Episode #47: Evidence For The Historicity Of The Book Of Mormon W/Ken Peterson

0:04 As Mormons, one of the things we constantly get beat over the head with by pseudo-intellectuals, is this argument? Well, if the Book of Mormon is an actual account of historical events, certainly, we should be able to find evidence has. Now, if you'll excuse me, me and Muffy need to get back to reading this inspired piece of holy, writ known as the CES letter. Well, today you're going to get some facts and figures you can use to defend the historicity of the Book of Mormon. Me Ken Peterson joins me again, where we will break down the evidences in support of the historicity of the Book of Mormon. Using these five disciplines, those are one archaeology to Linguistics, three geographical for geological, and finally fifth cultural.

0:49 Now, you may not agree with where pain believes the Book of Mormon took place, but is Ken and I break down, evidences from all five of these categories. I think you'll see that as Believers in the Book of Mormon, we have Every reason to be assured that the accounts in the Book of Mormon happened, just like it says it did. And that's next on this episode of the Mormon Renegade podcast. Because of your generosity last year, I was able to buy better audio equipment and software. I can't tell you how much it meant to me. That not only did you spend your time here with me on the podcast but also that you found enough value. In what I'm doing that you donated the podcast upgraded this year, I want to continue to grow.

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3:24 I love our conversations. I'm so glad you always are so willing to come on because it's just fascinating. I mean, you put in so much work into this stuff and I'm just glad you're here, man. Well have to say visiting with you even over to my in-person in probably be out of control but we I don't know I feel a real intellectual kinship with you similar questions and similar Avenues and and I'm always pleasantly surprised by the your awareness of certain things and I can't wait to embark on our conversation tonight. I've been looking forward to this ever since you mentioned it. Yeah. So when we talked last night, I mean not last.

4:06 Night. But when we talked the last time, after our previous conversation, we just kind of left it hanging. I, you know, we told everyone, hey, you're coming back on but we didn't go into great detail about what it was. We were going to talk about and I'm glad I did because if there's one thing I figured out and doing this podcast, if I tip my hand too early, I can count on somebody else coming back out and so I would, we would essentially be on defense. So I kind of kept this one close to the vest for Reason and I feel like what you're going to be presenting here is so so important. Because right now, one of the main ways that the gospel gets attacked is two things, they attack the founding leadership of the restored gospel whether that's Joseph or Brigham or John Taylor or Wilford, Woodruff, whatever the case is, or they attack the historicity of the Book of Mormon.

5:07 Oh yeah, yeah. That's that's their big push and so when you and I talked off, are last time we talked about a presentation, I guess that you had on the historicity of the Book of Mormon, right? And with the CES letter out and that's done Untold damage to folks. I mean, yes, I've met more than one family who just feel devastated by this. This fact that you have this letter that's put out. And basically it's a letter that's addressed to a member of CES Church educational system, which just write those down this list of grievances.

5:52 Yeah, he revisits it, he puts a lot in. So, as you and I talked about the historicity of the Book of Mormon tonight, I'm super excited because my hope is that this gets passed around to some folks that maybe have had Their testimonies damaged a little bit, whether by the CES letter, whatever else it might be. So yeah, I'm super excited for this Camp. Well, the whole thing of the, this short list of my favorite evidences, for the historicity of the Book of Mormon started as the result of an online conversation with now, a fairly well-known ex-mormon. I will say who it is, who become fashionable for the intellectual, or pseudo intellectual ladder.

6:36 Day Saints to say, we just need to admit that the Book of Mormon is not historical, you know, it, you know, that that seems to be One of the war cries of the progressive Mormon movement, as I read that, I was dumbfounded. I in my experience, in my life, there has never been more evidence and more reason to believe in the historicity of the Book of Mormon, then we have now especially within the last four years with the Advent of lidar. We're going to talk about that.

7:16 Absolutely. Absolutely. And and look, I don't care if someone is spouses a Heartland model, I don't care. If someone espouses a Mesoamerican model, I don't care. Right. That's that's one of those things where again it's that's kind of an internal debate right? I don't care. That's it. Is the other hand. It does have a lot to do with what we're going to discuss tonight so I and it's all going to put that out there, okay? Dominate the discussion but it is a part in terms of the evidences and where they're located, especially in relationship to their geographical relationship, it is kind of important, okay? A, although I mean, there are evidences I would admit and in both Heartland in the meso America model, but we'll get into that.

8:06 But to give you an idea. At the first part around 2001, dr. John Clarke of the new world archaeological foundation and compiled a list of 60 items mentioned in the Book of Mormon. The list includes items, like steel swords, barley cement Thrones, literacy etcetera. A dozen years after the Book of Mormon was printed. So we're talking about 1840, 42 gray. Only 13% of those 60 items, eight of them could be confirmed archaeologically. So in the Book of Mormon is published, 13% of it could be confirmed, right of those items back it at the turn of the 21st Century Year 2000 dish. 45 of those 60 items have now been confirmed, who my archaeological evidence that 75%. Now, look at what has happened within the last 23 years, particularly with the Advent of lidar, I would like to see that study done again.

9:18 I don't know that it hasn't met, I but I can't Peterson would estimate that. Those 40 items are now close to 50 items. I we're approaching 90 percent confirmation, but you see that the trend of confirming the claims of the hit the historical claims of Book of Mormon is only getting better and better and better. Why would that Trend to reverse this point? Where In a certain point you have to say he knew something sure he did a lot of things he shouldn't and in such detail if which, we'll talk about anyway. Yeah. And and I feel like so as a guy who's a convert to Mormonism period, I'll say this. If it didn't happen, like it said, go ahead. Am I doing what am I doing, right? We should know.

10:11 We should know. Because the thing is, is that if Didn't happen. I'm staying home on the couch and eating Doritos. It really diving deep into into fantasy football, right? Because because you know, don't get me wrong. The gospel brings me joy but one of the reasons it brings me joy is because I know it's true, right? Yes yes, yes, yes. And so while and that's why I respect folks like Hannah Stoddard and and you know people who come up. up with these models, whether it's Mesoamerican or Heartland because If it did happen, we should find evidence.

10:55 And so, when when folks like yourself Meldrum, folks, who espouse in mesoamerica model, Hannah, Stoddard, they come out and said, no, this really happens and they present evidence, that's good, that's evidence. We should have that's evidence that we absolutely should have because There's guys, like you and I and we talked about this on our first podcast, where guys, like you and I why we receive spiritual confirmations. We're also big on the cerebral end of things, right? Right. We like to know. Yeah, so the fact that they're out there is just fantastic. And there are thousands of them not even, not even talking about them as individual items and I can't stress this enough. And I want people to know nearly everything you and I are going to discuss tonight is found online. A tackle, the Jean Welch, who was the discoverer of Caius on his mission in the 60s, which we'll talk about to he spearheaded this Effort to make all of these evidences available free online for the whole world to see Book of Mormon Central dot org evidence Central dot org. And then when we talk about book of Abraham stuff, there's pearl of great price Central dot org, when you compile each of those entries and put them together,

12:28 it numbers over thousand and I The database grows day by day. So yes, go ahead. If I'm not mistaken, it grew just in the last few months, right? Because all of a sudden, one of the CES letters, major critic criticisms was there are no horses here and in a lot of that time and then what do scientists discover? You know, you know, I don't know how long, the see less CES letter has been out now, I want to save the better part of a decade. Yeah. And just that short time what, what do archaeologists discover horses in that area, During that time period, I agree.

13:14 Now, the crazy thing is, if you look on Wikipedia and you look at the Book of Mormon anachronisms, they will still list all of those things because they're behind the science behind the science. And even if you Google, it doesn't even have to be an LDS website. If you Google pre-columbian horses in America, you will see non-lds Scholars, displaying how this tide has turned. There is clear evidence of pre-columbian In horses in the Americas. It's not a question of if anymore. It's question of how late, right? Or were they here even when Columbus arrived right and his client and and what I find fascinating is that we as Believers are expected to answer every criticism that comes forward.

14:03 Yeah but whenever my upon try to do that I enjoy that. I really do, I know but But the dichotomy is that when something comes out in favor of it. It's quiet, right? Nobody wants to say anything. Good job. Good job performance. Congratulations. Right? Not everyone's like Well, it probably isn't what we think it is or you know they're just real quiet about it. Can they don't know why? I thought I could put myself in their shoes. I mean if if I were an atheist and I'm of the mentality that without the evidence is that that we're discussing and have discussed, I might be And that. I'm so innately skeptical that's kind of where I where I would land naturally.

14:56 Sure. So if someone were to show me proof positive that an angel named Moroni appeared to a 14 year old boy called him to be a prophet and the were all destined for exaltation. Remember for immortality in this world is going to be a terrestrial World in a few years if that that would be a paradigm shift that I don't think. I could it's just, it's a bridge too far. I mean, there's that leap of faith to take. We've talked about Force, the craziest story ever told. It is. It's look, if you didn't receive a testimony of it for yourself, it's a bat-crap crazy story.

15:38 Pardon the expression, right? His truth is. I understand that. I understand the silence, but just as I was going over my notes for our discussion tonight, in my skeptical mind has not Not gone away. It's still there. And, you know, you go through life and you're working in your, your mind, and your feelings become callous. And you keep thinking, man, this really is crazy. I go over these notes again and all these items, one by one and my mind is reeling like it really It really, it's true. Hilda Smith told the truth, what are you going to do about and each time I go through these things? Each time I learn something new.

16:18 The Wonder of it is still fresh on me because of my natural skeptic mind. Yeah. And I don't understand even as recently, as yesterday, I was having one of these discussions with a detractor on my Facebook or my darkened, Apocrypha page and and when you present them and he was apparently a trial attorneys what he said and I presented him with, you know, these three pages of links and evidences And he says it's all baloney and I said, well, clearly you didn't read the evidence. Right. Yeah, I did but it's still below me and my response is well, if you read the evidence and you reject, it just because it happens to be collected on an LDS oriented website that makes you prejudiced.

