DiscussMormonism.com

Charity posted the following thread at MAD.

Evidence For Christ In The New World?, Is this a smoking gun? Or not.

This appeared in Meridian Magazine at the following link.

http://www.ldsmag.com/bookofmormon/071221birth.html

"Bruce Warren notes that in 1987, Dennis O. Clawson was examining the Olmec-Maya Long Count calendar of Mesoamerica to see how the proposed birthdate of Christ (Thursday, 6 April 1 B.C.) would be recorded. To his delight, the date was 7.17.17.17.13 1 Ben 6 Mak.

The 6 Mak portion of this date is the New Year's Day of a Mixtec calendar. The 1 Ben portion is associated with the birth of Quetzalcoatl, and the long-count date represents the beginning of a major calendar round. This amazing parallel to the Book of Mormon account of the Messiah in Ancient America and the unique but detailed correlation with both the Olmec-Maya Long count calendar and the Mesoamerican Calendar round is startling to say the least."

I wanted to get the resident mesoamerican experts opinion here...

Better yet, look at Brant Gardner's and Larry Poulsen's asnwers. I think they pretty well settled it.

I'm just curious as to the numerous "smoking gun?" threads that have been popping up there. Whaddup wit dat?

According to Larry,

It is possible that Warren may have looked for a correlation method that fit his preconcieved theory that they should match.

Naaaa, ya think?

More Meridian Magazine "scholarship" biting the dust again.

Surely, out of all the "smoking guns," at least one might be submitted to a scholarly journal for peer review. Scratch has made a fair case that LDS intellectuals are afraid to do this.

Gadianton wrote:Surely, out of all the "smoking guns," at least one might be submitted to a scholarly journal for peer review. Scratch has made a fair case that LDS intellectuals are afraid to do this.

You guys still can't get it right. "Scholarly" journals don't take much to stories of visions and angels. No matter what is produced, the story all goes back to angels.

Gadianton wrote:Surely, out of all the "smoking guns," at least one might be submitted to a scholarly journal for peer review. Scratch has made a fair case that LDS intellectuals are afraid to do this.

Is there any chance of Fox News picking up on this story?

Gadianton wrote:Surely, out of all the "smoking guns," at least one might be submitted to a scholarly journal for peer review. Scratch has made a fair case that LDS intellectuals are afraid to do this.

Are you surprised?

Suppose you found strong evidence that there are invisible dragons that live around us. The evidence can be interpreted to support you strongly. You have a career in academia. Even if your evidence was convincing how many of your peer reviewers do you think will risk their career and back you on this. If definitive evidence of the Book of Mormon were to come forth do you think academia would wholeheartedly support it? By agreeing with the submission you're not just accepting an academic theory you're supporting the idea of angels and golden books from heaven. Can you say career suicide? Things will only change if the evidence is so overwhelming that it can't be ignored. I don't see that happening.

I think we're stuck where we've always been. A few people explaining how wrong it all is and some people trying to make it plausible. It's more fun this way anyways.

In a kind of follow-up of Quetzalcoatl/Christ connections, Meridian has an article today about "the claims of the Hebrew prophets of Mesoamerica," where Bruce W. Warren and V. Garth Norman approvingly cite as corroboration a 1975 book about aliens from other planets visiting the Aztecs:

http://www.ldsmag.com/bookofmormon/071228evidence.html

Brant Gardner weighs in on Warren's previous use of this book in his online "Quetzalcoatl Papers:" "The most disappointing use of secondary sources comes from Warren and Ferguson's The Messiah in Ancient America:"

Gardner is referring to a "translation" of "a Mesoamerican tradition" told to the Spanish that resembles the Book of Mormon account of Jesus Christ's visit to the Nephites which Warren and Ferguson make much of in their book and the recent summaries featured in Meridian.

"This story is amazing, and is the best example of a parallel between Christ's appearance in the Americas and a remembered tale. It purports to be the record of an early Spaniard. The particularly interesting part of the quotation is the clear indication of a being descending in a beam of light from the sky. This is obviously close to the Book of Mormon description of Christ's arrival, and this quotation is the only example of a report of a being appearing in light, descending from the sky.

The story is too good, however, and very suspicious. While the mention of a deity teaching the people fasting and the sacred calendar are Mesoamerican elements, as is the evidence of a miracle being recorded in a rock, the rest of the text has no support in either the native sources nor any of the later Spanish authors. Where does this passage come from? The source is Tony Shearer's Beneath the Moon and Under the Sun.

While the passage is introduced as a translation of a text from one Juan de Córdova, this is an unknown source, and is undocumented in Shearer's work. This is not unusual for Shearer, however. He is not a scholar translating a text, but a poet. His works include Mesoamerican themes, and he is obviously well read in Mesoamerican literature...None of his works are footnoted, so where does this citation come from?

In Larry S. Ferguson's introduction to Warren and Ferguson's book, he relates an incident told by Shearer, where Shearer indicated that he kept "the Book of Mormon next to my bed and read it almost daily." (Warren and Ferguson, 1987, viii.) Although Shearer is not LDS, he clearly knows the Book of Mormon, and just as clearly used the Book of Mormon as one of his sources for this passage which he attributes to a Spaniard. In the context of Shearer's work, this is well within poetic license. In the context of a scholarly attempt to use the passage as evidence for Christ's appearance in the America's is the most ironic of circular reasoning."

http://frontpage2000.nmia.com/~nahualli/LDStopics/DigQ/16Secondary.htm

Yeah, what Brant and Blixa said!!

This is why I think Brant is really the only Book of Mormon apologist worth dealing with. His personal integrity and background will not allow him to capitalize on a very popular, but completely fallacious, attempt to connect Christ and Quetzalcoatl. Nor will he embrace obviously problematic sources, the way so many others do - including quite a few FARMs Book of Mormon apologist. (can we say "ica stones"?) Of course, he has other serious problems with his apologia in that he's forced to try and bolster suspect* connections while ignoring inconvenient truths**, but he is still a step above most of the others.

*suspect connections like trying to create a connection between the Book of Mormon Gadianton robbers and the later Aztec Jaguar Warriors, for example

**creating an argument based on Nephi sharing a new skill, like metallurgy, while not mentioning no Mesoamerican scholar believes metallurgy existed at that time period