Delusion of forming opinions based on "the evidence" or "the text"

The recent Baja videos reminded me of one of the most popular pages on my setting blog titled 

Delusion of forming opinions based on "the evidence" or "the text"

You can see it here:

https://www.bookofmormoncentralamerica.com/p/psychology-of-central-american-theory.html

For convenience, I'm reposting it below with some minor edits.

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It is fascinating to observe how the psychological power of confirmation bias has led people to form strong opinions on the topic of Book of Mormon geography. Anyone who thinks he/she has taken a position based on "the evidence" or on "the text" is living in a delusion.

Everyone involved in this discussion has the same faith and testimony.

Everyone is reading the same text.

Everyone has access to the same physical and scientific evidence.

Everyone has access to the same teachings of the prophets.

Yet people reach completely contradictory conclusions. Why?

The truth is, we are all interpreting "the evidence" and "the text" through filters that confirm our biases. And our bias is driven by whether we accept (i) the prophets who teach a New York Cumorah or (ii) the intellectuals who teach a non-New York Cumorah. 

Everything else is confirmation bias. 

Our psychology is such that, once we make the choice about which expert to follow, we automatically reject the other category of expert.

We defer to experts (prophets or intellectuals, respectively) precisely because there is physical and scientific evidence to support both positions. Both positions rely on subjective interpretations of the text that confirm our respective biases, which in turn are determined by our initial choice of which expert we follow.

Those who accept the prophets reject the intellectuals who contradict the prophets, while those who accept the intellectuals reject the prophets who contradict the intellectuals. It's axiomatic. It's an irresistible psychological reality.

The fun comes when those who accept the intellectuals, and yet also claim they want to follow the prophets (such as BYU/CES employees teaching Book of Mormon or Church History classes), try to rationalize their choice by claiming the prophets haven't actually taught the things they have declared. 

They stare at the words and deny they are there--the power of confirmation bias.

Tomorrow we'll assess the origin of these powerful biases. Friday I'll offer some suggestions for cognitive debiasing. Next week we'll look at more of the physical and scientific aspects of the Hill Cumorah.

But today I want to point out how, because of confirmation bias , the New York Cumorah has been treated uniquely among all the other teachings of the prophets and apostles. 
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Before getting started with examples, I need to explain my purpose here.

Psychological studies have shown that information rarely, if ever, overcomes bias confirmation. People always interpret new information so that if it confirms their bias, they accept it, but if it contradicts their bias, they reject it as unreliable or otherwise flawed.

If you think the Hill Cumorah is in New York, evidence regarding other theories will have no impact on your beliefs. You will dismiss it out of hand because it contradicts the experts you've chosen (the prophets). Because of your confirmation bias, the information in this post will make you even more perplexed at the rejection of the prophets and apostles by faithful members of the Church.

Because your bias is based on the words of the prophets, however, if, say, President Oaks came out today and declared that the Hill Cumorah is somewhere else, accepting that teaching would be consistent with your bias, even if it conflicted with your previous beliefs about Cumorah. 

You might have to work out the inconsistencies between past and present prophets, but your bias in favor of accepting the prophets would lead you to accept the new teaching. You would suddenly see the evidence differently to confirm your stronger bias of following the prophet.

Likewise, if you think the Hill Cumorah is not in New York--if you accept the M2C (Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs) theory or another non-New York theory such as Baja--none of the information in this post will change your mind. You have already accepted the proposition that the prophets and apostles were wrong, so no matter how many times they repeated the teaching and no matter the purpose or context, you are convinced they are wrong and bias confirmation will make sure any new data fits the M2C/Baja paradigm.

Because of the psychology of bias confirmation, there is literally nothing any Church leader can say that will change your mind on this topic. 

Even if President Oaks came out today and read Letter VII and said he stands by it, your bias confirmation would have you believe that was just his opinion and he was wrong because you've already interpreted past statements by the prophets and apostles that way.

The corollary, of course, is that because your bias is based on teachings of intellectuals you respect, if those same intellectuals began teaching a New York Cumorah, it would be consistent with your bias to adopt that view, even though it contradicted your past beliefs. You would suddenly see the evidence differently to confirm your stronger bias of following the intellectuals you respect.

Bottom line: I'm offering this information not to convince anyone of anything, but to (i) show the power of bias confirmation and (ii) illustrate how deeply bias confirmation has seeped into the Church.

Let me re-emphasize that last point.

Bias confirmation on the part of Church employees has always led to decisions about curriculum, media, artwork, visitors' center displays, etc., that confirm their bias. Until about 1980, the bias was in favor of the prophets and opposed to the intellectuals. Since about 1980, that bias has been in favor of the intellectuals and opposed to the prophets.

The question for today is which bias will prevail in the future.
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Let's look at three examples of how confirmation bias operates to treat the teaching (doctrine) of the New York Cumorah uniquely.

1. Official LDS Doctrine. The Church has published guidelines so people can know what is and what is not official Church doctrine. See https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/approaching-mormon-doctrine

[Note: this site has been redirected to the main Church page, but it quoted President Christofferson's message that President Oaks later quoted: " As to all of these, the wise cautions of Elders D. Todd Christofferson and Neil L. Andersen in earlier general conference messages are important to remember. Elder Christofferson taught: “It should be remembered that not every statement made by a Church leader, past or present, necessarily constitutes doctrine. It is commonly understood in the Church that a statement made by one leader on a single occasion often represents a personal, though well-considered, opinion, not meant to be official or binding for the whole Church.” (2010s, 2019, October, Dallin H. Oaks, Trust in the…, ¶11 • CR) ]

The New York Cumorah seems to fit the criteria, as I've explained in these posts:

http://www.lettervii.com/2017/11/what-is-official-mormon-doctrine.html

http://www.lettervii.com/2017/12/mormon-doctrine-letter-vii-and-apostles.html

http://www.lettervii.com/2017/12/more-on-mormon-doctrine.html

As far as I have discovered, and as far as anyone else has told me, the New York Cumorah is the only teaching that (i) meets these criteria, yet (ii) people nevertheless deny is Church doctrine.

Some people say the location of Cumorah is not a doctrinal issue because locations are not doctrinal in nature. "Doctrine" is defined as "a set of beliefs. The word comes from the Latin doctor for “teacher,” so think of a doctrine is the teachings of a school, religion, or political group." By that definition, locations of sacred events are doctrines when they are what a religion teaches.

Would we say the location of the Sacred Grove is not Church doctrine? If it is not doctrine, why do we have a Visitors' Center in Palmyra? Unquestionably, the Church teaches that the First Vision took place there, so it is a teaching--a doctrine--of the Church.

It's certainly true that, as the Mormon Newsroom article points out, "Some doctrines are more important than others and might be considered core doctrines. For example, the precise location of the Garden of Eden is far less important than doctrine about Jesus Christ and His atoning sacrifice." The example given there is extreme to make the point clear, but what about closer cases?

For example, could we say that it doesn't matter whether the First Vision took place near Palmyra or somewhere else?

I think not. The reason: it goes to the credibility of Joseph Smith, the only witness to the event. He said it happened in what we now know was the Sacred Grove. If someone produces evidence that it actually occurred in Pennsylvania, that might not change the reality of the visitation, but it would raise a serious issue about the credibility of Joseph Smith that would carry over to other things he claimed.

Another point about the relative importance of doctrines is how often they are taught, and for what purposes. Letter VII was written partly in response to the claim in Mormonism Unvailed that the Book of Mormon was fiction. President Cowdery emphasized the physical reality of the Book of Mormon by stating it was a fact that the final battles of the Jaredites and Nephites took place in the mile-wide valley west of the New York hill where Joseph found the plates. The teaching served a very important purpose then, and it continues to do so today. That's why it was repeated so often.

It is indisputable that for over 150 years, leaders of the Church have consistently and specifically taught that the Hill Cumorah of Mormon 6:6 is the same hill in Western New York from which Joseph Smith obtained the set of plates that he translated in Harmony, PA. This was no isolated statement; it was proclaimed openly in General Conference by members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve. It was published repeatedly in official Church publications. It has never been contradicted by any member of the Twelve or First Presidency.

