coastline before moving into the Brazilian interior by 23,000 years ago. This would seem to offer further support to claims that modern humans were in Brazil long before even this early period."

Again, what people thought they "knew" for certain is being upended by new findings. This is why when people say to me that there is no proof (such a sloppy word) or evidence (better) that there were Nephites or Lamanites or Jaredites or any connection whatsoever between ancient America and the Middle East, first I tell them all the new stuff we're finding followed by "and wait until you see what else the Lord will eventually reveal."

By faith and also by reason. That is how truth is discovered.

Ancient horse bones found in Lehi, Utah

A family doing landscaping in their backyard of their Lehi, Utah home found the bones of what appears to be a 16,000-year-old horse.

Even though it's a small horse, about the size of a Shetland pony, this find pokes one more hole in the argument that no horses of any kind ever existed in the Americas prior to the Spanish Conquest.

It has always seemed strange to me that we have been able to find human inhabitants in the Americas going as far back as possibly 130,000 years ago, but that there is this strange idea that not one human crossing the Bering Strait or arriving by any other route thought to bring a single pack-horse with them from the Old World to the New World. Or that not even one of these animals found their own way across the strait or along the edges of glaciers.

This is one more example of the absence of evidence not necessarily being evidence of absence. Eventually, we will find many more pieces of evidence that help confirm what we already know by testimony to be true from the Book of Mormon.

Book of Mormon Month is coming. Are you ready to read?

The Book of Mormon and Democracy

In 1977, then Elder Ezra Taft Benson (later to become the 13th President of the LDS Church) gave a unique speech denouncing Communism as a potential form of government in the United States. In doing so, and with right authority, he momentarily departed from the Church's reticence to engage in discussing political philosophies as a matter of doctrine to issue a stern warning about where our nation would find itself should we continue to tolerate Socialistic and Communistic policies then beginning to take root.

See the video embedded below (on the blog if you're reading this in email).



What does this have to do with the Book of Mormon? Just about everything.

You see, if President Benson could be remembered for anything, it was his denouncement of Communism and his love of the Book of Mormon. When I left on my mission, I did so with his invitation ringing in my ears to share it early and often with as many people as possible. He said it contained the key to righteousness, liberty from sin, and freedom and equality for all. I have always found that to be the case. Undoubtedly, his strong views on the Book of Mormon fueled his strong passion for promoting liberty over tyranny.

From his 1979 Conference talk entitled "A Witness and a Warning", here are a few verses from the Book of Mormon that bear out his teachings.

Ether 2:10,12
10 For behold, this is a land which is choice above all other lands; wherefore he that doth possess it shall serve God or shall be ^aswept off; for it is the everlasting decree of God. And it is not until the ^bfulness of iniquity among the children of the land, that they are ^cswept off.
12 Behold, this is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be ^afree from bondage, and from captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but ^bserve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ, who hath been manifested by the things which we have written.

Ether 13:1-3

1 And now I, Moroni, proceed to finish my record concerning the destruction of the people of whom I have been writing.

2 For behold, they rejected all the words of Ether; for he truly told them of all things, from the beginning of man; and that after the waters had ^areceded from off the face of this ^bland it became a choice land above all other lands, a chosen land of the Lord; wherefore the Lord would have that all men should ^cserve him who dwell upon the face thereof;

3 And that it was the place of the ^aNew Jerusalem, which should ^bcome down out of heaven, and the holy sanctuary of the Lord.

2 Nephi 10:10-12

1 And now I, Moroni, proceed to finish my record concerning the destruction of the people of whom I have been writing.

2 For behold, they rejected all the words of Ether; for he truly told them of all things, from the beginning of man; and that after the waters had ^areceded from off the face of this ^bland it became a choice land above all other lands, a chosen land of the Lord; wherefore the Lord would have that all men should ^cserve him who dwell upon the face thereof;

3 And that it was the place of the ^aNew Jerusalem, which should ^bcome down out of heaven, and the holy sanctuary of the Lord.

President Benson also taught us that there are three things that we must do to avoid destruction in this land ordained for freedom (links added for additional study):

First: We must return to worship the God of this land, who is Jesus Christ. He has promised that the righteous will be preserved by His power (see 1 Ne. 22:17). But we must keep the commandments of God. We must pay our tithes and offerings, keep the Sabbath day a holy day, stay morally clean, be honest in all our dealings, and have our family and personal prayers. We must live the gospel.