17:08 Yep. A religious big it because here's what John Welch and the Book of Mormon central people Really want to, because the, he's he's an academic, he's an attorney, he's not dumb, he knows the demands and the rigors of scholarship, they made these websites scholarly. So when you look up, they call the no wise to make them more approachable. That if you look at the footnotes, there are all meticulously footnoted, siding top-notch colors of the day. Not predominantly LDS colors. Yes, you will find out. This colors in there yet as we should, as you would expect. But most of them are not who have no bias for or against the Book of Mormon, right?

17:53 The evidences are there. And so my question is, you've read the evidences? And I've challenged all of the, what refute the evidence as I post. Let's talk about the evidence. Let's go back and forth. They won't engage they. Just go into denial. Well, it's because it's a normal website, and you're all stupid, you're all crackpots. Why don't we talk about the that's, you know, right and Hi, Share story here. So when I was in Maryland, we did. We subbed out to I won't name the organization because I don't want any. Yeah, any links back to him because this would would hurt his career but we would go out.

18:38 And if they were doing a dig we would go out and map the Dig, right? So if we found old partner, Pottery, shards or /. Alright, would go out there and take measurements and show them where it is on the ground. Now, we'd make a map out of that and they would make adjustments and whatnot. But I remember something that he told me that was very interesting. I asked this archaeologist, I said, what's the most frustrating part of your job because I was fascinated. I was like, man, you get to be Indiana Jones? Yeah, right. I mean, you got yes and stuff going on and he's like, let me tell you my biggest frustration. He said my biggest frustration. It is the fact that we put together a narrative for all of human history in 100 years and I using were using the same models that we used in 1850 something.

19:35 Yeah, and we're discovering that a lot of these assumptions are now, blatantly wrong. Welcome to the world of science. But That's not the frustrating part. The frustrating part is getting those in that are The Gatekeepers within that Community, right to revisit. And re-examine what they held as gospel so to speak. Yeah, because they feel like it's a threat for some reason. And and so when we start talking about Book of Mormon archaeology and the evidences, I think we have to come to a conclusion pretty quickly that at least how it sets right now.

20:18 I don't think modern-day Academia for the most part is going to come around to any evidence. We would put forward right now, especially if we put it forward as evidence for the Book of Mormon, they're going to reject it out of an e, which is why I'm not inclined to do that. Here's the evidence. Let's not talk about the Book of Mormon. Let's just, let's talk about this evidence right now. That's good. So what do you got? W. Well, in the process of this discussion, I grouped these evidences into five different groups and I'm going to let you pick whatever you want their geographical evidences geological evidences, which I think in Europe, especially considering your background, you will die.

21:03 When you understand need, some of those cultural evidences linguistic, evidences of the, of the text of The Bookworm in itself is evidentiary, and Vehicle evidences, but let's start with the most recent archaeological one, just because it's amazing. Amazing. In 2018. National Geographic. Broke the story about the very first large-scale lidar investigation of the muted or area of the Yucatan Peninsula map before you have too much farther.

21:47 Let me explain to those who may not know what lidar is. I use lidar? Yes, lidar. Typically, you can hook it to a plane, or even a drone now, and it's, it almost looks like a camera and it mounts to the bottom. And what it does is that it sends out essentially what our infrared lasers, which can penetrate tree, canopy on their software, where you can remove that canopy. I've worked with it, some and I'm just fascinated by it. So, this gives an archaeologist or whoever's running the Drone, or the plane. The opportunity to see what lays beneath tree cover. So yeah, the case of South America or Central America, you get to strip away all of that without actually having to go cut down trees or chop, which is all there is there.

22:35 Yeah, I mean the girls are so thick you can't see anything, right? Yep. And, and if you look at a lot of those old pictures of when they were just discovering some of those old buildings and whatnot, they look, we'll just like Hills because over time dirt gets on them and so those Step period, pyramids will look just like Hills. Exactly. Exactly. So they conducted this first large-scale in the middle Basin of northern Guatemala, which is on the border of southern Mexico, the surveyed area is less than half the size of Utah County, to give us an idea. And I remember watching this on the National Geographic special and they have these three expert, mine, archaeologists.

23:21 Who are and they did it for a shock effect. They had these giant screen TVs, the size of a wall. And there were flashing these latter images in front of these archaeologists for the first time, and they were speechless speechless at what they saw, they could not believe it word and they would say things like this changes, everything, everything. So, I'll describe what why at any rate? Great. The Book of Mormon. In Isaiah 27:6 and the people began to be very numerous and began to scatter abroad upon the face of the Earth. And it goes on the whole face of the land had become covered with buildings according to the Book of Mormon, again, mosiah 27, and the people were as numerous almost as it were, the sand of the sea.

24:23 That's from Mormon 1:7. How many people is that Millions, right? Yeah. What they discovered in the Mirador Basin where they were they the the Central Plaza, they had excavated and cleared and they were estimating, the population of the region to be in the tens of thousands. What lidar showed them? where, Where'd that go? 60,000 60,000 new buildings, 60,000 structures buildings that they had no idea where their we're talking, massive suburbs to that Central Plaza.

25:21 Wow, leading the experts to new population estimates as high as 15 to 20 million. 15 to 20 million people in the lowland Maya, during the classic period and reference. for the years for that go, The classic period would be around a.d. 252. 8600. which is the line with the end of the nephite civilization, and the nephite civilization was only a small part What was their claim in that populations? And at the pre-existent populations that were there before Lehi and his family ever got there. Right?

26:13 Which were you know, we I could only think of the Olmec the Jared i'ts, right? They dared i'ts arrived, the Millennia and a half before Leah. They've been there thousands of years, right? And they probably sped spread throughout the entire American continent, North and South, right? So yeah, lots and lots and lots of people. Now, the other thing I discovered not well and it caused them to say during that period of time in history it is now Culated that. That area was the largest city on the planet in the new world, you believe that. so, the other thing they discovered The Book of Mormon says that Moroni had fortified or built forts for of security for every city in all the land roundabouts. Alma 49?

27:12 And the lamanites are at war with one another and the whole face of this land is one continual round of murder and bloodshed. That's Norman 8. And this is what they found researchers were particularly surprised by the ubiquity of defensive walls. Ramparts Terraces and fortresses everywhere leading to a surprising insights into the militarisation in the Maya. Lance, hmm. Impressive. Chronological correlation between widespread fortifications, the Maya lowlands. And the Book of Mormon endemic Warfare over centuries was the norm and warfare was particularly prevalent in the early classic ad 250 and 500. Yeah, right.

27:58 Interesting type rate consistent with the timing of the final words, the Nephites and continued Warfare thereafter, when the lamanites Brett Gardner LDS scholar pointed. Doubt that I can remember teotihuacan was trying to create trade routes with the, with the Maya, the Yucatan. And who was right in the middle of that will according to mace American Theory, the poor Nephites and that's why they were run down because they were in the way of this Native American Trade route, you know? And we've we've discovered now that There is copper, that was found down in South America, that was mined up by the Great Lakes area, right?

28:48 So, yeah, I have this massive trading Network that's going on. These are not These are not people who as you know, 19th century America would would have you believe are savages, right? These are people, that's all they knew, right? Right. Right. When that's when the colonists got here, while all, they knew were the Northern Plains Native, American tribes, which were not Advanced when they got here, right? So the concept of metal plates, submit trade routes, highways temples was laughable. Right, we need to underscore. That was laughable at Joseph, Smith's time. Yep. Yep.

29:29 It's absolutely. The third thing that is founded. The Book of Mormon and 3rd Nephi 6. It says, and there were many highways cast up and many roads, made highways Native Americans, were not building highways, right? These 3D scans, the lidar scans revealed sophisticated Mayan infrastructure, at a never-before-seen level, the Mesoamerican, jungle now reveals a fast network of Highways and Roads elevated so that they functioned, even in the rainy season, highways cast up. But we now know that the Maya had a well-developed infrastructure that provided public works. Such as dams, ditches irrigation systems reservoirs and stone quarries, Mormon, similarly describes the construction of Highways and Roads systems and other public works such as dikes and irrigation systems and stonemasonry, amazing.

30:23 Absolutely all confirmed. Well then and then course and then book of arm talks about flocks and herds and all of this irrigation, you didn't see that amongst the players. And Native Americans, you didn't see that Alma 129 and abundance of flocks and herds and fatlings of every kind, Helaman 6. They did raised grain and great abundance. They did raise many flocks and herds and many fat fatlings, the lidar technology has uncovered, the remains of animal pins and reveals. That food production was at an industrial. Scale, could you imagine to feed 15 to 20 million people? There weren't others they were Hunters and gatherers, they were growing.

31:06 So the Book of Mormon, similarly talks about the vast production food, and domestication of animals. So, all of this that we've just discussed with synths 2018, just last week, they did another lidar survey for the bottom Allah, same exact findings. Untold on previously, unknown structures. Showing a far greater civilization than they had ever before imagined. And I imagine it will continue every time they Point their lidar someplace else. Be the same thing. Amazing. Yeah. And for some reason is people we want to be able to wrap up history in in 10 minutes, right? We want to be able to say we've seen everything. There is to see we've come up with our conclusions, and this is What it is and unfortunately that's just not the way history works right?

32:01 I mean every day things are overturned or should be overturned but getting getting that to happen that seems to be the issue. So let me ask you this in any of those cities down there. Have they discovered anything that could be uniquely? Pinpointed back to gospel use, if you will temples that sort of thing. Well, yeah, let's talk about out. Well, here's win in the Book of Mormon. in the Jacob 5, is the Zenus allegory of the Olive Tree, which goes on and on, and on, and talks at length about all of culture, Which no one in Joseph, Smith's circle of friends and had any knowledge of. I mean, no one in the new world was growing all of groves, right?

