A parallel between science and the Book of Mormon about the mode of travel used by Lehi is feasible, because we have scientific evidence about the use of ships in the 6th century BC. In Phoenicia I give evidence that the Phoenicians were well established in sailing long distances. Their cargo ships were as large as the ships used by Columbus, and they dominated trade in the Mideast, probably in Europe, and possibly around Africa up to India. The Phoenicians lived in what is Lebanon today, which isn't an awfully long distance from Jerusalem. It is feasible that the reputation and exploits of the Phoenicians were known by Lehi and his family. In fact, when Nephi announced to his brothers that he was going to build a ship, they expressed disbelief that Nephi could build a ship, but they didn't express concern about the idea of a ship.
And when my brethren saw that I was about to build a ship, they began to murmur against me, saying: Our brother is a fool, for he thinketh that he can build a ship; yea, and he also thinketh that he can cross these great waters. (1 Nephi 17:17)
When the Lord first commanded Nephi to build a ship, he said
Thou shalt construct a ship after the manner which I shall show thee, that I may carry thy people across these waters. (1 Nephi 17:8)
We don't know if the Lord told Nephi how to build a ship using the methods used by the Phoenicians (or possibly by other peoples), or if the Lord gave Nephi a completely different way of building a ship. However it happened, Nephi built a ship as instructed by the Lord, and the people came to the Americas.
One question that needs to be asked is, Why aren't there records of some kind that document this migration to the Americas? My answer is the following. When the Lord, in a dream, told Lehi to take his family and flee from Jerusalem, he told Lehi that people wanted to kill him because of the things he had said about their wickedness. Lehi's departure was not announced in the daily "newspaper", and farewell parties were not held. He left quietly. In addition, there were no embedded reporters with Lehi to report to the Jerusalem media about Lehi's progress. As far as records are concerned, most of the maritime records that might have been kept by the ancient people have been lost. If there was a record made of Lehi's departure, there is a very low probability that record would exist today and would be found by our scientists.
So, in summary, the voyage to the Americas by Lehi and his party in the 6th century BC is reasonably feasible as far as knowledge of long voyages and ship construction are concerned.
Unfortunately, a correlation between science and the Jaredite migration is not feasible. To begin with, I don't have a date for the migration. The migration probably occurred sometime in the 20th to the 10th century BC, but I haven't found any descriptions of ship building or maritime escapades during those centuries.
The ships used by the Jaredites were described as "barges" and were tight on top, bottom, and sides so they could be submerged by large waves, and no water would enter the barges. It sounds to me like the barges were not typical boats that we would expect ancient people to construct, and this would make a correlation with scientific evidence difficult.
Finally, even though I don't know exactly when the Jaredites migrated to the Americas, it was early enough in the history of the earth to consider them a more primitive society than that of the Nephites who lived probably one to two millennia later. Scientists have believed that those primitive people didn't have the knowledge to construct sea-going ships. Because of this belief, scientists have believed the early migration to the Americas was via the Bering land bridge. In addition, migrations via the land bridge are believed to have occurred several thousand years before the Jaredite migration. There are some scientists who believe early migrations to the Americas occurred via ship, but the evidence for such migrations is mostly circumstantial and weak, and dates for those voyages are usually much earlier than the Jaredite voyage. Because of these reasons, I don't have a correlation between science and the Jaredite migration, and I'm leaving that issue an open question for the time being.
We do need to recognize that regardless of the ship building method that was revealed to Nephi, there were a lot of problems that he had to solve, and these problems probably contributed to the skepticism shown by his brothers. The problems would probably include the following.
ReplyDelete* The cutting, drying, splitting, and shaping of an awfully lot of trees.
* The mining and forging of ore to make the tools used in the construction of the ship
* The creating of heavy cloth and rope used in the sails (assuming the ship did have sails.
* Only 3-4 years in which to build the ship, according to the non-canonized dates given in the book.
* To hold all of the people and the supplies they took with them, the ship would have to be larger than the small ships that were used for trading along the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea.
And it came to pass that on the morrow, after we had prepared all things, much fruits and meat from the wilderness, and honey in abundance, and provisions according to that which the Lord had commanded us, we did go down into the ship, with all our loading and our seeds, and whatsoever thing we had brought with us, every one according to his age; wherefore, we did all go down into the ship, with our wives and our children. (1 Nephi 18:6)
The Book of Mormon doesn't say how Nephi solved those problems, and we are left to speculate about it. Since I accept the Book of Mormon as an act of faith not because of scientific evidence, I prefer to avoid speculation and to wait until I'm on the other side of the veil, where I will, I assume, get answers to my questions. When those answers do come to mortals, they will, I believe, come as part of the convergence of science and religion, and I believe that won't happen until we are in the Millennium.
You said:
ReplyDelete"So, in summary, the voyage to the Americas by Lehi and his party in the 6th century BC is reasonably feasible as far as knowledge of long voyages and ship construction are concerned."
No. This isn't established. Although it is speculated that the Phoenicians might have been capable of a trans-oceanic voyage, it has never been demonstrated that they actually undertook any such voyages. It has only been shown that they sailed in coastal regions and throughout the Mediterranean.
Secondly, it hasn't been shown at all that the construction of the ship by Nephi and his brothers was feasible. It was most emphatically not feasible.
If you calculated how large of a wooden vessel it would have taken to move the 20ish or more people across the ocean, with the food and water that they would need, and then calculate how much wood they'd have to chop down, saw up, season, and shape into timbers for a ship, actually construct the ship, prepare the sails and cordage, etc. it would be an impossible task for such a small group.
And remember this is starting without even any tools! Nephi had to dig up iron ore (with what?) just to get ore to smelt into iron to make tools. To smelt iron, you must heat it up with charcoal or coke (basically, charcoal made from coal). The carbon is required to attract the oxygen away from the iron ore, leaving elemental iron. So they would have to chop down wood to turn into charcoal, and they'd have to chop down wood to heat the other wood and turn it into charcoal. And then they'd have to chop down yet more wood to smelt the iron ore, and then they'd have to chop down yet more wood in order to forge the iron into useful implements. Just gathering the wood to process the iron and result with tools would have taken them months.
And then, after months of labor just to create some tools from unmined iron and a forest, they'd have to cut down hundreds of tons of logs in order to get the timbers for the ships. You can't make a ship out of green wood, so it would have to be seasoned, and for timbers big enough to be part of an ocean-going vessel for 20+ people, the seasoning time would be measured in years.
The Book of Mormon depiction of Nephi and his brothers, plus Zoram, and maybe some sons of Ishmael, and maybe with some help from the working mothers, starting with unmined iron ore and a forest and ending up with an ocean-going ship in three years' time is ridiculous.
And don't even get started with the "barges" built by the Jaredites. Phony, made up, fictitious, etc. don't even begin to describe that story.
-- Seth
Hi Seth,
ReplyDeleteIn my previous comment to this parallel, I commented there were problems that Nephi would have had to solve to build the ship. I noted that the Book of Mormon doesn't explain how Nephi built the ship, and that we are left to speculating about his methods. You've provided some interesting details about what those problems might have been.
As I noted in my comment, I prefer to not speculate about Nephi's methods, since we have no way of knowing how close our speculation is or isn't to the actual truth. Since Nephi was taught ship building by the Lord, it is likely the Lord also taught him solutions to the problems.