Second: We must awaken to “a sense of [our] awful situation, because of this secret combination which [is] among [us]” (Ether 8:24). We must not tolerate accommodation with or appeasement toward the false system of Communism. We must demand of our elected officials that we not only resist Communism, but that we will take every measure to prevent its intrusion into this hemisphere. It is vital that we invoke the Monroe Doctrine.

Then we must put our trust in Him who has promised us His protection—and pray that He will intervene to preserve our freedom just as He intervened in our obtaining it in the first place.

Third: We must do as the Lord commanded us by revelation in 1833: “Wherefore, honest men and wise men should be sought for diligently, and good men and wise men ye should observe to uphold; otherwise whatsoever is less than these cometh of evil” (D&C 98:10).

Men who are wise, good, and honest, who will uphold the Constitution of the United States in the tradition of the Founding Fathers, must be sought for diligently. This is our hope to restore government to its rightful role.

Last: We must study the inspired Constitution and become involved in the political process ourselves. I quote the First Presidency statement that was read in sacrament meetings on Sunday, 1 July 1979: “We encourage all members, as citizens of the nation, to be actively involved in the political process, and to support those measures which will strengthen the community, state, and nation—morally, economically, and culturally” (Letter from the First Presidency, 29 June 1979).

November 4th is our opportunity to assist in God's will for this land: that it remain free and prosperous based on sound Gospel principles. We will do this by voting in what we hope to be a fair and free election. If it is not free and fair, we must make sure that this and future elections are to the best of our ability. Whether Democrat or Republican, we each have the duty and responsibility to exercise that right to elect our electors and representatives and to maintain the course that God has already expressed for us if we are to remain free.

Please don't forget to vote. Please don't listen to negative voices telling you your vote doesn't count or that your particular cause is lost. This year, more than ever, it does count. Our cause is not lost.

The Second Book of Nephi (2 Nephi 1)

The Second Book of Nephi carries us fully into the new and promised land we now know to be the Americas. This book, like 1st Nephi, holds many prophecies about the Western hemisphere. In chapter 1, we also learn more about Israel being scattered and a last effort by Lehi to invite Laman and Lemuel to repent.

Lehi was the patriarch or oldest living male of the group. The word "patriarch" is of Greek derivation and means father-ruler; the Hebrew word it translates is simply father. Lehi held the priesthood "after the holy order of the Son of God", or, for short, the Melchizedek priesthood. It was the same priesthood authority held by Adam, Melchizedek, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob (Israel), and Moses. As such, it held the keys (or permission) to give father's blessings such as what Issac gave to Jacob and Esau and what Jacob (Israel) gave to his twelve sons.

In 2 Nephi chapters 1 through 4, Lehi gives a father's blessing to the following (in order of mention by chapter):

1. Laman - chapter 1
   
2. Lemuel - chapter 1
   
3. Sam - chapter 1
   
4. Sons of Ishmael - chapter 1
   
5. Zoram - chapter 1
   
6. Jacob - chapter 2
   
7. Joseph - chapter 3
   
8. Children of Laman - chapter 4
9. Children of Lemuel - chapter 4
10. Children of Sons of Ishmael - chapter 4
    
11. Children of Sam - chapter 4
    

It is notable that:

• The order of blessings follows that of Hebrew tradition--that is from oldest to youngest--with the exception of the Children of the Sons of Ishmael and the Children of Sam switching places in the age hierarchy. That Joseph Smith, if he had made it all up out of his head, didn't simply go the easier route and just list these descendants in the same order as their fathers is striking. One wonders if perhaps Ishmael's sons' descendants were somehow, on average, older than the children of Sam.
  
• Zoram and the sons of Ishmael were not Lehi's blood descendants. They receive the father's blessing from Lehi because Ishmael had passed away at Nahom, back on the Arabian peninsula, and Zoram had joined the group as part of an oath to Nephi without his own father accompanying him.
• Lehi doesn't specifically address Nephi. He really only makes reference to Nephi when comparing to and contrasting with Nephi's blessings the blessings that others will receive. There isn't much in the text to suggest why this is the case. One might suppose that Nephi was simply too modest to include his own blessing in these chapters, or that he felt it was sufficiently covered in his own written prophecies.

