- This presentation is titled
The Book of Mormon Metals Map Geography.
And it's in seven parts,
each about 30 minutes long.
And the first part is
going to be on constraints
regarding the Book of Mormon.
Past and current views of
the Book of Mormon geography
have been as follows.
First of all, you had a continental view,
such as with the Prophet Joseph Smith,
Brigham Young, John Taylor
and Wilford Woodruff,
the first four prophets and
presidents of The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Their view was that the
Book of Mormon peoples
populated both North and South America.
There also was a view at one time
that perhaps it was more
prominently in South America.
Then we have what is now the
predominant current view,
which is that it occurred in Mesoamerica.
And then there was another view
that it was South and Central.
And then a recent view that's come up
called the Heartland Model,
which tries to place
everything that happened
to the Book of Mormon
within the Eastern part
of the continental United States,
particularly the Mississippi,
Ohio river valleys,
and up into the this Great Lakes area.
So this is an overview
of the various parts
of the presentation.
In this first one, part one,
we're going to look at
General Considerations.
We're going to look at some
of these very interesting,
new Heartland evidences that
are getting everybody excited,
particularly those of us who are members
of the Church in the United States.
But we're going to also look
at Book of Mormon constraints
as a historic document.
We're also going to look
at population growth
and what does that tell us
for this segment, and then
we're also going to look at four
Book of Mormon maps that
are described by Mormon,
and three of them described
specifically by Mormon
and one described by Moroni.
One of the things that's
been exciting people, lately,
particularly in the United States,
is the finding of some
marvelous artifacts.
For example, on the, on your
left side of the slide there,
the Mound Builders, as they've called,
in this case in the Ohio area,
built some amazing
structures and earthworks.
This particular one is fascinating,
because you can see the Jewish
Menorah themes in there.
And so, you know, how did those get there?
How is it that ancient Americans
had these Jewish religious themes
in the construction of
this particular city?
Another one here is this discovery in 1860
by David Wyrick in Newark, Ohio,
where he found this inscribed
stone in a burial mound,
about 10 miles south of Newark.
The stone is inscribed on all sides
with a condensed version
of the 10 commandments.
But it's in a particular
form of post-Exilic
or meaning after the the exile into Egypt
and the liberation of the Jews there
or the house of Israel there.
It's in the square Hebrew letters.
The robed bearded figure on the front
is identified as Moses.
How on earth did this get in the Ohio?
So that's an example of some
of these exciting things.
But here's another one
that's well outside of
the Heartland area.
This one is in New Mexico
and this is another example
inscribed in stone, the 10 commandments.
And this is in New Mexico
and it's in a form of Hebrew
that was found here first, and
later discovered in Israel.
So now let's talk about what
the Book of Mormon is not.
Let's understand some of the constraints
on the Book of Mormon in
terms of a historic document.
So, Lehi as he approaches his death,
is recorded in Second Nephi chapter one,
he talks about others from Jerusalem,
that would come to the Americas.
Now, that could mean that it's, of course,
it's not only Lehi and
his family, the Lehites,
but it could have reference
of course to the Mulekites,
but others could mean more than that.
And so we don't know who those People are
and what their history might
be if there are others.
Even the Mulekites prior
to Lehi's descendants
joining with them, we don't
know much about their history.
Also, we know from the
Book of Mormon itself
that it is not a complete history,
that the prophets and others kept a record
on the large plates of Nephi,
which was far more extensive
than what we have today
in the Book of Mormon.
So the Book of Mormon is
not a complete history.
It is also interestingly,
and this according to Mormon,
it is not an account of the peoples
who populated the Lands northward
to an exceeding great distance,
which had large bodies
of water and many rivers
and that migration North began in 55BC
and Mormon tells us that extensive records
were kept by those people.
But he didn't have room
to put that information
in his compilation of the Book of Mormon.
So the Book of Mormon does not include
a history of the people that
went into the North countries.
Also, it is not an
account of the righteous
Nephite civilization for 300 years
and immediately after
the coming of Christ.
That period is covered in one of the
smallest books - Four Nephi.
And as you know, Four
Nephi, only has one chapter,
and it really doesn't
say much of anything.
So we don't know what occurred
during that amazing time
of great righteousness
and advances probably
in their civilization.
Another thing that we can look at is
we can try to answer the
question, who were the Nephites?