33:02 And what we discover is what he was describing and how they tended their Olive Groves and how they cared for them. Improve them is exactly right. I'm ready possibly known of all of culture but okay that's not something made down. That was not answering your question. Ancient American consumption of alcohol. It talks about the lamanites getting drunk, right? And everybody laughed at that. There didn't have any well call, that is not true. They had all forms of alcohol including wine and grapes. We now discover Ancient American monetary systems. They talk about currency.

33:43 They had a currency that weights and measures. We need to be very careful because the Book of Mormon never says points, right? Because of our present ISM and where we're coming from were expecting nickels and dimes. But they had metal money, some in the form of ax in the shape of axes and things like that. But they did have that in meso America, there's clearly identified. So yeah, and temples Towers, all that. Sort of let me go here, I've looked at some of those scans and the thing that keeps popping back out to me is you can tell that and a lot of the time when those were constructed, those people were at War Yep, those people were at War, whoever was constructing. No cities.

34:40 War and fortifications were Forefront in their mind. And all you need to do is look at the alma chapters where it talks about building up, you know, fortifications and they talk about continuous Warfare. Yep, exactly. I don't know why we should be surprised. The old world is full of. I mean just look at the Old Testament. Can you imagine one neighboring City over running? Another just because they want their stuff, or because they desperately need it, because they're starving. I mean, we don't comprehend that. No, no. Our biggest crisis is when our cell phone doesn't charge. Exactly. Exactly. So barley, The Book of Mormon mentions that they had barley and that they were cultivating barley.

35:26 Everybody knows that's not native to do, you know? And it's not that it doesn't grow wild. It has to be cultivated. Well guess what? We've discovered that there was barley in those ancient cultures. So so let me ask you this, have we seen where about the time period that barley was introduced to the region? Because that, that would be kind of a Smoking Gun, right? I mean, if barley is introduced about the time that the Nephites are theoretically showing up in all this, I don't think all of this stuff coincides with the entire era 600 BC to 400 ad. It's all there that classic the classic my period. That's when all of this is happening, it's an all-day activity is really going up.

36:20 Its going to look up The Barley link here. I'll read it to you. There are actually three Tate, three types of wild, barley native to the Americas, it wasn't until 1983, that they first uncovered, a domesticated form of barley, native to the Americas, in Arizona, in a pre-columbian context, 8900, little barley, It has since been found throughout the Mississippi River Valley where it was a major staple during the middle ad 280 500.

37:11 It has also been found dating to his early as 800 BC in Iowa go. Heart Landers right. so that's extraordinary that that's one of those things where like you want to say It doesn't she? And keep in mind, I mean, carbon dating isn't exactly exact all the time, right? I know that there's some fluctuation there, share. So if you say between 680 BC and 400 ad, and you're coming up with 200 years later, that in a lot of times is well within that range of error 200 years.

37:57 Yep. And so if you can't find any barley older than that and then all of a sudden, Didn't you got it? From down in Central America, to Arizona to the Mississippi, you know, Valley. That's that's a that's a huge piece of circumstantial evidence. Oh yeah. Well and all of this is circumstantial. I mean, welcome to the world of history and people get upset. Well, those just circumstance, that's not evidence and The Smoking Gun is circumstantial evidence, right? What are people looking for Nephi was here, kind of a thing and it's It's an unfair and kind of an ignorant thing to expect that particularly in mesoamerica, those tropical humid climates, organic remains Highland a mountainous areas.

38:51 Undergo erosion, decreasing, the chance of remains being preserved in the meso. America consists of many Highland areas. Additionally, the area is mostly humid, especially in its Southern extent with subtropical to Tropical conditions in this area such as This animal and plant remains quickly decompose and are destroyed without leaving a trace. Even if an organism is buried before it decomposes the commonly acidic soils continue the Raptor process of decomposition also the generally abundant vegetation in such a region, very limited areas of exposed ground is just for bones or teeth might be observed because of this combination of factors a significant record of past life and meso America. We very difficult to uncover as archaeologists as well. As paleontologists have discovered, most animal remains AIDS are not preserved and are lost for all time. Animal / human remains.

39:40 So it's why are we not finding the barley, a meso America who its decomposed at this point and you bring up a valid point as a guy who was made his living outside? Yeah the bulk of my career in very in a lot of different climates. I've been, I've surveyed in Florida. I've surveyed on the east coast of the United States. I've surveyed out west There is a different rate at which things decompose it in West versus the, the the East, right? Yeah. Oh yeah. West. I mean, it's not uncommon. You're out there may be doing a survey for a Rancher and you you will see a cow that's been dead for a year or better. That still has the hide on it.

40:24 Yeah I'm not all the height but in the Bones have been bleached a little bit but if something like that happens in a high humidity climate, if an animal dies it will decompose As the bones yeah, quickly. Oh yeah, they don't just hang out. I mean, you think of that the Mirador Basin lidar? I mean there were as many as 20 million people there where all the bones they're gone. They're gone, Millions gone, so it's an unfair expectation. Kind of an ignorant expectation, we should be fighting those types of evidences in such climate but Metallurgy, we talk about the gold plates and people make a straw man argument saying. Well, if the gold plates were gold, it would have been too heavy for a single person to lift and Sandra Tanner's Museum, and Salt Lake City.

41:19 She has something about the size of the Book of Mormon made out of lead. So people can see how impossible that is. The strawman argument is that they were made of 14-karat gold. Which no one ever claimed. They had the appearance of gold 14 karat. Gold is too heavy and it's too soft. It wouldn't have worked, what has been discovered in mesoamerica in abundance? Is a, what is now referred to as Tom Baga, which is a gold copper alloy, which has the appearance of gold, but is much lighter and is much stiffer and significantly lighter. Wow, it would make sense that.

41:59 I mean, The Nephites if they were real. I mean, they're not stupid. They got to make their not going to make records out of things. You can't happen. They're gonna crumble if you drop them off. So the thinking is, yeah, I mean they did have significant knowledge of metallurgy. Among other things. So, one of my other favorites is Cement that's mentioned in the Book of Mormon. Because everybody knows the Native Americans were building this cement. They were living in deep. He's right submit that's ridiculous. In the mid first century BC, Mormon reported that some nephite dissenters did travel into the land northward for they found large bodies of water.

42:49 Many rivers Helaman chapter 3 but there was Little Timber. So they became exceedingly expert in the working of cement and built houses out of cement and even built many. Any cities both of wood and of cement. And, of course, people laughed at the Book of Mormon, and it Joseph Smith for making such claims. However, according to Mayan experts, Michael Co Stephen Houston, non-lds. In fact, Michael Cole has some anti aldea Street to him. It was not until the late pre-classic period 300 BC to ad 2250 that the Maya quickly realized the structural value of 8.

43:31 Concrete, like Phil made, from Limestone rubble and lime, Rich mud, this led to an explosion of activity around 100 BC, what? That's exactly right. What Mormon was talking about? And one area for the cement was used extensively was in the city of teotihuacán, in central Mexico, which some Book of Mormon Scholars, consider to be the land northward. Wow. So that's crazy. All right, but I do, you know what probably the greatest Mesoamerican, bold side. We could spend a lot of time on this, but in the Book of Mormon, when, when we come to 3rd Nephi after the great destructions in the ER, 30A d, The voice of the Lord tells the people about the cities that were destroyed and how they were destroyed. And he mentioned 17 cities, and specifically how they were destroyed.

44:40 One city and particular Jerusalem, which is located. The Book of Mormon tells us on the shores of the Waters of Mormon was sunken was swallowed up by the waters. Hey, Those who commit to this, John Sorensen model makes America model believe that the Waters of Mormon is Lake atitlan in northern Guatemala. Okay? 50 feet below the waves of lake atitlan is an ancient Mayan city. It was submerged about that time. Wow.

45:24 Again it's one thing if it was one, right? If Joseph Smith got lucky on one. Exactly. If you got lucky on to, you got lucky, I'm three. But when you start approaching As you pointed out earlier, those 60 things that archaeologists thought you could find in your approaching 90 percent, he's a pretty good guesser, right? At that point you got to start saying maybe he wasn't guessing, maybe that's not the point where my skeptical mind finally gives up right and says, oh my goodness. He He was telling the truth. I mean, what are my favorite ones is elephants? That was the most laughable thing of all. Everybody knows.

46:13 There aren't any elephants in the Americas, Joseph Smith, you idiot. We now know that there absolutely were elephants a mastodon of some sort. That existed in the 1950s, an article published in the Scientific American. I got a quote that is because it's pretty cool. Here we go. Loved will Johnson in an article entitled man and elephants in America. Published in scientific monthly wrote that quote, discoveries of associations of human and elephantine remains are by no means uncommon.

47:01 As of 1950 Macau enlisted, no less than 27 such items including a partly burned, Mastodon skeleton and numerous potsherds in Ecuador. The offense weren't burning themselves with the shirts, right? No, no, no. He goes on to explain that. There can no longer be any doubt that man, and elephant coexisted in America, it is safe to say that American elephants have been extinct for a minimum of 3,000 years. You go back. 3,000 years from 1950. 256. I don't remember. Guess what? You're at the end of the year, at the end of the Jared, I era, where elephants mentioned in the book of ether.

47:50 Ding dong. Yeah, it'll never cease to amaze me that despite all the evidence people still want to put the brakes on it, right? Like oh no, that can't be right. Well, of course it gets. Then you have to admit that those crazy varmints might be onto something and then what does that mean for me and all I mean who wants to admit that, right? Especially if you don't. Not like being a Mormon, don't like more of it. You have something against them. You don't want. You don't want that. Sure, sure, yeah, no. But there's this feeling that if or at least for me, right?

48:33 There's this feeling that, if you start looking At. At the evidence, unbiased lie. If you just say okay what what does what's the statistical probability? That all those things were there. Just math tells you this isn't a coincidence. This is a pattern. That study has actually been done. That are a couple of academics, I think in Michigan, I don't recall precisely, this is quite recent. It is statistical analysis of the corollaries between Michael Co who's one of the world's foremost, my and experts and he wrote the book, its kind of the Bible on the Maya on the corollaries between that and the archaeological details in the Book of Mormon.