As expected at this point, Laman and Lemuel's patriarchal blessings were full of dire warnings that terrible things would happen to their posterity if they didn't repent and obey the commandments from the Lord through Nephi. They had "pushed their luck" far too much and were being told in no uncertain terms that they were at a tipping point. Either they would be obedient and be blessed, or they would rebel and the family would split up, Nephi's descendants would be blessed materially and spiritually, and Laman and Lemuel's would be cursed materially and spiritually.

In chapter 1, Lehi also rejoices in his own blessings:

• "the mercies of God in sparing their lives, that they were not swallowed up in the sea"
• "how ^amerciful the Lord had been in ^bwarning us that we should flee out of the land of Jerusalem"
• "had we remained in Jerusalem we should also have ^eperished"
• "we have obtained a ^aland of promise, a land which is ^bchoice above all other lands; a land which the Lord God hath ^ccovenanted with me should be a land for the inheritance of my seed"

Additionally, Lehi sets forth the conditions under which the Lord allows any people to inhabit the Americas:

• "they shall serve him according to the commandments which he hath given"
• "if iniquity shall abound ^ccursed shall be the land for their sakes, but unto the righteous it shall be blessed forever"
• "this land should be ^akept as yet from the knowledge of other ^bnations; for behold, many nations would overrun the land, that there would be no place for an inheritance"
• ^"binasmuch as those whom the Lord God shall bring out of the land of Jerusalem shall keep his commandments, they shall ^cprosper upon the face of this land; and they shall be kept from all other nations, that they may possess this land unto themselves"
• "when the time cometh that they shall dwindle in ^aunbelief...if the day shall come that they will reject the Holy One of Israel, the true ^bMessiah, their Redeemer and their God, behold, the judgments of him that is ^cjust shall rest upon them"

Lehi is speaking out of the dust to all Americans--from the northernmost reaches of Canada down to Tierra del Fuego. 2 Nephi 1:10 is therefore one of the most important verses any of us here in the Western hemisphere can read if we value "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness".

Book: Ancient Americans: Rewriting the History of the New World

Book of Mormon scholarship under the prominent LDS researchers today has been the mainstay of arguments for a different understanding of pre-Columbian populations in the Americas. At a certain point in recent history, that began to change as new publications, often independently authored, brought to light other theories and evidences that have the potential to change the consensus of typical American Indian studies.

One of those publications is "Ancient Americans: Rewriting the History of the New World" by Charles C. Mann. Published in 2005, this book outlines an alternative to previously held conclusions about pre-Columbian American civilizations as well as a new way of viewing the events that followed European contact with the Americas.

Mann is not LDS, which makes his work all that more interesting to me. I find it refreshing to see that we are not the only ones who question the status quo when it comes to ancient American research. There is much more to be discovered that will cast new light on our currently held understanding about ancient American civilizations.

Nephi Sees Conditions Leading to Latter-day Events (1 Nephi 13, Part III)

In Part II of this chapter, we covered the arrival of the Gentiles and their wars and contentions with their mother nations. We also covered the book they brought with them which, it is abundantly apparent, is the Bible as we know it today.

In Part III, we finish 1 Nephi Chapter 13 by discussing Gentile influences on the descendants of Nephi's brothers, Laman and Lemuel.

Christopher Columbus wrote in journals regarding his experience in mounting his voyage to the New World:

It was the Lord who put into my mind (I could feel his hand upon me) the fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies. All who heard of my project rejected it with laughter, ridiculing me. There is no question that the inspiration was from the Holy Spirit because He comforted me.... For the execution of the journey to the Indies, I did not make use of intelligence, mathematics or maps. It is simply the fulfillment of what Isaiah had prophesied.

The passages of Isaiah he refers to are as follows:

Isaiah 18:1-2

1 ^aWoe to the land shadowing with wings, which is ^bbeyond the rivers of ^cEthiopia:

2 That sendeth ambassadors by the sea, even in vessels of ^abulrushes upon the waters, saying, Go, ye swift messengers, to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people terrible from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden down, whose land the rivers have ^bspoiled!

Isaiah 49:1, 5-6

1 ^aListen, O isles, unto me; and ^bhearken, ye people, from far; The Lord hath ^ccalled me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name.

5 ¶ And now, saith the Lord that ^aformed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength.

6 And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a ^alight to the ^bGentiles, that thou mayest be my ^csalvation unto the end of the earth.