And when we look at that carefully,
we realized that the Nephites themselves
were essentially a minority.
First of all, they were
followers of the Prophet Nephi,
who founded their
civilization in the Americas.
We know that they followed Christ,
and they adhered to the
principles of Liberty.
They kept religious records.
However, we also know
from the Book of Mormon,
that they moved their
faith and Liberty community
steadily to the north, to
preserve their community
and their beliefs from the Lamanite kings.
We also know that the
Nephites were abandoned
by numbers of groups,
such as the Zoramites, the
Amalikites and the Kingmen
who all went over to the Lamanites
and warred against the Nephites.
Again, this idea that the Nephites were
in essence a minority.
We know that they were
a minority community
due to defections for quite a while.
But we also know that
this was true up until Christ's visit
and then they flourished,
from the time of Christ's
visit to about 300 years AD.
They were frequently under
attack from Lamanite kings,
some of whom themselves
were previously Nephite,
such as Amalikiah.
They kept their genealogy and
they may have been very strict
about marrying believers.
And within the lineage of Nephi,
for example, we know that
descendants of Nephi included,
Mosiah, Benjamin, Mosiah
II, Alma the Senior,
Alma the Younger, Helaman, Nephi
and Nephi the disciple of Christ,
and his brother Lehi.
Mormon also prided himself as being
a descendant of the Nephi
and this seemed to place him
high in Nephite society,
where he was named Chief
Captain of the army.
We know that they maintained their Liberty
and their more advanced technology,
and dominated the social
position in the Americas
until they became completely wicked.
At which point they were then
destroyed by Lamanite King
by the name of Aaron in 385 AD.
Alright, so now let's talk
about population growth.
Let's talk about it from 600 BC
when Lehi and his family
first arrived in the Americas,
and we know that the lands that
they inherited at that time
were what was called First Inheritance,
and the Land Nephi.
Well, if you do a population growth
based on a 4% population growth,
which is pretty aggressive,
but considering that they
were very much dependent
on having children to
be able to gather food
to raise food to, you know, survive,
that high birth rates are more normal
in those types of cultures.
So that's kind of how they starting out.
And you'll notice that
there were about 30 of them
when they arrived.
Well, if you run that
population growth out,
about 300 BC, you finally get
to about four million people.
Four million people are not
going to cover a huge area,
- [Man] Does ...
- Yes,
- [Man] Does this take
into account all the wars
and loss of life in
the many wars they had?
- It may not, and so this is kind of
a peaceful anticipation.
And so yes, it may have
been less than this.
But from that point on, let's
cut the birth rate down to 2%.
Because now they have
more cities, they're more organized
and so families can choose
to have less children.
Perhaps it's not as
important at this point
as their civilization develops.
And this is kind of a trend
that is true for most civilizations.
So we cut it down to 2%.
And we look at the population growth then.
You'll notice that by
the time we get to 1 BC,
we're one and a half billion people.
Well, again, because of wars and disease
and that kind of stuff,
it's probably not that high.
But still, there is a significant increase
in the population.
- [Man] And just the Nephites?
- Yes, as you note there, it
does not include the Mulekites
and we know from the
record that the Mulekites
outnumbered the Nephites
by a significant margin
when the Nephites joined them.
- [Man] More than the Lamanites?
- No this number includes
growth from Lehi's family,
so would include Lamanites
and this would be in now the
lands of First Inheritance,
in Nephi, but also
Zarahemla and Bountiful.
With a larger population,
obviously people are
going to move, expand,
go out and find new places
because its becoming too
crowded where they are.
Okay, so that's going to force
them to populate more areas.
Now let's look at it another way.
Let's look at the Book
of Mormon in terms of the
number of pages
for the various times in their history.
So if we start on the left side there,
we'll notice that approximately 25%
of the Book of Mormon records
Nephi and the family's
journeys to the Americas
and their first encounters there
and includes Jacob, and so on.
But then we get into this
period, from about 450 BC
all the way up to about 150 BC
where you've got Enos, Jarom,
Omni and the Words of Mormon,
which covers very little.
You know, maybe 2%.
Now the bulk of the Book of Mormon
is the period from 150 BC to
the time of Christ's coming.
There you have Mosiah, Alma,
Helaman and Third Nephi.
And you've got a significant
amount of history in there.
