The Book of Mormon

“Many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and delightsome people.” 2 Nephi 30:6.
Dark skinned Mormon Indians have never become lightened due to their holding Mormon doctrines. Indian murals show Indians of 4 skin colours, all living peaceably.
Question: If the light skinned Nephites were wiped out in 421 AD as the Book of Mormon claims, why are both light and dark skinned Indians portrayed in later wall paintings at Bonampak and Chichen-Itza?

The Book of Mormon is wrong on Indian warfare.

It is mostly a book of wars, oppression, slavery, treachery and bloodshed. The writer has an obsession with warfare and killing, with killings starting from Chapter 4. Weapons used from 544 BC to 52 BC (p107-359) are listed as bows and arrows, steel swords, axes, brass and copper breastplates, shields, horses and chariots, and cimiters.

Question: What is wrong with this picture? Almost everything.
The author knew almost nothing about early American life, lack of warfare, and politics. Early Americans from 600 BC to 421 AD had very little interest in war, and had no occasion for war because:

a) They spent most of their time farming.
b) They had no great cities of great population as are mentioned in the Book of Mormon.
c) Mongoloids have a different philosophy of life and war than Europeans and Semites.
d) Early Americans knew nothing of iron and steel for swords, until the Spaniards came.
e) Breastplates of brass and copper were unknown then.
f) Cimeters were curved swords used by Persians, Arabs and Turks, only appearing 1000 years later (1400 AD).
g) Arm shields and axes of metal were not yet invented in America.
h) The earliest metals in America were gold beads dated 600 AD. Copper, bronze, and silver came much later, when smelting was invented.
i) Horses and chariots were not used in America before the Spanish conquest.
j) The wheel was never used in America before the Europeans came. Roads were pedestrian roads approaching the temples, and were not built in the Book of Mormon period
k) The sinewed bow and arrow of the American Indians came 600 years later, after 421 AD. They instead used an atlatl, or throwing stick.
l) Wars of conquest were unknown because the gaining of new territory for occupation was unnecessary, as there was plenty of room for all Indians.

The Book of Mormon forgets that glass windows were not invented in 2200 BC at the Tower of Babel.

(The first glass vessels were invented around 1500BC in Egypt. The
first window glass was invented around 50AD. World Book Encyclopedia.
Jared and others supposedly migrate from Mesopotamia to America when the Tower of Babel was built. For light in their boats, God was supposed to have given them luminous stones.
“For, behold, ye cannot have windows, for they will be dashed in pieces.” Ether 2:23.
Smith did not know that the Phoenicians had not yet invented glass.
Amazingly, 50-80 people sailed for 344 days, without any loss of life, or running short of food.

Darkness covered the whole earth at Christ’s crucifixion for 3 hours (Matthew 27:45 and Mark 15:33), but the Book of Mormon mistakes it to be 3 days (Helamen 14:20,27).

Smith thought that Elijah (O.T.) and Elias (N.T. spelling) were different people.

They are the same person. Elijah is the Old Testament name, and Elias is the New Testament name. This is found in “Doctrines and Covenants” Section 109 and 110:11-13, which is devoted to a prayer offered at the dedication of the temple in Kirtland, Ohio, March
27, 1836, where Smith states: “The Lord appeared, … Moses appeared before us… Elias appeared… After this vision was closed another great and glorious vision burst upon us; for Elijah the prophet, who was taken to heaven without tasting death, stood
before us.”

Elijah and Elias are the same person. What a blunder! Elijah and Elisha are distinguished correctly in Luke 4:25,26: “Many widows were in Israel in the days of Elias (Elijah)… Many lepers were in Israel in the time of Eliseus (Elisha) the prophet; and none of them was cleansed saving Naaman the Syrian.” Once this revelation was presented as the word of God, there was no easy way to correct
this mistake.

The Book of Abraham Fraud

This is found in the Mormon scripture known as “The Pearl of Great Price”. Joseph Smith in 1835 purchased an ancient Egyptian papyrus found in mummy wrapping acquired by Michael H. Chandler. Smith, believing that he had the gift of interpreting ancient Egyptian, claimed that the rolls contained the writings of Abraham himself, signed personally by Abraham.

