Review of William E. Evenson and Duane E. Jeffery. Mormonism and Evolution: The Authoritative LDS Statements.

Review of Trent D. Stephens, D. Jeffrey Meldrum, with Forrest B. Peterson. Evolution and Mormonism: A Quest for Understanding.

President Samuelson’s Neal A. Maxwell Lecture, delivered 23 March 2007, highlights the life and scholarship of Elder Neal A. Maxwell, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the man for whom the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship was named.

The costume design for the Hill Cumorah Pageant reflects a strong understanding of the physical and artistic needs of the production as well as a good grasp of the historical setting of the Book of Mormon. Through a rich blending of theatrical techniques, the pageant dramatically re-creates scriptural episodes to underscore the wisdom of human agency based on moral choice—a message made poignantly relevant by the historical realism conveyed in large part by authentic costuming. This article explores the physical challenges of creating costumes for an outdoor drama and the historical research that influences the costume construction while staying true to the message of the script.

Over the last twenty years, various objective author-attribution techniques have been applied to the English Book of Mormon in order to shed light on the question of multiple authorship of Book of Mormon texts. Two methods, one based on rates of use of noncontextual words and one based on word-pattern ratios, measure patterns consistent with multiple authorship in the Book of Mormon. Another method, based on vocabulary-richness measures, suggests that only one author is involved. These apparently contradictory results are reconciled by showing that for texts of known authorship, the method based on vocabulary-richness measures is not as powerful in discerning differences among authors as are the other methods, especially for works translated into English by a single translator.

Review of Fingerprints of God: Evidences from Near-Death Studies, Scientific Research on Creation, and Mormon Theology (1999), by Arvin S. Gibson

The abundance of skeptical theories about who wrote the Book of Mormon has led many scholars to seek scientific data to discover the answer. One technique is stylometry. Having first been developed in the 1850s, stylometry seeks to find the ” wordprint” of a text. Although these stylistic studies are not as accurate as a human’s fingerprint, they can give researchers a good idea either of differences in style between authors or of who might have written a text from a list of possible authors. Beginning in the 1960s individuals have completed four major stylometric studies on the Book of Mormon, studies that varied in both findings and quality of research. In addition to these four studies, this article presents a fifth study—using extended nearest shrunken centroid (ENSC) classification—that incorporates and improves on the earlier research.

While on assignment from the LDS prophet Joseph Smith to visit Jerusalem in 1840, Elder Orson Hyde of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles suggested opening a mission in Germany and translating the Book of Mormon into German. By April 1852, the new prophet, Brigham Young, had sent Daniel Carn to Germany to be the mission president and to help with the translation, and by May of the same year, Das Buch Mormon had been published. However, when East Germany was created and placed behind the “Iron Curtain,” matters grew worse for the Latter-day Saints. Because they were unable to print anything themselves, they relied on missionaries and members of the church in West Germany to smuggle copies of Das Buch Mormon into East Germany so they could have the scripture that was so central to their beliefs. Members still had to burn all manuals and church material that had been published after 1920 to avoid arrest, but since Das Buch Mormon had been published in 1852, the Saints were able to keep their copies of that scripture.

Review of The Literary Message of Isaiah (1994), by Avraham Gileadi.

Review of The House of the Lord: A Study of Holy Sanctuaries: A special Reprint of the 1912 First Edition (1998), by James E. Talmage.

Review of Avraham Gileadi. Isaiah Decoded: Ascending the Ladder to Heaven.

Available for free at BYU ScholarsArchive.
A review of Teachings of the Book of Mormon: Sememster 3 (1992), by Hugh W. Nibley.

The image of the hand of God in both the Old Testament and the Book of Mormon stands for the Lord’s power to intervene in the affairs of men and the events of history. Comparison between the ways this image is used in the two scriptures supports what the Book of Mormon claims about its own origin.

Review of Reexploring the Book of Mormon: The F.A.R.M.S. Updates (1992), edited by John W. Welch

Old Testament prophet Jeremiah and Book of Mormon prophet Lehi were contemporaries, and both preached repentance to the people of Jerusalem. Despite their common love for the truth, these men led very different lives because the first was commanded to remain in Jerusalem and the latter was commanded to leave. This article examines the lives and teachings of Jeremiah and Lehi and compares them to each other, suggesting that Jeremiah’s life symbolizes God’s justice and that Lehi’s life symbolizes God’s mercy.

After the Book of Mormon prophet Lehi left Jerusalem with his family, he built an altar in the wilderness and offered a sacrifice to God. This practice appears to contradict biblical law as outlined in Deuteronomy 12, which states that sacrifices should be made only on an altar within a temple. However, David Rolph Seely provides three possible explanations as to why Lehi was not breaking the law of Moses.

Review of From Jerusalem to Zarahemla: Literary and Historical Studies of the Book of Mormon (1998), by S. Kent Brown

Some Latter-day Saint commentators deem a phrase that appears in 2 Nephi 12:16 but not in the parallel passage in Isaiah 2:16—“and upon all ships of the sea”—as evidence that the Book of Mormon preserves a version of this verse from the brass plates that is more complete than the Hebrew or King James readings. One scholar’s conclusions in this regard are reviewed and then critiqued for ignoring the complexities of the ancient Hebrew and Greek versions of the Bible. The authors examine Isaiah 2:16 in its broader literary context, noting that the 2 Nephi reading alters a pattern of synonymous couplets; analyze the Greek and Hebrew texts of the verse; and relate their findings to the Book of Mormon reading. They discuss the inherent limitations of textual criticism in this kind of study and conclude that LDS and non-LDS scholars are open to different interpretive possibilities owing to the role that faith plays in one’s approach to and interpretation of textual evidence.

In 1842 Joseph Smith published the basics of Latter-day Saint (LDS) belief in thirteen articles of faith. In Article of Faith 8 he succinctly set forth their belief about the Bible: “We believe the Bible to be the word of God.” While there is no evidence that Smith was familiar with Maimonides or his writings, in a strange coincidence Maimonides, in the twelfth century, also set forth thirteen principles of Jewish belief, and number 8 in his list also dealt with the Bible: “I believe with perfect faith that the entire Torah that is now in our possession is the same that was given to Moses our teacher, peace be upon him.”

The chronology of the use of plant imagery

Review of The Book of Mormon Text Reformatted according to Parallelistic Patterns (1992), by Donald W. Parry

Old Testament prophet Jeremiah and Book of Mormon prophet Lehi were contemporaries, and both preached repentance to the people of Jerusalem. Despite their common love for the truth, these men led very different lives because the first was commanded to remain in Jerusalem and the latter was commanded to leave. This article examines the lives and teachings of Jeremiah and Lehi and compares them to each other, suggesting that Jeremiah’s life symbolizes God’s justice and that Lehi’s life symbolizes God’s mercy.

Review of Blake T. Ostler. Exploring Mormon Thought: The Attributes of God. and Blake T. Ostler. Exploring Mormon Thought: The Problems of Theism and the Love of God.

The theory of intelligent design is an explanation for the origin and evolution of life on earth. Latter-day Saints should be sympathetic toward intelligent design.

Review of Robert V. Remini. Joseph Smith.

Letters praising the Journal of the Book of Mormon and Other Restoration Scripture and responding to articles published therein.

