Proper Names in the Book of Mormon: A Matter of Chance?

It is no small feat . . . simply to have picked a lot of strange and original names out of the air. But what shall we say of the man who was able to pick the right ones?

Hugh Nibley, "Men of the East," Lehi in the Desert (1987), 132

Joseph Smith: Lazy Boy?

Everybody says Joseph Smith was lazy because of the things he didn't do, but what about the things he did do? What good does it do to say that you, with your tiny routine of daily busywork, think another man is lazy if that man happens to accomplish more than ten ordinary men in a short lifetime? Joseph Smith's activities are a matter of record and they are phenomenal. You might as well claim that Horowitz doesn't know how to play the piano to a man who owns a library of Horowitz recordings, or that Van Gogh couldn't paint to the owner of an original Van Gogh, or that Dempsey couldn't fight to a man who had fought him, as to maintain that Joseph Smith was a lazy loafer to the historian who gets dizzy merely trying to follow him through a few short years of his tremendous activity.

I think this constantly reiterated unfailing charge that Joseph Smith was a raggle-taggle, down-at-the-heels, sloppy, lazy, good-for-nothing supplies the best possible test for the honesty and reliability of his critics. Some of them reach almost awesome heights of mendacity and effrontery when, like Mrs. Brodie, they solemnly inform us that Joseph Smith, the laziest man on earth, produced in a short time, by his own efforts, the colossally complex and difficult Book of Mormon.

Hugh Nibley, “Myth Makers," Tinkling Cymbals and Sounding Brass (1991), 144-45

More on Nahom

Neal Rappleye and Stephen Smoot have an article on minimalist efforts to downplay the identification of the site of Nahom over at Interpreter.

Blasphemy! The Book of Mormon

The first and foremost objection to the Book of Mormon was summed up in the first word of Alexander Campbell's opening blast against it: "Blasphemy!" The first thing that would hit any Christian on opening to the title page was the claim of this book to be nothing less than the word of God—right beside the Bible! . . .

Again the Book of Mormon has the last word. Rare indeed is the Christian scholar today who would maintain that every word declared canonical in the past by committees claiming no inspiration whatever is the absolute word of God or that all the writing given noncanonical status by the same learned conclaves are, when they claim the status of scripture, to be condemned out of hand as fraudulent. That won't do any more. Today religious journals are full of perplexed and controversial articles on "What is Scripture?"

Hugh Nibley, "Howlers in the Book of Mormon," The Prophetic Book of Mormon (1989), 253

Is Doctrine More Important Than Book of Mormon History?

Now there are those who say, “I believe that doctrine is all that is important in the Book of Mormon; we do not need to worry about the history.” We are faced, however, with the fact that most of the Book of Mormon is history. It is not doctrine; that is, it’s not doctrine in the sense of quotable proof texts–things that we can memorize and quote. Instead, history is a kind of container for doctrine. We do not understand the form of the doctrine, the substance of the doctrine, without knowing the substance of the history. We cannot know all the meaning of all those wars and migrations, the destructions, the ups and downs and the social fate of the peoples in the Book of Mormon unless we interpret it doctrinally. Doctrine and history are two sides of the same coin. We cannot have one without the other. Now, doctrine as such can be learned by careful reading and investigation and study and prayer in regard to the text of the Book of Mormon as we have it. The matter of history, however, deserves equal care and exhaustive examination. It, itself, the history, is a convincer of the authenticity of the book as much as doctrine is.

John Sorenson, “The Book of Mormon in Ancient America,” (1994), 4.

Those Who Disappear

The Book of Mormon tells of several prophets and leaders who prophesy, give counsel, entrust valuable records and other sacred objects to their sons, and then depart out of the land without ever being seen again (Alma 45:1-19; 3 Nephi 1:2-3; 2:9). Alma entrusted the Nephite records to his son Helaman (Alma 37:1-47), and then prophesied of the future destruction of the Nephites as a people (Alma 45:9-14). "And when he had done this he departed out of the land of Zarahemla, as if to go into the land of Melek. And it came to pass that he was never heard of more; as to his death or burial we know not of. Behold, this we know, that he was a righteous man" (Alma 45:18-19). In his recent book, Mormon’s Codex, John Sorenson notes a similar pattern found in Mesoamerican lore. Among the Quiche Maya, “some of the most important rulers were said to have disappeared without leaving notice whether or not they `tasted death.’” (Mormon’s Codex: An Ancient American Book. Salt Lake City: Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship and Deseret Book, 2013, 471-72. Sorenson is citing the work of Robert M. Carmack, The Quiche Maya of Utatlan. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1981, 149).