Samuel Eliot Morison of Harvard, who studied the extremely spiritual character of Columbus, wrote:

Men may doubt this, but there can be no doubt that the faith of Columbus was genuine and sincere, and that his frequent communion with forces unseen was a vital element in his achievements. It gave him confidence in his destiny, assurance that his performance would be equal to the promise.... This conviction that god destined him to be an instrument for spreading the faith was far more potent than the desire to win glory, wealth, and worldly honors, to which he was certainly far from indifferent.

In the secularized world of today, with its so-called "separation of church and state", and perpetual hand-wringing over America's erstwhile participation in the slave trade, the topic of Columbus can certainly make for uncomfortable dinner conversation among mixed company. For, as the argument goes, if Columbus hadn't set foot on his ship and come here, nothing bad would have happened.

Utter nonsense. To believe such a thing is to ignore patterns of human development and behavior in all nations and by all nations, especially their tendency to invade and enslave their neighbors. It is to imagine that only Columbus would ever have stumbled upon the Americas.

If not Columbus, then someone else--perhaps with unabashedly ignoble motivations--would have taken his place.

It certainly can't be denied that the impact of European contact with American natives was enormous. However, contrary to popular, uninformed opinion today, Europeans unknowingly carried with them certain strains of microbes and viruses that had not existed in the Americas, accidentally causing the deaths of great numbers of those already living here. They didn't arrive with a knowledge of what would happen in the future any more than you or I know whether we will be safe going to and from work in the morning or if we will, by some innocent choice or errant left turn, cause accident or injury to others.

Columbus was a humble, yet noble, learned, and religious man. So were several (but not all) of those who traveled with him on his first voyages. Those who were the more righteous and well-intentioned part did the best they knew how with what knowledge of the Gospel they possessed in the scriptures they had inherited from their fathers. They were therefore zealous in their desire to convert the natives they found on Hispañola and other islands of what is now known as the Bahamas.

Among many, a great example of these good intentions is found in a quote from a copy of Columbus' original Journal of the First Voyage as written by Bartolomé de Las Casas and quoted in America's God and Country: Encyclopedia of Quotations:

...And I say that Your Highness ought not to consent that any foreigner does business or sets foot here, except Christian Catholics, since this was the end and the beginning of the enterprise, that it should be for the enhancement and glory of the Christian religion nor should anyone who is not a good Christian come to these parts.

Tragically, when word got out about the great resources and riches of the New World, others who were not so much inclined towards religious benevolence as to monetary gain, took it upon themselves to exploit and plunder whatever they could find. The Native Americans, being in the way of their greed, took the brunt of this exploitation in that they were turned from friends into slaves and made to do the work of those who wanted what the new land had to offer.

Again, in today's political climate, we often hear a revisionist interpretation of these events: as if somehow Columbus was the purposeful instigator of the mistreatment of God's children on the American continents. However, those who malign Columbus do not have the perspective that the Book of Mormon offers to us--and to Native American descendants who remain. God foresaw all of these events and has designed a higher purpose in their tragedy and suffering that transcends our own limited perspective and interpretation of events. When people make wrong choices and suffer consequences, God provides for even greater blessings than those that were lost, if they will but repent and obey Him. Sometimes those blessings come much later, but the do come.

30 Nevertheless, thou beholdest that the Gentiles who have gone forth out of captivity, and have been lifted up by the power of God above all other nations, upon the face of the land which is choice above all other lands, which is the land that the Lord God hath covenanted with thy father that his seed should have for the ^aland of their inheritance; wherefore, thou seest that the Lord God will not suffer that the Gentiles will utterly destroy the ^bmixture of thy ^cseed, which are among thy brethren.

31 Neither will he suffer that the Gentiles shall ^adestroy the seed of thy brethren.

32 Neither will the Lord God suffer that the Gentiles shall forever remain in that awful state of blindness, which thou beholdest they are in, because of the plain and most precious parts of the gospel of the Lamb which have been kept back by that ^aabominable church, whose formation thou hast seen.

33 Wherefore saith the Lamb of God: I will be ^amerciful unto the Gentiles, unto the visiting of the remnant of the house of Israel in great judgment.

First, God makes a promise to Nephi that his family's descendants will not be completely eliminated. He promises to be merciful to the Gentiles and, through them, to restore what was once lost from the written Gospel they carried with them. How would he do this? Through the seed of Nephi and his brethren.

