Book of Mormon Evidence

BOOK OF MORMON EVIDENCE

Elder Janne M. Sjodahl

This yearis a centennial year in the history of the Church; for it was on September 22,1827, that the Prophet Joseph Smith re­ceived the plates of the Book of Mormon at the hands of the Angel Moroni. That was an event to be remembered now, preparatory to the great centennial in 1930, in memory of the organization of the Church.

The Book of Mormon is the most remarkable book in existence. It is a literary miracle from whatever view it is regarded. Since its appearance it has been assailed from all directions. It has been declared forged or spurious as to authorship; it has been pronounced a piece of plagiarism as to its contents; it has been ridiculed as imperfect with regard to composition, style and grammar. And yet the promise it contains that the Lord, through His Spirit, would manifest the truth of it to every sincere inquirer has been fulfilled in hundreds of cases, in all coun­tries, in many languages. In the entire history of the world there is no exact parallel to the Book of Mormon.

Comparatively little has been said against the doctrines of the book. Even the critics realize that they are the doctrines of the Bible, and they cannot, of course, be true in the Bible and false in the Book of Mormon. But the attacks have been directed against its history. The assertion has been made, over and over again, that archaeology does not corroborate but refutes that history in every particular.

That is a question which the average reader of the sacred record has, perhaps, no means of entering into thoroughly for himself. He must rely entirely on the testimony of others. The marvelous discoveries of the last few decades in the field of American archaeology are, however, as evidence considered, different to what was known previously as to make even experts sit up and take notice.

A case in point, as an illustration of this assertion, is discovery of a steel tool among the ruins of a prehistoric Panama. The Book of Mormon relates that King Shule, who was “mighty in judgment” as well against his brother, by means of his superior t discovered a method of making steel swords. (Ether 7:9.) Jarom tells us that the Nephites also had steel tools. (Jarom 1:8.) Hither­to the experts have generally held that the prehistoric Americans did not know the use of iron or steel. Mr. John Fiske in his admirable account of the Discovery of America (Vol. 1, page 31) makes the sweeping statement that “a knowledge of smelting iron was never reached in aboriginal America.” Critics have seized upon such dicta and tried to discount the Book of Mormon.

STEEL TOOLS FOUND

But now comes A. Hyatt Verrill, a veteran explorer for the Museum of the American Indian, and asserts that steel imple­ments were known and used in America by the prehistoric race. An account of his recent marvelous discoveries in the wilds of Panama appears in the January issue of the World’s Work. He has found, he says, the ruins of a mighty city, with, at one time in the long ago, a teeming population. He found sculptured pillars, some of which were seventeen feet long and nearly three feet in diameter, rivaling, it seems, in perfection of form and design some of the monuments of the ancient cities of the Mayas. On these pillars he found marks of chisels, not the irregular in­dentations made by pecking with a stone hammer, but clearly cut, delicate lines, evidently the work of hardened metal tools. And, as if to remove all doubt, less than two years ago he found, at a depth of five and a half feet below the surface, among broken pottery and embedded in charcoal, a steel implement, a piece of real hardened iron. Most of it had been destroyed by corrosion, but the chisel-shaped edge was there, and it is, Mr. Verrill states, “so hard that it is scarcely touched by a file, and will scratch glass.”

If his account is in accordance with facts, and there is no reason to doubt this, w« have been given as a New Year's gift this centennial year of the Book of Mormon, an item of external evidence of the truth and of the divine origin of that book, the importance of which we may not even be able to grasp in a moment. And I believe more similar evidence will be found as the explorations proceed.

There are problems to the solution of which archaeology offer no sure guide. But there are, on the other hand, some points which may be considered established beyond a doubt, by scien­tific research. Among these are the following :

1. That the Indians are one race—the American race—and not many races.

2. That in the culture of that one race several elements are dis­cernible, and that East-Asiatic. Semitic and Egyptian are among these.

3. That the traditions point to an early exodus from the Old World, and then to numerous migrations from north, south, east and west, of families, of tribes, or several tribes united : the cause of the migrations being, sometimes to escape a conquering enemy, sometimes to find new hunting grounds.

4. That some of the aborigines were highly civilized, and that many of their great cities and buildings were destroyed by seismic disturbances and volcanic eruptions.

On all these points there is, I believe, general agreement; and it seems to me that they are in perfect agreement with the main outlines of the history of the Book of Mormon.

American archaeology and ethnology have by no means said all there is to say on those subjects. But the scientists are dili­gently and conscientiously striving to find all the truth buried under the accumulated dust of ages. And their research is bear­ing fruit.

May I not suggest that we, as Latter-day Saints, read and re­read the Book of Mormon with some of the diligence scientists are manifesting in their research? It maybe necessary to do so in order to find out just what the sacred volume really does say, and does not say, on the history of ancient America.

When the scientists interpret their facts correctly, and we understand the Book of Mormon correctly, the perfect agreement between that record and archaeology will appear so clearly that he who runs may read. And for that reason I say that the Book of Mormon is a miracle of literature. There is no other way of accounting for its existence.