Circle Squared

Chapter 8: "Deja Quoi?"

 

Chapter Summary:

Ammon teaches the people of Limhi--He learns of the twenty-four Jaredite plates--Ancient records can be translated by seers--No gift is greater than seership. About 121 B.C.

 

 

 

 

 

King Limhi finishes his super important speech and has task-force leader Ammon recount all of the history of Zarahemla from the time jerk-face Zeniff left the city until now. Ammon obliges Limhi and even includes king Benjamin's final speech. It seems that Ammon is not just a hunk of a man physically, but he also commands an incomparable memory. He is the complete package.

 

After Ammon recounts Zarahemla's history the people are dismissed to their homes.

 

Hold on. Limhi started this speech after asking Ammon to help his people escape the Lamanites. When Limhi had all the people gather at the temple, I was under the impression that Limhi would break the news of their escape at this time. Why didn't he?

 

Having dismissed the crowd, Limhi brings the record of his people to Ammon. This is yet another reference in the Book of Mormon to more metal plates containing ancient history. According to the Book of Mormon, such metallic records were commonplace in ancient America. Too bad no anthropologist, archaeologist, historian, or scholar in any related field has ever found metal plates containing pre-Columbian history on the American continents. Not one.

 

This makes these references to history on metallic plates in the Book of Mormon appear as an attempt by Joseph to offer circular validation of his claim that he found and translated such a record. This is like claiming the bible to be true because the bible says it is true.

 

After reading the entire record (Ammon is apparently also a speed-reader), Limhi inquires of Ammon if he can interpret languages magically. Ammon says he cannot. I guess Ammon is mortal after all.

 

Limhi is disappointed in Ammon's lack of superpowers. Nonetheless, he tells Ammon of an expedition he sent out to find the land of Zarahemla, which came back fruitless; however, they found records of a people who had apparently killed themselves off in a great civil war.

 

This answers the question I had in the previous chapter of whether anyone had tried to go back to Zarahemla. I do find it hard to believe that they would not be able to find the city, being only two generations removed from the group which left Zarahemla. But this is a minor complaint. The larger issue for me is the fact that this is the second reference in the Book of Mormon to this self-destructive civilization, and I have a few questions.

 

The first reference to this civilization was in the book of Omni, in which the first king Mosiah (Benjamin's father), who found the people of Zarahemla, was presented with a stone engraved with an account of a tormented man named Coriantumr, who lived with the people for "nine moons." This Coriantumr carried with him this stone (large enough for a historical record to be engraved on it--which is strange in and of itself) rather than the much more convenient and supposedly long-lasting metal plates which Limhi's people found. So there were two records?

 

The first record (the stone) was translated by the first king Mosiah through the power of god. Since Ammon has no such power, the plates remain untranslated, at least for now. This does, however, inspire a superficial conversation between Ammon and Limhi that the ability to interpret languages through the power of god is the greatest of all the gifts of the spirit. Really, Joe? The greatest gift?

 

Greater than healing diseases, literally moving mountains or growing back amputated limbs? Greater than turning water into wine, or feeding thousands of people with a basket of self-multiplying bread and fish? Greater than casting demons into swine, walking on water or raising the dead? Greater than coming back from the dead yourself? Greater than turning wicked homosexual urges in to socially acceptable heterosexual appetites (I'm looking at you, Boyd K Packer)?

 

Ammon and Limhi explain that being a "seer" (one who can interpret languages with the help of god-powered magic rocks, like the ones Joseph used to "translate" the Book of Mormon and "find" buried treasure...) is like being a prophet on steroids:

 

"16 ...a seer is a revelator and a prophet also; and a gift which is greater can no man have, except he should possess the power of God, which no man can..."

 

"17 But a seer can know of things which are past, and also of things which are to come, and by them shall all things be revealed..."

 

"18 Thus God has provided a means that man, through faith, might work mighty miracles; therefore he becometh a great benefit to his fellow beings."

 

This is obviously more circular validation for the Book of Mormon designed to simultaneously boost Joseph's credibility.

 

Notably, the top 15 Mormon leaders claim to be "prophets, seers and revelators." Given that Ammon defines a seer as "a revelator and a prophet also," the self-appointed titles of these old white Mormon men seem redundant. "Seer" should be sufficiently aggrandizing.

 

In this conversation, Limhi also describes the plates as "pure gold" and breastplates and swords made of "copper and brass." These are more anachronisms in the Book of Mormon which have not been verified by any archeological evidence. We have no reason, other than a preconceived notion that the Book of Mormon is true, to think the pre-Columbian Native Americans had the technology to make such articles out of gold, copper or brass.

 

Some critics of Joseph's story of finding gold plates with an ancient record on them is that gold is incredibly soft and does not preserve details like fine writing very well. In other words, suppose that the Nephites did actually exist and they did actually keep records on pure gold plates; the writing would not have stayed legible enough for Joseph to read centuries later.

 

Apologists counter that perhaps the gold was mixed with an alloy, or perhaps a more sturdy metal was used initially and gold leaf was added. This is not consistent with Joseph's description of the gold plates and the Book of Mormon itself says it was pure gold. Furthermore, this ad hoc rationalization does nothing to explain the problematic fact that no other records made of these metals have been found in ancient America.

 

When you consider the fact that Joseph was a convicted fraudulent treasure hunter, and that no one without a vested interest in the Book of Mormon's success ever saw the plates without a cloth over them, the lack of historical and archeological support for the Book of Mormon becomes clear as day: Joseph pulled it all out of his conniving charlatan ass.

 

Eventually, Mormon does get around to describing these newfound plates. In fact, towards the end of the Book of Mormon, the record is included in its entirety as the book of Ether (a very apt name, considering how tedious it is to read). We are told that a civilization millions strong slaughtered itself to extinction because of a civil war. Coriantumr was the lone survivor of the last battle.

 

Millions of people, including women and children, died in battle. Millions of steel swords and pieces of armor were left scattered around a hill--the same hill, allegedly, where Joseph found the gold plates. Care to guess how many bodies and steel swords and pieces of armor have been found around this hill? Not a single one.

 

In addition to being a treasure hunter, Joseph also helped unearth Native American burial sites. Naturally the grandest cache of Native American artifacts in the presumably largest Native American burial site would make it into his book of fables.

 

Well, it turns out that, although Ammon cannot magically interpret languages, he knows a man who can! The king of Zarahemla, Mosiah! Well, mount up, boys. We are going home!

 

Not so fast! First we have to sludge through the next dozen or so chapters...

 

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