

From One Land of Inheritance Bordered by Inland Seas to Another



Lehi's Divinely Guided Voyage to America



A Feasible Voyage

How did the mistake of placing Zarahemla so very far from Cumorah come about?



According to Latter-day revelation, early members of the Church, notwithstanding their testimonies and exemplary lives, “treated lightly” the Book of Mormon, bringing “the whole Church under condemnation”. (D&C 84:54-57) Instead of carefully consulting scripture, enthusiastic associates of Joseph Smith jumped to conclusions based largely on outside source material i.e. available maps of the Western Hemisphere and popular works like John Lloyd Stephens, Incidents of Travel in Central America. Their hasty conclusions started traditions which have led to embarrassment and confusion. The following are examples of exaggerated geographies tendered by early church members: Hemispheric e.g. Orson Pratt’s model, suggested as early as 1832. Elder Pratt presumed the Book of Mormon's “narrow neck of land” to be at Panama . He contended that the Book of Mormon "river Sidon" was the long, northward flowing Magdalena River of tropical Colombia . Because of the presumed need for a landing site that was as far south of the equator as Jerusalem is north , Elder Pratt placed Lehi’s landing far to the south in temperate Chile . Orson Pratt’s presumptions make for a most exaggerated setting. Localized South American geographies have essentially distilled from the hemispheric tradition started by Orson Pratt and others. Orson Pratt outlived more than one Apostle who differed with his geographic conclusions. Late in the nineteenth Century, Orson Pratt’s geography prevailed to the point of being published as footnotes in the 1879 edition of the Book of Mormon. Though his speculative footnotes have since been removed, his influence carries on in the Church. Celebrated author Robert Silverberg notes that Orson Pratt in fact espoused a "Mound Builder" setting for the Book of Mormon. The Mormon leader chose to spread the setting of the "mounds" over "both North and South America." (Silverberg, Robert, The Mound Builders, 1970, pp. 72-73) Elder Orson Pratt started promoting his over-sized Book of Mormon geography as a brilliant young missionary on fire with his own vision of the scripture - a book which he had only begun to study in depth. Elder Pratt discoursed on “ancient” Cumorah in western New York . (“The Hill Cumorah”, Millennial Star, 28:417-19) He informed the Saints, that the exhumed remains of New York mega-fauna, (e.g. recovered near the Mohawk River ) were the bones of “domesticated animals” of the Jaredite people of Omer who, according to Apostle Pratt, “inhabited all that region of country”. (“The Mastodon of the Book of Ether”, Millennial Star, 28:776-7) Elder Pratt definitely recognized the mound builders as Book of Mormon peoples, and went so far as to promote the Ohio Hebrew stones, reportedly “discovered in the mounds”, as Nephite scripture. (Journal of Discourses, 16:47-49) Out of line with key Book of Mormon details, Elder Pratt placed Nephite cities like “Amonihah in the northern part of South America”, while correctly recognizing Cumorah in western New York . Elder Pratt had the prophet Ether carrying the Jaredite record thousands of miles from the region of Ramah (Cumorah) “towards South America ”, placing the plates “in a position north of the Isthmus, where a portion of the people of King Limhi, about one hundred year before Christ, found them.” (Journal of Discourses, 16:47-49) This is a geographic impossibility, not because ancient people could not have traveled far and wide, but because the land where the Jaredites were destroyed (proximal to Ramah / Cumorah), was near enough to Zarahemla to be misidentified as Zarahemla. (Mosiah 8:7-9; 21:25-27, Mormon 6:4, Ether 9:3; 15:8-12) Apostle Pratt had Zarahemla near the Magdalena River of South America. (Journal of Discourses, 16:47-49) Murals at the Rochester Museum of Science depicting the prehistoric New York mastodon and its use by local people. Large numbers of these creatures inhabited western New York in ages past. The discovery of mastodon remains in New York led many to expect the animal was contemporary with mound building people. (Ether 9:19) Latter-day Saint Apostle Orson Pratt acknowledged the mound builder setting for the Book of Mormon, but exaggerated it. Elder Pratt stretched his mound builder geography over the Western Hemisphere! His geographic views greatly influenced Mormon opinion for a while.