35 For, behold, saith the Lamb: I will manifest myself unto thy seed, that they shall write many things which I shall minister unto them [the Book of Mormon], which shall be plain and precious; and after thy seed shall be destroyed, and dwindle in unbelief, and also the seed of thy brethren, behold, ^athese things shall be hid up, to come forth unto the Gentiles, by the gift and power of the Lamb.

36 And in them shall be written my ^agospel, saith the Lamb, and my ^brock and my salvation.

37 And ^ablessed are they who shall seek to bring forth my ^bZion at that day, for they shall have the ^cgift and the ^dpower of the Holy Ghost; and if they ^eendure unto the end they shall be ^flifted up at the last day, and shall be saved in the everlasting ^gkingdom of the Lamb; and whoso shall ^hpublish peace, yea, tidings of great joy, how beautiful upon the mountains shall they be.

The fulfillment of this prophecy is the restoration of the Gospel, through Joseph Smith, who descended from these first European-American Gentiles, and the Book of Mormon, which was written by Nephi's, Laman's, and Lemuel's descendants.

Verses 38 through 42 can be summed up thusly: God saw that people would make wrong choices and intervened to help them. When precious parts were taken out of the Bible, either intentionally or unintentionally, He made sure that the Book of Mormon would be made available to support the Bible's teachings and provide clarification as to what was lost. In the end, the Jews, who were the first to receive the Gospel, and the Gentiles, who received it second, would be brought together and unified towards fulfilling all of the prophecies in both books.

Research hints that Columbus was of Jewish descent. It is certainly possible that God meant for Columbus' journey to be one of many symbols of the literal fulfillment of the unification of Gentiles and Jews in the latter days in this vision given to Nephi.

Nephi Sees Conditions Leading to Latter-day Events (1 Nephi 13, Part II)

Nephi now sees that the Gentiles who have come to the Americas (to Nephi, "the promised land") have family troubles of their own. The "mother Gentiles" from which they came arrived by sea to do battle with them. We know this as the various wars that led up to and followed the Revolutionary War.

Nephi also sees that the Gentiles are not alone in their struggles against their mother nations.

18 And I beheld that the power of God was with them, and also that the wrath of God was upon all those that were gathered together ^aagainst them to battle.

19 And I, Nephi, beheld that the Gentiles that had gone out of captivity were ^adelivered by the power of God out of the hands of all other nations.

As we will read later, and quite often at that, one of the major themes of the Book of Mormon is this: that no people will be able to prosper here unless they believe in God, their Creator.

Now, Nephi sees that they have something else with them that is "of great worth". He writes:

20 And it came to pass that I, Nephi, beheld that they did prosper in the land; and I beheld a ^abook, and it was carried forth among them.

21 And the angel said unto me: Knowest thou the meaning of the book?

22 And I said unto him: I know not.

23 And he said: Behold it proceedeth out of the mouth of a Jew. And I, Nephi, beheld it; and he said unto me: The ^abook that thou beholdest is a ^brecord of the ^cJews, which contains the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; and it also containeth many of the prophecies of the holy prophets; and it is a record like unto the engravings which are upon the ^dplates of brass, save there are not so many; nevertheless, they contain the covenants of the Lord, which he hath made unto the house of Israel; wherefore, they are of great worth unto the Gentiles.

In short, they carry with them a record of the Jews who were left at Jerusalem. Remember, now, that Nephi only has everything up to and including the reign of Zedekiah, Nephi's contemporary, and then his record is of his own people in the Americas. He would have known nothing about the Christian Bible as it came forth from the Middle East and Europe after the third century A.D. The book he sees in the vision is entirely new and unexpected, especially, as he writes, that they are "of great worth unto the Gentiles". Why would they have been of such great worth to Gentiles if they were considered "outsiders" to ancient and traditional Hebrews?

Here's why.

24 And the angel of the Lord said unto me: Thou hast beheld that the ^abook proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew; and when it proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew it contained the fulness of the gospel of the Lord, of whom the twelve apostles bear record; and they bear record according to the truth which is in the Lamb of God.

25 Wherefore, these things go forth from the ^aJews in purity unto the ^bGentiles, according to the truth which is in God.

It contained (past tense) the fulness of the gospel of the Lord, which the twelve apostles also shown in this vision bore testimony. The words that were originally written by the Jews at one time were uncorrupted when they arrived in Gentile hands. But then...