Review of Letters to a Mormon Elder: Eye-Opening Information for Mormons and the Christians Who Talk with Them (1993), by James R. White

Review of “Terminology” (1998), by Jerald and Sandra Tanner

The early church was unable to continue once the apostles had departed. Bishops were only local officials and could not speak for the entire church. Beginning with the later second century, philosophy plays an increasingly important role in the church—this appears to be an effect rather than a cause of the apostasy.

It is highly unlikely that an object found in Lake Michigan could be a Jaredite barge. Lee Siegel reports about an archaeological dig at Piedras Negras, Guatemala, conceived and run by Brigham Young University’s Dr. Stephen Houston. A bronze sword discovered in Texas may be an Old World artifact. A linguist documents convincingly that the Ket language in western Siberia shares cognates with the Na-Dene language family of North America, thus showing possible transcontinental linguistic links.

Review of Images of Ancient America: Visualizing Book of Mormon Life (1998), by John L. Sorenson

Review of Rediscovering the Book of Mormon (1991), edited by John L. Sorenson and Melvin J. Thorne.

Review of Terryl L. Givens. People of Paradox: A History of Mormon Culture.

Janne Sjodahl discusses how the Book of Mormon would have taken up less space on the plates than in its current translated and printed form. Because the plates were written in a language comparable to Hebrew, Sjodahl had fourteen pages of the English Book of Mormon translated into Hebrew and written out. This Hebrew text covered only one page. According to this finding, the Book of Mormon could be written using as few as twenty-one plates (or even forty-eight if written in larger characters). Sjodahl presents estimates of the size and weight of the plates.

The Dead Sea Scrolls constitute a seminal resource for understanding the context of the early Christian community and several New Testament texts. Soon after their discovery, some very sensational claims were made about the Qumran community and its literature (the scrolls) in terms of their connection to Jesus and his followers. While these have largely been dismissed, and serious and persistent scholarship over the years has shown that there were differences between the Qumran community and early Christianity, significant similarities do exist. These similarities line up largely according to the following categories: common scripture and its interpretation, theological ideas, vocabulary and practices, importance of the temple, eschatological and apocalyptic orientation, and the centrality of messianic expectations. This essay attempts to highlight some of the most significant of these parallels to show that both the New Testament and the Dead Sea Scrolls are products of the same roots, that we should expect to find certain commonalities, and that to fully understand one corpus of writings, we have to know something about the other.

The serpent is often used to represent one of two things: Christ or Satan. This article synthesizes evidence from Egypt, Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, Greece, and Jerusalem to explain the reason for this duality. Many scholars suggest that the symbol of the serpent was used anciently to represent Jesus Christ but that Satan distorted the symbol, thereby creating this paradox. The dual nature of the serpent is incorporated into the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Book of Mormon.

In my work as editor of the Book of Mormon Critical Text Project (which began in 1988), I was initially interested in discovering the original English-language text of the book. But I soon came to the conclusion that it would be impossible to fully recover the original text by scholarly means, in large part because only 28 percent of the original manuscript is extant. In addition, there are obvious errors in the original manuscript itself that require conjectural emendation. As I have worked on the text of the Book of Mormon, I have come to some surprising conclusions regarding the nature of the original text itself, conclusions that I had not at all expected when I started my work transcribing the original and printer’s manuscripts of the Book of Mormon.

Review of The Bible II (1991). This book is in actuality the Book of Mormon with some differences.

As I have been working on the Book of Mormon Critical Text Project, people have occasionally written or talked to me about passages in the Book of Mormon that seem strange or difficult. A good many have made specific suggestions about emendations (or revisions to the text). Surprisingly, a large percentage of these have ended up being correct or have led me to come up with an appropriate emendation.

Royal Skousen explains what a critical text is and discusses his own critical text of the Book of Mormon.

Review of New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology (1993), edited by Brent Lee Metcalfe.

A critical edition of the Book of Mormon has two main objectives. The first is to determine the original text of the Book of Mormon to the extent that it can be determined. The second is to determine the history of the text, as it has changed over the many editions of that book that have been published. Royal Skousen describes the history of the early manuscripts and editions of the Book of Mormon in order to better understand this book of scripture.

Review of Scott H. Faulring, Kent P. Jackson, and Robert J. Matthews, eds. Joseph Smith's New Translation of the Bible: Original Manuscripts.

Royal Skausen gives information about the history, corrections, and the use of the printer’s manuscript of the Book of Mormon.

Royal Skousen details the history of the critical text project of the Book of Mormon. He describes that project, including his work with both the original manuscript and the printer’s manuscript of the Book of Mormon. After six years of pursuing this venture, Skousen was asked by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to temporarily resign as a professor at Brigham Young University and focus primarily on the project. Skousen agreed, and for the following seven years he continued his work on the Book of Mormon text, often collaborating with the Church Scriptures Committee. In this article, Skousen shares several discoveries that have surfaced because of his research and the meaning that those discoveries have had in his life.

Details of the translation process Joseph Smith used for translating the Book of Mormon from the plates can be adduced from statements of witnesses and from evidence in the original and printer’s manuscripts. According to witnesses, Joseph Smith often translated without the plates being present and used the interpreters to receive the revealed text. Evidence from the manuscripts themselves shows that the original manuscript was written from dictation, that Joseph Smith was working with at least twenty words at a time, that Joseph Smith could see the spelling of names, that the scribe repeated the text to Joseph Smith, and that the word chapter and the corresponding chapter numbers were not part of the revealed text. The manuscripts and text show that Joseph Smith apparently received the translation word for word and letter for letter, in what is known as “tight control.”

Review of The Dead Sea Scrolls: Questions and Responses for Latter-day Saints (2000), by Donald W. Parry and Stephen D. Ricks

The original text of the Book of Mormon contains complex, Hebrew-like constructions that have been subsequently removed from the text because of their non-English character.

Near the end of his life, the prophet Nephi referred to the day of judgment and declared that we, the readers of the Book of Mormon, will stand face to face with him before the bar of Christ (2 Nephi 33:11). Similarly, the prophets Jacob and Moroni referred to meeting us when we appear before “the pleasing bar” of God to be judged.

Very often in my work on the critical text of the Book of Mormon, I have discovered cases where the text reads inappropriately. Book of Mormon researchers have typically attempted to find some circumstance or interpretation to explain a difficult reading, but in many cases I have found that difficult readings are actually the result of simple scribal errors.

Royal Skousen explains in detail the internal consistency of the original text of the Book of Mormon. He references several verses of the Book of Mormon to discuss five main points: consistency in meaning; systematic phraseology; variation in the text; conjectural emendation; and revising the text. By examining these five aspects, Skousen shows that neither the message nor the doctrine of the Book of Mormon loses credibility as a result of textual changes. Skousen also mentions that the consistency in the manuscripts suggests that Joseph Smith did not receive the text as a concept but rather received it word for word.

The two spellings strait and straight are often considered synonymous; however, they come from different Middle English words and have different meanings. Strait means “narrow” or “tight,” whereas straight means “not crooked.” The difference in these meanings affects the interpretation of the scriptural phrase “strait/straight and narrow path” and others like it. Reynolds and Skousen explore possible meanings that the original Book of Mormon authors may have intended in their use of the two words.

