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by Brant Gardner
This article
is from a presentation given at the 2001 FAIR conference. Brant
Gardner will be speaking again at this year’s conference, August
7th and 8th at UVSC in Orem, UT. The
conference is open to the public, but you must register in
advance. For more information, or to register for the conference, click
here: FAIR
conference information.
In piecing together a jigsaw puzzle, the most helpful tool is the picture
on the box that tells us what the completed puzzle should look
like. Seeing that larger picture, the small pieces that may
not be immediately intelligible on their own can find a place,
and the puzzle is more amenable to solution. The Book of Mormon
is just such a historical puzzle, but the box doesn't favor
us with the picture. Finding the overall picture becomes yet
another piece of our puzzle.
The task for a historical understanding of the Book of Mormon is complicated
in that there are a minimum of two pictures required to help
us understand the historical framework in which Book of Mormon
events took place. Both the Old World and the New World provide
gross locations for historical context. Of the two, the most
accessible is the Old World context, because we know the essentials
of time, location, and contemporary culture.
In this paper, I examine the New World in an attempt to find a similar
time, context, and contemporary culture with which to better
see the text of the Book of Mormon. Before suggesting an answer,
however, it is incumbent upon us to know when we have found
a plausible big picture. How do we know when we have found
something that approaches probability rather than sheer coincidence?
If I suggest that such nineteenth-century-sounding elements
such as tents, scalping, democracy, and infant baptism are
coincidence--and I do--how may I judge such a statement objectively?
Establishing Points of Correspondence
The Book of Mormon differs from a jigsaw puzzle in that it is not a complete
representation of the overall cultural picture in which it
participates. Because the text does not clearly spell out the
relevant location and contemporary culture, we are free to
float among possible pictures, picking points of correspondence
between a picture we understand, and the text before us. That
method leads to a collection of coincident points, but not
to a comprehensive and plausible picture of the contemporary
culture behind the text. To find the correct picture, instead
of only a possible picture, we must have particular types of
correspondences. The best picture will not have simple points
of correspondence, but rather complex ones. A simple correspondence
would be tents. It is easy to say that the American plains
Indians had tents, and that this provides a context for the
Book of Mormon. It is also quite plausible to understand tents
as temporary structures from ancient Mesoamerica. As a simple
connection, the interpretive world can freely spin around the
coincident point, because there are no other aspects of a complex
correlation that anchor the text to a particular time and place
for that tent. Ideal complex correlations create multiple connection
points that all rely upon the same time and place. The work
done on Lehi's trail is an excellent example of where multiple
complex points of correspondence exist between text and known
geography and history. As an indicator of the time, location,
and cultural context of the Book of Mormon, the complex set
of correspondences involved in Lehi's trail are a much more
powerful indicator of the correct picture than the single point
of the idea of tents.
The next requirement for the picture is that we have interconnected complex
correlations. If we have a single one, that is suggestive.
If we have two, that is even better--unless they two refer
to completely different times and places. Having a solid complex
set of correspondences for Lehi's trail gives us nothing if
our New World evidences become simple, and are pulled from
multiple cultures in multiple locations as was the tendency
not that long ago. What we need to find are multiple interconnected
complex sets of connection points between the Book of Mormon
and a proposed cultural context. As a very last requirement,
the best interpretive schemes are productive, that is, they
teach us more about the text than we see in the text without
that interpretive picture behind it.
Time, Location, and Context
The three critical components of an interpretive picture are time, location,
and context. Of these three, this paper will deal only with
the third, the cultural context. Time is given to us in the
text. We really only have to look at two time periods for our
possible picture of the Book of Mormon, the timeframe given,
and Joseph Smith's day. The text will either be ancient and
therefore reflect the time period it says it does, or it will
be a modern fabrication more accurately reflecting a modern
time period. That is an issue that is settled by the answers
to the location and cultural aspects of the examination.