49:28 And the corollaries are statistically impossible. Wow. Wow. So that's all the art. Is that all the archaeological stuff by no means is that all your stuff. But problem you really love, let's move on because we've had, we've had some big ones, I mean, cement in the time and the place at supposed to elephants where they're supposed to. I mean, those are and what kills me again, you go on Wikipedia, you look up Book of Mormon anachronisms, you'll find all these things still listed. Despite the recent evidence has been. So they're just either in denial or they just are too lazy to change.

50:09 I don't it. That's the frustrating thing about these discussions is the people they just they either quit the discussion or call you names and say, you're hopelessly biased. On my responses. Who's hopelessly biased here? You know? Yeah, you were looking at evidence, right? We're looking and saying okay, if Joseph said all those things These are supposed to be there. They will ya. We should find, they are we find them. You have to count it as evidence for Joseph's claims and the historicity of the Book of Mormon. Let's talk about a just a couple of other archaeological things while we're on there. Of course, he was roundly, criticized for saying, that ancient Americans wrote on metal plates. They didn't have any metal and nobody, the agent world would waste their precious metals to Right on that's just stupid right?

51:06 And lo and behold they have found all over the old world. And some of the new world writing on metal. I don't know if you've seen this Photograph, I have. Yep, if I have seen that. Yep. Now you look at that and you think then the Mormons going to say, oh look, yeah, it's a model of the Golden Plates and the stone box, right? It's not. That's an actual archaeological Discovery. The plates of the rious, persepolis gold and silver plates. They're called Foundation, please. And it was a common thing when they built the palace, they have this foundation stone and in it, they put these Foundation plates.

51:50 They were discovered in 1938 to gold and two silver plates dating from 518 BC in person where they're supposed to be right. Exactly the time and the place and they begin with the King Darius is Jenny ology. Ha ha, right? So it now, we now know of numerous examples of ancient sacred records, having we buried in preserve for future times, including records written on metal and Records very dusty boxes and numerous examples of records that were sealed. Much like the gold plates were sealed in the record. That's amazing.

52:31 In fact, that Joseph says, you know, under this Stone, there was a box, right? Yeah. A concrete of own right Made of Stone. Excuse me. And inside were the plates, and then you go across the ocean. And when you find the very same thing, the very same thing, which shows, not only The the historicity of this idea of the Ancients writing on plates, right? On the service, what's that, and preserving them, exactly. But The almost the very same way of preserving those records within Stone boxes.

53:15 I forgot to mention with the plates of dries, there were also precious stones found with them. And we know dries and I think that's interesting because we know that Darius was was somewhat sympathetic to the the Israelites, right? So it's not out of the realm of possibility that he would have. Maybe adopted some of their Customs or vice versa or vice versa right there. When we talk about, we can talk about reformed Egyptian and everybody, laughs Israelites, hated the Egyptians they were using reformed Egyptian. Well, guess what? They were they it's called hieratic, there's another form called demotic.

53:58 It's a jiffy short head. They have found examples of a higher attic interspersed with Hebrew symbols in Jerusalem in and around juice Jerusalem at the time of Lehi. Well, in Oman, and not only that, I've read a little bit about both of those. Those were used in four guys who were essentially men who were Merchants, right? He had heard that was olive oil. Whether that was wine, whatever it was. It was used because it was so well recognized by everybody, it's why the world. Predominantly when it comes to business, everybody speaks English, right? Because what did Lee hi do for a living again? You know you got a virgin.

54:46 Yep, exactly. And so, when you start, when you start adding this all up and you're right. Right. When you start talking about archaeology, there is very rarely anything that you can look at and be like it's plain as day, right? Yeah. All of these evidences. It To a certain extent are circumstantial, that's what makes it history, right? Exactly. So, here's probably the single greatest Smoking Gun that has a direct language relationship in the Book of Mormon. Before I get there, I need to preface this the problem with finding the words and the names and the vocabulary of the Book of Mormon in ancient American culture is because the It has not been there. Has not been continuous habitation. What we find amazing?

55:42 American let's see. I'm like the biblical lands. Where many toponym survived due to a continuity of culture. There is no reason to assume that my languages and me fight languages were related. We don't know. Secondly, we find that toponyms often disappeared from one area to the next. There were these massive cultural interruptions and the history of the Maya. And in the case of the Olmec, I mean they just They were gone, right? Can I ask a quick question here? And I'm here. So, my lack of Education. What's top oven top and him a name? Okay? Steamer person named right. Okay, sorry about that, the collapse of the indigenous civilizations, before the Conquistadors created a sharp historical, discontinuity, we have the names of almost, none of the classic mine and Olmec cities of two Millennia ago, which is why they are Known today under Spanish titles, archaeologists simply don't know.

56:43 But many of the original names for these Mayan cities were if archaeologists. Don't know the names of some cities they have discovered, how should, how could we ever hope to provide English names? Those cities, such as names provided in the Book of Mormon? It's another straw man, right? One. Who I have? What we found. Is there a hibbler written on a stone somewhere? Because Sarah Hamlet is an English interpretation of some reformed Egyptian text, right? I mean, it's it's an impossibility. Well, ever the less. Yeah. And I think that's a Fool's errand. Yeah. And the other thing I would say about, you know, that you're right. That's the other thing. I like the latch onto is the, the reformed Egyptian argument, right?

57:27 That's my favorite one. Knock it out of the park. Everybody knows there was What you want? Yep. And and and they say, well why don't we find more of it in in the new world? And that's another straw, man argument. Go ahead, go ahead. I'll let you mind culture. Well, here's sorts and pointed this out. In terms of trying to identify book more Milan's, two primary requirements, massive populations in the millions and and concrete evidence of literacy writing. We don't Find that in South America, we don't find that en masse in North America, thus far, the only American ancient cultures we know of the had massive populations and literacy where the Aztec and the Maya, and the Aztecs occurred far too late. They chronologically don't agree. So that leaves us with the Maya, the Maya we know they had writing, we know that they have libraries. Libraries of stuff.

58:29 What happened to those libraries? Destroyed by The Conquistadors, by the well-meaning priest, who came over, were destroying those writing to try to convert people to Christianity and so those writings didn't cause him to revert back to their paganism. There were entire Librarians. We know we have in the world today. There are four exactly for Mayan books. Remaining four. That's it and had libraries on the, it's so sad when you stop to think about that, right? Whether it's here in the new world with the Maya or, you know, the the library at Alexandria.

59:12 Alexandria. That's what comes to mind, right? I mean, it's the same pattern over and over again. And I think what it does is it, it just creates gaps in our own history that are nearly impossible to fill again. But the other thing I'd say about, Reformed Egyptian is that one, we know that the language was interpreted, you know, it could be interpreted in Egyptian or Hebrew, but the other thing I'd say is, there's no guaranteed that that language didn't undergo changes once that it is B, got to the new world, right? The Book of Mormon says, is not right?

59:53 Absolutely, so, so here we are to the Definite, the greatest Smoking Gun in the Book of Mormon. Because it's in the old world in Nephi. In first Nephi, 16 verse, 34 Nephi tells us tells us all that he wished us to know about the place called Nahum, and it came to pass that Ishmael died and was buried in the place, which was called Nahum. They didn't name it was a pre-existing place and he Ishmael died at the point when they were, if you follow people marked, the math of them fleeing, Elam it was before they had cut east across the Arabian Peninsula. So it was near the shores of the Red Sea but on toward the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, non-lds, archaeologists discovered an ancient city and it was called Nahum.

1:00:51 How do they know this? Because there were three ancient Alters inscribed chiseled on these blocks of stone. Where the letters in hm, because they don't use vowels and submit right judges. So, the wording makes clear that name was not made by Lehigh's party was already known by that name to look people. Thus other people were already settled in proximity to the Lehigh. Encampment Mayhem was, or at least included a place of burial. According to Nephi note, that Nephi does not State additional died there, but that he was buried there. Implying, I lost you still there. Other year that included an established variables. We get, we got a, we got a bit of a storm. So if we re 3 chisel blocks of Stone, from a pagan temple in Yemen now, provide incontrovertible incontrovertible evidence that in fact that name did exist in the and that the area was a logical place to bury Ishmael. And then there's this photograph of the ancient altar with the inscription Nahum, which is donated to a temple. Guess when?

1:02:01 600 BC. Ah, It's Joe, you know, anybody? I wish it was an experiment that could be done, where you could take someone who's never heard of The Book of Mormon and just go around and show them all of these things. And then hand them a book of Mormon. Let him read like that. And then, like, oh yeah, I remember seeing that, right? Every member here about that, this must be a history book because again, if your baton 90%, that's a pretty darn good. Average.

1:02:42 Can, I mean that's, that's not just throwing crap against the wall to see what sticks that. Not only that. There were three bull's-eyes bull's-eyes of stupid things. You elephants horses, go play. Marley, it's all there cement. I mean, people still mock us for that and ignorance of the actual archaeological discoveries in, I would say in any other discipline other than archaeology today. If you were to come out whether it was you were trying to figure out the puzzle of the universe and you could hit 90 percent of what You observe. Yeah.

1:03:23 Action. They would be like, oh, that's golden. We're good then, right? To figure out but we're right there. Well, let's move on to the textual literary. Evidence is of the Book of Mormon and I want to start. Can I ask a quick question before we start? You can do whatever you want. I'll scream. Ah, yes. Explain to me. What chiasma Siz. I'm so glad you went there so I wanted to start know. I wanted to Start with names, but let's go to Kaya's. Kai asmus is an ancient Hebrew literary form. The ancient Hebrews were steeped in their in their poetry and how they wrote Things was very specific and it was very specifically taught in their synagogues and in their schools And it wasn't rediscovered.