In 1892, when John Gilbert was 90 years old, he made a statement about the process of setting the type for the Book of Mormon at the Grandin Print Shop. John was the compositor (or typesetter) for the 1830 edition of the book. He makes claims about the number of manuscript pages, the number of copies and the price, the number of ems (a measure of type width) per printed page, a comparison of manuscript versus printed pages, a description of the font, the process of receiving the pages to typeset, proofreading the title page, the decision not to correct grammatical errors, scribes for the printer’s manuscript, paragraphing and punctuation, capitalization in the manuscript, Gilbert’s taking work home to punctuate, and details about the signatures. In every aspect, Gilbert’s recollections are either precisely correct or easily explained.

The Book of Mormon, told by a variety of narrators over a period of hundreds of years, is deeply concerned with remembrance and the written production of memory. As each narrator grows old and finishes his time recording the events of his people, he hands down the plates to a son or other trusted, younger male companion to continue writing the history and preserving the memories of their people. In this paper, I’d like to argue that nineteenth-century visual art becomes a continuation of the concern for and production of memory so present in The Book of Mormon itself. The book’s proclamation of itself as Bible-“And because my words shall hiss forth-many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible”-establishes its reliance on its own participation in the production of memory and highlights its own limited ability (given its status as a completed text) to continue the process of memory generation. I will first examine how The Book of Mormon presents the recording of memory and then turn to C. C. A. Christensen as a case study on how visual art entered the Mormon religious sphere in the nineteenth century as a way of re-recording the stories.

Prophesying of the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, Nephi foretold that an unlearned man would be asked by God to read the words of a book after a learned man had failed to do so. The unlearned man was initially unwilling, claiming, “I am not learned” (2 Nephi 27:19). One interpretation of Nephi’s account is that Joseph Smith could not translate the Book of Mormon before the meeting of Martin Harris and Charles Anthon. Early historical accounts are consistent with this interpretation. However, according to Joseph Smith—History 1:64, Harris did take a translation to Anthon. Although this translation has not been found, evidence exists of similarities between this document and documents produced during the preliminary stages of the translation of the Book of Abraham. These similarities suggest that the document taken to Anthon was a preliminary and unsuccessful attempt to translate the Book of Mormon, during which Joseph Smith studied the translation problem out in his own mind as he qualified himself to receive the revealed translation from God.

Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon consistently use such phrases as “Book of Lehi,” “plates of Lehi,” and “account of Nephi” in distinct ways.

One of the principal themes of Nephi’s writings on the small plates is his desire to convince others of Christ. A second, related theme is his desire to write plain and precious things on those plates. Some of the most plain and precious writings of Nephi are those instances in which he used the name Christ in chiasmus or other forms of poetry. Perhaps more than any other portion of his words, Nephi intended these plain and precious writings to convince both Jew and Gentile that Jesus is the Christ, the one true Messiah.

Walter Benjamin famously claimed that “only a redeemed mankind is granted the fullness of its past-which is to say, only for a redeemed mankind has its past become citable in all its moments. Each moment it has lived becomes a citation a l’ordre du jour. And that day is Judgment Day.” The Book of Mormon (1830) posits a pathway to redemption for believers and organizes all time around the coming of Christ. I aim to use Benjamin’s model of messianic time to interpret the complicated formal and narrative temporalities in The Book of Mormon and to offer a possible answer to the question, “Why did The Book of Mormon materialize when and where it did?” The Book of Mormon anticipates its own appearance in the nineteenth century. This temporal peculiarity authorizes my reading of the sacred text in its economic and historical context. I will argue that Joseph Smith’s discovery and translation of the plates he unearthed on a hillside in Palmyra, New York, presented a challenge to the capitalist perception of time that threatened to further disenfranchise Smith and others in the Burned-over District.

Deflected agreement is a grammatical phenomenon found in Semitic languages—it is ubiquitous in Arabic and found occasionally in Classical Hebrew. Deflected agreement is a plausible explanation for certain grammatical incongruities present, in translation, within the original and printer’s manuscripts and printed editions in the Book of Mormon in the grammatical areas of verbal, pronominal, and demonstrative agreement. This finding gives greater credence to the plausibility of the authenticity and historicity of the Book of Mormon. Additionally, the implications of this finding on Book of Mormon scholarship are discussed.

Review of Sam Harris. The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason.

Review of George D. Smith. Nauvoo Polygamy: &ldquo. . . But we called it celestial marriage.”

Review of Rod L. Meldrum. Rediscovering the Book of Mormon Remnant through DNA.

President Boyd K. Packer's October 2010 general conference address met with criticism from people opposed to the stance of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on same-sex marriage and homosexual acts. Critics portrayed President Packer's printed clarification of his words as backing down under pressure. Six of his past addresses are reviewed here demonstrating that the clarification matches his past teachings. Critics' claims about President Packer's views are also shown to be inconsistent with his published views over many years. The reaction of Mormons for Marriage (M4M), a group of Latter-day Saints dedicated to opposing the church's stance on California Proposition 8, is examined. Despite promising to avoid any criticism of the church and its leaders, M4M is shown to indulge in both. M4M also recommends materials hostile to the church, its leaders, and its standards of morality. Examples of M4M's scriptural and doctronal justifications of its stance are also examined. The critics' arguments in favor of altering Latter-day Saint teaching regarding homosexual acts are critiqued.

Review of “Multiply Exceedingly: Book of Mormon Populations Sizes” (1993), by John C. Kunich

James Smith lists the population numbers given in the text of the Book of Mormon, and discusses what the possible population growth might have been. Comments in the Book of Mormon about multiplying exceedingly and filling the land are indicative that Nephite fertility was indeed high. He discusses the possibility that other peoples were assimilated into the Nephite and Lamanite groups.

The term Christology refers to the presentation of the life and nature of Jesus Christ. The purpose of this essay is to explore King Benjamin’s Christology (see Mosiah 3), to consider its similarities to that found in the Gospel of Mark, and to explore some implications of Benjamin’s Christology. Christology is often described as being on a continuum from low (which emphasizes the human nature of Jesus) to high (which emphasizes his divine nature). It is definitely the case that Benjamin’s description of Jesus contains elements of a high Christology since he begins by describing Jesus as “the Lord Omnipotent who reigneth, who was, and is from all eternity to all eternity” (Mosiah 3:5). Yet the very next line describes Jesus as “dwell[ing] in a tabernacle of clay” (Mosiah 3:5), which reflects a decidedly low Christology. This emphasis on the mortal nature of Jesus continues as Benjamin relates at length Jesus’s physical suffering (see Mosiah 3:7).

In recent years, the study of Leviticus has been galvanized by anthropologist Mary Douglas. Douglas’s central insight was that Leviticus relies on analogical thinking, which means that each part of the law cannot be understood on its own but only by comparing it with other parts of the law of Moses. This paper uses an analogical approach to Leviticus in order to explore what the law of Moses teaches about Jesus Christ. Details of the various offerings; laws regarding food, contact, and illness; and holy days are examined analogically in order to show what ancient prophets in the New and Old Worlds already knew: that the law of Moses can \"[point] our souls to Christ.\"

In silence, an unnamed woman approaches Jesus and pours ointment on his head. Responding to criticism from his disciples, Jesus not only defends the woman’s actions but states that wherever the gospel is preached, her story will be told as a memorial of her (Mark 14:9). This enigmatic story has, surprisingly, received very little comment from biblical scholars over the centuries. Yet it is a veritable treasure trove of insight into the person of Jesus and his ministry: (1) anointing was, as Jesus himself explains, a preparation for his burial. Both Jesus and the woman who anoints him understand that he will soon die; (2) anointing was also, in the biblical tradition, part of the coronation ritual for kinds (see example, 1 Samuel 10:1)--both Jesus and the woman who anoints him understand that he is the King of Kings; (3) a point where the disciples seem to understand only the glorious aspect or the suffering aspect of Jesus’s mission, the anointing woman’s actions show that she understands that both aspects must be integrated in the atoning mission of Jesus Christ; and (4) the Joseph Smith Translation of Mark 14:8 on first reading does not appear to add much to the story but on closer examination reveals a chiasmus that strengthens and nuances Jesus’s praise of the woman.