North American Continent e.g. Apostle John E. Page’s model, the initial version drafted in1842. Elder Page was enamored with John Lloyd Stephens’ 1841 best settler, and sought to fit Book of Mormon cities to the sites of Mesoamerica stone ruins brought to public attention by Stephens’ volumes. Stephens’ own conclusion that the ruins which he and Catherwood documented were not of "great antiquity", went unheeded by Elder Page and many other excited Latter-day Saint readers. [6] Page made more than one revision of his geographic model. Page initially had the “narrow neck of land” at the bay of Honduras (not Panama), but appears to have modified his view (by 1848), moving the location further west and north, possibly to the wide lateral Isthmus of Tehuantepec. In contrast to Pratt's model, Page’s geography better accommodates the compact size of Nephite lands indicated in scripture. Still, Page's Central American scenario is set far too distant from scriptural Cumorah. Based more on Stephen's popular volumes than on scripture, Pages model does not contemplate the difficulties imposed on a party of Israelite immigrants intent on keeping “the commandments of the Lord in all things, according to the law of Moses” (2 Nephi 5:10) in a tropical land with only two seasons (wet and dry). American Heartland e.g. ”Manti” in Missouri, circa 1838, as indicated in the Journal of Samuel D. Tyler, September 25, 1838. In the late 1830s, some members of the Church claimed that the Book of Mormon city of Manti (southward from Zarahemla) was located in Randolph County Missouri. [7] There is no firsthand, verifiable statement by Joseph Smith supporting this belief. Some American heartland settings draw upon the Manti in Missouri claim, and the fact the Lord approved “the name of Zarahemla” to be placed upon the site of an LDS community across the Mississippi from Nauvoo. (D&C 125:3) These models spread Book of Mormon sites and events over much of the eastern U.S. and parts of Canada. The "head of the river Sidon" is argued by some to be the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers, even though this confluence was routinely called the "mouth of the Missouri" - never the head of the Mississippi. ( Wilford Woodruff's Journal , August 2, 1842, 2:184) As one might expect, the Book of Mormon patriarch Lehi correctly understood a river's "head" to be its source at higher elevation. (1 Nephi 8:13-14) Thus w e see that the hemispheric setting was not the only geographic model on the minds of early members of the Church. Joseph Smith’s contemporaries had different, conflicting ideas about Book of Mormon lands. Joseph apparently tolerated this, but he refused to take responsibility for things published in his name, that did not come under his supervisions. For instance in the March the 1842 issue of the Times and Seasons, Joseph refused to take responsibility for the previous February 15 issue published in his name. The absence of certified comments from Joseph Smith on ideas of the time like: Manti in Missouri, Lehi’s landing in Chile, Lehi’s landing just south of Panama, "the narrow neck of land" embracing all of Central America, Zarahemla at Quirigua, etc., does not mean that he endorsed these conflicting ideas. Joseph at the very least had resolved that some Book of Mormon events took place in his own country. He clearly stated this, and the Saints accepted it! Beyond this he apparently allowed the Saints to do as the Bible directs: “…consider of it, take advice, and speak your minds.” (Judges 19:30) Even though exaggerated hemispheric settings for the Book of Mormon were encouraged by some early Church leaders, there is no known statement by Joseph Smith endorsing a hemispheric model. The fact that Elder John Page entertained a non-hemispheric setting for the Book of Mormon, indicates that Joseph Smith did not teach a hemispheric setting as an oral tradition. Page clearly did not agree with the geography of his contemporary Orson Pratt (who did not attribute his hemispheric model to Joseph Smith or to revelation). [8] The fact that other LDS in the late 1830s placed southern Nephite territory (Manti) in the United States is further evidence that the hemispheric setting was only the opinion of some Latter-day Saints, and not a teaching issued by the Prophet. Orson Pratt’s model, by the way, was not identical to the hemispheric model proposed by his brother Parley. Parley Pratt’s departure from his brother's geography, seems to show the strong influence that Stephens’ best seller had on Parley. Parley ostensibly placed the “narrow neck” at a wider location closer to Stephens' discoveries, far to the northwest of Panama. [9] The Hemispheric geography got a boost sometime after the death of Joseph Smith, when the Williams document (alleging a Pacific Ocean crossing and Chilean landing) was trumped as “Revelation to Joseph the Seer”. [10] Unsubstantiated statements followed, to the effect that the Prophet had, “to some individual or individuals [unnamed]”, identified the Magdalena River of Colombia as the Book of Mormon River Sidon, and the landing site of Lehi far to the south at Valparaiso , Chile . [11] This alleged landing site, in fact, sounds more like the idea of Orson Pratt and Frederick G. Williams, than anything Joseph Smith is known to have said. The Chilean landing site conflicts with another site, also mistakenly attributed to Joseph Smith; alleging that Lehi “landed a little south of the Isthmus of Darien [ Panama ]”. [12] Not one of these claims is supported by a verifiable statement from Joseph Smith’s. LDS leaders eventually tried to counteract the widespread