The only ones who oppose this teaching are certain intellectuals in the Church and their followers.

I know of no other such teaching that has been so often repeated by Church leaders yet is openly repudiated by LDS scholars and Church staff.  

I'd like to know if anyone can think of another one. This is not like the so-called Adam-God theory or Priesthood restrictions that were expressly repudiated by later Church leaders.
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Some may say the New York Cumorah is an unimportant doctrine.

We've already seen why President Cowdery formally published Letter VII. We've seen how many times the teaching was repeated. Now let's look at one example of how important previous prophets and apostles have considered the teaching.

In October 1975, President Marion G. Romney of the First Presidency spoke in General Conference on the topic of "America's Destiny." Present at the time were President Spencer W. Kimball and Elders (and future Presidents) Ezra Taft Benson, Howard W. Hunter, Gordon B. Hinckley, and Thomas S. Monson.

President Romney said this:

I will give you a lesson today that the Lord has taken great pains to bring to us.... In the western part of the state of New York near Palmyra is a prominent hill known as the “hill Cumorah.” (Morm. 6:6.) On July twenty-fifth of this year, as I stood on the crest of that hill admiring with awe the breathtaking panorama which stretched out before me on every hand, my mind reverted to the events which occurred in that vicinity some twenty-five centuries ago—events which brought to an end the great Jaredite nation.... Thus perished at the foot of Cumorah the remnant of the once mighty Jaredite nation, of whom the Lord had said, “There shall be none greater … upon all the face of the earth.” (Ether 1:43.)

As I contemplated this tragic scene from the crest of Cumorah and viewed the beautiful land of the Restoration as it appears today, I cried in my soul, “How could it have happened?”... This second civilization to which I refer, the Nephites, flourished in America between 600 B.C. and A.D. 400. Their civilization came to an end for the same reason, at the same place, and in the same manner as did the Jaredites’.... I bear you my personal witness that I know that the things I have presented to you today are true—both those pertaining to past events and those pertaining to events yet to come.

The language here is unambiguous. Can anyone say President Romney did not think his teaching was important? He bore his personal witness that the things he told about past events were true. And yet, confirmation bias is so strong among the M2C/Baja intellectuals that they have convinced themselves and their followers that President Romney did not say what he said; instead, he was merely expressing his personal opinion and that he was wrong.

Because of confirmation bias, they honestly believe that 5 Presidents of the Churchsat there and listened to false doctrine being preached without saying anything.

In fact, far from opposing President Romney's teaching, 15 years later President Hinckley himself personally approved of a letter that stated, “The Church has long maintained, as attested to by references in the writings of General Authorities, that the Hill Cumorah in western New York state is the same as referenced in the Book of Mormon.”

As I indicated at the outset, if you believe Cumorah is not in New York, none of this will change your bias one iota because you've chosen the intellectuals as your experts, not the prophets. But if you believe Cumorah is in New York, than all of this strongly confirms your bias.
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2. Brigham  Young. As the second President of the Church, Brigham Young has been enormously influential--and controversial, both inside and outside the Church. But as far as I've been able to discover, and as far as anyone else has explained, there is only one time he described a historical incident about which people say he was either lying, mistaken, or describing a vision.

Of course, I'm referring to his observations about Mormon's depository in the Hill Cumorah in New York.

This is a core issue because if President Young was telling the truth about what he knew, then Oliver Cowdery and at least Don Carlos bore witness to him that they and others had actually entered Mormon's depository in the Hill Cumorah in New York. This means that when President Cowdery wrote Letter VII, he was speaking from personal experience, not from speculation, rumor, or even revelation. I've discussed this several times, including here: http://www.lettervii.com/2016/06/the-room-in-cumorah-why-its-important.html

Knowing this, the M2C/Baja intellectuals claim that Brigham was merely describing a vision that Oliver had of a hill in southern Mexico. This alleged vision was shared with Joseph on multiple occasions. During this alleged vision, Joseph and Oliver returned the plates to the cave and saw the other plates and artifacts. Don Carlos and others either shared the same vision or were a witness to Oliver and Joseph having the vision.

The detailed account is here: http://www.lettervii.com/2016/06/the-room-in-cumorah-brigham-young.html

When you read the account, ask yourself, was Brigham Young relating a vision or an actual experience? Note these statements:

I lived right in the country where the plates were found from which the Book of Mormon was translated, and I know a great many things pertaining to that country.

Oliver Cowdery went with the Prophet Joseph when he deposited these plates.

Oliver says that when Joseph and Oliver went there, the hill opened, and they walked into a cave, in which there was a large and spacious room.

They laid the plates on a table; it was a large table that stood in the room. Under this table there was a pile of plates as much as two feet high, and there were altogether in this room more plates than probably many wagon loads; they were piled up in the corners and along the walls. 

I tell you this as coming not only from Oliver Cowdery, but others who were familiar with it, and who understood it just as well as we understand coming to this meeting, enjoying the day, and by and by we separate and go away, forgetting most of what is said, but remembering some things. 

I relate this to you, and I want you to understand it. I take this liberty of referring to those things so that they will not be forgotten and lost. Carlos Smith was a young man of as much veracity as any young man we had, and he was a witness to these things.

Normally, a historian would be thrilled with such testimony. Here is a President of the Church, nearing the end of his life (he would die 2 months later), relating an event he thought was so important that he didn't want the Church to forget about it. He cited specifics. He named other witnesses. The event corroborated not only Letter VII but the teachings of all the other prophets and apostles who had also claimed that the Hill Cumorah was in New York.

Those who choose to follow the prophets readily accept this account. It passes right through their confirmation bias filter.

Even those who choose to follow the intellectuals would normally accept Brigham Young's statements about historical events, but this one presents a problem. It contradicts their bias about the New York Cumorah. To accept this statement as an accurate account of an actual event would obliterate their belief that Cumorah cannot be in New York, but worse, it would destroy the credibility of their chosen expert, the intellectuals who teach M2C/Baja.

Therefore, once again, the Prophet cannot be correct.

Confirmation bias requires them to interpret President Young's account as something other than literal.

Inferring that President Young was describing a dream here is pretty much impossible. We have Oliver, Joseph, and at least Don Carlos as participants.

We can tell ourselves that maybe Mormon's depository was magically transported to New York for Joseph, Oliver, Don Carlos and others to experience. Or we could tell ourselves that these brethren were magically transported to southern Mexico to have these experiences.

To an outside observer, no matter which of these alternatives we choose, we're straining. Our confirmation bias is at full strength, but even then, the magical thinking causes more problems than it solves.

So we tell ourselves that Brigham Young was wrong, or that Oliver and Don Carlos lied about what happened; i.e., it was completely made up or it was merely a vision or dream.

Even though we accept the intellectuals over the prophets, we don't want to base our position on the premise that the prophets are liars. We can't say Brigham Young was expressing a false opinion here, either; he was simply relating what others told him.

So the only solution is to frame this as a dream, as improbable as that is.

Fortunately, we have other accounts (about 10 of them). Unfortunately, they all speak in literal terms the way President Young did.

But we can turn to Heber C. Kimball's separate account and focus on a single term he used.

When he was discussing the handcart pioneers, Kimball said, "How does it compare with the vision that Joseph and others had, when they went into a cave in the hill Cumorah, and saw more records than ten men could carry? There were books piled up on tables, book upon book. Those records this people will yet have, if they accept of the Book of Mormon and observe its precepts, and keep the commandments."

On another occasion, Brigham Young noted that "President [Heber C.] Kimball talked familiarly
to the brethren about Father Smith, [Oliver] Cowdery, and others walking into the hill Cumorah and seeing records upon records piled upon table[s,] they walked from cell to cell and saw the records that were piled up. . . ."

That account sounds literal, but it doesn't matter. Our confirmation bias has seized on that term "vision" and that's the only thing that matters. Everything in every one of these accounts must be interpreted as a vision.