Review of First Nephi: Study Book of Mormon (1998), by Zarahemla Research Foundation.

Review of LDS Collectors Edition CD-ROM (1994, 1995), by Infobases.

Review of Overview of the Book of Mormon (1991), by Zarahemla Research Foundation.

The attitude held by certain sectors of the anti-Mormon crowd has changed over the years, even to the point where some no longer deny the literary merit and beauty of the Book of Mormon. Although an assessment of the impact of Jack Welch’s work and writing on chiasmus may be premature, it is clear that his work on the subject incited the expansion of other literary analyses of the Book of Mormon and encouraged the publication of their results. Welch’s work influenced studies and analyses on chiasmus in Classic Mayan texts, and his publications have contributed much to the discipline of chiastic analyses.

Robert Smith works out a detailed chronology of events in Palestine and the surrounding area from 793-445 B.c. to show what was happening in the years prior to Lehi’s departure from Jerusalem and journey to and settlement of the New World. He also describes the topographical and climatic conditions of the land through which Lehi and his colony may well have traveled on their way to the Americas.

The Book of Mormon annals open in an ancient Near Eastern context. The archaeological-historical context is carefully outlined here within a systematic chronology that is tied to fixed, absolute dates of recorded astronomical events—particularly those from cuneiform eponym calendars. The resultant matrix allows those early Book of Mormon events to be understood in a rational, familiar, and meaningful way—that is, in a biblical context. In addition, an excursus is devoted to understanding the Arabia of the Book of Mormon as the Lehite exiles must have known it. Throughout it is clear that the world depicted by the Book of Mormon dovetails remarkably well with what we know of the ancient Near East.

The claim that a personal letter in the Book of Mormon mimics a form indicative of modern rather than ancient composition is critiqued. The majority of letters in the Book of Mormon follow the ancient Hittite-Syrian, Neo-Assyrian, Amarna, and Hebrew epistolary format in which the correspondent of superior rank is always listed first. Other clues to ancient composition are noted.

The early and persistent claim that Joseph Smith quoted Shakespeare in the Book of Mormon fails to take into account the broader context of sources. Much closer parallels than Shakespeare are available in the Bible as well as in ancient Near Eastern literature. Indeed, the constellation of ideas about death expressed in 2 Nephi 1:13–15 fits that ancient Near Eastern context in several powerful ways—ways that belie the claim that Joseph Smith plagiarized Shakespeare.

No abstract available.

This table compares Nephite weights and measures with Egyptian values and gives possible equivalents in grams and ounces.

The Book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price depicts the creation, including the motifs of the divine council, primeval chaos, and creation from preexisting matter. This depiction fits nicely in an ancient Near Eastern cultural background and has strong affinities with the depiction of the cosmos found in the Hebrew Bible and other ancient Near Eastern texts (especially Egyptian and Mesopotamian).

Review of Michael R. Ash. Of Faith and Reason: 80 Evidences Supporting the Prophet Joseph Smith.

Review of The Book of Mormon Paintings of Minerva Teichert (1997), by John W. Welch and Doris R. Dant

This paper suggests the use of narrative criticism, a recent literary interpretive tool, as a favorable method of Book of Mormon interpretation. As an example of narrative interpretation, the narrative by Samuel the Lamanite in Helaman 13–16 is analyzed as a discrete narrative portion of the Book of Mormon for the exploration of the possibilities of a narrative critical approach to its text. Instead of focusing on the content of Samuel’s exhortations, lamentations, and prophecies in order to understand these passages, I interpret the surrounding narrative and find it serves as an impressive complement to the doctrinal content of Samuel’s discourse.

Review of Living the Book of Mormon: A Guide to Understanding and Applying Its Principles in Today's World (1991), by Allen K. Burgess.

Review of William D. Russell. “A Further Inquiry into the Historicity of the Book of Mormon.” Sunstone, September–October 1982, 20–27.

In the past, experts have assumed that primitive sailors would have found it impossible to cross the oceans between the Old World and the New. However, John Sorenson here concludes that the evidence for transoceanic contacts now drowns out the arguments of those who have seen the New World as an isolated island until ad 1492. Sorenson’s arguments are based on evidences from Europe, Asia, and Polynesia of the diffusion of New World plants and infectious organisms. His research identifies evidence for transoceanic exchanges of 98 plant species, including tobacco and peanuts. The presence of hookworm in both the Americas and the Old World before Columbus also serves as evidence to establish transoceanic contact.

This annotated bibliography compiled by John Sorenson makes accessible a range of information about animals in the Book of Mormon. It also includes an appendix of animal references in the Book of Mormon.

Critics of the Book of Mormon often cite genetic evidence in their attacks on the historicity of the text, saying that the lack of any Near Eastern–American Indian DNA links conclusively proves that no emigration ever occurred from the Near East to the Americas. Their simplistic approach—that the Book of Mormon purports to be a history of the entire American Indian race—is not supported by archaeological or Book of Mormon evidence. The authors pose and respond to questions about the geographical scene, the spread of Book of Mormon peoples, Latter-day Saint traditions about the scenes and peoples of the Book of Mormon, the terms Nephites and Lamanites, the possible presence of others in the land, ocean travel, Mesoamerican native traditions, languages of the Western Hemisphere, Old World peoples coming to the Americas, archaeological evidence, and ethnically distinct populations in ancient American art. These questions set out the social, cultural, and geographical contexts that are necessary for geneticists to understand before reaching major conclusions.

This article discusses the evolution of book collecting, particularly by Latter-day Saints. Although the circle of book collectors used to be small, it has since expanded, probably because of the spread of the Internet. Latter-day Saints throughout the world are now able to locate and purchase old and rare books within minutes. While this innovation can be productive and beneficial, the easy access can be risky. Because people are so anxious to buy these types of books, they have the potential to be deceived by those who create fraudulent products, and unlike the older, more experienced buyers, newcomers often do not inspect books closely for authenticity and condition before purchasing them. Because of these potential mistakes, it is essential that book collectors be more aware of the risks and take the necessary precautions to avoid them.

It has been 100 years since George Reynolds published his massive work, A Complete Concordance of the Book of Mormon. Reynolds worked on this project, begun while serving a prison sentence for polygamy, over 21 years of his life. He tabulated virtually every word used in the Book of Mormon except a few of the most common words, and gave a portion of the sentence in which each cited word appeared. He himself paid all the printing costs.

Revisions of Nephite chronology in the Book of Mormon occur as scholarship on various issues improves.

