Kaye Robinson

May 4 2016

To help understand the depth of discrimination against Native Americans in our country, I want to begin with a very brief timeline. Please note that I am using the term Indian because of the time period.

1797-First Indian Reservation was established.

1821-The Sundance and all similar types of dancing were banned. The so-called religious ceremonies were considered an “Indian Offense” under existing regulations and corrective penalties were provided.

1873-Sweat Lodges were forbidden to all Native Americans by the Federal Government. The laws were very actively enforced.

1890-The killings at Wounded Knee were legal because of the violation of the Ghost Dance. They were dancing.

1920-Women were given the right to vote.

1924-Indians were finally given the right to be a citizen of the USA and eventually the right to vote. Prior to 1924, Indians were not considered American Citizens in their own country. Each State had to ratify the right to vote.

1956-New Mexico was the last State to give the Indians the right to vote.

1978-All Indian ceremonies were illegal until the passage of the American Indian Freedom of Religion Act. This in a country based on the freedom of religion. The pilgrims came here to freely practice their religious beliefs but that right was taken away from the Indians.

1978-Blacks (African-Americans) were allowed to hold the Priesthood in the Mormon religion. This meant they could perform ordinances and could have the opportunity to finally go to the highest level in heaven. Prior to that, they could only be members. This came at a time when President Carter was moving to remove the tax-exempt status from BYU because of the discrimination issue. Also other Universities were boycotting BYU because of the same issue.

1981-Regarding the Lamanites (Indians), the Book of Mormon, 2 Nephite 30:6 changed the wording from “white and delightsome” to “pure and delightsome”. Any editions of the Book of Mormon prior to 1981 will have the word WHITE. Before 1981, the Lamanites were cursed with the dark skin. Their skin would turn white when they accepted the Gospel.

Some of the following information was taken from Wikipedia and LDS sites. I find some variation in the dates depending upon the source.

The time line for the Book of Mormon history of the Nephites and Lamanites expands from 585 BC to 395 AD. This is a period of about 1,000 years. Any archeology would have to fit into that 1,000 years. Timeline is as follows:

2200 BC- Jaradites leave the Tower of Babel and land in Central America near Panama.

585 BC- Nephites, the righteous, white ones and the Lamanites (Indians), the dark-skinned, wicked ones landed in South America.

33 AD- Jesus Christ appears to and converts both the Nephites and the Lamanites.

33 AD -There was a peaceful co-existence between the Nephites and Lamanites.

230 AD

114 AD- A small portion of the people revolted and called themselves the Lamanites. (84 years after Christ’s visit)

326/395 AD- Lamanites became a larger portion of the population, fought wars, and killed off all Nephites by 385 AD

The 1981 Book of Mormon edition stated, “The Lamanites are the principal ancestors of the American Indians.” In the 2006 edition the wording changed to Lamanites are among the ancestors of the American Indians.

Some Book of Mormon scholars now view Lamanites as 1) one small tribe among many in the ancient Americas, the remainder of whom were not discussed in the BOM 2) a tribe that intermarried with indigenous Native American cultures, or 3) a tribe that descended with modern Asians from common nomadic ancestry, diverging prior to Lehi’s (Lamanite) departure from Jerusalem. With advancements in the archeology fields and the DNA studies, the scholars seem to be changing their point of view.

MY PERSONAL THOUGHTS

There is absolutely no mainstream archaeological evidence that supports the Book of Mormon. I have actively studied archaeology for the past 25+ years so I have first hand experience in this area. The Book of Mormon mentions such things as horses, cattle, sheep, elephants, wheels, steel items like swords and shields that existed in the Americans between 2200 BC and 400 AD. Nothing has ever been found. Since those items have not been found, you might think some of those items would be shown on painted pottery, painted murals in the Kivas, petroglyphs, pictographs, kids toys, clay figures, and in Native American stories – but nothing. Now, there are some current interpretations by Mormons that say the petroglyphs are a testimony to Christ and the Nephites. If the petroglyphs were done by the Nephites, then that would mean that White folks did them and not even Native Americans. The age of most of the petroglyphs do fit the Nephite timeline. The Book of Mormon mentions large scale battles where millions were killed. Like everywhere else in the world, there should be plenty of evidence to support those large numbers. But nothing appears. Archaeology has made major advances in dating all artifacts and the petroglyphs/pictographs. Most of those dates do not correspond with the Book of Mormon dates. Even when BYU sent out teams in the 1950s and 1960s, they found nothing. It is just not there.