Someone who doesn't share our bias may point out that the term "vision" is a synonym for "view," but that, too, doesn't matter. Our bias will not allow this account of walking into Mormon's depository on the Hill Cumorah to be true, so our minds will latch onto one connotation of one term and dismiss everything else.

And it doesn't matter that this interpretation of Brigham Young's statement is unique to this account because it involves the New York Cumorah.
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3. Oliver Cowdery. In a previous post, I pointed out that most LDS agree that Oliver Cowdery, as one of the 3 Witnesses, was truthful.

Those with the M2C/Baja bias, however, cannot accept what he wrote in Letter VII. Consequently, they have to tell themselves that on this unique topic, he was lying or mistaken. I demonstrated their confirmation bias with a table that shows how they accept everything except this one teachings.

Oliver was truthful about everything except...

Letter VII from Messenger and Advocate, July 1835

Those who reject Letter VII cite no reasons other than their preference for a different location for the Hill Cumorah.

It is interesting to take a look at Oliver Cowdery's participation in the Church to put Letter VII in context. When he wrote it, he was the Assistant President of the Church. He had been commanded by revelation to select materials to publish. All eight of Oliver's letters about history are accepted by Church historians as important insights into the early events of the Church.

The only ones who object to any of Oliver's writings are the Mesoamerican advocates who reject just a few paragraphs out of one of the eight letters.

Oliver published Letter VII in July 1835. In February 1835, he, as one of the Three Witnesses, had selected the first members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. He gave them their aspostolic charge. In April 1836, he, along with Joseph Smith, was visited in the Kirtland temple by Moses, Elias, Elijah, and the Savior Himself. Oliver and Joseph were given the keys of the gathering of Israel and the dispensation of the gospel of Abraham.

Mesoamerican advocates expect you to believe that Oliver Cowdery could faithfully record the entire Book of Mormon, most of the Book of Moses, and much of Church history. Oliver could faithfully edit and publish two Church newspapers, the Book of Commandments, and the original Doctrine and Covenants. He could accurately write the statement for the Three Witnesses. Of all the writing he did, you're supposed to believe he was faithful and accurate except for a few paragraphs in one letter, solely because those paragraphs contradict the opinions of the scholars.

Here is the chronology. Everything that is okay is marked green. The items the scholars object to is marked red.

	Date	Event
	1829 April	Transcribes Book of Mormon as Joseph dictates
	1829 May	Receives Aaronic Priesthood from John the Baptist, baptizes Joseph and is baptized by him
	1829 May	Receives Melchizedek Priesthood from Peter, James and John
	1829 June	Sees the plates and angel as one of the Three Witnesses
	1829 June	Completes Book of Mormon and makes a printer’s copy, supervises printing and publication
	1830 April	Helps organize the Church as a Second Elder and apostle, ordains Joseph Smith as First Elder
	1830 June	Transcribes Book of Moses 1:1 through 5:43
	1830 Oct.	Leaves on mission to the Lamanites
	1830 Nov.	Baptizes Sidney Rigdon
	1831 Jan.	Arrives in Jackson County, Mo.
	1831 Summer	Meets Joseph in Jackson County
	1831 Nov.	Takes revelations from Ohio to Missouri for publication
	1832	Helps Phelps with printing operation in Missouri
	1832 Apr.	Approves Book of Commandments
	1833 Nov.	Sets up printing press in Kirtland, reprints Evening and Morning Star
	1833 Dec.	Begins editing Evening and Morning Star
	1834 Feb.	Chosen as founding member of Kirtland Council
	1834 May-Aug.	Leader in Kirtland after Zions Camp left
	1834 Oct	Edits LDS Messenger and Advocate and Northern Times
	1834 Oct	Publishes Letter I about Church history, part of which is in the current Pearl of Great Price
	1834 Nov	Publishes Letter II about Church history
	1834 Dec	Publishes Letter III about Church history
	1834 Dec	Ordained by Joseph Smith as “Assistant President of the Church”
	1835	Publishes Letter IV about Church history
	1835 Feb	With David Whitmer and Martin Harris, selects first members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
	1835 Feb	Gives apostolic charge to the Twelve Apostles
	1835 Mar	Publishes Letter V about Church history
	1835 Apr	Publishes Letter VI about Church history
	1835 May	Resigns from Messenger and Advocate
	1835 July	Publishes Letter VII about Church history
	1835 Aug.	Gets Doctrine and Covenants approved for printing
	1835 Oct.	Publishes Letter VIII about Church history
	1836 Mar.	Resumes editing the Messenger and Advocate
	1836 Apr.	Visited in Kirtland temple by Moses, Elias, Elijah, and Christ, receives the keys of the gathering of Israel and dispensation of gospel of Abraham
	1836 July	Accompanies Joseph to Salem, MA
	1837 Feb.	Turns over printing company to Joseph and Sidney
	1838 July	“Excluded from fellowship” for accusations against Joseph
	1848 Nov.	Rebaptized into the Church
	1850 March	Dies in Richmond at home of David Whitmer

Baja, M2C, and biases

I've updated this post from one of my other blogs to incorporate Baja.

Check your biases!

One obstacle to consensus about any issue is confirmation bias. People see what they want to see. As one scholar put it, Mesoamerican proponents "can't unsee" Mesoamerica when they read the Book of Mormon. It's the same with the Baja proponents, the Heartland proponents, etc.

Advocates of every alternative generally feel the same way--including those who don't accept the Book of Mormon as an authentic translation of ancient records. Everyone is confirming their biases.

For many years, I, too, could not "unsee" Mesoamerica in the text because I trusted the "experts" at BYU and CES and so I deferred to them. But that changed once I learned about a few critical facts and re-examined the text and Church history from another perspective.

Critics could say my biases changed, and all I'm doing is confirming my new biases.

Fair enough.

So how do we build consensus to achieve "no more contention" on this topic?

The obvious solution is the FAITH model, where we all lay out all the facts and then separate them from our respective assumptions, inferences and theories that lead to our overall hypotheses or worldview. This eliminates contention because we can clearly and charitably understand one another. This is the pursuit of clarity, charity and understanding.

But that obvious solution seems difficult for LDS and anti-LDS podcasters, so let's try this step of identifying our respective biases.

We can all lay out our biases and let others see which biases they most closely identify with.

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Below are the respective biases as I understand them, based on writings, speeches, presentations and conversations. If I'm wrong about any of these, please let me know. Notice that the Meso/Baja bias is basically the same as the anti/former LDS bias, at least with respect to these issues.

Put a checkmark next to the bias that is closest to yours.
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Letter VII (which unequivocally declares that the New York Cumorah is the scene of the final battles of the Nephites and Jaredites):

__ My bias: Oliver Cowdery was credible and reliable because of his personal experience, as well as for the many reasons I've explained. I also think Joseph Smith helped him write the letters, including Letter VII, and subsequently endorsed them fully on multiple occasions. D&C 128:20 corroborates other accounts that Moroni himself identified the hill in New York as Cumorah even before Joseph obtained the plates.

__ Meso/Baja bias: Oliver Cowdery was not credible or reliable about Cumorah/Ramah and he was an ignorant speculator who misled the Church. Lucy Mack Smith, David Whitmer, and others adopted Oliver's speculation. Even Joseph Smith passively accepted this false tradition about the New York Cumorah when he wrote D&C 128:20.

__ Anti/Former LDS bias: Oliver Cowdery was not credible or reliable about Cumorah/Ramah and he was an ignorant speculator who misled the Church. Lucy Mack Smith, David Whitmer, and others adopted Oliver's speculation. Even Joseph Smith passively accepted this false tradition about the New York Cumorah when he wrote D&C 128:20.
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The Golden Plates

__ My bias: Joseph translated all the abridged plates (except the unsealed portion) in Harmony, returned them to a heavenly messenger who took them back to Cumorah (David Whitmer account) and got the plates of Nephi from the repository, which he then took to Fayette and gave to Joseph, which is why Joseph translated those plates in Fayette.