For location, I am suggesting that the Limited Tehuantepec Theory, particularly
in the flavor suggested by John L. Sorenson, is the most complex
and interconnected set of geographical and climatic correspondences
for a plausible location for the Book of Mormon's New World
events. Given time and a target place, we may now turn to known
culture to see if we find similar sets of complex interconnected
touchstones between the cultural content of Mesoamerica and
the Book of Mormon for similar time periods. What we will attempt
is the application of the known picture of Mesoamerican from
Book of Mormon times to see how that picture may inform the
historical puzzle of the text.
Cultural Influences on the Early Lehites
We necessarily begin with the origin of Lehi's people in the New World.
It is indisputable that Lehi and his company landed on a coast,
and the coast of Guatemala is our plausible location, according
to Sorenson's reconstruction. If a ship carrying Lehi's party
was to have arrived on the coast of Guatemala approximately
590 years before Christ, what might they have found? Would
they have been alone or were other people already there?
The archaeological survey of the Middle Formative sites for the coast
of Guatemala deals with sites dated some two hundred years
earlier than Lehi's landing, so we need to make some inferences.
Two hundred years prior to Lehi's arrival there were seven
settlements ranging from one household to twelve households.1 After
this time, the coastal areas saw a peak of population density
not seen until the Late Classic period, over a thousand years
later. It is important to understand that the settlement areas
were not necessarily larger, but simply more numerous.2
What this tells us is that Lehi's company would have found it nearly impossible
to remain isolated for long, if they were ever completely isolated
at all. Even with a relatively sparse settlement along the
coast, the typical radius for finding food would have led to
some overlap of territories among the various populations.
Those settlements that had been in place for years would have
known of the other settlements on the coast. Smoke from cooking
fires would easily be seen on certain scouting trips, and contact
with a new entrant into the area would be virtually certain.
It is quite probable that the arrival of a ship with sails
would have been noticed while still on the horizon, and Lehi's
ship might plausibly have been met by some of these residents
of coastal Guatemala.
Secondly, we have Lehi's company entering an area dominated by small hamlets
and perhaps a few villages. Such conditions would favor the
acceptance of their party into those small communities. If
they were seen as bringing important skills, a hamlet or two
might be willing to join with them, and even willing to cede
leadership to the new arrivals. Larger cities, however, might
see them as threats and be less likely to desire to merge with
them. They would surely not be willing to give up their sovereignty
in favor of the newcomers, as the text indicates for Lehi's
party. The conditions along the coast of Guatemala would therefore
favor both contact with existing populations, and the possibility
of merger with some of those native inhabitants.
Lehi's company had every reason to accept aid from, and a merger with,
local populations. Lehi's group planted seeds from the Old
World, but a rapid acquisition of information about survival
skills particular to the New World would have been extremely
important. They would have needed to know about the local food
sources that were successful, the local sources of materials
for clothing, the locations and types of clay for pottery,
and any number of location-specific cultural items.
Scriptural Indications of Cultural Merger
The first indication we have that this merger took place, and took place
this early, comes from the description Nephi gives us of the
separation of his party from that of his brothers, Laman and
Lemuel. Nephi describes the flight of his people:
And
it came to pass that the Lord did warn me, that I, Nephi, should
depart from them and flee into the wilderness, and all those
who would go with me. Wherefore, it came to pass that I, Nephi,
did take my family, and also Zoram and his family, and Sam,
mine elder brother and his family, and Jacob and Joseph, my
younger brethren, and also my sisters, and all those who would
go with me. And all those who would go with me were those who
believed in the warnings and the revelations of God; wherefore,
they did hearken unto my words.3
Nephi names those who leave, including "all those who would go with
me." When we account for the named or mentioned individuals,
there is very little room for "all those who would
go" in the original landing party. In fact, using
mentioned people and their logical progeny, the only ones clearly
unaccounted for in the division are the sons of Ishmael. Regardless
of whether they stayed with the Lamanites or went with Nephi,
it would certainly seem that if "all those who would go" were
only one or two people, we would expect that Nephi might make
mention of them, at least by their head of household, as he
does for the families of Zoram, Sam, Jacob, and Joseph. The
best hypothesis to explain Nephi's inclusion of "all those
who would go" is that it referred to those of the hamlet
(or perhaps hamlets?) that had joined with the Lehites.