This second of two volumes of essays honoring Hugh Nibley includes scholarly papers based on what the authors have learned from Nibley. Nearly every major subject that Dr. Nibley has encompassed in his vast learning and scholarly production is represented here by at least one article. Topics include the sacrament covenant in Third Nephi, the Lamanite view of Book of Mormon history, external evidences of the Book of Mormon, proper names in the Book of Mormon, the brass plates version of Genesis, the composition of Lehi’s family, ancient burials of metal documents in stone boxes, repentance as rethinking, Mormon history’s encounter with secular modernity, and Judaism in the 20th century.
A microanthropological examination of what the text reveals regarding the composition and demography of Lehi’s party from the beginning of their sojourn in the Arabian wilderness to their arrival in the promised land.

Introduction to the current issue.

Introduction to the current issue.

Introduction to this issue.

Introduction to the current issue.

The introduction to this issue is a discussion of the emphasis of the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies as defined by the editors.

Introduction to the current issue.

Introduction to the current issue and the new editorial team.

No abstract available.

No abstract available.

This department gives news updates on various topics related to Book of Mormon studies: evidence of Chinese voyagers in Mexico, publicity on an ancient skull of a Caucasian male discovered in Washington, excavation of an ancient basilica in Jordan, Egyptian figurines from El Salvador shown to be fakes, and the establishment of a new journal, Pre-Columbiana: A Journal of Long-distance Contacts.

A comprehensive analysis of Book of Mormon geography. Sorenson gives a history and summary of all Latter-day Saints who have written on geography. He indicates what the text says, verse by verse, on geography and presents a trial map based on the text. Also presents problems of establishing distances and deciphering directional statements in the Book of Mormon. This work is reviewed in J.057.

By John L. Sorenson, Published on 01/01/90

Review of Mapping the Action Found in the Book of Mormon (1987), by Harold K. Nielsen.

In memory of John L. Hilton and his contribution to Book of Mormon word-print studies.

Warfare is a constant theme in the Book of Mormon. Conflicts with varying motivations erupted between the Nephites and Lamanites from the beginning of their sojourn in the New World. Ultimately, the Nephites as a sociopolitical group were exterminated in one climactic battle when hundreds of thousands died in a single day. Have Mesoamerican archaeologists detected an intensity and scale of warfare great enough to account for the extermination of a people like the Nephites? Yes, there is now good reason to believe that the period when the Nephites were being destroyed by their enemies was characterized in southern Mexico and Guatemala by widespread disruption rather than an orderly evolution in the Classic era that once was the standard claim of archaeologists. The process of the complete destruction of the Nephites and their culture agrees with a recurrent pattern in Mesoamerican history.

Letters praising the Journal of the Book of Mormon and Other Restoration Scripture and responding to articles published therein.

Observations from Jakeman’s students honor this LDS scholar, who could be called the father of Book of Mormon archaeology.

Ancient Mesoamericans used some systems of weights and measures; items in the market, though, were usually sold by volume. The Mesoamerican weights and measures may coincide with the weights and measures described in Alma 11 of the Book of Mormon, but more research is necessary in order to make conclusive claims.

The text of the Book of Mormon refers many times to metals, ores, and metal processing. John Sorenson provides an annotated bibliography of sources on archaeological finds of Old World and Mesoamerican metallurgy and metal specimens. He includes a summary of statements in the Book of Mormon text about metals, ores, and metal processing, with notes on Hebrew usage of metal-related terms.

As the ancient prophet Mormon edited the scriptural texts that would become the Book of Mormon, he must have had a map in his mind of the places and physical features that comprised the setting for the events described in that book.
Mormon’s Map is Book of Mormon scholar John Sorenson’s reconstruction of that mental map solely from information gleaned from the text after years of intensive study. He describes his method; establishes the overall shape of Book of Mormon lands; sorts out details of topography, distance, direction, climate, and civilization; and treats issues of historical geography.
The resultant map will facilitate analysis of geography-related issues in the Book of Mormon narrative and also be of help in evaluating theories about where in the real world the Nephite lands were located.

How Mormon compiled Nephite records into the book that bears his name has never been carefully studied. This paper makes an attempt to understand that process as it details the limitations Mormon faced and the sources he would have used. Mormon’s framework depended primarily on the larger plates of Nephi, but this paper demonstrates that Mormon appears to have supplemented those plates with other sources from the Nephite archive of records. The restrictions of the plates of Nephi and the nature of the additional sources are discussed and evaluated.

Anti-Mormons frequently refer to a long-standing form letter sent by the Smithsonian Institution in response to inquiries about the Book of Mormon. In this paper, John Sorenson makes note of serious flaws in this Smithsonian statement, pointing out that parts of the form letter are based on unsubstantiated assumptions by the Smithsonian staff who are unqualified to make such generalizations. Also included in this paper is a more responsible letter recently issued by the Smithsonian Institution on this matter.

The Smithsonian statement about the Book of Mormon has been revised to indicate that the “Book of Mormon is a religious document and not a scientific guide.” James E. Talmage correctly identified various Michigan relics as fraudulent.

During the 19th century, critics of the Book of Mormon claimed that steel was not known in the Near East or ancient America during the appropriate Book of Mormon times. This assertion, if true, would discredit the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. However, in more recent decades, proof that Mesopotamian peoples used steel has been revealed. This discovery means that steel was used well before the oldest Book of Mormon people lived. Further research regarding steel in ancient America is still necessary; however, it appears that five Mesoamerican proto-languages have a word for metal, suggesting that the people who spoke those languages were familiar with some form of metal.

Over the last century, new techniques of scientific analysis have been developed that have been applied with the intent to clarify the course of human history. Immediately after World War II, blood group data seemed to provide a magic key to open up the history of the world’s populations, but by the 1960s such studies were shown to be unrealistic and misleading. The new tool in human biology and anthropology is DNA analysis. Despite cautions from the best scientists about the limits the new findings have for interpreting human history, some enthusiasts continue to claim too much for DNA study.

Review of Terryl L Given. By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture That Launched a New World Religion.

This book shares the exciting results of scholarly research on the Book of Mormon undertaken during the 1980s. As an ancient religious text and cultural artifact, the Book of Mormon rewards close analysis along many lines of inquiry. Twenty-three essays by prominent LDS scholars cover such topics as warfare, repentance, Exodus motifs, Hebraisms, kingship, politics, Isaiah, Mormon as editor, chiasmus, covenant renewal, and poetry.
These studies aim to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon contains complex patterns not previously recognized—that is, subtle patterns of style, ideas, history, and actions that, once made visible, shed much light on the power and beauty of the book and stimulate greater appreciation and respect for it.

When we look carefully at what the Book of Mormon says about war, we find that the many military activities reported did not take place just anytime during the calendar year. Rather, they occurred according to a definite pattern. Certain months were war months while others were not. The complete consistency of this pattern reminds us of how many details the writers of this scripture kept straight.

John Sorenson analyzes the extent and significance of the discrepancy between two reports of the same event in the Book of Mormon and explores how the two versions may have arisen. He looks at the scope of the problem and the fallibility of the historical record before analyzing the problem and offering a resolution. He also provides a reconciled chronology of the years in question and discusses some lessons we can learn from the discrepancy.

Review of Fantastic Archaeology: The Wild Side of North American Prehistory (1991), by Stephen Williams.

In touring southern Guatemala, many FARMS patrons traveled west of the capital city to visit Lake Atitlán, one of the most photogenic spots in Central America. Tour guides have told thousands that the beautiful “waters of Mormon” beloved by Alma and his people (see Mosiah 18:30) might well be Lake Atitlán. The Nephite record also tells us that a city called Jerusalem, which was constructed by Lamanites led by Nephite dissenters, was located “away joining the borders of Mormon” (Alma 21:1–2).