__ Meso/Baja bias: David Whitmer was not credible or reliable so he made up or misremembered the experience with the messenger going to Cumorah. Although they are not mentioned in the Title Page, the plates of Nephi were always in the set of plates Joseph originally got from Moroni in New York because the repository described in Mormon 6:6 is in Mexico (Meso or Baja). Witnesses described the plates differently because they were confused or just wrong.

__ Anti/Former LDS bias: Basically the same as the Meso/Baja bias, except neither Oliver, nor Joseph nor any of the witnesses were credible or reliable because there were no plates to begin with.
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The repository in Cumorah

__ My bias: Brigham Young and others accurately reported what Oliver and others said about entering the records repository in the Hill Cumorah in New York. David Whitmer accurately explained that the plates were no longer in Cumorah but were not far from there.

__ Meso/Baja bias: Brigham Young and others may have accurately reported what Oliver and others said about entering the records repository in the Hill Cumorah in New York, but Oliver was not credible and if anything, he described a vision of a hill in Mexico (either Meso or Baja), which he and Joseph shared multiple times. David Whitmer was unreliable and not credible when he explained that the plates were no longer in Cumorah but were not far from there.

__ Anti/Former LDS bias: Basically the same as the Meso/Baja bias, except neither Oliver nor Joseph nor any of the witnesses were credible or reliable because there were no plates to begin with, and no repository except, maybe, a "visionary" one.
____________________

Statements about Central America

__ My bias: Orson Pratt, Benjamin Winchester, WW. Phelps, William Smith, and others invoked the discovery of ancient ruins in Central America as evidence of the Book of Mormon to support their zealous missionary efforts. In addition, anonymous articles appeared in the Times and Seasons during 1842, when Joseph was the nominal editor. Joseph had nothing to do with these articles. Joseph never made a single direct link between the Book of Mormon and Central America, and actually made specific statements repudiating that theory. Alleged correspondences between the Book of Mormon and Central America are illusory because they are characteristics of most ancient societies. Joseph's statements about North America fit the text and relevant anthropology, archaeology, geology, and geography.

__ Meso/Baja bias: Orson Pratt, Benjamin Winchester, WW. Phelps, William Smith, and others invoked the discovery of ancient ruins in Central America as evidence of the Book of Mormon to support their zealous missionary efforts. In addition, anonymous articles appeared in the Times and Seasons during 1842, when Joseph was the actual editor. Joseph actually wrote these articles, or at least edited and approved of them, because he didn't know where the Book of Mormon took place and he expected scholarship to answer the question. Modern LDS scholars and educators know more about the Book of Mormon than Joseph did. Joseph's statements about the North American setting are ambiguous and reflect his confusion and adoption of an early false tradition. Alleged correspondences between the Book of Mormon and Central America/Baja are reliable, especially when we realize that Joseph Smith used the wrong terms to translate the plates and thereby missed the Central American/Baja connections. The Mesoamerican/Baja models fit the text and relevant anthropology, archaeology, geology, and geography.

__ Anti/Former LDS bias: Basically the same as the Meso/Baja bias, except modern LDS scholars and educators can't point to any evidence directly connecting the Book of Mormon text to Central America, Baja, or anywhere else.
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Statements by Joseph's successors

Facts: Every one of Joseph's contemporaries expressed or accepted the New York setting for the Hill Cumorah. Orson Pratt's 1879 footnotes in the official edition of the Book of Mormon specified, unequivocally, that the Hill Cumorah was in New York, while he acknowledged his identification of other sites was speculative, or "believed to be." Beyond Joseph's contemporaries, Joseph Fielding Smith, Marion G. Romney, Mark E. Peterson and others reaffirmed the New York Cumorah, including in General Conference addresses, while no General Authority has ever contradicted the New York Cumorah in General Conference.

__ My bias: Every one of these prophets and apostles was correct about Cumorah.

__ Meso/Baja bias: Every one of these prophets and apostles was speculating about Cumorah and was wrong.

__ Anti/Former LDS bias: Basically the same as the Meso/Baja bias, except the prophets and apostles were not only speculating and were wrong about Cumorah, but about everything else as well.

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How did you do?

Two ways to be deceived

 

“There are two ways to be deceived. One is to believe a lie; the other is to be unwilling to believe the truth.” — Søren Kierkegaard

Appreciating different perspectives

Even when we disagree or have different perspectives, we can appreciate that people are trying to discover truth through some kind of process of reasoning based on facts with the objective of discovery and learning, etc. 

That is the charity element in the pursuit of clarity, charity and understanding.

And we assume the Baja proponents, like the M2Cers and SITH sayers everyone else, are well-intentioned and sincere. We are want to understand one another. It is more interesting and productive to seek to understand others rather than try to convince, persuade, etc.

But we still have to start with clarity, which requires separating Facts from the Assumptions, Inferences and Theories that lead to the overall Hypothesis being advocated.

The FAITH model leads to "no more contention."

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To be clear: the Baja podcasts lack clarity. Instead of trying to discover truth and educate their viewers, they censored important historical sources, omitted others completely, used a series of logical fallacies, and generated confusion instead of clarity.

There is no need for them to engage in such tactics. 

While these tactics might work if they intend to "stir up a hornet's nest," they cause contention for no reason other than to promote the Baja theory at the expense of helping people make informed decisions.

Instead, the Baja proponents, like the M2Cers, SITH sayers, critics, and everyone else, owe it to their viewers and readers to lay out all the facts, including in this case all the accurate, authentic historical sources, and then explain why they reject what those sources say about Cumorah/Ramah in New York.

It is very simple.

For example, they could start with the compilation of historical sources here:

https://www.mobom.org/cumorah-overview, which links to this site:

https://www.mobom.org/byu-packet

The Baja proponents, like the M2Cers, should go through each of these sources and explain why they reject them. Then everyone can make informed decisions.

Related to that, they owe it to us to explain why they conflate the Cumorah issue with the broader issue of the non-Cumorah geography. They are two distinct issues and have been recognized as such from the outset.

I'm hoping Baja proponents re-do their discussion of Cumorah by using the FAITH model. But I've been waiting for years for the M2Cers to do this, and they still refuse.

Clarity is the hard part, apparently.

To repeat: the FAITH model leads to "no more contention."

So how about if everyone adopts that model of analysis instead of resorting to the type of censorship, misdirection, and sowing confusion that we have seen for so long? 

 

Part 3 - Baja, sophistry, Cumorah and Baja propagandizing channel (Stick of Joseph) Part 3

In the ongoing pursuit of clarity, charity and understanding, this is the third installment of a review of the podcast by Stick of Joseph that promotes the Baja theory by purporting to talk about Cumorah.

We emphasize that the podcasters are awesome Latter-day Saints who are well-intentioned. We offer these comments in the hope that they will take another look at what they've presented and correct the errors for future viewers. Ideally, they would explain to viewers why they did what they did. 

It seems out of character for them to so blatantly misrepresent the facts.

And we're completely fine with people believing in a Baja model, and M2C model, or any other theory about Book of Mormon geography. We are just not fine with misleading people about the historical record in their effort to persuade people to accept their particular theories.

_____

In parts 1 and 2, we saw how the podcasters misled viewers about several basic historical facts, even going so far as to censor the passage in Letter VII in which Oliver Cowdery states it is a fact that the hill where Joseph found the plates is also Cumorah/Ramah. 

In this part 3, we'll see how they contradicted their own standards of evidence and engaged in further misrepresentation and omission, solely to promote the Baja theory.

_____

We will start where Part 2 ended, with the censorship of Letter VII. Original transcript in blue, my comments in red, other quotations in green.

Below is the actual quotation from Letter VII, taken from Joseph Smith's journal, with the part the podcast omitted in bold, and the most critical part they omitted shown in bold red.

I think I am justified in saying that this is the highest hill for some distance round, and I am certain that its appearance, as it rises so suddenly from a plain on the north, must attract the notice of the traveller as he passes by. At about one mile west rises another ridge of less height, running parallel with the former, leaving a beautiful vale between. The soil is of the first quality for the country, and under a state of cultivation, which gives a prospect at once imposing, when one reflects on the fact, that here, between these hills, the entire power and national strength of both the Jaredites and Nephites were destroyed.