26 And after they go forth by the ^ahand of the twelve apostles of the Lamb, from the Jews ^bunto the Gentiles, thou seest the formation of that ^cgreat and abominable ^dchurch, which is most abominable above all other churches; for behold, they have ^etaken away from the gospel of the Lamb many parts which are ^fplain and most precious; and also many covenants of the Lord have they taken away.

27 And all this have they done that they might pervert the right ways of the Lord, that they might blind the eyes and harden the hearts of the children of men.

28 Wherefore, thou seest that after the book hath gone forth through the hands of the great and abominable church, that there are many plain and ^aprecious things taken away from the book, which is the book of the Lamb of God.

29 And after these plain and precious things were ^ataken away it goeth forth unto all the nations of the Gentiles; and after it goeth forth unto all the nations of the Gentiles, yea, even across the many waters which thou hast seen with the Gentiles which have gone forth out of captivity, thou seest—because of the many plain and precious things which have been taken out of the book, which were plain unto the understanding of the children of men, according to the plainness which is in the Lamb of God—because of these things which are taken away out of the gospel of the Lamb, an exceedingly great many do stumble, yea, insomuch that Satan hath great power over them.

You can read the howls of heresy across the Internet as I write this. Hundreds of anti-mormon web sites exist for the sole purpose of denouncing us for believing that the Bible is not 100% the inerrant and flawless word of God. All kinds of rhetorical gyrations are engaged in by anti-Mormons to show that the Bible (no matter which of the hundreds of translations now published) has never, ever been tampered with...or that if it has, God "made it okay" somehow and that it's just a mystery we'll never understand.

We respectfully disagree.

We disagree on the grounds that any document that passes through the hands of men, as the Bible has done for the nearly 1600 years that it has existed more or less as a single book (there were 400 years during which it was scattered to the four winds), has the potential of being changed. To claim that God somehow forced each handler to be precise, even when making mistakes in translation or interpretation, either on purpose or by accident, is completely illogical and at odds with the clearly accepted Christian doctrine that God respects free agency.

No. There is another explanation that makes much more sense, does not require incredible claims with virtually no evidence, and does not contradict God's law of free agency: a second record. God knew that there would be mistakes and deliberate changes made by translators and those who made handwritten copies. Instead of forcing those individuals to "do it right" in some unexplainable way (and forcing us to believe without providing some other witness as to authenticity), God prepared other records, the principle of which is the Book of Mormon, to help re-establish what was lost in terms of doctrine and "plain and precious things" that once existed in the Bible.

1. Deut. 17: 6
   6 ^aAt the mouth of ^btwo witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he that is worthy of death be put to ^cdeath; but at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death.
2. Deut. 19: 15
   15 ¶ One ^awitness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two ^bwitnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established.
3. Matt. 18: 16
   16 But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three ^awitnesses every word may be established.
4. 2 Cor. 13: 1
   1 This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three ^awitnesses shall every word be established.
5. 1 Tim. 5: 19
   19 Against an elder receive not an accusation, but before two or three ^awitnesses.
6. Heb. 10: 28
   28 He that ^adespised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
7. D&C 6: 28
   28 And now, behold, I give unto you, and also unto my servant Joseph, the ^akeys of this gift, which shall bring to light this ministry; and in the mouth of two or three ^bwitnesses shall every word be established.
8. D&C 128: 3
   3 Now, in relation to this matter, it would be very difficult for one recorder to be present at all times, and to do all the business. To obviate this difficulty, there can be a recorder appointed in each ward of the city, who is well qualified for taking accurate minutes; and let him be very particular and precise in taking the whole proceedings, certifying in his record that he saw with his eyes, and heard with his ears, giving the date, and names, and so forth, and the history of the whole transaction; naming also some three individuals that are present, if there be any present, who can at any time when called upon certify to the same, that in the mouth of two or three ^awitnesses every word may be established.

The Book of Mormon is that sacred, second witness that fills in what Satan tried to have removed from the Bible. Why else was Joseph Smith killed, among other things, for claiming it to be true scripture? Why else were thousands of Mormons forced from their homes and made to flee from the most religiously free nation on earth? Why else would Mormons be so hated for propagating it to all the world? It so enrages the enemy of God to know that his original plan to create confusion and contention among thousands of breakaway Christian sects because of misunderstandings about passages found in multiple of versions of the Bible was thwarted, that he will stop at nothing to discredit a second witness.