But notice that after that
we've got this long period
of 300 years in Four Nephi,
where you've got virtually nothing.
And then you've got Mormon and Moroni,
their books, likewise, very small,
don't contribute much to the history.
Also, what is significant about this,
is when you consider
this from Mormon's map
from his time, he refers to,
he divided the Nephites from the Lamanites
by the treaty line that was
at the border of Desolation
and Bountiful in 350 AD.
Everything North of there, Desolation
and the many Lands north,
are represented here in the green.
Everything else to
Mormon was the Land South
and the Land South there
is in that light yellow.
And so there you have
Bountiful, Zarahemla, Nephi
and First Inheritance.
So that gives you a
sense that the vast bulk
of the Book of Mormon history
is in what Mormon
considered the Land South,
south of the line between
Desolation and Bountiful
and also it was around
100 just after 100 BC
that you start to get
records of migrations North,
large numbers of people
by land and also by ship.
Alright, so now, now we're
going to take a look at,
I talked about Mormon's Map.
Let's talk about the four maps
that are described in the Book of Mormon.
Interestingly three of these
are actually described by Mormon himself.
He refers to a map that
by which the Nephites
kind of referred to things, you
know, in their early history,
and then he talks about the references
that the Mulekites used.
And then he talks about,
he describes of course his own map also.
And then we have one from Moroni,
that describes where the
Jaredite kings lived.
The first map that Mormon talks about
is the one that the Nephites
used as a reference,
what their references were,
and basically you're
talking about the area
from First Inheritance
and Nephi up to Zarahemla.
So you'll notice here
that First Inheritance
is described as being by the West Sea.
The Land Nephi is referred
to as being Eastward and Up.
Up in the Book of Mormon
refers to elevation.
All right, so then between
there and Zarahemla
is this narrow strip of wilderness,
the small neck of Land
between the East Sea
and the West Sea.
Now, this is all described,
these maps all described
in Alma 22, but by Mormon.
So notice though, that in different ways,
the Nephites in the records
may have referred to
Zarahemla as being North
and Nephi being South.
In some other references,
they may have referred to it
as being Mulek to the north,
and Nephi or Lehi to the south.
The next map is that
which Mormon refers to as
the one that the Mulekites referenced.
Of course, they came in to the Americas
and landed from the east into Desolation.
And in Desolation because it was desolate,
they moved south into the Highlands south
and that became Bountiful for them
and they also established Zarahemla,
which was south of Bountiful.
So their division was,
Desolation was north.
Everything else was south to them.
Now we look at Mormon's Map.
Now the time that he's
recording, of course,
he's already General over the armies
and he's starting to record
things that are happening
in his time.
So his time references
and his map references
are quite different.
Because we'll learn that Mormon
actually was born and raised up north
and he was brought down
south by his father
into the Land Zarahemla.
So he divides them up basically this way
based on a 350 AD treaty with King Aaron
where the Nephites were
given the lands north
of the boundary between
Bountiful and Desolation.
So Desolation and
everything north of there -
again the Land North went
to exceed a very great
distance with huge bodies of water
and the great rivers.
That's North for Mormon.
Everything else including Bountiful,
Zarahemla all the way down,
was given to the Lamanites
and was referred to as the Land South.
There's one other map reference
and that's from Moroni.
Moroni in Ether, just puts
an editorial note in there
that the Land Moron where
the Jaredite kings lived,
was a little bit north of
Desolation and by the West Sea,
and so we have that
reference with respect to
the Land Desolation.
When we put these maps together now,
let's also remember one other thing.
We've got this Nephite
migration northward over time
over the period of the Book of Mormon.
There's this continual
pressure of the Lamanites
from the south, pushing,
pushing, ever pushing north.
There's a significant period of time,
in the time of Alma and after that,
where they're very, very
concerned about the Land North,
and so they guard it very, very well
to prevent the Lamanites
from getting past them
and getting up into the North countries.
They wanted to preserve
that for themselves.
All right, so when we
put these references,
map references together, we get the
Book of Mormon map that
most folks will refer to.
The only difference is that I separate the
"narrow neck of land with a
narrow pass by the West Sea",
I separate that from the
"narrow strip of wilderness",
which was described
as a "small neck of land,
between the Sea East and the Sea West."
Remember we also have of
course out of Bountiful,
we have Nephite migrations
going north by land
and also by sea.
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