1:04:26 Let me see here. And it's a form of parallelism, parallelism. So let's say you have an order, you're telling a story and in that story, you have five specific events and you start, you tell number one. Number two, third fourth and the fifth event and then you re emphasize the fifth event and repeat it backwards. So you go 1 2 3, 4 5, then 5 4 3 2 1, okay that is a chiasm that's a chiastic structure. Sure the simplest one, being Hickory Dickory Dock, the mouse ran up the clock, the Clock Struck One, the mouse came down, Hickory Dickory, Dock, those were just a reverse ordered parallels, right?

1:05:16 So can any shape? Yes, we're like in the Bible. Would you seek? I asmus because you'll find in the Old Testament. It's obscured because the translation process because the translators didn't know anything about That is so they wouldn't keep the same words off the top of my head. I don't have one. I was looking at one just the other day but I don't have that on me right now. It's all a lot of people. Criticize o people. Do Chi has was all the time, you know, Hickory Dickory, Dock the Shakespeare had some but what they cannot comprehend Is that the longest and most perfect chiasm known to the world. Today is in the book of Alma.

1:06:02 Really, the book of Alma chapter, 36, chapter 36, 30 verses long. The entire chapter, the whole chapter is one chiastic structure that has 17 elements. That are repeated in order and get to 17 repeats it. And then says, they'll 17 items in reverse order. Kai asmus was not discovered in the Book of Mormon. Nobody knew a thing about it until the 1960s. When a young missionary serving in Germany by the name of John Welch, that he and His companion were going to.

1:06:45 This Bible study with the Lutheran scholar and the Lutheran's Feller is teaching them about chiasma sand that it was evidence of Hebrew writing and these stupid missionaries. They go home and they go I wonder if there's any in the Book of Mormon and they found loads of them, the one in Alma being the most, extensive of them all. And the, in their excitement, they go, in the middle of the night. They knock on this Lutheran pastors door, the scholar, and they show him this class. This task was from The Book of Mormon, this chiasm. And he says, oh, this is a particularly beautiful example, what's it from? And he's a shallot, It's in the Book of Mormon, he slams the door and kicks him out.

1:07:32 Wow. So and Alma chapter 36, it's one thing to talk about it, but when I finally went, you know, and I was like, yeah. And then the literary evidence is are not as exciting and while we use cement and elephants and that's working until you see it with your own eyes, which is why the Book of Mormon was give it to us. Anybody can grab it and read it for themselves and what you will find to Joseph Smith was not aware of it. No, the verse the first vacation Of the Book of Mormon occurred in 1879 by Orson Pratt and you will find that the verses do not follow the chiastic structure meaning in 1879 or some crap, or anybody else knew that it was there, right?

1:08:17 It was there the whole time. So what I did, without reading anything, I went to Alma 36 and I started at verse 1 and verse 30 and began comparing And lo and behold it is exact and I've marked it they'll 17 elements in exact reverse order. One of the other defining purposes of the chiastic structure is that the pivotal element, so you have to 17 and reverse on repeating 17. Again, is the key point of that structure and it's usually revolving around God or Christ. In a novel 36:17, I remembered Jesus Christ.

1:08:59 A Son of God and that's where it reverses and verse 18, I cried Jesus Christ, Son of God and that starts reversing those elements. Again, the pivotal point of that, chiasm in chapter 36 is Jesus Christ. Hmm. What a coincidence and I have three or four or five of my favorite. Chiasm. 'S picked out all of them. This is the longest one you will find. It's the whole chapter. The Joseph Oliver cowdery Orson Pratt. Nobody knew it was even even knew that it was there. Never meant until the 1960s.

1:09:42 Way to go. That is just that's one of those things that I know as somebody who believes this. Not because first, I received a cerebral witness, or someone convinced me, you know, scholastically but because I received it spiritually first. but when you hear about that it, if you're if you're someone who believes in the restoration that should give you enormous confidence, going forward that this is not Not the religion of a charismatic individual who could get people to follow him. This has some Keith lots of teeth. I mean, you and I are just getting started. I have to tell you story, my father-in-law is a Fundamentalist.

1:10:36 Okay. Okay, he and I are friends and we love talking by just he's a terminally degreed intelligent, man, and I love his wisdom, he loves church history. Love talking about this. He didn't know about class - I mean, he's a True Believer when I was telling him about Kai asmus and he, his doctorate degree is in literature. So he appreciates the written were when he when I was telling about this and I showed him one, he just burst out and he doesn't do this. He says The Book of Mormon is true, which would you always knew? But it's like you and me when we see these things with our own eyes, it's reaffirmed to us that oh my gosh, Joseph Smith, he really did translate this and he wasn't, it wasn't a loose translation. A loose translation would not have provided a word-for-word chiastic structure.

1:11:30 Those 17 elements are repeated, identically word for word in reverse order. And and Let's, here's the other thing that I would say here to Kim, there's a picture of it. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's awesome. Here's the other thing I'm going to say for those that are tend to be the the progressive Mormons, right? Those who want to believe that maybe the Book of Mormon wasn't literal, or there weren't really playing with, right? And, I guess you're not going to get Kai asmus through and inspirational idea, right? You're going to get chiasma this by actually, translating something.

1:12:12 He could get a class Miss with two elements. It's accidentally, sure. But not 36, not like they're not 30 forces. Yeah, right sep 17 elements in Reverse with 1734. Total elements, the longest, chiasm known to the world and it's perfect. And it how it pivots on Jesus Christ. That's that is not an accident that cannot be an accident and it for those who say well, maybe Joseph read some Shakespeare, something like that. I'm like have you read Joseph Smith, have you must awake. He said, these are not people who are hanging out, you know, on the frontier of America going. You know what, go?

1:12:57 Well right now, a little Hamlet, that's not happening, but what I'm seeing themselves, right? So this is Joseph. Got time just to hang out and read Shakespeare. It's not happening and chiasma, this doesn't really from what I understand. The Western mind doesn't understand this, tell the early 20th century. So I asked, cosmas is a form of what is what people refer to as Hebrew isms Hebrew literary mannerisms that are unique to that culture. An article that was written In 2002 by Donald Perry. Great LDS. Collar goes through this multi page article, detailing 17, Hebrew isms All present, within the Book of Mormon will go through some of those admit it. But my favorite thing, one of my favorite literary, evidences are the names in The Book of Mark.

1:14:02 Crazy names, most of which you won't find anywhere else, right? Right. Hugh Nibley was writing, this is in the collected works of Hugh Nibley, volume 6. He says recently there have been discovered lists of the names of prisoners that Nebuchadnezzar brought back to Babylon from him the with him from his Great Expedition into Syria and Palestine. So these are Hebrew slaves they have lists of their names. What are they? These represent a good cross-section of proper names. Prevailing in those lands in the days of Lehigh and among them is a respectable proportion of Shouldn't names.

1:14:47 What? Why did the Hebrews have Egyptian names? Which is what the Book of Mormon would lead us to really expect. Why also in the list are Philistine Phoenician Ela, my Medallion Persian Greek and Lydia names, all the sweepings of a campaign into Lehigh's country. According to DW, Thomas, this list shows that it was popular at the time, Lee ice time to name children after Egyptian hero Kings of the past, a surprisingly large number of the non hebraic. I fight names are of this class, thus the name, aha, which Nephi General bestowed on. His son means warrior in Egyptian and it was born by the legendary first hero king of Egypt him. Die korihor Panky.

1:15:32 Pacu many Psalm zayas rom-com. Monty neffe Nephi and Xena are all Egyptian hero names. Wow. All the tested in ancient Egypt and it goes on. I'll give you some specifics but he concludes I'll give you his conclusion. He said Joseph Smith new a number. We're talking hundreds of names, there are over 300 proper names. In The Book of Mormon Joseph Smith, knew a number of typically Egyptian names, queer sounding words in no way resembling Hebrew or any other language known to the world of Joseph. Smith's time, it is no small feat, simply to have picked a lot of strange and original names out of the Are but what do we say of the man who is able to pick the right ones?

1:16:21 What does he mean by that, we've been learning that the Book of Mormon names are also highly symbolic the representative. They actually refer to the role of the Book of Mormon character, which is weird, How would, how making up names, but have them in the right context is an impossibility. Wow, hundreds of times, right? We talked about aha, how about Amman? Which would be Egyptian among in the Book of Mormon is the most common name in The Book of Mormon and the old world. I'm oh no. Moon is the commonest name in the Egyptian Empire?

1:17:04 The great Universal, god of the Empire, the temples are named the Temple of Abu coincidence. I'm an IHOP name of a country and city in the old world. The prince of Beirut under Egyptian rule the above might stand the same relationship to this name. What am I? Some of my favorites did you don't? I give you a name him brother of the earlier Amman him in the old world means servant specifically of a moan. Hmm was a servant of a so they are related. Him night, a son of King Messiah.

1:17:45 Hmn and the old world is the name of the Egyptian. Hot. God symbol of the emperor and goes, he goes on for three pages with this stuff. Wow. So even the names. Wow, what a genius. He was. Knowing all about these ancient Egyptian connections. Yeah. And and it fits perfectly within the time that Lehigh would be coming or that Lehigh would be in in the Holy Land. Right? And yeah, exactly. Because Egypt was a massive Center of Commerce. It was, it was pivotal during those times. Here's something else that I recently learned about the names of all the names of persons mentioned in the Old Testament. None of them are surnames Biblical characters, whether notable, or not, we're known by one name. Only what we find in the Book of Mormon, the exact same thing. They're known by one name, and those names is translated into the English language.