THE CULTURE INCLUDING THE BOOKS AND WRITINGS AT THE TIME BEFORE THE BOOK OF MORMON (PRE-1830)

The following is not proof or disproof of the Book of Mormon. It is not meant to be a debate. It is just a collection of words from books, thoughts and conversations in early America, east of the Mississippi. It is the questions and thoughts in the minds of early Americans and what were they talking about sitting around the pickle barrel. The Book of Mormon was not borne in a vacuum. The environment was the Petri dish that cultivated the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon did not reveal any new ideas; it just answered old questions from a theologyical point of view. The Book of Mormon was not the first to answer the questions of the time. Those answers had already been published and were the talk of the town. The Book of Mormon filled in the blanks by solving historical questions at that time by using theology. I will use the term Indian because that is the word from that time period.

1.) What was the origin of the Indians and how did they get here? If everyone came from Adam and Eve and everyone was destroyed in Flood, how did these people appear on this continent? What Nation did the Indian population come from?

The current archeologists are still debating some of these questions. These people did not appear in the Bible so how did they get here? The Book of Mormon answered those questions. Earlier the Jaredites came in a six boats. And then the Nephites/Lamanites came from Israel. That explained the Adam and Eve situation and the Great Flood. One of the first missionaries for the Church was Samuel Smith, the brother of Joseph Smith. He introduced the Book or Mormon as “a history of the origins of the Indians.”

2,) Were the Indians Jews from Isreal or perhaps the people from the Tower of Babel? Could the Indians be the lost ten tribes?

Many folks thought some of the Native Americans words sounded Jewish so there had to be a connection. The Book of Mormon answered both theories and questions. The Jaredites fled the Tower of Babel about 2200 BC. The Nephites/Lamanites were Jews from Isreal. The Book of Mormon offered the solutions to each of the contemporary dilemmas.

3.) Why did the Indians have a different skin color?

This appeared to be a really big question at that time for Europeans. They were puzzled by this abnormality. In their world at that time, all folks were white. The Book of Mormon explained how the dark-skinned, cursed people (Lamanites-Indians) killed all the white-skinned people (Nephites). That is why only the dark-skinned Indians survived. This explained the skin color issue.

4.) In the Bible, according to Paul, Christianity was supposed to be spread worldwide. Why were there no Christians in the new World?

The Book of Mormons tells that Christ visited the Americas after his resurrection and gave the New World Christianity. One again, the Lamanites-Indians were the bad guys that killed off all the white Christians and thus eliminated Christianity. And the Lamanites-Indians corrupted Christianity by using the symbol of the cross and other ceremonies so there were some shadow forms of Christianity.

5.) Since the Indians were not mentioned in the Bible, did they even have a soul?

The Spanish thought strongly that they did not have a soul and thus the Spanish could do anything to these soul-less people including slavery and killings. The Book of Mormon answered this issue by saying that the Lamanite-Indians were cursed by God.

6.) Who had created the great cities, temples, and artifacts that had been discovered in South American, Central America and North America? Who had created the highly skilled artifacts found in the Mississippi Mound culture – Hopewell Mound culture?