With the addition of "others" into Nephi's party we have a larger
core of people than we could possibly have with the segregation
of only those who arrived with Lehi. Three events described
for the early city of Nephi would appear to confirm the presence
of more people than those who had come from the Old World.
About thirty years after the departure from Jerusalem, Nephi
describes some of the events of the establishment of the city
of Nephi. First, Nephi describes having not only built dwellings,
but also a temple.4 Public
building projects require excess labor. Even on a modest scale,
a public building takes time and resources away from daily
life. The very existence of a public building suggests a larger
population than the pure Old World immigrants and their natural
increase.
The second event that indicates the presence of a larger population is
the declaration of Nephi as king.5 Small
hamlets do not have kings. To name one of a dozen men "king" is
an insult, not a compliment. Finally, we have the designation
of Jacob and Joseph as priests and teachers "over the
land of my people."6 Were
we to assume only Old World peoples at this point, we have
a king and two priests servicing perhaps ten households. The
early Nephite political/religious structure is too top heavy
for so few people. The only situation that sufficiently explains
our text is the presence of non-Old World peoples at this early
date.
The plausible presence of these "others" among the Nephites
at this early point in Nephite history provides a context for
a strange choice Nephi makes when recording on his personal
plates. In 2 Nephi 6, Nephi records a sermon that Jacob gave.
This is an odd discourse in the absence of any explanatory
background. Jacob addresses a population that has recently
established a city, and may still be in the throes of establishing
that city and their way of life, and he preaches to them about
a text from Isaiah that deals with the long distant future
salvation of Israel through the Gentiles. Of all of the possible
concerns for a people recently established in a new world,
let alone a new city, why discourse on an event thousands of
years away, and dealing with Gentiles in the Old World? To
top off this mystery, we have Jacob's statement that it was
Nephi, the king, who suggested this topic.7
When we look at the sermon again with our understanding of the likely
presence of a goodly number of non-lineal Israelites in the
early city of Nephi, that sermon becomes precisely the type
of sermon that a king might request. We can easily imagine
tensions between the two cultures arising, and a wise king
noting the importance of "Gentiles," or non-lineal
Israelites, as the salvation of Israel, or the literal descendants
of Lehi. Nephi would be "likening" this future situation
to that of his own community. The not-so-subtle message would
be that these "others" in their midst would be essential
to the salvation of the Old World lineages. Rather than a discourse
on a theological future, it is a strong commentary on an important
social present.
Riches, Costly Apparel, and Polygyny
click to enlarge
So far we have examined points of correspondence that only require contact
with another people. Now we turn to events that require the
particular cultural content of Mesoamerica at the very time
period of the Book of Mormon event. The first example is another
of Jacob's sermons. In this case, we have Jacob's first recorded
sermon in his own book, encompassing Jacob chapters 2 and 3.
This sermon is much more problematic than Jacob's discourse
on the future salvation by Gentiles. The first problem is his
choice of topics. Jacob has two major problems with his people.
He will decry their use of riches, and he will preach against
their adoption of polygyny.
On the surface of the discourse we have the structural problem of the
relationship between these two topics. Even given the presence
of both problems in society, what is the linkage between the
two that suggests that they be treated in the same sermon?
When we examine the specifics of each of his sections, we end
up with even more problems.