In 1842, Smith published his translation under the title “The Book of Abraham” in “Times and Seasons”. He claimed that a picture in it was Abraham sitting on Pharaoh’s throne.

These papyri were lost for many years, but they turned up and were presented to the Mormon Church by the Metropolitan Art Museum of New York on November 27, 1967.

When translated, they found that not a single word of Joseph Smith’s translation was correct. The text had nothing to do with Abraham, but described magical spells to open the mouth of the dead to prepare him for his audience with Osiris to be judged. Hence
Joseph Smith’s translation of Egyptian is proved false.

Many earthquakes with great destruction and loss of life supposedly accompanied Christ’s death, to show God’s displeasure. Mormons claim that this took place in Yucatan in Mexico.

This is an area of flat jungle on limestone, which has been free from earthquakes. Ruins here date from 150 AD or later, not before. What is wrong with this passage?

a) Jesus rebuked James and John for wanting to call down fire from heaven to destroy the scoffing Samaritans.
b) The inhabitants of America were no greater sinners than the chief priests who demanded Christ’s death. Christ did not curse them, but prayed for their forgiveness.
c) Calvary was an act of mercy, not of destruction. No one died in the Jerusalem earthquake, nor when the temple veil was torn. So why should many people die in America who were not responsible for Christ’s death? 3 Nephi 8:1-24.
d) Christ came to save men’s lives, not destroy them. Smith never understood God’s mercy and grace to man at Calvary.

How can Helaman 12:26, supposedly written in 6 BC, quote John 5:29 which was not yet written until 85 AD? You cannot quote something that is not yet written.

“fulfilling the words which say: They that have done good shall receive everlasting life; and they that have done evil shall have everlasting damnation.” Helaman 12:26 in 6 BC.
It is obvious that this is a great mistake, proving the Book of Mormon to be a fake, made up by someone who did not know his facts, and who was given to lying. John 5:29 quotes: “And shall come forth: they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that
have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”

QUESTION:: Does this verse teach salvation by good works?

Answer: No, because John’s theology forbids this (3:17-21; 6:28,29). It states that those who are truly born again will live a life of good works after salvation. They obey Christ (14:15), they abide in Christ (15:5-7), and they walk in the light (John 8:12). Damnation is
because of rejecting Christ (John 3:36).

Of the 38 cities in the Book of Mormon, leading archaeologists have not found any remains of any of these alleged cities.

The Smithsonian Institute in Washington states:
“There is no correspondence whatever between archaeological sites and cultures as revealed by scientific investigations, and as recorded in the Book of Mormon… Thus far no iron, steel, brass, gold and silver coins, metal, swords, breastplates, arm shields,
armour, horses and chariots, or silk have ever been found in pre-colonial archaeological sites.” Kingdom of the Cults, W. Martin, p.162.

The testimony of the 3 witnesses which appears at the front of the Book of Mormon (Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris)

… declares that: “an angel of God came down from heaven, and he brought and laid before our eyes, that we beheld and saw the plates, and the engraving thereon…” Martin Harris denied to Professor Anthon that he had actually seen the plates, but that he only saw them “with the eye of faith.”

Note: All three of these witnesses later apostasized from the Mormon faith, and were described by Mormon contemporaries as thieves and counterfeiters.

Joseph Smith lied to try and prove the book of mormon
Joseph Smith, in an effort to prove the Book of Mormon, claimed in the “Pearl of Great Price” Section 2, verses 62, 63, 64, that Professor Charles Anthon verified the “reformed Egyptian language.”

Smith allegedly quotes Professor Anthon as follows:

“Professor Anthon stated that the translation was correct, more so than any he had before seen translated from the Egyptian. I then showed him those which were not yet translated, and he said that they were Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac and Arabic and he said that they were true characters”.

This later proved to be a TOTAL LIE, as Professor Anthon wrote in a letter to E.D. Howe, that he NEVER SAID ANY SUCH THING.

Mormons have NEVER been able to refute this letter or ANY of
Howe’s research. An excerpt from Professor Anthon’s letter of rebuttal is as follows:

New York, N.Y., Feb. 17, 1834
Mr E.D. Howe
Painseville, Ohio
Dear Sir,
… The whole story about my having pronounced the Mormonite inscription to be “reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics” is perfectly false…
Yours respectfully,
Charles Anthon, LL.D. Columbia University.