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1834-1836/90

The deliberate censorship of Oliver's statement of fact is inexcusable. The only plausible justification is that Rosenvall and the Stick of Joseph do not want their viewers to make informed decisions about their Baja theory.

Now we resume with the transcript from the video.

This must have been where they buried the plates and fought. Okay.

After censoring what President Cowdery wrote (he was Assistant President of the Church at the time and Joseph Smith called him President Cowdery), this podcast reframes Letter VII as a sort of logical conclusion or assumption: "This must have been..."

He says it again in another letter. Both of these are to WW Phelps as they’re conversing and I suspect studying in some place.

Phelps was in Missouri. Oliver was in Kirtland. The gratuitous comment about "studying in some place" makes no sense.

President Cowdery's essays on Church history were originally published as letters in the Messenger and Advocate, but they were also copied into Joseph's own journal as part of his history. With Joseph's approval, they were reprinted in the Gospel Reflector and Times and Seasons. They were reprinted in the Millennial Star in England and Joseph's brother William republished them in The Prophet, all during Joseph's lifetime.

If you were a Latter-day Saint during Joseph's lifetime, you knew like all the other members that it was a fact that Cumorah/Ramah was in New York.

So, from what I can tell these are the first ones that place Cumorah in New York.

This is a common logical fallacy used by the anti-New York Cumorah crowd.

The earliest known identification of Cumorah was by Moroni the first time he met Joseph Smith in September 1823. Joseph related it to his mother, Lucy Mack Smith. She also related another instance in 1827 when Joseph referred to the hill as Cumorah before he obtained the plates. Lucy repeated this history frequently, but it was not written down until she dictated it in 1844/5. Consequently, historians claim it is "late" and therefore, presumably, untrustworthy.

By this standard, we cannot trust accounts about the First Vision, Moroni's visit, the restoration of the priesthood, etc., because these were all related retrospectively. 

Besides, the Saints book quotes/cites Lucy's history over 100 times. Her history is the only substantial record of Joseph's early life and is deemed reliable, except where we can see she erred on specific dates.

The logical fallacy arises from assuming that retroactive accounts are erroneous. Because memory is imperfect, we look at corroboration. Joseph himself corroborated Lucy's account in D&C 128:20, when he wrote "Glad tidings from Cumorah! The book to be revealed.... " The glad tidings from Cumorah came before he obtained the plates, just as Lucy reported.

The podcast earlier mentioned the Ohio newspaper article that involved the four missionaries to the Lamanites. But they forgot to mention that during that same mission, Parley Pratt recorded teaching the Indians that it was Moroni himself who anciently called the hill Cumorah. We can all read this in his autobiography, which is not hearsay like the newspaper article that mentioned Chile.

There are other accounts, such as David Whitmer's explanation that the messenger who had the plates went to Cumorah before taking the plates of Nephi to Fayette.

While Oliver published Letter VII in 1835, these other accounts identify Cumorah starting in 1823, then 1827, then 1829, then 1830.

So, I’m adding their pins now.

[14:12]

Okay, so this is interesting because on one end, people that argue that had to be in Cumorah that he landed because of letter seven and and all this stuff. But Oliver Cowdery doesn’t readdress the landing spot of of where Lehi landed, right?

Here they repeat their attribution of the Ohio newspaper article to Oliver. But Oliver had no reason to "readdress" Lehi's landing spot. First, it is merely an assumption that he addressed it at all, based on the ambiguous newspaper article. Second, it is more likely Parley Pratt promoted the Chile landing. Third, in Letter VII and the other seven essays, Oliver made a point that he was relating facts, not speculation. When he did speculate, such as how deep Moroni's stone box was originally, he made that clear.

The stark contrast between (i) Oliver's explicit, formal declaration about Cumorah in Letter VII and (ii) the speculative hearsay newspaper article about Chile demonstrates why the first is credible and the second is not.

Like there’s that one there’s that one quote saying he landed in Chile. Uh there’s a BYU article that I’ve read um that talks about this idea the where these ideas come from um of them landing in Chile and there’s multiple people and sources of people saying that he landed at the 30th parallel south

The "multiple people and sources" consist of Orson and Parley Pratt, along with the notation by Frederick Williams.

Yep.
and all this and so I guess what I’m saying is because a lot of the pushback that we’ve gotten from our heartland friends is Oliver Cowdery said it happened in Cumorah, but it looks like he also said they landed in Chile.

See, here is where they try to confuse people by attacking Oliver's credibility. They've transformed their assumption/inference that (i) the Ohio paper accurately reported what was said by "they" about Chile and (ii) that the "they" identified in the article was actually Oliver Cowdery.

Then the podcasters equate that unattributed hearsay newspaper article to Oliver's formal declaration in Letter VII which he explained was written with Joseph's assistance, was republished multiple times with Joseph's express permission/direction, and even copied into Joseph's own journal.

They don't tell their viewers any of this.   

Yeah.

So, did did he land in Chile as well? Because as far as I understand, the, that group, the heartland group believes that he landed somewhere in Florida.

Florida.

Right? And so it’s like, okay, you can pick and choose and they’re like, you’re picking and choosing but it’s like, no, you’re picking and choosing too.

It should be evident to every viewer what they are doing here.

The podcast repeatedly ignores the important difference between the New York Cumorah/Ramah and speculation about landing in Chile. Not only did Oliver state Cumorah/Ramah was a fact, but he personally visited Cumorah in New York, including the repository of records there. 

And so, the question has to be asked is like, by what standard can we pick and choose all of these comments by prophets, apostles, early church leaders, or maybe do we just need to pick a different standard than sifting through all of this?

This is a good point. One standard could be that we reject anything that contradicts our personal beliefs about geography, based on our subjective interpretation of the text, the way this Stick of Joseph podcast did here, which is also the way the M2Cers develop their own geography models based on repudiating the New York Cumorah.

Another standard could be that we rely on statements of fact by Church leaders, especially members of the First Presidency, based on their personal experience. This is the standard by which we establish belief in the First Vision, the recovery and translation of the plates, the restoration of the Priesthood and temple keys, etc. Related to this standard is that we rely on statements of fact repeated by multiple Church leaders in formal settings over many years.

[15:35]

Exactly. And And let me, you know, continue on that thought because Oliver Cowdery’s one apostle. I don’t know how we exclude him from all the other apostles.

This is poorly worded, but he seems to be saying he doesn't know why we accept what President Cowdery wrote over what other apostles wrote.

The obvious answer is Oliver at the time was Assistant President of the Church, senior to the two counselors in the First Presidency. He and Joseph, together, received the Priesthood and temple keys. No other apostle (or even Church President after Joseph) had these experiences. In his essays on Church history, he clearly distinguished between fact and speculation.

And so, for example, Parley P. Pratt was doing the exact same thing. In fact, he introduced uh Bahia, Brazil. And I don’t know if you know where Bahia, Brazil is. That’s on the east coast of Brazil. So, he’s putting pins down there.

And Parley Pratt was he was one of the first he was part of the first 12.

That’s right. Yeah. And he also uses Peru. So, he’s putting pins down. So, now we’re getting lots of pins.

Parley joined the Church after the events Oliver wrote about. Parley never once claimed he knew any of this by personal experience.

Orson Pratt may be the one that I think we should if we’re going to use this process, we should look at because Orson Pratt was commissioned by the first presidency to add footnotes to the 1879 Book of Mormon. I mean, if there’s going to be anything official, it might we might want to look at this.

This is a good idea, but the podcasters don't tell the audience how Orson distinguished between fact and speculation in those footnotes. Regarding Cumorah, it was a fact. Regarding Chile, Colombia, and Panama, Orson explicitly stated it was merely an assumption by stating "it is believed..."

You can see how Orson Pratt distinguished between fact and speculation in these footnotes here: https://www.mobom.org/orson-pratts-1879-footnotes

Viewers of the Stick of Joseph should ask why the podcast did not make that clear. Instead, they confused their viewers with the following discussion.