rumors about Lehi’s landing. Orson Pratt’s geographic footnotes (published in the 1879 edition of the Book of Mormon) were removed, and Frederick J. Pack (Chairman of the Gospel Doctrine Committee), George D. Pyper (Assistant editor of The Instructor) and General Authority B. H. Roberts tried to set the record straight by publishing the facts in regards to the dubious Williams document. While having "no confidence" in various Book of Mormon geographies of his day, First Presidency member George Q. Cannon nevertheless regarded the location of Cumorah as settled. [11] The thing that all early models agreed on was the general location of the land Cumorah revealed by Joseph Smith. (D&C 128:20) In time, the RLDS church relegated Joseph Smith’s epistle mentioning Cumorah, to an historical appendix in their version of “the Doctrine and Covenants” (RLDS D&C 110; see also RLDS D&C 107), even though the Prophet had endorsed the epistle as “the word of the Lord”. (LDS D&C 127:10, D&C 128:1-2 ) The chief subject of the epistle is “baptism for the dead”, a practice RLDS leaders chose not to regard as binding upon their following. Marginalizing the authority of Joseph’s epistle on baptism for the dead made dismissing the location of Cumorah indicated in the epistle, less problematic for RLDS members. It is not surprising, therefore, that the earliest "limited" Central American geography theories, dismissing the revealed location of Cumorah, were advanced by RLDS. To be fair, RLDS should be recognized for their attention to some Book of Mormon details. Some began to realize that the book’s principal lands were more localized than previously supposed. (Hills, Louis E., 1917; Gunsolley, Jeremiah F., 1922) [9] Even so, a decision was made to shrink-fit proposed settings around distant locations that had been celebrated in exaggerated geographies, and travelogues instead of anchoring near the land Cumorah revealed by Joseph Smith. In other words, some chose to trade the location of Cumorah revealed by the Prophet, for exotic pottage in faraway places! But none of these misplaced “limited geographies” are truly limited in one important detail: They all have Moroni traveling thousands of miles to the Finger Lakes region of North America in order to deposit the abridged record of his people. This is a claim that runs into problems with scripture: In the Book of Mormon land northward, even before the abridgement of the record was complete, the Lord commanded Moroni to “seal up” the means for interpreting the record. (Ether 1:1; 4:5; 5:1) Though many years had past from the fall of the Nephites at Cumorah, Moroni was nevertheless in Lamanite held territory when he finally completed the abridgement. ( Moroni 1:1-4 ; 10:1-2) Moroni did not need the interpreters to complete an abridgement of a record already translated into his language. (Mosiah 28:11, Alma 37:25-26, 29) There is absolutely no mention of retrieving the interpreters for a mission to carry the plates, and other heavy essentials to a far away land – a land whose soil had not gathered the ancient dead of the account. On the contrary, as the Book of Mormon proceeded from the mouth of the young translator, so spoke the voice of the former inhabitants as if from the very ground. (Mormon 8:23-26) It wasn’t that there were no candidates for a “narrow neck of land” right there in the vicinity of the Great Lakes, not far from Cumorah and the Smith home; or a river flowing northward in the same region, qualifying as “Sidon”. It wasn’t for lack of finds like mounds of earth, timber breastworks, old copper artifacts; and stories of great battles between long ago peoples of the region. Rather it was that Latter-day Saints, a persecuted people, turned to popular works for support - works like Stephens' bestseller, rather than remembering to consider in detail, the “New Covenant, even the Book of Mormon”. This is essentially how unauthentic traditions and a mass of confusion, regarding the book’s covenant lands, came about. The general Finger Lake’s location of the Book of Mormon land Cumorah is of course consistent with the original "Mound-builder" setting. American historian and journalist Hampton Sides is incredulous towards the proposal of an alternate Cumorah. Sides remarks, “As fantastic as it may seem, Sorenson actually argues that there were two Cumorahs: one in Mexico where the great battle took place, and where Moroni buried a longer, unexpurgated version of the golden Nephite records; and one near Palmyra, New York, where Moroni eventually buried a condensed version of the plates after lugging them on an epic trek of several thousand miles…” (Sides, Hampton , “This Is Not the Place”, Double Take Magazine, Vol. 5, No 2; Also included in his work ''American: Dispatches from the New Frontier'', 2004) Today, there is no question in the minds of American History and Literature scholars as to the Book of Mormon’s legitimate setting. These scholars are not distracted by unauthentic traditions and misadventures that still intoxicate and befuddle the minds of so many Mormons (LDS and "Community of Christ"). American History scholars go straight to the best sources; which include, Latter-day Saint scripture and verifiable statements by Joseph Smith. Uncertainty about the location of Lehi’s covenant land of liberty remains a uniquely "Mormon" problem. But with improving attention to scripture, more Latter-day Saints are coming to recognize authentic lands of the Book of Mormon with a devotion akin to what others have felt all along for another Promised Land. “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.” (Psalm 137:5)

