Brack wrote: ↑Tue May 11, 2021 4:18 pmBut the Book of Mormon doesn't state that there were "others" after they arrived, and the Nephites are described as a "lonesome and a solemn people" within the text of the Book of Mormon. (See Jacob 7:26) The current FAIR response on Nephi's temple doesn't have the link to "Book of Mormon demographics" on this. Here is the current FAIR response to this.
I wholeheartedly concur with what you said. The text of the Book of Mormon clearly shows that Nephi, Sam, Jacob, and Joseph, separated themselves from their other brethren (Laman & Lamuel) and began a dynasty as a group of people who had no contact with other people other than the contention/war between Nephi’s family and the his brethren in which he fled from. The key word is “lonesome”.
Jacob 7:26 wrote:And it came to pass that I, Jacob, began to be old; and the record of this people being kept on the other plates of Nephi, wherefore, I conclude this record, declaring that I have written according to the best of my knowledge, by saying that the time passed away with us, and also our lives passed away like as it were unto us a dream, we being a lonesome and a solemn people, wanderers, cast out from Jerusalem, born in tribulation, in a wilderness, and hated of our brethren, which caused wars and contentions; wherefore, we did mourn out our days.
It’s also important to note that the various family lineages of *all* those involved in the story are listed in their entirety. There is nothing about another group of people who could have assisted in building the temple. The Nephites were a lonesome people who were under the sole administration of a single family ruler whereby Jacob said, “For I, Jacob, and my brother Joseph had been consecrated priests and teachers of this people, by the hand of Nephi.”
Jacob 1:13 wrote:Now the people which were not Lamanites were Nephites; nevertheless, they were called Nephites, Jacobites, Josephites, Zoramites, Lamanites, Lemuelites, and Ishmaelites.
That’s it, there was nobody else to speak of.