And so, in the footnotes of this edition of the Book of Mormon, you find Chile as the landing spot, Ecuador, you find Colombia, and specifically the Magdalena River in Colombia they said was the River Sidon. You have New York as being the Hill Cumorah. You have the Isthmus of Panama. And so, it’s clear that they are trying to lay this out again in this American continent context.

Cuz that’s all you get from the text. The Book of Mormon text, right? And we read that very first verse in Was it Mormon?
In Joseph Smith’s history, when when you’re talking about Moroni
Oh, yeah, when Moroni. Sorry, it was Joseph Smith’s history. So, that’s all we get is that it’s the American continent.
Continent. Yeah.

This is difficult to follow, but it seems to be reprise of their earlier misleading discussion of the word "continent." 

[17:14]
And so, I’ll just finish up again, W. W. Phelps, Frederick G. Williams. He’s probably the one where we learn about the 30° south.

Yes.
That’s the very first one where he actually lays down a latitude. Which can I just say something about that?
Are these all apostles?
These are all apostles.
All of these are apostles, okay.
You know, I’m trying to create a the full collection of all these quotes because I think that’s the group we have to do. So,
And Orson Pratt for cuz I’m just trying to think about how people are going to try to debunk it. Orson Pratt was excommunicated in 1842. But he did come back and he was commissioned to do stuff after
Absolutely.
after he came back. So,

So, as far as I can tell using the quotes and putting these pins down and then going look at it, I mean, this is their geographical model all through the 1800s.

Mhm.

With Cumorah in New York, the narrow neck of land, a landing spot, Sidon was down in South America,

Yeah.

and east and west seas. And so, with this, I have to ask myself, how do I pick the pins to figure this out?

to include, yeah.

Now, here’s my problem. I’m an engineer. I do not know how in a set of data like this to just pick 25% of the pins.

Mhm.

If I was an engineer and did that, I would lose my license.

Yeah.

I have to use all the data or I have to say, “What were they measuring?”

I assume the logical fallacies here are obvious to viewers, but in case not, look at the way he is referring to speculation as "data" here.

The pin in the New York Cumorah/Ramah was established as a fact by Oliver Cowdery, as corroborated by Lucy Mack Smith, David Whitmer, Joseph Smith, and others. The speculation by the Pratt brothers was identified by Orson Pratt himself as speculation in the 1879 footnotes.

This is a classic example of mingling fact with assumptions, inferences and theories. This is why the FAITH model separates facts from the other elements.

Mhm.

And it seems to me that they were measuring and these quotes are based on this North and South America.

Yeah. They had a paradigm that was kind of stuck in their head.
Yeah.
And and they were trying to fit that model to
Yeah. None of them had the internet. And again, I don’t know what was taught in school, but there was definitely this concept of a continent. And that they were looking at it in its entirety, not the United States or not North America.

We discussed this focus on "continent" in Parts 1 and 2. 

Yeah.
There’s no premise for that at all.
Interesting.
So,
cuz the United States was still only not even the United States, you know what I mean?
Yeah.

This is confusing, so have to infer he means that the United States circa 1830-1844 was not as large as today's United States. This is more gratuitous rhetoric that is irrelevant to the Cumorah question. 

The Mississippi was kind of the western boundary at the very farthest.
Yeah.
And then everything else was unknown. In fact, Mexico had more land
Yeah.
part of the United States than they did.

[19:31]
I will also throw in Joseph F. Smith’s statement at the temple dedication in Hawaii that he says he’s standing amongst the descendants of Hagoth.

Mhm.

And so that’s another prophetic statement of

Uh-huh.

Just you know, apparently there was a way that those people got to Hawaii if we’re going to take that as

Yeah.
geographical truth.
Yeah.

And and I hope one of the things we allow is just like we’re trying to figure this out, they were trying to figure it out.

It bears repeating that this entire podcast confuses the audience by conflating what the prophets have said about Cumorah with the speculations of various people, including some early Church leaders. But those same Church leaders made the distinction between the fact of Cumorah and their speculation about geography.

Mhm.

And I don’t believe that they were receiving revelation every minute of the day.

This is a non-sequitur that serves only to confuse the audience. It reflects the common M2C argument that Oliver did not claim revelation for his statement of fact about Cumorah. But that is easily answered by observing that Oliver did not claim revelation for the visit of John the Baptist, the restoration of keys in the Kirtland temple, etc. He simply reported these events as facts, the same way he did regarding Cumorah, and he also explained that he visited the repository of Nephite records in Cumorah.

In fact, let me just show you this just quickly before I jump into this.

Oh, what is it?

This is an early map. I believe it was the late 1800s, early 1900s that somebody in the church had put out to teach from.

Really?

If Rosenvall and/or the Stick of Joseph had done any research, they would know that this map is the 1899 RLDS map published in the Report by the RLDS Committee on Archaeology. It was the RLDS scholar Louis E. Hills who published the first M2C map, showing Cumorah in southern Mexico. Hills and his collaborator Stebbins made the same argument about Oliver Cowdery being an ignorant speculator who could not be trusted.

Like this podcast, Hills and Stebbins ignored the other historical accounts that corroborate Letter VII.

And you can see it’s it’s got some elements, but definitely you can see Hill Cumorah in the top right. Land of many large bodies, which is interesting they put it right in the middle of the United States. Then things really don’t start getting heated up until you get to Central America. But that Central America is actually desolation.

Yeah.

in their models. Zarahemla is down in Ecuador. And and so forth. And so it’s it’s a good relative map to where the places are. But they’ve just got it all over in else North and South America.

That’s pretty great.

So this is from 1899?

I think it’s 1899 is the earliest date you can see on there.

Baja getting no love right there. Baja is they didn’t even include all of Baja. They cut Wait, Baja is an island. Yeah, there it’s an island now. Uh I think it’s just it’s just cut up. There we’ll do a whole another thing on the island of Baja at some point.

But my point is this is in the early church I think there’s a clear indication that they were thinking of this as a hemispheric all the entire continent and just trying to put it down here.

While the historical record does indicate that a hemispheric model was promoted by the Pratt brothers and others, they clearly delineated it as speculation. In fact, when Joseph wrote the Wentworth letter, he deleted Orson Pratt's speculation about Central American and replaced it with the statement about the Indians in this country, as discussed in detail here:

https://www.mobom.org/wentworth-orson-pratt

More importantly, this belabored discussion of various models of geography has nothing to do with the Cumorah question. The podcasters are merely trying to sow doubt and confusion.

[21:29] So I want to just share a couple of thoughts that I think are so important when we’re going to talk about this is actually given in April 2012. In fact, do you want to read that to us?

Says, “It should be remembered that not every statement made by a church leader, past or present, necessarily constitutes doctrine. It is commonly understood in the church that a statement made by one leader on a single occasion often represents a personal, though well-considered opinion, not meant to be official or binding for the whole church.”

This is an important explanation of doctrine that the podcasters don't seem to realize undermines their point, as we'll see.

It’s interesting that Elder Christofferson put this out there. And I’ll just say I think you see elements of this when people record state conferences and so forth or and and things like that that every word uttered is not revelation. He’s saying as much. In fact, this was a concept that was a concern for Joseph Smith. In fact, do you want to read what Joseph Smith said in 1843?

Says, “This morning I read German and visited with a a brother and sister from Michigan who thought that a prophet is always a prophet. But I told them that a prophet was a prophet only when he was acting as such.” [laughter] This is Joseph Smith and I hope we understand he recognized I’m going to be speaking as a prophet and I’m going to be speaking as a man. Yeah. And trying to figure out when that’s happening when that’s not can be difficult especially when it’s not canonized when it is not officially, you know, declared and things like that.

They cite two separate indicia of credibility: (i) when something is canonized and (ii) when something is officially declared.

The standard works are the only canonized material. They include an excerpt from Oliver Cowdery's Letter I regarding the translation of the Book of Mormon. (That excerpt is usually not quoted in full by the SITH sayers, but that's another topic.)