And that is why God establishes truth via multiple testimonies, including the Book of Mormon. To destroy the works of the devil and to establish His Word among all nations...not just those dwelling in one region of the world.

For more on this subject from a Book of Mormon perspective, go to www.fairlds.org:

• Archaeology and the Bible [2 articles]
• Bible Complete - No Additional Scripture [18 articles]
• History and Manuscripts [16 articles]
• Inerrant [11 articles]
• Joseph Smith Translation [12 articles]
• LDS View [16 articles]

Also see 2 Nephi 29.

Nephi Sees Conditions Leading to Latter-day Events (1 Nephi 13, Part I)

As the vision continues, Nephi is shown many of the things which, to him, were new and amazing. To those of us living in the U.S., they are now part of our national lore and cultural history. These things at which Nephi marvels as future and strange events are things we now take for granted and even struggle to teach effectively in our schools. This begs the question: Which is of more benefit in our day...to learn exclusively from our history, or to look to prophets to guide us so as to avoid pitfalls of the future?

The answer as provided by the Book of Mormon is that we should do both.

First, Nephi sees the many nations and kingdoms of the earth. In those nations were living those that the angel refers to as "the Gentiles". To Nephi, who was part of the house of Israel, this would have meant that they were all people outside the covenant and lineage he had come from.

Next, Nephi is shown that the Gentiles create a great church, one that is opposed to God's purposes and aligned with Satan's purposes instead. Nephi sees that this church puts in bondage, persecutes, tortures, and kills people who believe in God.

The temptation here is to immediately wonder which "church" is meant by what is shown in the vision, but we must be careful not to engage in presentism (distorting historical analysis by applying our own present-day biases) to interpret scripture. The purpose of this vision was not to single out any one denomination or even any one religion. No such entity is specifically named. All this scripture points to is "a great church".

The angel clarifies what is meant. This church is a metaphor for any organization of the world that seeks to use its power to gain power over God's people, to corrupt them in any way, or to destroy them physically and/or spiritually. He also states that it is the "church of the devil", meaning that the devil is the founder of it, and that its motivation is pride and to get the glory of the world. The fact that it is lumped into one great church is meant as a convenience in addressing its influence in the world rather than an attempt to single out any one group of individuals having a particular religious belief.

Now we get to the really interesting part, for we learn that Nephi sees "many waters" that divide his and his brothers' seed from the Gentiles (obviously these are the Atlantic and Pacific oceans). Then, he sees a man who is influenced by the Holy Ghost to set out on the waters "even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land."

Stop for a minute and think about who Nephi is seeing. Who in our own history books "first" arrives on our continent and "discovers" the people living there? Why, it's Christopher Columbus, of course.

In the next verse, we learn that other Gentiles followed suit and arrived in the Americas in "many multitudes" and began to smite the seed of Nephi's brothers who remained, scattering them--which we, in hindsight, see as having been done in three ways: geographically, culturally, and spiritually.

14 And it came to pass that I beheld many ^amultitudes of the Gentiles upon the ^bland of promise; and I beheld the wrath of God, that it was upon the seed of my brethren; and they were ^cscattered before the Gentiles and were smitten.

15 And I beheld the Spirit of the Lord, that it was upon the Gentiles, and they did prosper and ^aobtain the ^bland for their inheritance; and I beheld that they were white, and exceedingly fair and ^cbeautiful, like unto my people before they were ^dslain.

16 And it came to pass that I, Nephi, beheld that the Gentiles who had gone forth out of captivity did humble themselves before the Lord; and the power of the Lord was ^awith them.

Again, beware presentism. It is the norm today to vilify Columbus and those Europeans who followed them by viewing their motives and doings through the lenses of multi-culturalism and political correctness. No one should or can deny truthfully that what happened to Native Americans was a travesty and caused pain and suffering and near extermination of entire tribes and full extermination of others.

But, now we are reading history through the eyes, minds, and hearts of people whose descendants they were and who have a prophetic and divinely inspired explanation (not an excuse) as to why such horrible things would have happened to their seed. Remember that an earlier portion of Nephi's vision is replete with a fratricidal war of equal proportions perpetrated by the Lamanites against the Nephite people and eventually among the Lamanite people themselves.

Nephi explains to us in this and later writings that the Lamanites were reaping the consequences of actions previously sown. The lesson that Nephi, and later Moroni, teach us is that the Book of Mormon is meant to show the Gentiles that they are little different from the Lamanites, Nephites, and Jaredites. The Gentiles will be under equal condemnation and consequence from God if they do not repent of their sins (including the intentional killing and scattering of the Lamanite nations) and turn to Him while living in the promised land.