The artifacts were just too detailed and too beautiful to have been created by the Indians. These great archeology discoveries were all prior to the writing of the Book of Mormon and were discussed in many circles. This is where racist archeology comes into play. Only a race of civilized white people could have created such cities. There was no way savages could have done this. Therefore, the talk was that these items would have to have been created by the LOST WHITE TRIBE. The debate had begun over who was the Lost White Tribe and where did they disappear to. The Book of Mormon answered all those questions. The White Nephites landed in South America and worked their way north. They created the cities and the temples of Peru and Central American and finally the great mounds in North American. And amazingly they did all of this in just 1,000 years. The dark-skinned Lamanites – Indians – who had been cursed – killed off the Lost White Tribe. Beautiful cites were created by the white Nephites. The dark-skinned Lamanites created only war and destruction. The Nephites were superior to the inferior Lamanites. This answered the questions of the racism of the day.

7) Where is the sealed Indian Book that contained all of the answers to the history of the Indians?

In 1775, Indian trader James Adair described two brass plates and five copper plates found with the Tuccabatches Indians. According to Adair, an Indian informant said, “he was told by his forefathers that those plates were given to them by his forefathers by a man we call God. Orsamus Turner reported that in 1809 a New York farmer ploughed up an “Ancient Record or Tablet.” The Philadelphia Port Folio reported in 1816 “that thin plates of copper rolled up” were found in one mound. In 1823 John Haywood described, “human bones of large size” and “two or there plates of brass, with characters inscribed resembling letters” found in one West Virginia mound. In Ethan Smith’s book, he said that the Indians once had a book which they had for a long time preserved. But having lost the knowledge of reading it, they concluded it would be of no further use to them: and they buried it with an Indian chief. There had been a persistent legend of a lost Indian book. The story of a lost Indian book was a popular one, repeated in various forms by Elian Boudinot, Charles Beatty, Israel Worsley and others. Joseph Smith found the Indian Book. This was one of many reasons that made the Book of Mormon very popular at the time of its publication.

8) Who were the Mound builders and other interpretations of archeology?

Since archeology was in its infancy at the time of Joseph Smith, any artifact could have been 300 years old or 3,000 years old. They did not have the knowledge we have today. For example, according to the Book of Mormon, the Jaredites landed in the Americas near Panama 2500 BC to 2200 BC. After Nephites build the great cities and temples in Peru, they began to move north. The Nephites joined up with the Jaredites to build the great cities and pyramids in Central America. Remembering the Nephites time table, this all happened in only 1,000 years. The Jaredites, who had migrated from the tower of Babel and inhabited the land northward until their destruction shortly after the arrival of the Nephites in 585 BC, had rendered a portion of the land desolate of timber and littered the ground with their bones. The Nephites called the region the land of desolation. Joseph Smith and other early Mormons referred to North America, especially the prairies, as the land of desolation. In 1844 John Taylor, editor of the church’s official, Times and Seasons, remarked that the Jaredites “probably made the present prairies by extensive cultivation when they removed the forests to cultivate their crops. There is no archeology evidence to back up any of the previous statements. People at the time were puzzled by the wide open prairies and Joseph Smith provided an explanation. And once again, Joseph Smith provided an explanation of the great cities in South America and North America and the Mound Builders.

The country was doing a great deal of talking and proposing theories regarding the Mound builders and their culture. Some thought that they were temples and some thought they were burial mounds and fortifications. In 1805, Reverend Thaddeus Harris wrote that the mounds were “piled over the heaps of slain after some great battle.” In 1818, the Palmyra Register stated that the unfortunate mound builders must have been killed in battle and hastily buried.

Solomon Spalding (died in 1816) wrote a fictional book about the Mound Culture. His story wove around the current mound builder myth. He described two distinct nations; the one lived in huts, hunted, and were uncivilized, dark-skinned savages; the other built houses and cities, worked metals, kept records, tiled the earth, domesticated animals, wore clothes like Europeans and were a fair-skinned civilized people. Such thinking was bound to have been read by Joseph. In 1818 the Palmyra Register stated that the mound builders “had made much greater advances in the arts of civilized life” than any Indians. The Palmyra Herald declared in 1823 that the fortifications were “the work of some other people than the Indians.”

On October 1830 the editor of the Brattleboro Messenger (Vermont) suggested that the Book of Mormon could have been “designed to explain the ancient fortifications and other things seen at the west.”