Sorenson reminisces about his experiences with Davis Bitton, telling of Bitton’s love for truth, God, family, and friends.

Review of “Does the Shoe Fit? A Critique of the Limited Tehuantepec Geography” (1993), by Deanne G. Matheny.

In an interview with John L. Sorenson, linguist Brian Stubbs discusses the evidence he has used to establish that at least one language family in Mesoamerica is related to Semitic languages. Stubbs explains how his studies of Near Eastern languages, coupled with his studies of Uto-Aztecan, helped him find related word pairs in the two language families. The evidence for a link between Uto-Aztecan and Semitic languages, or even Egyptian or Arabic, is still tentative, although the evidence includes all the standard requirements of comparative or historical linguistic research: sound correspondences or consistent sound shifts, morphological correspondences, and a substantial lexicon consisting of as many as 1,000 words that exemplify those correspondences.

John Sorenson offers a survey and interpretation of the evidence that the wheel was known in the New World before the arrival of European explorers in the early sixteenth century. He discusses Mesoamerican and Old World wheeled figurines, wheels and movement in Mesoamerican belief, and the similarities between figurines in the New World and the Old.

A number of statements in the Book of Mormon text indicate the presence in Lehi’s promised land of peoples other than those descended from Lehi’s party. Reasons the topic is not addressed more explicitly in the record include a focus on the Nephites (and not on other people), a generic treatment of Lamanites, an a desire not to waste space on something obvious or insignificant. Clear evidence for the presence of others in substantial populations is present in the Book of Mormon. The demographic or cultural history of Lehi’s literal descendants must take into account these other groups.

The Nephite account is a record that resembles in form, nature, and functions—in scores of characteristics, in fact—what we would expect in an ancient Mesoamerican codex, a type of document that was utterly unknown to Joseph Smith.

John Sorenson proposes a plausible chronology for the Jaredites based on what is known of ancient American cultures through archaeology.

Cynthia Hallen invited students in her History of the English Language course to search for conjoined word pairs in the scriptures as a term project. They searched for pairs of words linked with conjunctions in order to better understand the meaning of selected set expressions in the King James Bible and the Book of Mormon. Hallen summarizes and comments on their research.

Review of Feasting on the Word: The Literary Testimony of the Book of Mormon (1997), by Richard Dilworth Rust.

Review of John L. Sorenson. Mormon's Map.

Nephite record keepers were very meticulous in monitoring the passage of time. Lehi’s departure from Jerusalem in the reign of Zedekiah marks the beginning of one formal reckoning of time. The prophesied 600-year window to the birth of Christ could well have been measured in lunar years. Lehi must have drawn on familiar Israelite calendrical practices to establish his calendar. Lehi’s descendants likely used twelve lunar months for their calendar without adding an occasional thirteenth month to adjust for the length of a solar year, which would solve the chronological problem of dating Lehi’s departure 600 years before the birth of Christ.

Review of A Detailed Chronology of the Book of Mormon (1995), by Thomas O. Moore

Much research has been devoted to identifying and examining language patterns in the Book of Mormon that appear to reflect the book’s underlying Semitic character. One possible Hebraism in the Book of Mormon that has not received attention is the use of negative rhetorical questions when a positive meaning is intended. Some modern Bible translations now translate these negative questions in a positive or even emphatic way. This rhetorical device occurs in English, but it is stronger and more com-mon in biblical Hebrew.

Review of Alonzo L. Gaskill. The Lost Language of Symbolism: An Essential Guide for Recognizing and Interpreting Symbols of the Gospel.

Recent years have witnessed a growing recognition in the academy that the Book of Mormon deserves closer attention than it has received. Not surprisingly, adherents to the various Mormon faiths have long read the book with some care. But larger numbers of believing and nonbelieving academics have come to recognize that, despite its often didactic style and relative literary artlessness, the Book of Mormon exhibits remarkable sophistication. This is perhaps nowhere truer than in those passages where the volume interacts—whether explicitly or implicitly—with biblical texts (always in or in relation to the King James rendering). Close reading of the Book of Mormon makes clear that Mormonism’s founding text models a profoundly inventive biblical hermeneutic that deserves a place in the burgeoning field of reception history. How does Mormon scripture understand and react to particular biblical texts, and what might be learned about the potential meanings of those biblical texts in light of such interactions?

The unique role and function of the book of Isaiah in the Book of Mormon has rightly been of interest to a variety of readers, both scholarly and popular. A quick review of a portion of the literature reveals something of its ongoing appeal. For the most part, these studies have focused on explaining the reason for the extensive quotations of Isaiah in the Book of Mormon and/ or offering a rationale for the numerous differences between the text(s) of Isaiah cited in the Book of Mormon and the text(s) of lsaiah found in a variety of other places including the King James Version of the Bible. Often these studies have been related to the larger issue of Joseph Smith’s involvement in the production of the Book of Mormon. Though a number of these studies are fascinating and merit careful reading, what has been missing, in my estimation, is a sustained treatment of the topic from the perspective of a close theological reading of the text. In other words, most of these studies have focused on the production end of the question-What did Joseph Smith or Nephi use and what may be learned by the actions of the author?-while much less attention has been focused on the product end of the question-specifically, What theological role and function do the Isaiah quotes (and their variants) play in the Book of Mormon, and what might be learned by a careful literary and theological examination of them? Thanks to the work under discussion, considerable progress has been made toward filling this lacuna.

A series of striking parallels between the vision of Arjuna recorded in the Bhagavad Gita and the vision of the brother of Jared in the Book of Mormon suggests the need for comparative work to be done on these two volumes of world scripture. This paper works through three interrelated points of contact between the two visions. First, it considers the epic context of each vision, context that provides conditions for the possibility of religious revolution. Second, it looks in detail at the respective religious revolutions produced by the two visions: the Hindu shift toward devotion and the Jaredite shift toward faith. Third, it outlines the theological significance of the principal difference such similarities bring into focus—namely, that between the conceptions of incarnation at work in Hinduism and Mormonism. Where the incarnational logic associated with Arjuna’s vision suggests that embodiment is temporary and instrumental for the divine, the corresponding incarnational logic associated with the brother of Jared’s vision suggests that embodiment is permanent and essential for the divine. The striking parallels between the visions of Arjuna and the brother of Jared thus help to highlight crucial but subtle theological differences between the respective religions associated with those visions.

This essay examines the shared literary approach to the Book of Mormon in recent essays by Elizabeth Fenton and Jared Hickman. These two scholars use the literary tool of deconstruction to investigate ways in which the Book of Mormon not only presents a narrative but also offers an implicit critique of its own narrative. Each sees this selfcritical or deconstructive aspect of the Book of Mormon as central to the volume’s historical and political force, a means by which the book could subtly but powerfully work against major assumptions in nineteenth-century American culture. Although they share this methodology, Fenton and Hickman use it for slightly different aims or go to slightly different lengths with it. These differences help to clarify both the usefulness of and the potential dangers or temptations inherent to the deconstructive interpretation of the Book of Mormon.