The canonization of part of Letter I is an indication of its credibility. But the entire series of eight essays fit within the second category of official declarations.

Oliver wrote the essays with the express assistance of Joseph Smith; he wrote as Assistant President of the Church; he wrote from personal knowledge; he distinguished fact from speculation; and he published the essays in the official Church newspaper.

The essays were republished in official Church newspapers and copied into Joseph's personal journal as part of his life story. Few if any documents were republished as frequently or as authoritatively during Joseph's lifetime as Oliver's eight essays on Church history, including Letter VII.

Yeah. And this concept from Elder Christofferson, I think is one of the most repeated things of the last 20 years. President Holland talked about it. President Oaks has talked about it. So many of them have talked and reminded us, “Hey, uh there’s going to be times when individuals will say something, you need to look at where do all the brethren agree over time.” And so I think I think that’s my almost frustration sometimes is is the like, “Well, I’m just going to believe the prophet.” And it’s like, “Uh if you believe the prophet, then it’s also in Brazil. It’s also in Chile.

Here they show why President Christofferson's statement is so relevant. When one Apostle expresses an opinion, it does not become Church doctrine. That's why the speculation by early Apostles, which they acknowledged was speculation not based on personal experience or actual knowledge, led to a variety of theories.

That speculation is compounded by the various theories of scholars and other authors which explains why the various theories about Book of Mormon geography are inconsistent, even contradictory, and cannot be considered doctrine.

But President Cowdery did not speculate about Book of Mormon geography in these essays. He said nothing about Chile or any hemispheric models. What he did do is declare it is a fact that Cumorah/Ramah is the same hill in New York where Joseph obtained the plates.

That declaration of fact distinguishes Letter VII from the various speculative theories. But that's not all.

The New York Cumorah/Ramah was taught not only by President Cowdery, but by everyone else who corroborated it, as discussed previously. It was taught by Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, and others with personal knowledge of Joseph and Oliver and the Hill Cumorah. Joseph Fielding Smith pointed out that the New York Cumorah was taught consistently for over 100 years.

And no Church leader has ever repudiated the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah. To the contrary, Cumorah has been reiterated many times, including over 200 times in General Conference.

https://www.mobom.org/cumorah-overview

Thus, President Christofferson's guidance applies directly to speculative theories about geography but also places the New York Cumorah squarely within the category of consistent, unambiguous and continuous teachings by Church leaders, including in General Conference.

But these podcasters don't explain any of this to their viewers.

And it’s also like let’s either accept their model that they proposed or let’s let’s debate evidences and debate proofs and and look at like what has actually comes from the text and we can show that that’s real.

What "actually comes from the text" is a series of vague directional and distance terms that no two people read identically. Everyone who proposes a geography claims to rely on the text, but in reality they are relying on their interpretations of the text, just as the Baja proponents in this podcast do.

Let’s not use the like kind of spiritually manipulative, “Well, I just believe Joseph. Oh, that’s That’s just me.”

This is a good point. What is "spiritually manipulative" is claiming one's theories about geography reflect what Joseph Smith taught to the exclusion of alternative hypotheses that also incorporate those teachings.

But it is the opposite of "spiritually manipulative" to inform people about what the prophets actually taught about Cumorah and let them decide for themselves.

This podcast already has demonstrated several examples of deliberate misrepresentation of the historical record, solely to promote the Baja theory which puts Cumorah somewhere in the Baja area. To justify that position, the proponents have to repudiate the teachings of the prophets about Cumorah. One way to do that is to not tell people about those teachings, which these podcasters have done. Another is to censor and edit those teachings, which they have also done. A third way is to conflate those teachings with other tangential speculation about geography, which these podcasters have also done.

For sure. [24:07] I do want to say this is like as you can see, you have to do some picking and choosing if you’re going to be using the words of early church leaders, even Oliver Cowdery.

As we've seen, no one is "picking and choosing" among equivalent teachings. The Cumorah teachings are consistent, formally published, and stated as fact. Speculation about other geography is inconsistent, anecdotal and often unpublished or published as hearsay, and described as speculative by the authors.

So you have to you have to choose to disregard the Chile thing but keep the Cumorah thing or keep all of them or and so with that it’s just like, “Okay, maybe we need a use something that is more reliable.” You know what I mean?

This is pure sophistry, designed to confuse viewers.

And even when it comes to Zelph, for example, Zelph’s mound. Okay, where’s Zelph in the Book of Mormon? Oh, no, he’s a He wasn’t he the prophet Onandagus or isn’t What’s the whole thing Zelph is the... So Onandagus, as I understand it, was his leader. Was his leader. was known from the East Sea to the Rocky Mountains. Again, giving this massive, massive thing.

But here’s the thing, it’s not in the Book of Mormon.

That was the point. The accounts say Joseph had a revelation about Zelph. And this revelation came just a few days before Joseph wrote to Emma saying they had crossed "the plains of the Nephites" in Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.

Yeah. And as we’ll talk about and as we’ve talked about privately, there is a big group of Nephites who leave north uh in the middle of the Book of Mormon. And so, like at the end of the day, the question isn’t where did all the Nephites end up? The question is, where did the events in the Book of Mormon take place? And that’s a different question than where are all the Nephites? Cuz the Nephites could be spread everywhere. But, these events and these places have to be somewhere on a map. And that is the question needs to be asked. And Zelph’s Mound isn’t like a a a slam dunk of like, “Oh, this must be where the whole Book of Mormon happened.” because it’s an unknown person and an unknown leader. And that’s it. Like, it’s it’s not in the Book of Mormon.

This is the straw man fallacy. No one suggests Zelph determines "where the whole Book of Mormon happened."

me add two things to your wonderful point. First of all, it’s clear in the text that people would be swept off because of iniquity. Mhm. And so, I’m going to assume that they were swept off from wherever they were. The second, they found bones. Bones don’t last 2,500 years unless they’re mummified or something. Yes. So, the fact they’re finding bones where they are are going to suggest, “Hey, we’re looking at maybe a couple hundred years before 1800s.” And where are where are the scattered Nephites then? And they could have easily been in the Midwest.

Of course, the Zelph accounts place him at the time of the great battles, which is corroborated by archaeological dating, not merely a couple of hundred years before the 1800s. And the Zelph accounts do refer to Cumorah to the east of Ohio, not in Baja or Mexico.

[26:22] So, my hope is that everybody watching who is a part of the camp that has been super critical of this theory because of the Cumorah stuff, I hope that it’s just this is just kind of eye-opening to a fact of like, “Hey, maybe we need to pick something that’s a little bit more unbiased.”

Yes, they actually said this in the podcast.

After nearly 30 minutes of blatant disinformation and obfuscation on the issue, they suggest viewers should consider their podcast as "a little big more unbiased."

Unbelievable audacity.

And I I would say that that’s just the text. Yeah. Yes, cuz I can imagine that a lot of people that are very passionate about this um might be seething watching [laughter] this right now.

The only reason viewers would be "seething" right now is because viewers don't appreciate being lied to and misled. I’m stirring up the hornets’ nest. I know that.

If the purpose was to cause contention, they succeeded because nothing causes more contention than misinformation framed as "truth." Maybe this is another Freudian slip because they never actually intended to truthfully inform the viewers in the first place.

Let’s take a little break to reflect on some wise words of counsel that I think that we find uh the gospel topics on Book of Mormon geography.

Individuals may have their own opinions regarding Book of Mormon geography and other such matters about which the Lord has not spoken. However, the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles urge leaders and members not to advocate those personal theories in any setting or manner that would imply either prophetic or church support for those theories. All parties should strive to avoid contention on these matters.

This is an excellent entry on Gospel Topics as I've discussed before.

https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/p/book-of-mormon-geography-essay.html

But it is not relevant to the Cumorah question. It does not even mention Cumorah.

And we just saw that the podcasters' intent was to cause contention by stirring up a hornet's nest. So what, really, is the point of this podcast? They used Cumorah as clickbait and then ignored and misrepresented the historical record about Cumorah.