On June 2, 1834, Joseph Smith and a small company of Mormons visited a burial mound. After a skeleton was unearthed, Smith revealed that it belonged to a “White Lamanite” named Zelph who died during the last battle with Nephite nation (from “History of the Church”) Joseph Smith felt the Mounds were built by the retreating Nephites for the last great battles with the Lamanites and that the mounds contained the bodies of the destroyed Nephites. The Book of Mormon supported the Mound-builder myth of that time. In 1834, the Unitarian claimed that the mounds were “proof that this county was once inhabited by a race of people better acquainted with the arts of civilized life, than the present race of savages; and this, they content, is satisfactory presumptive proof of the truth of the Book of Mormon history.”

The belief that the mound builders were something other than Native Americans was laid to rest as early as 1894 (At least the archeological community thought it had been laid to rest. There are many current Mormons that still belief Hopewell is a Nephite site). The Bureau of Ethnology did extensive surveys and excavations. Any doubts about who build the mounds were crushed by a lengthy report packed with descriptions and excavation details. The current timeline of the Mound culture ranges from 11,000 BC to 1,000+ AD. The timeline for the Hopewell culture is 100 AD to 500 AD. DNA studies in 2006 were taken from the teeth of 34 individuals excavated from the Hopewell site. First, they were surprised that the DNA represented a very diverse Native American group. This diversity suggested that individuals from different groups were buried together in the mounds. Second, the DNA shared close ties with Asia – especially China, Korea, Japan and Mongolia. Third, the DNA showed biological ties to current Native American groups such as the Chippewa/Ojibwa groups. There were no ties found to the Cherokee group or Jewish (Israel). Thus, there is no DNA evidence that a white race built and occupied the Mounds.

9) Who were some of the authors, books, and writings of the day prior to the writing of the Book of Mormon in 1830?

In 1823 (second edition was 1825), Ethan Smith published his book, “View of the Hebrews or the Tribes of Israel of America.” His books contained some of the following concepts; Hebrews leave the Old World for the New World, Settlers journey northward after landing in South America, Hebrew is the origin of Indian language, a set of “yellow leaves” buried in Indian Hill that are the Lost Indian records, breastplate, urim and thummim, the Gospel was preached in the Americas, Messiah visits the America (Quetzalcoatl was the white bearded Mexican Messiah), Hebrews were divided into two classes, civilized and barbarous, long wars break out between the civilized and barbarous groups, barbarous group kills the civilized group.

The following is a quote from “Indian Origins and the Book of Mormon” by Dan Vogel. “Ethan Smith is by far the most important and interesting work dealing with the origin of the American Indians and the mound builders. Smith quotes from many other writers, both American and European, to support his thesis that the first settlers of the New World were the lost ten tribes of Israel….. Smith, so far as can be determined, is the only writer before 1830 to combine Hebrew origin theory with the mound builders myth. Several times he repeats the notion that the mound builders were destroyed by the Indians. His ten tribe theory forces him to develop the hypothesis that the Indians had degenerated from a civilized condition to their wild and savage state. He also mentions the Indian legends of the lost book of God which would one day be returned.”

With carbon dating that was discovered in the 1950s and the advancements with DNA studies, the answers to the dates and origins of Native Americans is getting more precise. There is no archeologyical evidence or DNA proof that a white race created antiquities in the country. The answers are getting away from using archeology to support any theological position.

SKIN COLOR — DID THE POINT OF VIEW CHANGE WITH TIME?

In the BOM, Lamanites are described as having received a “skin of blackness” as means of distinguishing themselves from the Nephites. This “change” in skin color is often mentioned in conjunction with God’s curse on the descendants of Laman for their wickedness and corruption, as seen in 2 Nephi 5:21: “And he had caused the cursing to come upon (the Lamanites), yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For, behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, and they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.”