Although Sorenson does not cite specific examples for this pattern, one is found in the Mayan Popol Vuh, which recounts the departure of the founding tribal ancestors Balam Quitze, Balam Acab, Mahucutah, and Iqui Balam. According to this account these leaders first gave counsel and instruction to their sons, charged them to remember them and gave them a sacred bundle. Then, though they were not sick or ill, they departed.

This, then, was their counsel when they disappeared there atop the mountain Hacavitz. They were not buried by their wives, nor their children. Neither was their disappearance clear when they vanished. But their counsel was clear . . . . Thus were the deaths of our four grandfathers and fathers when they disappeared, when they left their sons there on top of the mountain Hacavitz. (Allen J. Christenson, ed. and trans., Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Maya. New York and Winchester: O Books, 2003), 253-55, emphasis added).

Nezahualpilla King of Tezcoco (Wikipedia Commons)

Diego Duran in his History of the Indies of New Spain tells how Nezahualpilli, one of the last kings of Tezcoco visited Motecuhzoma before his death and foretold the destruction of the Aztec empire. Like Alma in the Book of Mormon, the old king foretold the future destruction of their people.

O powerful and great lord! I do not wish to trouble your peaceful spirit, but the obligation I have to serve you forces me to reveal a strange and bewildering thing that I have been permitted to to see by the Lord of the Heavens, of Night and Day, and of Wind, something that is to happen in your time.

You must be on your guard, you must be warned, because I have discovered that in a very few years our cities will be ravaged and destroyed. We and our children shall be killed, our subjects humbled. Of all these things you must not doubt. . . . Before many days have passed you will see signs in the sky that will appear as an omen of what I am saying. But do not be cast down because of these things, since one cannot turn one’s face from that which must be. One consolation is that I shall not see these calamities and afflictions because my days are numbered  (Doris Heyden, ed. and trans., The History of the Indies of New Spain By Fray Diego Duran (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994, 452).


According to most historical sources the old king died not long before the arrival of the Spaniards in Mexico. One source, however, the Codex Chimalpahin, tells a different story.

1515, Ten Reed. At this time Necahualpiltzintli [Nezahualpilli], ruler of Texcoco died. He had ruled for twenty-four years. And when it is all added up, he lived on earth fifty-two years. But although it has thus been put forth that Necahualpiltzintli died, it is not true that he died. He was just gone; he just disappeared. It is not known where he went, although all the ancestors knew and said that it was said that he went into a cave near Mount Tetzcotzin as soon as he first knew that the Spaniards were coming here to New Spain; that they would spread out, that they would be rulers yet. For the aforesaid Necahualpiltzintli knew it well. He was a great sorcerer and a wise man. 1516, Eleven Flint. At this time the Lord Cacamatzin was installed as ruler of Texcoco. He was the son of Necahualpiltzintli, who had just disappeared.

(Arthur J. O. Anderson Susan Schroeder, eds. and trans., Codex Chimalpahin: Society and Politics in Mexico Tenochtitlan, Tlateleco, Texcoco, Culhuacan, and Other Nahua Altepetl in Central Mexico. The Nahuatl and Spanish annals and accounts collected and recorded by don Domingo de San Anton Munon Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin. Norman and London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997, 2:37, emphasis added).

While I strongly doubt that the King of Tezcoco was translated, the pattern found in some Mesoamerican literature is an interesting one. Make of it what you will.

“Blessed is he that shall bring this thing to light”

As a believer in the Book of Mormon, someone with a testimony, I do not need to win the debate with disbelievers. It becomes rather irrelevant to me, although there are those who wish to carry on the debate–and they may if they wish, as far as I’m concerned. I am more concerned with reaching out to accomplish the blessing–to bring about what Mormon describes in chapter 8, verse 16, of his book. He says, “Blessed be he that shall bring this thing to light for it shall be brought out of darkness unto light. It shall shine forth out of darkness and come unto the knowledge of the people.” He’s speaking, of course, of the Book of Mormon itself, and the obvious fulfillment of that blessing was on Joseph Smith, but perhaps those of us who would like to clarify–make more convincing, make more understandable–the Book of Mormon are in our own ways also bringing it to light–to a knowledge of the people. It certainly still remains dark for some.

John Sorenson, “The Book of Mormon in Ancient America,” (1994), 2-3.