We begin with Jacob's sermon on riches. Our first problem with Jacob's
sermon is that he is presenting what would be an impossible
situation if we assume the city of Nephi is isolated in the
land. He suggests that they have become wealthy because of
the gold and silver that they have found, elements that he
calls abundant.8 This
should be impossible. First of all, in a Mesoamerican economy,
gold and silver had no intrinsic value. They continued to lack
intrinsic value for Mesoamerican populations up to the time
of the Conquest when the Spaniards rather forcibly imposed
their own values for gold and silver. Secondly, it is hard
to get rich from gold and silver ore. Third, it is difficult
to get rich on anything that anyone can find in abundance.
Finally, we have the manifestation of this wealth in "costly apparel."9 This
is another situation that should not exist. In an isolated
community with no department stores, clothing is made by the
community. The same materials are available to all; the same
dyes are available to all. Even stylistic changes tend to be
widely copied. It is quite common for villages to have an almost
uniform dress rather than a segregation created by dress. Under
the assumptions that are commonly brought to the Book of Mormon
text, that of a group of people alone in the land, it should
be virtually impossible to have "costly apparel."
There is a condition, however, that explains all of Jacob's economic problems.
That condition is trade. As will be noted, not just
any trade, but trade in Mesoamerica at this particular point
in time. As noted for the coastal region of Guatemala, there
were others in the land when the Lehites arrived, and archaeology
tells us that there are other populations and cities in the
general land when the Nephites arrive at the location of their
city, presumed to have been in the Guatemalan highlands. If
we assume that the gold and silver were being worked, using
metalworking skills Nephi could have taught them, then these
worked goods would have exchange value with other cities, and
the resulting importation of goods creates a situation where
those engaged in the trade accumulate more unique prestige
goods than those who do not trade outside of their own city.
Thus trade provides precisely the conditions Jacob is combating.
The process of trade would have brought not only esoteric goods, but also
a mechanism for the very social differentiation that Jacob
excoriates. This is the cultural problem behind the "costly
apparel" that will become one of the hallmark themes of
the competing religious ideas throughout the rest of the Book
of Mormon. In Mesoamerica, the time period of the early Nephites
saw developing social stratification, and an increasing pressure
towards kingship in the cities of the Maya lands. This social
differentiation was supported by the accumulation of esoteric
goods, often displayed on the clothing of the elite. As Schele
and Mathews put it, "People throughout Mesoamerica wore
these currencies as jewelry and clothing to display the wealth
and enterprise of their families."10 Bringing
in clothing and adornments from other locations is a way to
create a differentiation in dress. When the clothing itself
becomes the display mode for elite consumption goods, then
the costly apparel in and of itself becomes the marker of the
increasing economic and social distance between developing
classes. It is important to remember that Jacob's issue is
never wealth, but rather the social stratification that was
based on wealth. The costly apparel was a unique Mesoamerican
mode of creating and displaying that social separation. The
pressures for creating social stratification that we see beginning
in the city of Nephi mirror the greater trend in the entire
Mesoamerican cultural area at just this point in time.
The presence of trade relations with other Mesoamerican communities therefore
provides a context in which we may understand Jacob's sermon
denouncing social stratification through wealth, particularly
wealth manifest through costly apparel. It is that very same
context that explains both why he also preaches against polygyny
and some of the anomalies of that particular discourse. Before
looking at the cultural background, we again must note that
Jacob's denunciation of polygyny is problematic for multiple
reasons, none of which have to do with the obvious difference
between Jacob's denunciation and historical LDS polygamy.
First, Jacob consistently equates having more than one wife with whoredoms
and unchastity. This is as impossible as valuable gold that
is easily found. Note that Jacob clearly speaks of wives, not
of harlots. All societies that accept multiple wives
have legal regulations that legitimize the union. A plural
wife is a wife, and relations with a wife do not fall under
the rubric of whoredoms in any society. Thus, Jacob is somehow
in the position of having a type of union that someone recognizes
as a wife, but which he (and the Lord) does not. Jacob also
describes the fate of the wives and children in ways that make
no sense. He speaks of the daughters of Jerusalem being led
away captive11 and
their children being brought into destruction.12 It
is hard to see how the very fact of multiple wives can be equated
to captivity, and cause the destruction of their children.