Several BOM passages have been interpreted by some LDS as indicating that Lamanites would revert to a lighter skin tone upon accepting the gospel. For example, at a 1960 LDS Church General Conference, President Spencer W. Kimball suggested that the skin of LDS Native Americans was gradually turning lighter:

“I saw a striking contrast in the progress of the Indian people today…The day of the Lamanites is nigh. For years they have been growing delightsome, and they are now becoming white and delightsome, as they were promised. In this picture of twenty Lamanite missionaries, fifteen of the twenty were as light as Anglos, five were darker but equally delightsome. The children in the home placement program in Utah are often lighter than their brothers and sisters in the Hogan on the reservation. At one meeting a father and mother and their sixteen year old daughter we represent, the little member girl – sixteen – sitting between the dark father and mother, and it was evident she was several shades lighter than her parents – on the same reservation, in the same Hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather…These young members of the Church are changing to whiteness and to delightsomeness. One white elder jokingly said that he and his companion were donating blood regularly to the hospital in the hope that the process might be accelerated.”

The BOM, 2 Nephi 30:6, which in early editions of the BOM reads: “Their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes, and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and delightsome people.” In 1840, with a third edition of the BOM, Joseph Smith changed the wording to “a pure and delightsome people”. However, all future LDS Church printings of the BOM until 1981 continued from the second edition, saying that the Lamanites would become “a white and delightsome people.”

PERSONAL NOTE

My personal BOM shows the wording “white and delightsome”. Having grown up in the 1960s in Utah, I knew full blood Native Americans who were doing “bleach” baths and scrubbing their skin until they bled, trying to “lighten up their skin color”. It was just horrible. If the Native American’s skin did not turn lighter, they were judged as being less holy and not accepting the Gospel.

NATIVE AMERICANS AND THE PIONEERS

In Southern Utah, the Pioneers took the land and the water sources (Santa Clara River, Virgin River and Pipe Springs). The Pioneers changed and destroyed the landscape in order to feed their cattle and water their crops. After taking so much, the Pioneers then blamed the Native Americans for the Mountain Meadow Massacre in 1857. The Mormons massacred the folks in the Wagon Train headed to California. It was not until April 2016, that the Paiute Massacre of 1866 in Circleville was recognized. The Mormon Militia killed 15-20 Paiute men, women and children by hitting them on the head and slitting their throats. There are other undocumented incidents that are similar to those I have mentioned. And in recent times, the Mormons are beginning to take over Petroglyph sites and to change the stories to fit the Book of Mormon stories. The white Nephites carved in the petroglyphs.

Since Brigham Young brought the Pioneers out West to settle this area, how did he feel about the “Indian” population? The following are direct quotes from Discourses of Brigham Young published in 1925 by Heber J. Grant for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

“There is a curse on these aborigines of our country, who roam the plains, and are so wild that you cannot tame them. They are the House of Israel; they once had the Gospel delivered to them, they had the oracles of truth; Jesus came and administered to them after his resurrection, and they received and delighted in the Gospel until the fourth generation when they turned away and became so wicked that God cursed them with this dark and benighted and loathsome condition. (Page 188)

“When we came here, they could catch fish in great abundance in the lake in the season thereof, and live upon them pretty much through the summer. But now their game has gone, and they are left to starve. It is our duty to feed them. The Lord has given us ability to cultivate the ground and reap bountiful harvests. We have an abundance of food for ourselves and for the stranger. It is our duty to feed these poor ignorant Indians; we are living on their possessions and at their homes.” 11:264. Page 189-190.

Just to set the record straight, when the Spanish Explorers passed through Southern Utah area in 1777, they saw cultivated fields of corn, beans and squash. These were not poor ignorant Indians. The Pioneers exposed the Paiutes to diseases that killed from 80-90% of the population. The Paiutes taught the Pioneers many things about plants and how to survive in this area. Without them, I do not think the Pioneers would have survived.

INDIAN PLACEMENT PROGRAM (HOME PLACEMENT PROGRM)

Do Mormons treat the Native American any better in recent times? The Indian Placement Program shows that things have not changed. The following information comes from my personal experience and Wikipedia (dated 04/21/16).