Since John Welch discovered Chiasmus in the Book of Mormon fifty years ago, students of the volume have paid attention to textual structures. Unfortunately, little attention has yet been paid to book-length structures, structures organizing larger stretches of the Book of Mormon. Analysis of whole books within the Book of Mormon has largely remained in a preliminary phase.3 In this note, however, I lay out what appears to be the intentional organizational structure of the book of Alma.

Elizabeth Fenton’s first book-Religious Liberties: Anti-Catholicism and Liberal Democracy in Nineteenth-Century U.S. Literature and Culture-appeared in 2011. The next year, she began presenting work on the Book of Mormon, first in a conference paper at the annual convention of C19: The Society of Nineteenth-Century Americanists, and then in an invited lecture at the University of Maryland titled “Why Americanists Should Read The Book of Mormon.” In 2013, she published her conference presentation from the previous year in J19: The Journal of Nineteenth-Century Americanists. The next year, Fenton organized a panel at C19 focused on the Book of Mormon, which drew the attention of Jared Hickman and opened the door to an important collaborative project, soon to come to fruition in the form of Americanist Approaches to the Book of Mormon, a collection of essays by various scholars forthcoming from Oxford University Press. In 2016, Fenton presented again at C19 on the Book of Mormon (this time in a comparative study involving The Anarchiad), and she also published in the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies a review essay focused on Grant Hardy’s Understanding the Book of Mormon. The past five or six years have, for Fenton, been focused in a remarkable way on literary study of the Book of Mormon.

The text of the Book of Mormon contributes to the understanding of the Pentateuch and to a confirmation that Moses was indeed its author. The Book of Mormon also helps confirm that Isaiah was the author of the book of Isaiah. The Isaiah chapters quoted in the Book of Mormon are a better translation than the King James Version, as they are undoubtedly from an older version. The Book of Mormon quotes Micah and Malachi with clarification and augments selected New Testament scriptures.

Many critics deny that the first five books of the Old Testament were written by Moses and consider them to be childish myths. However, when Nephi and Lehi examined the brass plates, they found them to contain “the five books of Moses.” And in the Book of Mormon, the Savior himself confirms their authorship. The book of Ether also offers confirmation of the Tower of Babel story.

The Sermon on the Mount in 3 Nephi parallels the accounts in Matthew and Luke, although it is closer to Matthew. The sermon was addressed partly to a general audience and partly to the twelve disciples exclusively, although the crowd heard it. In many cases the account in 3 Nephi clarifies the New Testament accounts; in particular, the Joseph Smith Translation and Book of Mormon explain the Lord’s Prayer.

What constitutes great literature? What is it about the literature of the Book of Mormon that has such a profound effect upon its readers? Although perhaps not beautifully written, the Book of Mormon’s message or theme justifies its classification as great literature and accounts for its profound effect on the lives of millions.

The Book of Mormon is a translation, containing details of the original language in which it is written. Very few of the writers would have had a working knowledge of Egyptian; the writing would more likely be a Hebraized Egyptian. The Book of Mormon contains many passages from Isaiah, more correctly translated than in the King James Version. Various examples of the Hebrew construct state are evident in Joseph Smith’s translation, together with direct translations of Hebrew idioms.

The Book of Mormon exhibits the intimate relationship between God and his people. The brother of Jared’s experience is a fine example. The driving force of the prophets was moral and religious, rather than economic and political. Social injustice was condemned by Nephi, Jacob, Alma, and Captain Moroni. Although little is said about the status of the family, respect for women and family affection are standard. Workers were well treated and friendship was promoted between Nephites and Lamanites. The Book of Mormon displays a high caliber of personal religion and brotherhood.

Although the beginning of Nephi’s record only mentions sons, Joseph Smith says the record of Lehi in the 116 missing manuscript pages refers to at least two of Ishmael’s sons marrying Lehi’s daughters. Nephi himself mentions his sisters at the end of his record. As no mention is made of further births to Lehi and Sariah after Jacob and Joseph, the assumption can be made that these sisters are the daughters who married Ishmael’s sons.

Literal translations of Hebrew idioms are prevalent in the Book of Mormon, as are literal renditions of compound Hebrew prepositions. Parallels can be found in the Old and New Testaments, especially in the Hebrew translation of the Old Testament.

Doubts as to the literary unity of the book of Isaiah are fairly recent. The late nineteenth century saw a division of Isaiah into three parts by critics, who categorized only 262 of the 1292 verses as the genuine product of Isaiah. These critics deny the prediction element of prophecy and highlight different literary forms and theological ideas. The Book of Mormon attributes two of these three sections to Isaiah by quotation; ancient scriptures as well give no hint of a division. Christ and the apostles themselves attribute the book to Isaiah. Internal evidences of the unity of the book include imagery, repetition, expressions peculiar to Isaiah, and song. Changes in style can be attributed to mood. The differences between the Book of Mormon and the King James Version support the authenticity and literary unity of Isaiah.

Nephi quotes from the book of Isaiah because of its relevance to his people and to all men. He highlights the message of Christ’s appearance and atonement. The latter-day prophecies, both those which have been fulfilled and those that are yet to be fulfilled, are cited and explained. Israel will be restored in the latter days, but warnings accompany this glorious prophecy. The enemies of Zion will be confounded.

The Lamanites in the Book of Mormon are descendants of the Nephite, Mulekite, and Lamanite peoples. They were a scourge to the Nephites to keep them faithful to the Lord. They survived because they observed the Lord’s commandments regarding marriage. When the elder Mosiah and his followers left, the remaining body of Nephites were probably either destroyed or became Lamanites. Once the Lamanites understood the Lord’s word, they were very faithful and renounced their previous living style. Out of this milieu came Samuel, the Lamanite prophet.

The literary problem caused by the parallels between Moroni 7–10 and 1 Corinthians 12–13 can be explained if one realizes that Moroni had access to the same teachings of Christ as Paul, and that both received revelation, so that the Lord himself might be the author of both dissertations. Different prophets might have had similar inspiration in dealing with the same topics.

The prophecies given by Moroni to Joseph Smith come from Malachi, Isaiah, and Joel. The Malachi prophecies deal with the rise and restoration of the church, preparation for the millennium, and the significance of the sons of Levi. The Isaiah prophecies, explained in the Doctrine and Covenants, give a direct explanation of the millennium and Joseph’s own role in the preparation for it. The Joel prophecies have to do with the events just prior to the “great and terrible day of the Lord.”

Moroni wandered alone for sixteen years before adding to the abridged record of his father. When he did make his additions, he also wrote the title page of the Book of Mormon, but in two stages, each stage necessitating a return to the Hill Cumorah. The second paragraph clearly follows his decision to abridge the book of Ether.

Most contemporary Old Testament scholars question whether Moses wrote the Pentateuch, but the Book of Mormon affirms Moses’ authorship. Questions arise as to how Jeremiah’s prophecies appeared on the brass plates and what the nature of the Book of the Law was. According to the brass plates, Laban and Lehi were descendants of Manasseh. How then did they come to be living in Jerusalem? The brass plates, on which may be found lost scripture, may have been the official scripture of the ten tribes.

A universal element is a succinct concept with comprehensive spiritual appeal to humanity; the Book of Mormon is itself a universal element. Among universals found in the Book of Mormon are concepts (1) that truth is given of God to all peoples; (2) of faith, in which good and evil are clearly defined in terms of opposition; (3) of the purpose of man’s existence in mortality; and (4) of the importance of service given to men and God.