All reputable linguists who have examined the Mormon evidence have rejected it as mythical.

Mormon misunderstanding of the Sticks of Joseph and Judah in Ezekiel 37:15-23.

Mormons claim that the “stick of Judah” refers to the Bible, and the “stick of Ephraim” refers to the Book of Mormon. They claim that the joining of the 2 sticks refers to the union of the Bible and the Book of Mormon as an addition to the Word of God.

Answer: The subject under discussion is not books, but people and nations. It refers to the then divided nation of Israel (587 BC) of the northern and southern kingdoms becoming reunited as one nation in the land, just before and after Christ’s second coming.
“These bones are the whole house of Israel”. Ezekiel 37:11.
The 2 sticks becoming one stick in Ezekiel’s hand represent Judah (2 1/2 tribes) and Israel (9 1/2 tribes) being united in the end days.
“I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, … and bring them into their own land: I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel,…..they shall be no more 2 nations”. Ezekiel 37:21,22. The Mormon view totally ignores the context, hoping no one will read the passage too carefully.

There are no rivers emptying into the Red Sea.

“… When he had travelled three days in the wilderness, he pitched his tent in a valley by the side of a river of water…. He called the name of the river Laman, and it emptied into the Red Sea; and the valley was in the border near the mouth thereof.” I Nephi 2:4-9.

a) It would have been impossible for an old man (Lehi), women and children to travel the 175 mile journey from Jerusalem to the Red Sea in 3 days.

Question: Could you walk 58 miles per day for 3 days? Travelling 3 miles per hour, you would need to travel for 20 hours each day non-stop for 3 days. This would have been quite impossible.

b) There are no rivers running into the Red Sea along their route, the eastern shore of the Gulf of Aqaba, at this or any other point. There are not even any traceable ancient river systems in this part of Arabia. This part of the world was well known and well travelled in
600 BC. Had there been a river as Nephi describes, the area would have been one of the best known in the world of its day. It would have supported a sizeably populated civilization, as always happened where fresh water was available. The mouth of such a
river would have been a world-renowned port, if not a capital city, in 600 BC.

c) These 6 people then cross 1400 miles of the Arabian peninsula, 400 miles being rugged mountains and 1000 miles of desert.

d) They find a bountiful, fruitful land on the Persian Gulf. Alexander’s troops in 330 BC avoided this as desert area.

e) They then build a ship sufficiently seaworthy to carry them two-thirds around the world in rough seas to the west coast of America, now known as Peru.

American Indians are Mongoloids from East Asia, not Semites from Jerusalem as the Book of Mormon claims.

For 200 years before 1820, many philosophers thought that the American Indians were the lost tribes of Israel. The dark skin of the Indians is not caused by their bad morals, as the Book of Mormon claims, but by genetics. American Indians are Mongoloid, not Jewish, because:

a) Mongoloids lack face and body hair, (growing at most 3 inches of beard in a lifetime), but Jews have much face and body hair.
b) Mongoloid hair is coarse, black & straight, but Jewish Semite hair is moderately fine, wavy and brown.
c) Mongoloids have reddish skin pigmentation, but Jewish Semites have an olive-gray pigmentation.
d) Mongoloids have prominent cheek bones, not like Semites.
e) Mongoloids appear slant-eyed, but Semites have deep seated eyes.
f) Mongoloid babies have a Mongolian spot on their backs. This is a slate-blue round pigment spot that disappears after a few months or years. It is not present on the backs of Jewish or Semite babies.
Hence American Indians could not descend from Jews. Mormons must defend their prophet even if they have to close their eyes to do so.

No coinage system was ever developed in ancient America.

If the alleged ‘Nephites’ were descended from Jews raised in Jerusalem, their coinage and money values would have survived to the New World. Hence Joseph Smith created a system of coinage for people of the Book of Mormon in America. It seems strange that
Smith did not continue using Jewish shekels and talents, but that he devised coins such as senines, seons, shums and limnals of gold.
Unfortunately for Smith, while his guess was logical, it was completely wrong. No system of coinage was ever developed by ancient Americans.