1:18:51 Neither use the letters q X or W and they never begin with the letter f. Yeah, I'm just sitting here thinking right now our own. I don't see him Foreman, we don't see that. So, there's there in the Bible notes, you x, no que, nor x no W or no f. It's exactly the same for the bottom line. Yeah, as you said that I was just sitting here thinking, okay? Can do no more Mormon? No? Yeah, so nothing hundred out of 337 proper names in The Book of Mormon, not one of them use QX W 4f or start with F. Boy, he was a good guesser, wasn't he? Well in that you know this has been I mean this is so fun for me to go over these again because you know you forget stuff but you know for here's one of my favorites. And it came to pass occurs in the Book of Mormon, a lot thousand, 1279 1297 X, Mark, Twain joke. He said if Joseph Smith had left out the many instances of and it came to pass from The Book of Mormon book would have only been a pamphlet and some are doing said and people laugh about that, but what they do not know

1:20:27 Is that ancient writing? And this is prior to the invention of the press. There were no, there was no punctuation. They didn't punctuation was the development of the modern printing press. And so, how did they transition from one idea to the next without a period or something like that? Let me guess it came to pass, right? Or, and so what happened or and then write those transition words. And there's a very specific word for that. In. The ancient texts. So, what you will find Let's see. In the Hebrew Bible which we would expect to have the same thing, right?

1:21:20 Advocate for past is the translation of the Hebrew expression used frequently and scriptural, histories and crawl chronologies and far less frequently in poetry. So, it's in histories and chronologies because they're showing a progression of events, which you would have to say, and next. And then, and it came to pass, right? So not a poetry, not a prophecies are direct speech. In the Hebrew form, the expression is found in Hebrew Bible. 1200 times in the Hebrew form in the Hebrew. It was translated in the King James version. And as Anna Kate past only about seven hundred and twenty-seven times. King James translators, probably thought the expression was redundant to cover some, which explained why they often translated it as and it became or and it was or just aunt.

1:22:10 On a number of occasions, they simply ignore the expression altogether, but in the Old Testament, it is as frequent 1200 times as the Book of Mormon, wow, 1,300 times. Wow. And now similar to Old Testament uses the phrase and it came to pass is not found in the Book of Mormon. When there are Psalms Lamentations Proverbs, which are all poetic forms blessing curses prayers. Speeches are dialogues where the / first person is speaking only when it's talking about histories and chronologies is a Decay Professor used in The Book of Mormon, identical to its usage in the Old Testament.

1:22:50 Testament. Joseph Smith was a blinking genius. you the other thing, I did, I started my own audit and in the Old Testament came to pass 727 that exist in English. It came to pass occurs once every three pages the New Testaments once every six pages and the pearl of great price, which is a more ancient once every page In the Pista, Sophia that we discussed it averages. Once every page while Book of Mormon, it's two and a half times every page, the closer a text is historically to ancient Egypt, the more frequent is the use of it came to pass. So let me ask you will find it in the doctor and governors of the teachings of problems.

1:23:45 Joseph Smith, it wasn't something. He was just throwing in to make it sound special, right? Right, translated. All right, let me ask you this about the Apocrypha. Were in particular specifically those that came during the time of Christ. Now Christ was speaking Aramaic if I'm not. Yes, yeah. We find that in the Pista, Sofia. So what that was after the time of Christ, right? The tell them that was Sophia claims that it was Jesus Christ speaking, right? The manuscript that we have dates to the 1st 2nd Century so it's really close. Yeah, it was written.

1:24:27 It was written in Coptic, okay, literature which is a Egyptian right? Or if it's related to yes, And it's hard to read out loud because it's not, right. like, An example. behind me, or And so much that they did fall back from before them compound prepositions back from before, do you see those all over? And that's an evident that's a Hebrew is mm. So just even little things like that are evidence that he was not making it up, he wasn't just trying to sound like you was King James eating it, you know?

1:25:47 So I it is extraordinary to say the least. So, let me ask you this. Why we're talking about Linguistics? Is there anything that we can link to either the Heartland or the the Mesoamerican model? That shows any sort of language that those cultures would have had that would have mimicked these these Hebrew Roots, two things come to mind, okay, there is a Mayan glyph which means and it came to pass. Wow, I think most significantly an LDS linguist ancient linguist has done a study comparing Hebrew to the ancient puto Aztec and languages and has found significant corollaries between those languages.

1:26:43 One significant and I was just listening to a podcast that Jonathan Neville was being interviewed. And apparently he's done the same with ancient. Native American North Eastern tribes and found similar corollaries. Yeah, I was going to say, I know the gender that one hasn't been published yet. I know. So I have, I have a friend that I surveyed with, who was was substantial, had a substantial lineage Within The Cherokee Nation. Yeah, and there's a group of Cherokees it actually talked about, you know, that their forefathers came from across the sea and when they analyze their language, there was a bunch of Hebrew Hebrew I can't pronounce it.

1:27:30 Can you're going to have to help me Hebrew isms with in Abraham's? Yes, within their language. Oh, yeah. And it's interesting that they're finding that not just in Central America button in North America as well. I find it fascinating that we can see those ties all the way through. I'm going to read this to you and stubs began to study. You do Aztec and languages. You noticed a lot of similarities to the Semitic languages. He had studied previously and he early stages the identity be identified. Several hundred potential cognates are words that have the same linguistic origin between Hebrew and noodle as Tekken several hundred as he continued his studies, a list expanded to over.

1:28:20 Thousand potential connections thousand and he discovered links to Egyptian as well. Who finally, after three decades of research, he published a comprehensive hence of study documenting 1528 total connections between Ludo has Tekken and Semitic or Egyptian languages. That's, that's amazing. I mean just the fact that you have the crossover with the language is just nuts and and I would submit that, you know, I think you can see you can you can even see a little bit of Egyptian.

1:29:07 Influencing in the architecture, if you look at the pyramids in South America. Yeah, I mean it granted their step pyramids, but it's still a pyramid, right? I'm entity. The first Egyptian pyramids were step pyramids, right? Right. Absolutely. And so the fact that we're seeing all of this and the fact that we now, because I think for a lot of Mormons we have this idea that that Lehigh came out Out of just this Hebrew bubble, right? That he didn't. We shouldn't expect to see Egyptian things with it with the exception of reformed Egyptian. But once you understand who Lehigh was, what his profession was He's going to be exposed to a lot of Egyptian things, right?

1:29:56 And those would be passed on to his kids, right? I can imagine Nephi. Well actually, we high on those Expeditions and trading and in being a merchant. And so when they come here, we would expect to see the same stuff. Well and it's initially, we thought that the Hebrews are trying to keep themselves separate and they would never use Egyptian names, right? Until these prisoner lists. Another show up, we find out that, that's absolutely false. Yep, you're naming their children. Have the Egyptian arrows gives as part of their had become part of their tradition. Not surprisingly. Let's transition into geographical evidences, here we go.

1:30:41 The, I want to save the geological evidence has for laughed. David Palmer put together a list of ten essential geography features from The Book of Mormon. Okay then 15 and I added a 16th cultural features that the Book of Mormon specifically named. So if we're looking at a book of Mormon land potential, it has to fit. All 26 of these parameters, right? The Book of Mormon has over 600 specific geographical references, 600 and you have the geological references will get to that.

1:31:30 So to find so well you know critical say well there you go. Doesn't it painted himself into a corner? There isn't any place that's going to fit all of that stuff? Except that there is so the ten Geographic, the geographical features a narrow neck and dismiss me fight, Limonite lands occupied at least three times as much as the west coast line. So the western coastline is three times bigger than the east coast line and I have the scriptural references city of Nephi was in a Highland. Valley zarahemla, would be in a river base down from Nephi, the Riverside and flows northward through zarahemla. Being into the East sea, the Waters of Mormon, a Highland Lake of significant size zarahemla, would be surrounded by nephite fortifications.

1:32:20 And he fights city was beneath the city of Nephi was three weeks, traveled, south from zarahemla. And near the Waters of Mormon, the city of Bountiful would be north of zarahemla and near the narrow neck of land. It was about five days travel from her own eye, and guarded the route to the land northward. And Kimura was near the Eastern Sea, not far from Bountiful north of the narrow neck of land. That's a lot to keep in mind, right? Yep. Cultural features that had to be City's. Large cities Towers agriculture, metallurgy. Formal political city-states organized, religion idolatry crafts, trade writing Weaponry, astronomy counter systems cement Wheels. They did have wheels.

1:33:14 We have toys that exist with that are that are web Wheels. Wow. Of course if they had wooden Wheels those are all be gone and the 16th I had are two distinct, two different. Ancient civilizations that Overlap, chronologically and older civilization dating from before, 600 BC. That that and they have contact at the end of the other civilization in the new civilization and that they were they overlapped geographically. Hmm the older civilization was in the land northward and to the South would be the newer civilization. Is there any place in the Western Hemisphere?

1:33:56 The satisfies all of those requirements? Yes. Yes, there is. Where is it? Baseball America. So it supports our model which holds up, so it's a new that look at more of it. The geographical reference is better than anybody who's ever lived. They say, he inhaled The Book of Mormon, he knew of my heart and he, and he developed the theoretical math, just based on Book of Mormon descriptions. And he compared the theoretical map to the actual maps and lo and behold there is and we could find we find ancient ruins corresponding with those locations. Yeah.

1:34:39 And and the olmecs, which are would be that ancient civil civilization. Yeah, that they were significantly older and much, much older. Yeah. And and they were they were northward now. I'll never say on this podcast where my allegiance lies. Yeah. But for my Heartland Brethren, let me ask, how do you square that with what Joseph said and it's found in church history. I can't remember which volume writes that letter back to Emma as there on Zions camp that marked and he tells her, I'm wandering Across The Plains of the Nephites.

1:35:24 Yeah. Seeing their bones strewn, across the plains. How does that square with with a Mesoamerican model then? The Book of Mormon is, they didn't have Google Maps, right? They didn't have drones. They didn't the Book of Mormon was was a record of the family of a family of people that existed in a much much larger cans, right? They could not have known anything about Native Americans in Alaska or Native Americans in Chile. And here's what we know, Native Americans have populated this entire continent for millennia.

1:36:15 and the other thing we know the vast majority of them have the same DNA inheritance Asian right, Asian DNA from Alaska, to Chile, all Asians with very few, very interesting exceptions, So then Lehi and his family by the way they were not Jewish. They were from the tribe of Manasseh. That's the first straw man. That is just dispelled. They and the other false assumption that Latter-Day Saints have is that all these Jared i'ts all died and there were none left. The jadeite record was just as limited. They have the the the the two warring factions at the end that killed exterminated each other.