The most significant allegory in the Book of Mormon is the allegory of the tame and wild olive tree, which appears in Jacob 5. Six different types of prayers are found in the Book of Mormon. Perhaps the best example of a true song is “The Song of the Vineyard,” actually a quotation from Isaiah. There is only one example of an extended genealogy, that of Ether, the last Jaredite prophet.

The Book of Mormon contains nine epistles—two pastoral, one prophetic, and six dealing with war. The “Psalm of Nephi” is the only psalm in the Book of Mormon, called such because it is a song of praise, betraying deep religious feeling. A good example of lamentation literature occurs in Mormon 6.

Historical narrative in the Book of Mormon is written by laymen and is the truth as they see it. Of emphasis is the doctrine that blessings follow those who keep the commandments; they will prosper in the land. More than autobiography, the words of the writers could be described as memoirs. Benjamin delivered a wonderful oration that deserves detailed study and can be divided into three parts.

The patriarchal blessings that Lehi bestows upon his children and grandchildren are filled with important doctrinal and historical details and contain many prophetic elements. Lehi and Nephi share the vision of the tree of life, a fine example of symbolic prophecy. Perhaps the finest example of prophetic literature in the Book of Mormon deals with the coming of Christ. The prophetic dialogue in the Book of Mormon can be divided into five parts.

The American Gospel, found in 3 Nephi, differs from the Gospels of the New Testament in that Jesus is teaching as a resurrected, glorified, and exalted person. It includes details of the cataclysmic events at the time of the crucifixion and of the multiple appearances of the Savior to the Nephites. Jesus delivers sermons to the Nephites in general and also to the Nephite twelve. He heals the sick and institutes the sacrament. The depiction of prayer is perhaps the most powerful in all scripture. The Savior quotes the prophecies of Isaiah and Micah with regard to the New Jerusalem and the Gentiles. He emphasizes the importance of record keeping for the church, which should be called in his name.

Sidney Sperry discusses whether the Cumorah in New York is the only one or whether there is another Cumorah somewhere in Central America. He looks at evidence in the books of Ether, Mormon, Mosiah, and Omni, as well as various scholarly opinions about the matter. There is no explanation of how the Hill Cumorah in New York came to be called Cumorah or how, if there are indeed two Cumorahs, the plates were transported from one to the other.

No one doubts that the hill where Joseph Smith received the plates is known as Cumorah, but is the hill where the final battles between the Nephites and Lamanites took place another Cumorah? The book of Ether tells us that Omer traveled to this place of the last battles of the Nephites, and that the relatively short duration of this journey would not account for the three thousand miles from Middle America to New York. A similar journey was undertaken by Limhi’s men, of equally short duration. The description of the geographical features around the final battle site is also at odds with the topography of present-day Cumorah.

The records of the Nephite, Jaredite, and Mulekite peoples comprise the Book of Mormon, of which Mormon is the principal editor. Four divisions are evident—namely, the small plates of Nephi, Mormon’s explanatory notes, the literary labors of Mormon, and the literary labors of Moroni. The first division, the small plates of Nephi, is analyzed in this chapter.

An analysis of the text of 3 Nephi to Moroni. Third Nephi was written by Nephi, the son of Nephi, the son of Helaman. Fourth Nephi in turn was written by the son of Nephi3, also called Nephi, and Nephi’s son Amos and grandsons Amos and his brother Ammaron. The book of Mormon was principally inscribed by Mormon and Moroni. The book of Ether exposes the terrible end of a people persisting in wickedness. The book of Moroni shows his love for his enemies.

An analysis of the Words of Mormon to Helaman, including Mormon’s abridgment between the small and large plates of Nephi. The teachings of Benjamin, Mosiah, Abinadi, Alma, and his son, Alma the Younger. Helaman’s and Shiblon’s writings in the book of Alma are set forth. Alma the Younger is to the Book of Mormon as Paul is to the New Testament. The book of Helaman covers fifty years of Nephite history.

Traditional interpretations of the various-colored or cursed skins in the Book of Mormon have asserted variations of two basic perspectives: first, the Book of Mormon describes God as darkening the flesh pigmentation of some wicked peoples as a mark of a curse; or alternately, the descriptions of “white” skins and “dark” skins in the Book of Mormon are only metaphorical descriptions and not necessarily descriptions of flesh pigmentation. However, a careful textual analysis of all the relevant terms and passages in the Book of Mormon (and its closest literary analog, the King James Version of the Bible) strongly suggests that the various-colored skins in the Book of Mormon can be understood more coherently as a kind of authoritative garment. The relevant texts further lend themselves to associating such garment-skins with both the Nephite temple and competing Lamanite claims to kingship. Ultimately, this exegesis suggests that such garment-skins (as the mark of the Lamanites’ curse) can be understood as being self-administered, removable, and inherited in the same way that authoritative vestments in the King James Version are self-administered, removable, and inherited.

By covenanting with Abraham, God promised him that through his seed all the families of the earth would be blessed—his seed would be as leaven within bread. This metaphor can likewise be applied to the children of Lehi, who introduced the Abrahamic covenant to the much larger indigenous Mesoamerican population. The larger gene pool with which the children of Lehi assimilated makes it very likely that no genetic evidence will ever substantiate an American–Middle Eastern link, although Native American populations show a strong affinity with Asian populations. The assumption that all modern-day Native Americans are descended exclusively from Book of Mormon peoples is not required by the scriptures. The genetic link, however, may be less important than the nongenetic transmission of memes, including ideas, behaviors, information, languages, and divine kinship.

Scholars of Mormonism have seen a deluge of race literature on the Book of Mormon flow over the past five years. Compared to the robust scholarship on the use of biblical literature in constructing race, Mormonism strikes one as the particularly colorful character who showed up late to the party. For a faith system that has started to imagine itself in global terms, the implications of this recent increase are profound and invite commentary from a variety of disciplines ranging from literary criticism to forensic anthropology. This review essay holds humble aspirations for itself: to trace the basic contours of racialization and deracialization in the Book of Mormon’s historiographical record, illustrating how the contestedness of the racial narrative reflects a variety of needs for Mormon reception of the Book of Mormon text. To close, I will speak to the Book of Mormon’s relevance as a point of entry for undermining Anglo-Saxon knowledge control.

Stewart examines the DNA research applicable to Native Americans and how it relates to Book of Mormon peoples.

Review of Doctrines of the Book of Mormon: The 1991 Sperry Symposium (1992), edited by Bruce A. Van Orden and Brent L. Top

Review of The Book of Mormon: Helaman through 3 Nephi 8, According to Thy Word (1992), edited by Monte S. Nyman and Charles D. Tate Jr.

The Book of Mormon describes a great division in mankind between the few who walk in the way of life and the many who walk in the way of death. This division results from the response of each individual to Christ or to the voice of God during probation. Men either hearken to the voice of Christ and progressively acquire spiritual life or they hearken to the voice of the devil and progressively descend into spiritual death. Nine Book of Mormon texts reveal detailed teachings on life and death. A diagram illustrates the ideas of each text. The conception and portrayal of spiritual reality in terms of two mutually exclusive, progressively diverging, and correspondingly opposite ways of life and death are clearly demonstrated. This dualistic conception of reality underlies the entire Book of Mormon. An understanding of this paradigm is critical, in order both to assimilate the essential message of the Book of Mormon on life and death and to understand its theological relationship to the Doctrine and Covenants.