beastie wrote:I am trying to keep you on target by visualizing how, and why, apologists might unloosen the moors from “history” and more fully embrace the idea of an epic myth written by ancients. I think that’s what you’re about, as well, but by continuing to emphasize the actual social complexity of the region, apologists would continue to see good reasons to prefer Mesoamerica over Great Lakes. They have to let go of that altogether, as we discussed earlier.
Ahhh... OK. Yes. Well, my hypotheticals are piling up. I can see lots of different ways that the array of apologetic options brought into the service of the Mesoamerican setting could work for the North American. Epic is certainly one way of going about it, and one I find very attractive because of my classics training. For example, what is the likelihood that the Greek force that destroyed Troy looked anything like its description in Homer. In some ways it may have been more advanced, in others, who knows? Epic allows one to recreate the past in many creative ways.
In strategic terms you are correct. Arguing the
realia is probably not the way to go. On the other hand, I really like Ostler's combination of historicity and Joseph's input. I mean, who knows how far that could be stretched and in which directions? Some of the examples Ostler provides don't even deal with doctrine, but with the kinds of historical perceptions I am talking about here. It really is
that good. So, it is difficult for me to refrain from at least sketching out how that could prove useful.
beastie wrote:I know that a certain amount of apologia works by minimizing or discounting accepted science, but that’s going to continue to create problems for them with more educated “shaken” believers. If they fully embrace the idea of mythic history then social complexity won’t matter. As you suggested earlier, the Book of Mormon descriptions that point to a society of certain advanced complexity can be absolve through “translation artifacts”, no more clumsily than they currently absolve “horses”. So I’m saying forget about social complexity altogether. There’s no need to discuss mounds versus ruins. Doing so points apologia in a direction that will lead them straight back to Mesoamerica.
Gotcha. But, of course, every turn to Mesoamerica leads right back to North America in an endless circle of apologetic sweetness. Also, one of the things I love about the North American setting is that it is even less falsifiable than the Mesoamerican setting. Brant Gardner may read the contents of the Book of Mormon like a Mesoamerican Rorschach test (sorry, Brant), but the Hopewell civilization does not have any troublesome, extant history to deal with. It is just gone. No extant written record means nothing to prove wrong or defend. When you watch some of these Great Lakes enthusiasts speaking, you can just see how it is the sparse nature of the evidence that returns their musings to the level of folklore and speculation. Their imaginations are free to roam.
beastie wrote:I’m not positing anything quite as extreme as your “father/son” scenario, but something similar, like the Hatfields and McCoys. A generational dispute between families who detested one another. One of those families, through miraculous intervention, became “Christian”, and began the family tradition of writing an epic myth of the family’s history. I’m pretty sure I read something very close to this on MAD, except the believer used the analogy of LA gangs instead – gangs embedded within a larger society completely unaware of their ‘wars’. So I think it should be acceptable to apologists, but I continue to believe that talk of social complexity in a way that too strongly moors the text in actual history will keep them firmly in Mesoamerica.
Yeah, the father/son thing was pushing it to the furthest limits. The Hatfield/McCoy scenario seems to be the kind of situation the Mesopologists are reaching toward, however unwittingly, and surely that kind of thing could have just as easily occurred in the north. You are probably correct in the end when it comes to matters of strategy, and you would know, after all. I just love to see how many tools have been created for getting around the problems of a North American setting, by the very people who insist on a Mesoamerican setting.
“I was hooked from the start,” Snoop Dogg said. “We talked about the purpose of life, played Mousetrap, and ate brownies. The kids thought it was off the hook, for real.”