1:36:59 But that was in the area of the Olmec. What what I'm believing in others. And so they could not possibly take into account the colonization. I mean they spread throughout the land for how long, how long would the Jared i'ts in the new world? And let's just assume for the sake of discussion when they got here. Ear, which is right after the flood. Let's presume that the flood was Global, right? So did swept the American continent clean, which is why I believe that your diets, when they brought their barges, they had to bring bees, they had to bring fish because they had to. Yeah, that's all that stuff would have been gone.

1:37:39 Great, and any case. So, they get here, this blank slate, and they spread, and we can presume that they. Well, I would presume that they landed in the center of all my culture. Which was near Veracruz southern Mexico in the curve of the gulf right and spread out and clearly they spread throughout North and South America from Alaska to Chile. Okay, is that DNA is all throughout the Americans, right? And they had almost 2000 years to do it. Now you can you tell me that ether was aware of all of those popular even the book of our does know what happened to kick-off, right? You know what the true three ships and Expeditions that took off and went heaven knows where right?

1:38:24 They don't know that neither the book of ether nor the nephite record can possibly account for all of these. Settlements and where these people spread to, they don't know that and my personal belief is that. There were descendants of Labor night and potentially of Nephites that had gone haga for one example, who went into the north countries, who went beyond the land. Northward, And some have called this. The hinterland idea. Because we know there were Native Americans in North America.

1:39:09 We know there were there, you know, obviously there were there when the Europeans arrived and we know that they were there, even before that long before that. So, I don't doubt at all that. There were descendants of we lamanites and effect. What Joseph, Smith's letter, and what his teachings about self-injury Hamlet. Do not identify is exactly who he was exactly what he was doing. There are exactly when it was, we don't know any of that, right? So, I to pin an entire Geographic model on a very ambiguous. Although, fascinating statement Joseph Smith. I don't think serves us.

1:39:52 Well, here's my other point. I mean, and I have a list of insurmountable. Geographic problems, insurmountable problems. With the Heartland model, you just you can't get around it. There's no fixing it. Now, on the heels of that every evidence we could possibly hope for exist in mesoamerica, everything. Arguably 90 to 100% of what the book arrived. It's already there, right? Why are we reluctant to go there? One of the issues is Kimora. Right, right. And the, it's part of the traditions of men that have crept in to LDS culture, Joseph Smith Never referred to the Hill Cumorah as Kimura until the end of his life. And he probably just You just called it that, right? And we already know that there's nothing in that Hill. I mean, you know, it's a Drumlin Hill. It's a pile of gravel pushed.

1:40:56 Glad glaciers, but nothing there. It's it's a dead end besides, which, in Mormon 6:6. Mormon says, I'm getting old. I'm going to take all of these records, all of them, and I'm going to hide them up in Kimura. Which was the place of the last great battle, right? - I'm not hide them all up, so that lame and Ice don't get them. Except for these plates, these few plates which I'm going to give tomorrow night and then he left. Morgan dies amarone takes those plates and leaves, and he wanders around for 36 years, by himself fleeing because the lamanites are still hunting, some of them escaped, south or hunted down moroni's, and say, where he But for 36 years, he took these little planes where could he have gone in 36 years all over all, he could have gone anywhere and where did he go? Ultimately to the place.

1:41:58 God knew Joseph Smith would be fourteen hundred years later, right? 1,500 1,400 years later and we know that that's possible because it has been done. So, mace American is think that the Camorra, we're all the records are or the tuxtla mountains. It's in southern Mexico, okay? Near very near Veracruz which was which was the hill Rama, the great and last battle of the, of the Jerry rights as well. Ironic that those two cultures should meet their demise in the same place and guess what? That is the heart of Olmec civilization. Right? And maybe the lab northward for the mice. Do we do?

1:42:39 We find like massive amounts of arrowheads or spears around that area that would lend itself to this idea of a massive battle that I can't address directly. We do know that Mayan culture is full of Weaponry, right? Towards and Senators curved swords they had armor. Now it's not like we In the Knights of the Round Table, has sure your kind of city that obsidian weapons, which were sharper than steel. Yep. And it could be stained with blood, right? I can't, I need like yard swords are stained with blood, right? Right.

1:43:21 How do you sustain how do you sustain steel? You know that any case they had curved swords and they had all of those things and people will we'll take issue. I mean they had but most of their Weaponry was not what we imagined. It was most likely, right? But yes, they have loads yet. Loads of evidence and evidence of exterminate Warfare of extermination. It was happening there a lot loads of evidence for it. So I let me there the list of insurmountable geographical problems that the heart ladders have to address Hey golf cannot as its claim navigate from the Great Lakes to the ocean.

1:44:08 That's where they think kickoff went well, hey golf. He departed from the western shore. And there was no way to reverse the Great Lakes. Then right? We didn't have. That was not a possibility. To the Mississippi River, which they say, is the sidon flows north to south is the opposite direction is that's sidon river flows. The seidman river should empty into the Seas, which are the Great Lakes and the Heartland model, but it flows to the Gulf of Mexico away from the seeds, the Heartland model uses. The Ohio river at the geographic feature, separating the land of Nephi from the land of zarahemla, while the Book of Mormon indicates that, that separating feature was a narrow strip of wilderness, Not a river.

1:44:58 The Heartland model has the lounge Bountiful southeast of zarahemla. The Book of Mormon has it northward The land of the first inheritance should be on the west Sea West from the land of Nephi. The Heartland model places, it south of Aladdin ephi on the Gulf of Mexico that is not even one of the season. And that the Hill Cumorah. Is south of the narrow neck of land. As they say, in the Heartland model, when the Book of Mormon says that they Hill Cumorah is north of the Isthmus of the narrow neck of land. There are those are some pretty significant issues that the Heartland model does not match the known, archaeology the Hopewell area that he wishes to make into the nephite that the chronology of that and the archaeological and cultural.

1:45:54 Cyril issues don't line up with certainly not as well as The Vine. By the way. When we talk about the Mayan, we have to recognize that the mind was his massive culture. Sure. That the Book of Mormon peoples are a subset of that much larger culture, which explains a lot of things. How the lamanites were constantly, outnumbering the Nephites. Yeah, the lamanites were recruiting from the Native populations that had been there all along it. Also explains how skin tone Could change sure the flavor, the level where intermarrying outside of the Hebrew tradition there. Intermarrying with the natives who were the Native Asians, right would take on a darker, Hue within a generation, right?

1:46:37 I mean, what's not a big deal. That's a very interesting, very interesting. Probably it supports the text. Yeah. So and nobody knows for sure. And it would be a delightful surprise to find some, you know, if I was here written on Summit. It's scription of my Palmyra, that would be cool, but not. But for now, I, the, the evidence unquestionably, the archaeological cultural textual, evidence favors, the Mesoamerican civilizations. It's all there and it's been there all day. And what's cool? Is it? Joseph Smith and his people and his friends. They didn't know a darn thing. Nobody knew anything about my right until the Stevens account in 41, which one it was?

1:47:26 When Joseph Smith read it? You'll man, this could be a book of word stuff. He was very excited about that, but that was the first real. Scholarly type reference to my and Mesoamerican culture. Hmm. Yeah. Do you have time for this? Do do, I, we got all the time in the world can if you logical. And this is a new approach geological evidences for the Book of Mormon. In the Book of Mormon in 3rd Nephi chapters 8. And then chapter 10 specifically it describes very specific geological events that destroyed these cities. Simultaneous, volcanic, eruptions and earthquakes in the first half of the century and submerged ruins. If that happened at 30 a.d., there should be geological evidence of volcanic eruptions, sure and destroyed cities, and, and tsunami and earthquake events and remains of those cities that that exists.

1:48:35 It just so happens. This is, this has one of my favorite book of Mormon archaeological treatments It's called the geology of the Book of Mormon written by Jerry Grover. Who is a professional geologist? I know who did Grover is, do you? I said a good thing is a very good thing. I like, I've never I've never met him right. When I first saw this book. I'm like, well, I have to have this and went on to Amazon to buy a copy. And one used copy for like $400 like man, I'm never going to own that and then I realized what Jerry has done. He's made it free. You go to his website and download it for free for colored PDF.

1:49:20 So here's my copy. I'll print it out and marked up nice. It is amazing. Amazing. So what he did he used to just because it was the most commonly academically accepted model, he took the Sorensen model. The meso America model and compared it against known geologic events. I know this is a professional John, it's pretty technical right? But he starts with the describing the destruction of these 17 cities zarahemla burned with fire Maroni cause to be sunk in the depths of the sea.

1:50:01 Moroni was a an establishment along fish, the Eastern Shore. Would have been a tsunami. Is there a fault line that runs along there? That would cause that slip fault cause it's an army, Bingo. Yes, That occurred simultaneously with a volcanic, eruption to the North in 30 a.d., the identifies, the volcano. Really, yes, yes, yes. Well, I Moroni hell I have covered with Earth was buried by some slide last night. Gilgal I had caused to be sunk in the inhabitants buried in the depths of the earth. Let's see.

1:50:44 Now, how do we know all this? Again, they didn't have Google Maps. They didn't have news or Wireless anything in 3510. It's Jesus. Who's telling them what has happened, right? He's recounting. What, what if what? What's wrong? I hot Malcolm and Jerusalem. I have caused Waters. Have I caused a come up in the stead thereof and we know that those are all on the shores of the waters, Mormon, Which we've already taught that's good. It's my favorite one Lake atitlan. Have a friend who's raised in Guatemala and you used to swimming at Lake all the time, really the Waters of Mormon and yeah beneath the waves is this ancient Mayan city called some of your job or something like that city of guardium be and granuloma Jacob, who I have caused to be sunk made the hills of Allison places thereof Jacob Lew got to be burned with fire city of lame. And Josh Gad have cause to be burned with fire. I did say I did send down fire and Destroy them. That's a very specific fire.