The Mayans who traded had:
a) No money transactions in their records.
b) Their coins would have been discovered in their graves and homes.
c) No coins were found in sacred wells, where so many valuable ornaments and jewels were thrown as offerings to their gods.
d) All the known Mayan media of exchange have been identified, both of their own land, and also along the ancient trade routes of Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean Sea, but never have they found metallic money.
e) Columbus was told by a Mayan chieftain in 1502 that all transactions were by barter.
f) Interregional markets were found at Xicalenco, a market town between Aztec and Mayan populations, where Aztec, Mayan, Toltec, Mixtec and Totocan peoples met. Surely if there had been a coined money system it would have been found here.
g) Cacao beans came closest to a standardised medium of exchange for uneven barter.
h) Taxation had no metal coinage, but was a work service.

Question: Why did they have no coinage?

Answer: Because they had no metal until gold was discovered after 600 AD. Gold was used only for ornamentation. Silver was discovered around 900 AD.
There never was an iron age in America before Columbus. In spite of this, Joseph Smith had his ancient Nephites and Lamanites using iron and steel swords. Iron was the scarcest and most valuable metal. Gold was the most plentiful and cheapest metal.

Silk and fine linen have never been successfully grown in America.

Joseph Smith has Alma, a judge of the Nephites in 100 BC, stating that his people possessed “an abundance of silk and fine twined linen, and all manner of good homely cloth.” Alma 1:29.
Smith was wrong here because:
a) Silk was unknown in the Americas until the Europeans came, and that it has never been successfully introduced since then.
b) Cortez tried to grow silk in Mexico in 1522, but the industry died out 75 years later. Encyclopaedia Brittanica, 1959 ed. XX, 664.
c) James I of England in 1609 tried to introduce silk culture in the American colonies, but failed.
d) Silk still has to be imported to the US from the Orient.
e) In Alma 17:25-33, Ammon protects King Lamoni’s flocks from attackers. This is wrong because there were no domestic sheep in America before the Spanish came (Morley, The Ancient Maya, p.408). Central America and southern Mexico never have been
suitable for raising sheep. Sheep could not thrive in jungle country.
Indians wore fabric of rabbit hair, birds’ feathers &Kapok tree. Joseph Smith’s failure to mention these, and his mention of materials totally unknown in any early American period, proves that the Book of Mormon was written by a completely uninformed scribe who knew
nothing of life in Ancient America.

Impossibility of churches, temples and synagogues in America from 539 BC-34AD

a) The Book of Mormon mentions “synagogues” at least 12 times. Alma 16:13 speaks of synagogues “built after the manner of the Jews”. They date synagogues from 559 BC to 34 AD. Nephi and his successors in America could have known nothing of synagogues.
Why?
Because synagogues were founded after the Temple’s destruction in 586 BC, when Temple worship was an impossibility because Jews were in Babylonian exile. Nephi would never have seen a synagogue in Israel.
b) II Nephi 5:16 tells us that Nephi built a temple “after the manner of the temple of Solomon”, not more than 20 years after the migrant party landed in America between 588-570 BC. What is wrong with this?
i) They didn’t have enough workers. In I Kings 5:13-18 Solomon needed 183,300 workers (made up of 70,000 labourers + 80,000 stone quarriers, 3300 supervisors + 30,000 loggers) over 7 1/2 years, to build his temple. Yet Nephi had only about 12 adults, because half the company had apostasized. Five couples could not produce more than 50 children in 20 years. It would have been impossible for Nephi, with 5 men’s help, to construct a building requiring many specialised skills.
ii) There could be no practical use for it, because the population was so small (about 20). Solomon’s temple served a nation of several million worshippers.
iii) II Nephi 5:15 says that materials “were in great abundance”.
This contradicts v.16 which says that the materials were ‘not to be found upon the land’.
“And I, Nephi, did build a temple; … after the manner of the temple of Solomon, save it were not built of so many precious things; for they were not to be found upon the land…” v.16.
Here Joseph Smith tripped badly, because he has Nephi saying in the previous verse: “And I did teach my people to build buildings, and to work in all manner of wood, and of iron, and of copper, and of brass, and of steel, and of gold, and of silver, and of precious ores
which were in great abundance.” II Nephi 5:15.

Note: At this same time Smith has Nephi making swords of steel, long before the invention of steel anywhere in the world, to arm his soldiers against about 40 of his apostate brother’s people.