Did Joseph Smith use Local Place Names in the Book of Mormon?
From FAIR, the Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research

Similarities and Parallels

Critics have pointed out such similar words as Tecumseh and Teacum, St. Agathe and Ogath, Moravian and Moriancum, and Jacobsburg and Jacobugath prove that Joseph Smith was merely fabricating names in the Book of Mormon based on places known to him.

A Vast Area

Joseph Smith was not well-traveled, and he almost certainly did not have access to detailed maps.

Despite these facts, to obtain this list of parallels, a huge geographical area has been scanned to obtain names like Rama, Ontario (over 100 miles north of Toronto, Canada); St. Agathe, Quebec (north of Montreal and Ottawa); Shiloh, New Jersey; Jerusalem and Jacobsburg, Ohio; and Alma, West Virginia. Five states and two Canadian provinces yield this little list of strained parallels.

Biblical Names

Some of the names listed by the critics are, in fact, Biblical names. If one is going to suggest that Joseph plagiarized the names, why rely on obscure and sometimes distant American towns? It is clear that whoever wrote the Book of Mormon was familiar with the Old Testament, and so it is not surprising that some Biblical names were used:

Lehi — which is mentioned in Judges, is found in the name of the city Lehi-Nephi. This is clearly from the name of the two prophets of 1 Nephi. This is more plausible than making "Lehi-Nephi" come from the U.S. "Leheigh."

Jerusalem — Any Bible reader would know Jerusalem.

Jacobugath — The element "Jacob" is a well-known Biblical name. The " Gath " portion is also well-known as a Philistine city.

Ogath — the " Gath " portion is also well-known as the city of the giant Goliath, a Philistine city as mentioned above

Ramah — Critics suggest that the Book of Mormon "Ramah" comes from the local "Rama." However, the KJV Old Testament has "Ramah" repeatedly; "Rama" is also used once in the New Testament Again, a direct borrowing from the Old Testament (whether by Joseph as plagiarizer or by ancient authors) is more plausible than raiding the 19th century geography.

Shilom — A closer parallel than "Shiloah" in the U.S. is the Biblical "Siloam.” If one really wants Shiloah, there is the Biblical "Siloah.”

Names that didn't Exist in Joseph's Day

Critics scour modern maps looking for "parallels," and so use some place names that didn't exist at all when the Book of Mormon was translated in 1829.

Angola = Angola

This name is identical, and located within New York State . This would seem to be an excellent candidate for the critics' theory. However, the settlement at that site was not named " Angola " until 1855.

Tecumseh = Teancum

The critics rely on the fact that words which start with the same letter seem "the same" to us on a cursory glance. To get Teancum from Tecumseh, one has to take off the last syllable, add "an" after the "Te," and there you have it. Tecumseh = Teancum. Kind of like John = Joshua!

But could Joseph have known about Tecumseh , Ontario ? As a prophet of God, yes, but as a plagiarizer, unlikely. Tecumseh , Ontario , did not get this name until 1912. It was officially incorporated as a town in 1921.

Desperate to save this idea, other critics have suggested the town of Tecumseh , Michigan instead of the Tecumseh, Ontario , replacing a ridiculous candidate with one that is merely silly (and even further from Joseph Smith than its later Canadian cousin).

A check of the Michigan location reveals that this tiny Western suburb of Detroit had just barely been settled by a tiny handful of people in the late 1820s, but at least there was a village of Tecumseh in 1824. Insignificant and remote for those in Joseph Smith's area, it's hard to imagine Joseph being aware of that village and feeling some need to stick it on a mental map of the Book of Mormon. And while he may well have heard of the Indian warrior Tecumseh, it's still quite a stretch to get Teancum from that name.

Strained "Parallels"

Some of the supposed "parallels" are extremely weak.

Kishkumen and Kiskiminetas might be said to share a "Kish/Kisk" first syllable. But, what relationship is there between "-kumen" and "-iminetas"? Critics hope we'll notice the first and ignore the second. This is poor scholarship.

Moriancum and Moravian likewise share a "Mor-" first element. But, what are we to make of "-iancum" and "-avian"?

It seems no evidence is too weak when attacking Joseph.

Other Implausible Sites

Alma = Alma

Alma , West Virginia is another interesting name. Unfortunately, the town is so small that there is almost no information about it on the Web — not even a stub in Wikipedia. The satellite image of the town suggests that there might be a couple of businesses in the area, but there seems to be little there even in modern times.

With so many other sources of "Alma" to choose from — like Alma Mater, or the female Latin name, Alma, why do we have to drop down to West Virginia to find this "incredible" parallel? Alma isn't a city in the Book of Mormon — it's a prominent name for a couple of prophets.

True, there was a valley that Alma's group encounters in Mosiah 24 that his people briefly called the valley of Alma on their way back to the main land of the Nephites, but this is nowhere close to a notable landmark in Book of Mormon geography. The reality is that nothing available to Joseph Smith would have informed him that Alma was not a female name, but was actually an authentic male Jewish name in Nephi's day, a name that could have been brought to the New World by Nephi's group.

(See the FAIR wiki article at http://en.fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon_anachronisms:Names )

Conclusion

A modern survey of thousands of square miles and hundreds of small townships can doubtless turn up a few coincidental matches to Book of Mormon place names — or place names from any other source.

Cognates and similar names occur easily by chance and can readily be found anywhere one looks. (One LDS author has compiled a list of Hawaiian "parallels" that are at least as convincing as the critics', to demonstrate how pointless this exercise is.)

Critics are desperate to discredit Joseph, and so even resort to suggesting place names that did not exist in his day. They also resort to extremely small, distant sites about which Joseph almost certainly could have had no knowledge.

They also overlook the Biblical source for their American "parallels," which are far more likely and plausible than giving Joseph an encyclopedic knowledge of North American place names. Even if they insist that he wrote, rather than translated, the Book of Mormon, isn't the Bible a far more likely source for these names than obscure hamlets hundreds of miles away?

The full FAIR wiki article, including a complete list of all similar word pairs, may be accessed here.

If you have any topic or question you would like to see addressed pleased contact Carolyn Wright at http://www.fairlds.org/contact.php.  Just check the box for the Meridian Article Editor.

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