1:51:45 Yeah, it is right. So, with his lens is geographic, geological lands, he identified. What would cause these things geological events. Most of them would be volcanic in nature and earthquakes. And though, all these cities were the lad northward. Except for Jerusalem, Malcolm and on Ayah which were on the waters, Mormon and the lake atitlan. Does not have an outlet. Okay, look. Alright. So the waters rise, you're a big trouble because it doesn't go anywhere. It's one of the deepest lake in Guatemala or stuff like that. So let me cut to the chase here.

1:52:33 He identifies any yes pictures and photographs everything here? Whose fault segment, satisfies. All the necessary conditions given in the Book of Mormon, as the primary earthquake fault, system me as a photograph of it runs right along the beer. Crews are up the Gulf of Mexico, part of it, on land of part of it in the Gulf itself. It's it is a strike-slip fault which typically generates surface, ruptures fractures and subside ins meaning the land has. Yeah. It is located in the land northward where the worst damage occurred part of the fault segment is in the Land, South or any could cause damage in the Land South or did is located on an adjacent, on an adjacent, to the coastal plains, it occurs in areas that had significant population at the time. The Veracruz fault system also satisfied, most of the perfect preferential conditions.

1:53:31 It has a major volcanoes sitting directly on the fault system. The volcano San Martín it occurs within parts of the land, Bountiful part of the fault system sits under the water in the Gulf of Mexico and could potentially generate tsunami. It possibly could cause a fixed triggering. Some sightings in the city of Verona, there are five, there are major rivers that some lakes and lagoons on or adjacent to the fault which could quickly feel areas of societies. It's beautiful fit and and he and you can tell geological studies when those volcanoes erupted, the San Martín erupted around, 30 a.d., wow. With significant volcanic Fallout that we learned from Mount st.

1:54:17 Helens, it would bury anything within a 30-mile radius or something like that. Just the pyroclastic flow. Exactly. The pyroclastic flow. Kunai, the city of Verona in the end, he has pictures of the maps here does not say. With the end, does not sit within the anticipated area of directors grexit, sightings but is located in an area of soils, susceptible to earthquake, amplification of 1.6 points on the Mercalli intensity scale, being 43 km from the intensity level. 8 area would put it in the intensity level 7 area and by addition to the amplification Factor 48.6 because of the susceptible soils, look, Both faction could also be contributing factor to the subsidence anyway, while Samsung accounts for Moroni being sucked out, and then Jerusalem sinking. They got that.

1:55:14 I just love that. If you look up, there's a wonderful Advertisement for for people visiting Guatemala. And it shows, scuba divers swimming around and the sunken Mayan ruin and they got that long, but I just, I think is so cool. So interesting to get down there and see what kind of artifacts are down there. Yeah, burn cities. These would be within it. Was he put it? And we, he fills a map and all of these cities be would be within the area of the iconoclastic, flow of the San Martín eruption.

1:56:04 Then we get to the city Bountiful where the temple was and people gathered about of all about evil did not suffer. The destructor was causing these other areas, but they could see from the temple about across the river. Great destruction and of people. He's found that place. The temple in the land of Bountiful is not noteworthy because of the description of its destruction, but is noteworthy because it was apparently not destroyed. It was also situated in a geographic position such that the people were observing the great and marvelous change that had taken place nearby, the Locale also contained or was immediately adjacent to a much larger population just by Word of Mouth. 25 people hundred gather 2500 people got it.

1:56:48 The temple was also adjacent to some type of body of water 35 1910, the sorts of model identifies. The city Bonneville is being in the area of the current city of tala, which is located on the West Bank of the tunnel a river prior to its discharging into the Gulf of Mexico. So it's Coastal This location does lie within the McCauley's onate area of the San Martín. However, it is located on a stable Bedrock really so that if it was unstable Bedrock, consisting of conglomerate sandstone and stilted for so formations which may have dampened surface. Oscillations somewhat limiting the earthquake damage importantly directly across the river from Bountiful is an entirely different seismic situation as the soils and sediments. Our Marsh deposits and are extremely susceptible to Amplified, ground shaking and potential. Liquefaction till even explains why bottles Preserve in the adjacent places weren't so Wow, I love this approach become more scientific in regard to the geology, right? Even a matches it up to specific Book of Mormon cities in sight. Now, the majority of them that were buried near San Martín in the land, north were land northward. We don't have to dig those out of many, many meters of, I kind of classic.

1:58:19 I say that right? Not a kind of class. I, yeah, I kind of classic. Whoa. Yeah. A classic. Well, yeah. So he concludes says the swords and maces American. Geographic model is accurately supported by the non geological data, which is very specific. The cities that were burned, the cities that were submerged, the cities that were swept out to sea the cities that were spared all fit. How I mean the fact that would fit the geographical requirements, the cultural requirements and the geological requirements is mind-boggling, right? And it takes a lot of takes, a lot of put that stuff together to get there.

1:59:01 But so let me ask you this Ken, are you aware of any? Oral tradition. That the Maya might have about that time of Destruction, right? I mean, this is the kind of thing that should leave societal scars, right? I don't. Okay. There are some, but once again the problem is it's an old tradition that would be 2,000 years old and that was disrupted culturally by The Conquistadors and others who came in and basically destroyed their culture, right? They intentionally erased the memory of the Mayan culture because it was by that time at least Pagan Rite.

1:59:47 And we'll during the time of the Nephites, all the surrounding they were all Pagan, right? Yeah. Okay. So we've covered archaeological linguistic geographical geological. You said there was one more. Which one is that one? I think we got all sadly. Let me see. So we had go into the geographical. Geological cultural linguistic and archaeological. Okay, we we did Cover cultural then. Yeah. Alright, we did Cover Mall, dude. This has been so fascinating and and again I don't care which model somebody espouse, right?

2:00:29 As long as they're a believer, in the Book of Mormon, we can argue about this amongst ourselves, although, it's fun. I have friends who are DieHard. Heart, ladders, and we just get together. And we laugh, we had the best time. We don't pull punches. We had it, but we in it. Make you know what it does. It causes each of us to go back to the source. Yep, absolutely. And and so there there's there's Times to this debate, right? One is the in-house argument, right? Where we're like. No, it happened here. No, it happened. Here, that's cool, right? Because that's steel, sharpening steel. But I think that in having these conversations, the other thing it can do is bolster this idea that? No no there's history here.

2:01:23 There is scientifical scientific provable history that lends Credence and I would say pretty much a level of certainty that the Book of Mormon is a historical document, as well as a spiritual spiritual texts. Yeah. well, that's that's where I'm at and and once we get to that point We can have our disagreement, you know, people can have their disagreements all day long about where it took place. It's no fun for me to talk with people who I agree with about everything. What are you learn it for 30 years? And he said I made a mistake and I'm a heart ladder. I wanted him to go on because he's no dummy, right? Is very well-read.

2:02:21 I want to know what flipping and he kind of LED on. He says he holds the highest importance what Joseph Smith said right? All right and of course the issue with that is much of what he said is second-hand through others like the whole science camp and the Zelfs and I mean he wrote the letter to his wife but there's a lot of things that he didn't say where Wilford Woodruff another's, inserted their own and as a practicing attorney, they should know that people do that. Yeah, not intentionally, they just do. But right, right. Well, and the other thing it the Heartland model appeals to Americans. You sure the promised land is USA? Of course.

2:03:07 The Mexicans will say the promised land is Mexico. The peruvians was a the promised land as Peru, but the fact is they all Joseph Smith Brigham, Young and others believe that the promised land was the American, the hemisphere right hemispheric. Was it a nation per se, right? Exactly another. They had they believe in the hemispheric model right? To me, that's all of us when we first read it. Uh, Panama is a narrow neck of It right. Yeah. Well, south of the South America, the landlords of North America. But that just completely implausible, I guess the main thing that I want people to take away from from this episode, is that Not only should you expect to find significant evidences of the Book of Mormon there are historical. Evidences of the Book of Mormon that are substantial and as time goes along.

2:04:05 We seem to to be hitting more and more those bullseye bullseye. We are, we are. And as time goes along, I think we're going to come to a point to where there's going to have to be some sort of Reckoning where where the archaeologists are going to be forced to take a look at this new information and think about things in a much more open way. I maybe I'm just a pessimist but I don't believe that's ever going to happen before Christ comes I you know, I I have enough friends from my time back East because of all the work I did with some archaeologists that I have hope. I think the new generation coming up is understanding that there are some significant holes that need to be filled in. Now, how they fill that in?

2:04:58 I don't know. But you and I know I mean not that I have friends that are On the opposite side of aisle. And as I am in many respects, we have read the same stuff, right? We have, we know the same data and yet they will interpret that data to fit what they want to believe as I will fit it. And now, you know, there are any number of ways to look at it but you can't deny the, 90% of the Book of Mormon claims are now been verified, right? Come on, absolutely. Well, you know, and it doesn't mention this in a previous interview with you, a friend, says, well, Well, so he had so he had help from the other side. How do we know it wasn't the devil? I mean, we, you know, when they're making that argument, they could no longer argue against Joseph Smith was doing Supernatural things.

2:05:50 Absolutely absolutely, the resulted in all of these Wicked Mormons destroying the world, right? Right having families and yeah how terrible horrible things helping people and trying to Healthy and be nice. Do good. That's just terrible. That's horrible. Yeah, well Ken dude. It's always good. Thank you so much. And dude, I'm looking forward to the next time. Yeah, what? Then? Whoa. We're anything. Anything you want? Like I've tell everybody, once you've been on here, once you got a standing invitation my friend. Yeah, I'm game. I'm game. Anytime you're interested.

2:06:31 I don't know. Where are we? I mean, we could go any direction we wanted that we can with this was this was so fun. I'm so glad we got to do this. Absolutely, absolutely. I always enjoy our conversations and I always, always, always look forward to him. So dude, you're awesome. I love you and I appreciate you. Thanks my friend till next time. All right, bye everybody. You're listening to the Mormon Renegade podcast.