In the next post, 1 Nephi 13, Part II, we will analyze Nephi's vision of the Revolutionary and other Gentile wars and events in the Americas. We'll also look at Nephi's vision and interpretation of the development and influence of the modern-day Bible (no, it didn't just fall out of the sky one day as a single, chronological volume and land on Emperor Constantine's throne or Martin Luther's pulpit).

In 1 Nephi 13, Part III, we'll look at the additional books of scripture that God authorized to be written and how both the Bible and other books of scripture support each other in testifying of Christ in all the world...not just in Jerusalem.

Nephi Sees the Vision of Lehi (1 Nephi 11)

Nephi's desires to see and hear what his father saw come to fruition in Chapter 11. Not only does Nephi experience the same vision, but he is also given the meaning or interpretation of each of the elements shown.

What you're about to read is one of the most profound moments of the Book of Mormon. In beautiful metaphor, Nephi is shown the coming of the Son of God. He is taught the meaning of the tree, the fruit, the rod of iron, the fountain of living waters, the river of filthy water, and the great and spacious building.

In this and subsequent chapters (11-14), Nephi also beholds, in a continuation of the vision, the future of his descendants in the promised land (the American continents), the death, resurrection, and visit of the Savior to Nephi's people, the fall of his people, and the building of a great and abominable church. Finally, he sees the coming of the Gentiles to the Americas, their prosperity, and their role in ushering in the Second Coming of the Lord.

As Nephi sat pondering what Lehi had seen, he was "caught away" onto a high mountain. The Spirit asked him, "What desirest thou?" to which Nephi responded, "To behold the things which my father saw". The vision was opened to him only after he affirmed that he would believe what the Spirit was about to reveal.

This is the kind of faith we must all attain to, and is a major theme of the Book of Mormon--to accept on faith that which we haven't yet seen or that which we are about to hear from the Lord. Latter-day Saints (members of the LDS faith) practice this kind of faith each time they attend church meetings or general conferences.

The Spirit then shows Nephi the tree, which was precisely as Lehi had described it. Nephi is then asked again what he desires. He responds that he wants to know the meaning of the tree. Next he is shown Jerusalem, then Nazareth, and then a beautiful virgin.

The heavens open and an angel asks Nephi what he sees and whether he understands the condescension of God. Nephi responds that he knows that God loves His children, but that he doesn't know the meaning of all things. The angel teaches Nephi that the woman he sees is to be the mother of the Son of God "after the manner of the flesh". In other words, the Son of God would be born on earth, to a virgin, in a body of flesh and blood, and live among men.

"Knowest thou the meaning of the tree which thy father saw?"

Nephi immediately understood that it was the love of God, being the most desirable of all things.

The angel rejoices, saying "Yea, and the most joyous to the soul." Nephi then sees people falling down at the feet of the Son of God and worshiping Him. The rod of iron or the word of God, leading to the fountain of living waters and the tree, which represent simultaneously the love of God and the Son of God, appears and Nephi understands their meanings. The angel confirms that these symbols represent the condescension of God.

Nephi sees a prophet, John the Baptist, baptizing the Son of God and preparing the way for His mission on earth. He sees the Holy Ghost descend on the Son of God as a dove before He begins his preaching. He sees the multitudes rejecting Him and the calling of the twelve apostles.

The Son of God heals the sick and afflicted, casts out evil spirits, is judged by the world, crucified, and slain for the sins of the world. The people persecuting and rejecting the Son of God are the very same people who are found in the great and spacious building of Lehi's dream.

The angel makes note of this, saying, "Behold the world and the wisdom thereof; yea, behold the house of Israel hath gathered together to ^bfight against the twelve apostles of the Lamb."

Nephi looks again and sees that the pride of the people in the building is great, such that they would not repent and turn to the Son of God. Rather, they stood mocking Him. The building they were in falls in an exceedingly great and dramatic way.

The angel speaks again, saying, "Thus shall be the destruction of all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people, that shall fight against the twelve apostles of the Lamb."

Right: Modern-day edifice of the "great and spacious" kind, meant only to illustrate the concepts discussed in 1 Nephi 11. LDS artwork depicting Lehi's dream can be found here.