Okay? And hyper fixate on that last sentence there, you know? Because ultimately, the beauty of the Book of Mormon is that it is truly another testament of Jesus Christ, right? Uh where we’re trying to the reason that I think this is great that we’re having this conversation is that a lot of people have hyper fixated to the point where they are demonizing a side that doesn’t follow the prophets, right?

There may be people who demonize others for not following the prophets, but this looks like another straw man argument because they don't identify who any of these people are. Instead, they are doing exactly what the Church leaders ask us not to do; i.e., cause contention by promoting private theories and interpretations.

The only way to realistically handle the question of geography is to pursue clarity, charity and understanding instead of seeking to convince, compel, or convert people to one point of view or another.

And clarity means transparency about all the facts, without misrepresenting them, without censoring them, and without conflating them with personal assumptions, inferences, etc.

And so as we’ve And I’m grateful that you’ve gone through these cuz it shows that maybe it’s not the most strong position or accurate thing to say, “Look, if you don’t believe in X model of the Book of Mormon geography, then you’re not following the prophets.”

This repeats the straw man fallacy because no one is saying that about any particular model.

I hope that’s not we’re trying to put you We’re trying to figure this out. Yeah.

It's not credible to say they are trying to figure this out when they have just deliberately misrepresented the facts, as we've all seen. And not to be absolute or to not take the opportunity to learn and add to our knowledge. And I hope that’s what we’re doing is adding to not to be authoritative as you asked before. I have no authority to do that.

I think this is something that David does really well, and this is why David’s always proposing looking at the bigger looking at your assumptions, looking at the model that you’re building, and what that all includes. And And as he pointed out earlier, if you’re going to pick up the prophet stick, you got to pick up the whole stick.

This is more of the same effort to confuse people by conflating Cumorah with speculative geographical theories.

Yeah. And that probably means you believe in a hemispheric model that like both North and South America is where it happened. I think that’s very hard to argue when you actually read the Book of Mormon. It’s very difficult. I think what you pointed out is so important to remember of we’re not arguing that there are zero Nephites in the Ohio River Valley or in the Rocky Mountains or even maybe in Mexico. What we’re arguing is the the place that they are describing in the book is a specific place and we should be able to match the geographical characteristics that they’re describing, but it it’s not saying that they never spread out. I mean, as David just pointed out, the book says that they’re wiped off the face of the Book of Mormon land that they’re describing, that they’re wiped away from it. Yeah. So.

This is difficult to follow, but apparently they mean that although the Book of Mormon events, including Cumorah/Ramah, took place in Baja, the people were swept off that land and so Nephites and Lamanites may have gone throughout the hemisphere.

But Moroni wrote about the Jaredites "in this north country" where he lived, so he was not swept off the land of the Jaredites, which was also the land of the Nephites. In fact, Moroni told Joseph that the record was "written and deposited not far from" Joseph's home in Palmyra, which is another corroboration of the New York Cumorah.

Later in the podcast they address that point, which we will cover in Part 4.

[29:40]

So, I mean, the thing that’s the thing that’s hard though that I’ll say is like for example in the introduction to the Book of Mormon right now. This is the current introduction to the Book of Mormon. After Mormon completed his writings, he delivered the account to his son Moroni who added a few words of his own and hit hid up the plates in the Hill Cumorah. So, it says in the introduction to the Book of Mormon that the plates were hid up in the Hill Cumorah. And then right after that says on September 21st, 1823, the same Moroni, then a glorified resurrected being, appeared to Joseph uh Prophet Joseph Smith and instructed him relative to the ancient record and its destined translation into the English language. Yeah. Now, the introduction to the Book of Mormon who’s that written by? Committee. It’s written by committee.

Regardless of who wrote the Introduction, the statement about Cumorah simply reflects the consistent, unambiguous historical record about Cumorah.

Um but I mean, there have been multiple things that have been put in the Book of Mormon. So, originally uh in was it the 1840 um Four. Book of Mormon where it had the geographical notes in there. Well, 1879 had 1920 they took it out. In fact, in general conference they explained why. Yeah. Because they didn’t, there was so much contention around this. Yes. And so so like there have been things that have been in the in the scriptures like the introduction in footnotes and things like that. But um those have been removed.

Except the Introduction's comments about Cumorah have not been removed.

It would be interesting to be like, “Hey, I mean Well, and also before 2007 the introduction read that uh it says after thousands of years all were destroyed except the Lamanites. Uh and they are the principal ancestors of the American Indians. That’s what it said pre-2007. And now it says, “And they are among the ancestors of the American Indians.” So, what you can see is that even this introduction is evolving over time as we learn more things. Yeah. And so they changed that.

This change was a reversion to what Joseph Smith said in the Wentworth letter when he removed Orson Pratt's speculation about Central America, but the introduction still reflects D&C 28, 30 and 32.

I just want to put all of that out on the table because then what happens is people listen and they’re like, “Well, they didn’t talk about this.” And it’s like the point still stands. Um our understanding of the internal geography of the Book of Mormon has evolved over time. It used to be hemispheric. It used to be included in the footnotes.

They keep saying this, but those footnotes distinguished between the fact of the New York Cumorah and the speculation about the other geography.

Now it’s not. We used to say in the introduction that it was the principal ancestors of the Native Americans. DNA evidence has proven that’s not the case.

Reverting to what Joseph wrote was a good idea.

And then right now it says that uh the plates were deposited in the Hill Cumorah. But I think it’ll be interesting to see what what you have to share today. Um that may evolve as well.

There is no reason to change the statement about Cumorah because the historical record is clear and unambiguous.

Absolutely. There’s definitely a principle of line upon line, principle upon precept upon precept that even the church is recognizing. And I love that about the church is that not everything was revealed in 1830 to a few select people. Mhm. We are learning this together as we go forward, so Yeah, it’s an ongoing restoration. Well, all right. Well, let’s hear what you have to say about this. [32:48] again, our approach is let’s get into the text, let’s try to see what the text is saying about the Hill Cumorah.

The rest of the podcast relates the personal, subjective interpretation of the text they use to promote the Baja theory. But every theory does exactly the same thing. The proponents claim such and such a word or passage must mean such and such. That's why there are so many different theories and that's what leads to contention the moment anyone looks at these theories with any intention other than to just understand what other people think.

So, I’m going to start in a unique place. We’re going to start in the land of Nephi to try to figure this out because there’s not a lot specifically about the Hill Cumorah other than they buried plates.

This is precisely why it was important for Moroni to tell Joseph the name of the hill the first time they met.

And so we’ve got to do some geography around this. So, maybe we could do is we’ll just read some of these things as we go through and on the left I’m going to start just laying out a model Okay. based on the text and challenge me if you think we’re off there. So, Hayden, do you want to start us off and just read what it says? Yeah. And it came to pass that the king sent a proclamation throughout all the land of Nephi amongst all his people who were in all his land, who were in the regions round about, which was bordering even to the sea on the on the east and on the west. Okay. So, the land of Nephi, by the way, did you it was the king of the Lamanites. That was the king over the land of Nephi. It seems kind of opposite, but this is where we start. And I think it’s pretty clear. We’ve got a land and I’m just going to represent those by boxes with the sea on the east and on the west.

Anyone who has followed these geography theories knows what is coming next. This podcast interprets everything to fit Baja. Others interpret the text to fit whatever setting they prefer. In this podcast, they actually insert words into the text to support their Baja theory.

All of that is fine. But it does not justify the way they mislead viewers about the historical record.

And we didn't even get into all the historical references about Cumorah that they omitted.

In summary, no viewer should accept a podcast such as this. It is worse than a waste of time because it is so deceptive.

We have to wonder how these podcasters think it builds faith in the Book of Mormon to affirmatively misrepresent the historical record that we can all see. It would be far better to lay out all the facts and then explain the various assumptions and inferences they apply to those facts so viewers can make informed decisions.

Let's all hope that in the future, the Stick of Joseph and other podcasters adopt the FAITH model of analysis in the pursuit of clarity, charity and understanding.

We'll skip all the speculative interpretation of the text to get to more points in Part 4.