by Tyler Livingston on February 12th, 2011
The Book of Mormon narrative begins with a small group of people who arrived in the Americas around 600 b.c. and numbered less than 30 people. Yet, within 1,000 years, grew to a civilization of hundreds of thousands of people. While the dynamics of such a population growth seems astronomical, it has been dealt with by previous scholars. 1 What is important to realize is the vast amount of people that compose the Nephites and Lamanites in The Book of Mormon. For example, after the Nephites fled the land of Nephi and joined the Mulekites in the city of Zarahemla, it is said that the group was “exceedingly numerous” (Omni 1:17). Although, there were many people located in Zarahemla it was not even “half so numerous” (Mosiah 20:11) as the Lamanites, meaning the Lamanites were at least double the population of the Nephites.
Throughout The Book of Mormon, we begin to see hints of what “exceedingly numerous” actually means. Throughout this sacred text we see repeated mentioning of thousands 2, and tens of thousands 3 of Lehites in regard to lives lost in war, conversions, or armies. In the last battles between the Nephites and the Lamanites around 400 b.c., these numbers increase to hundreds of thousands people 4. James E. Smith, one of the creators of the Cambridge model for estimating historical populations noted that “With a moderately positive population growth rate of .1 percent per year, a population of 300,000 in Zarahemla in 87 B.C. would produce 450,000 in Mormon’s day.” 5
Any candidate for consideration to be Book of Mormon people must have a large civilization with tens and hundreds of thousands of people. If the population was not there to match these numbers, then they could not be Nephites and Lamanites. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Book of Mormon, General, LDS Scriptures, Uncategorized | 15 Comments »
by McKay Jones on November 8th, 2010
In my opinion, one of critics’ most harped-on “weaknesses” of the Church is actually its greatest strength: the lack of absolute certainty and infallibility, and the possibility that Church leaders could potentially lead astray. How could that be a good thing? Because of our purpose for being here, and the great blessing of learning through experience to seek, receive, discern, process, and apply personal revelation. That this is not a guaranteed error-free process for anyone, regardless of past success, is what makes this crucial, and what ultimately preserves and protects the Church from being led astray.
There are numerous statements from Church leaders, unknown to many, that expound on this seeming paradox. Comments on my recent paper for FAIR are welcome!
http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/Latter-day_Prophecy_and_Revelation.html
Posted in Anti-Mormon critics, Doctrine, General, Interfaith Dialogue, LDS Scriptures | 5 Comments »
by Allen Wyatt on February 16th, 2009
A week or so ago the world noted the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin. Dubbed “Darwin Day,” the event was met in the press with many stories related to evolution and the effect that evolutionary theories have had on not just the biological sciences, but also on society as a whole.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General | 111 Comments »
by Allen Wyatt on February 12th, 2009
In a different thread on this blog, an ex-member of the Church mentioned that he and his friends—some still in the Church and some no longer in the Church—regularly met for lunch and were able to remain friends despite their now-different takes on the truth claims of the Church. As part of his comment he made what I consider to be a very interesting statement:
Our biggest problem was that we maybe believed in the church too much…and to some here it seem too literally and then tried to learn more.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General | 239 Comments »
by Allen Wyatt on November 24th, 2008
One of the perennial debates that springs is how much control the Church exercises over its members. Ever since the early days of the Church, critics have charged that the Church exercises an inordinate amount of control over its members in their daily lives. Even today we hear resurgent claims that “when the prophet has spoken, the thinking is done” (which sentiment has been roundly denounced by—of all things—a prophet over 60 years ago) and the concept that Mormons are somehow brainwashed. (This last charge is particularly prevalent among those who need, for whatever reason, to classify Mormonism as a cult.)
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General, News stories | 35 Comments »
by Keller on September 12th, 2008
Recently FAIR (via Ask the Apologist feature) was queried about whether the Church’s website was knowingly misusing the popular 6% divorce from temple marriage statistic. Its main promoter has been Daniel K. Judd. He gave a BYU devotional in 2006 and defended the 6% figure. A partial transcript of Judd’s comments about his prior (2000) LA Times newspaper interview can be found here. Judd explains that divorce statistics are very dependent on how one collects and calculates the data. My co-blogger, Steven Danderson, pointed out that the high divorce rates that people are most familiar with are calculated (for example by the government) on a yearly basis by dividing the number of recorded divorces by the number of recorded marriages. As will be shown, the research that Judd refers to uses a different counting scheme, which is nevertheless well within the norms of academic journals. I think Judd and the LDS Church can continue to use the figure in good faith.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General, Temples | 6 Comments »
by Allen Wyatt on July 10th, 2008
An interesting “news” piece has appeared on the Signature Books website in the last few days. The undated piece, entitled Fair-weather Friends at FARMS and FAIR,” is interesting and somewhat amusing. Most interesting is why it would even appear as “news” on the website of a book publisher. It is not about one of their books or one of their authors; it is not about any of their employees; it is not about the company; it is not about the company’s financiers. What, then, makes a mention about FAIR’s analysis of a recent Book of Mormon geography publication news worthy?
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General, News stories, Uncategorized | 17 Comments »
by Rachel Lynch on June 24th, 2008
I have been involved in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints all my life. I was raised into it, nurtured by it, and used it as a crutch to lean on when things in life became difficult. And things were often difficult. My childhood was spent in the small Santa Cruz mountain town of Boulder Creek, California. Population 8,000 where true civilization is miles away and there are more tattoo parlors and tie dye shops than grocery stores, drug stores and gas stations combined. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in General, Women | 7 Comments »
by Allen Wyatt on May 5th, 2008
On the “Setting the Record Straight” thread there was a comment made by MarkW that indicated that Tracy Bachman, wife of Tal Bachman, had independently corroborated Tal Bachman’s story of what was said by their ex-stake president.
MarkW said: Actually, his wife did speak publicly about this at the exmo conference. So there is corroboration from her. I don’t remember how specific or on-point it was, so we’d have to go back and review that. And while her witness would not be direct corroboration of Tal’s meeting with the SP it’d be corroboration that the SP did say the type of things in question to someone else.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Anti-Mormon critics, General | 23 Comments »
by Mike Ash on February 13th, 2008
Heretic that I am, I regularly read the Skeptic and the Skeptical Inquirer (2 magazines that regularly attempt to debunk anything that seems to be unscientific). Although I don’t agree with everything in their magazines (much of it is atheistic), I do like a lot of what they print.
The other day I picked up the latest copy of the Skeptical Inquirer and found that the first article I read tied neatly into LDS apologetic efforts. The article is entitled “Difficulty in Debunking Myths Rooted in the Way the Mind Works,” by Shankar Vedantam. Here are some quotes, paraphrases, and summaries of the article.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Anti-Mormon critics, General | 5 Comments »