From 1947 to 2000, the Mormons ran a program called the Indian Placement Program or Home Placement Program or Indian Student Placement Program. Native Americans (primarily Navajo) were placed in Mormon homes during the school year and then sent back home for the summer. The cost of care was borne by the foster parents. Since the Native American had to be a Mormon before being placed into a home, they had to be baptized into the Church. Because they first had to be baptized before being sent away, the Navajos called it the “Dip and Ship” program. Many Navajos joke about their Ward being the largest Ward because they have over 2,000 baptized members, but only about 50 attend. Many thought the program would increase the number of Lamanites as members. The program backfired on them.

First, how would any parent feel if their child was taken from their home, and sent away? Not only was that child taught other customs, but the child was sometimes taught, if not implied, that the child’s parents and grandparents ways were evil and traditional customs had to be done away with. Native American children lost their identity. First hand, I saw homesick children and children being disconnected from their heritage. This took years to recover and to rebuild family ties. Some children got lucky and were placed in a home that encouraged the Native American connection. Those children and families did much better.

In 1977, the U.S. Government commissioned a study to investigate accusations that the Church was using its influence to push children into joining the program. The study found that the program was largely positive. I personally did not see this. When you have a Church that emphasizes how important families are and that families are forever, this program did not think about the Family. The children’s parents were shamed by this program. This program split up and destroyed families. I was so glad to see it discontinued.

SOURCES

The sources used were various LDS websites, LDS historical sites, Brigham Young’s Discourses, the Book of Mormon, the book “Indian Origins and the Book of Mormon” by Dan Vogel, Wikipedia, Ancient DNA from the Ohio Hopewell by Brad Lepper, The Mound Builders by Thames and Hudson, and my personal experiences.

CONCLUSION

Before I began this study, I did not realize that the BOM was so tied to explaining the origins of the Indians. I doubt that many current Mormons including non-white members know the full history at the time of the writing of the Book of Mormon. That history is not taught in Sunday School. There are many that would deny what I have written – but it is just history. I grew up in Mormonism. The Native Americans are pulled into the religion because of two primary factors. First, it is the only holy scriptures that even mentions them. Secondly, the Mormons tell them that they are the chosen ones in the last days. If they are chosen, what are they chosen for? Why do you not see large numbers or any number of Native Americans in top Church positions? In the words of the Book of Mormon, Native Americans are being told they are cursed with the dark-skin for their actions and thoughts. They are ignorant savages. Under the Church, they have been misplaced in white homes, discriminated against, shamed and treated like poor helpless children. I find the Book of Mormon to be discriminatory against Native Americans and full of racist archeology. The words in the Book of Mormon perpetuate the racist theories by turning them into theology. God made the whites superior and God made the dark-skinned people inferior. Whites create and dark-skinned people destroy.

I also think that Genealogy (the study of your ancestors so they can be baptized into the Church) is racist and elitist. Racist because many non-white races do not have a written record of their ancestors. My mother who loved genealogy could only go back three generations on my father’s Native American family. With her family from Liverpool, she went back to the 1400s. My father’s side of the family was condemned to the lower levels of heaven because they could not be baptized. Genealogy is elitist because many poor people throughout the world did not have any written records of their ancestors. Throughout history and in many countries only the rich and sometimes the royalty kept records of their family.

Looking through the lens of pre-1830, one can better see the world that created the Book of Mormon. That was a time of great discovery and expansion. Unfortunately, the wonderments that were found were credited to a white race. They did not think that the indigenous people were capable of such creations. That thinking justified the “Manifest Destiny” thinking of the time. A white race once occupied this great country so the white race was entitled to take it back. The indigenous people were not capable of running the show. It is too bad that the Book of Mormon still perpetuates that thinking. Even if the Church denies that thinking, they stand in the shadow of their own words in the Book of Mormon. I have just attempted to put a little light on that shadow.

In the past, the Mormon Church did not treat everyone equally. In the future, will the Mormon Church treat EVERYONE equally? I will leave that answer to the historians.