Many factors in a marriage might be considered to yield such
an end, but not the very fact of a marriage.
Once again, the cultural context of Mesoamerica gives us a way of seeing
this text and removing those difficulties. The same context
of trade provides the answer. The development of social segregation
in Mesoamerica has been the subject of multiple theories and
studies, but one study uses the archaeological information
to support the hypothesis that the development of "institutionalized
social inequality and political privilege"13 was
due to the internal social pressures of personal advancement.
In terms of this theory, such seekers of advantage are termed "aggrandizers."
"Aggrandizers
simply strive to become more influential. It is the successful
deployment of resources and labor that ultimately ensure the
social and political longevity of an aggrandizer."14 Building
renown commences in the nuclear unit of production. An aggrandizer
first accumulates deployable resources by the sweat of his
brow, and through the efforts of his wife (wives) and children.
The more wives and children the better."15
click to enlarge
The linkage between economics and multiple wives is absolutely parallel
between Mesoamerica and the situation we see in the city
of Nephi. The communities with which trade would have been
established
would certainly have had men with multiple wives among the
most influential, and those would also be the ones with the
most excess production to trade. Along with the trade goods,
the mechanisms of achieving the excess production for trade
would be carried back to the Nephites. The Nephite men who
were taking wives were precisely the same as those who were
seeking to exalt themselves over their neighbors, using the
trade-acquired "costly apparel." These particular
Nephites fit the description of the aggrandizers, and it
would not be surprising that they would attempt to adopt
the accumulation
methods of those they saw as successful role models for trade.
Their adoption of plural wives would be modeled after foreign
law, not Nephite law, and therefore subject to Jacob's denunciation
as a non-sanctioned union, even though it could be seen as
a legitimate wife in the greater cultural context of the
region.
The last piece of information that finishes elucidating the problematic
aspects of Jacob's denunciation of polygyny is the probable
exchange of wives with another community. The practice of the
social exchange of wives to establish close bonds is well understood
in human history. We may easily imagine that a daughter who
was brought out of Jerusalem, as noted in Jacob 2:32-33, who
was sent to another village might consider her marriage as
a form of captivity because of the separation from her known
community and background. The children are under threat of
destruction because of the foreign ideas being brought into
the community. Certainly children born of Nephite women in
other communities would have little opportunity to grow up
with the Nephite god, and therefore be subject to spiritual
destruction. If the Book of Mormon events of the early city
of Nephi took place in highland Guatemala as Sorenson's correlation
suggests, this scenario is more probable than any other, and
fits the text of the Book of Mormon better than any other explanation.
(Look for Part 2 in tomorrow's edition of Meridian)
Notes
1 Joyce
Marcus, "The Size of the Early Mesoamerican Village," The
Early Mesoamerican Village, edited by Kent V. Flannery
(San Diego, California: Academic Press, 1976), 85.
2 Muriel
Porter Weaver, The Aztecs, Maya, and their Predecessors (New
York: Seminar Press, 1972), 44.
3 2
Nephi 5:5-6.
4 For
the building of the temple, see 2 Nephi 5:15-16. These events
precede Nephi's marking of the thirty years from the time of
departure in 2 Nephi 5:28.
5 2
Nephi 5:18.
6 2
Nephi 5:26.
7 2
Nephi 6:4.
8 Jacob
2:12.
9 Jacob
2:13.
10 Linda
Schele and Peter Mathews, The Code of Kings (New York:
Scribner, 1998), 19.
11 Jacob
2:33.
12 Jacob
3:10.
13 John
E. Clark and Michael Blake, "The Power of Prestige: Competitive
Generosity and the Emergence of Rank Societies in Lowland Mesoamerica," The
Ancient Civilizations of Mesoamerica (Boston: Blackwell
Publishers, 2000), 252.
14 Ibid., 253.
15 Ibid., 255.
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