bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

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_tapirrider
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _tapirrider »

ClarkGoble wrote:As to skin, there's a lot of debate as to what that means. I've always thought that it made most sense as ritualistic marking and not the skin itself. While there's not consensus on where the Book of Mormon transpired, if it was in the general mayan region then the painting of bodies black and red is a well attested tradition. This would easily explain how the skin would change. It wasn't the skin proper so much as a cultural marking. Much like you could distinguish the typical EFY kid from a certain subgroups of San Francisco kid by the amount of tattoos and piercings.


Mormon prophet Wilford Woodruff prayed for Indians to turn white when he dedicated the Salt Lake Temple in 1893,

"Restore them we pray Thee, to Thine ancient favor, fulfill in their completeness the promises given to their fathers, and make of them a white and delightsome race, a loved and holy people as in former days."
http://www.ldschurchnewsarchive.com/art ... house.html

And the Mormon prophet George Albert Smith also prayed for their skin color to change when he dedicated the Idaho Falls Temple in 1945.

"O Father, remember Thy promises made unto Thy holy prophets regarding the remnants of those whom Thou didst lead unto this western hemisphere, that they should not be utterly destroyed but that a remnant should be preserved which would turn from their wickedness, repent of their sins, and eventually become a white and delightsome people. May the day speedily come when those promises will be fulfilled."
http://www.ldschurchnewsarchive.com/art ... where.html

They weren't praying for Mayans to stop ritualistically marking their own skin with body paint.

In the October 1960 General Conference, LDS apostle (who later became the prophet) Spencer W. Kimball told the world that the prophecy of Lamanites (American Indians) turning white was being fulfilled.

"For years they have been growing delightsome, and they are now becoming white and delightsome, as they were promised. In this picture of the twenty Lamanite missionaries, fifteen of the twenty were as light as Anglos, five were darker but equally delightsome. The children in the home placement program in Utah are often lighter than their brothers and sisters in the hogans on the reservation."

"At one meeting a father and mother and their sixteen-year-old daughter were present, the little member girl–sixteen–sitting between the dark father and mother, and it was evident she was several shades lighter than her parents–on the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather."
http://scriptures.byu.edu/gettalk.php?ID=1091&era=yes

In 1981 the Mormon church changed "white" in 2 Nephi 30:6 to say "a pure and a delightsome people."

For 151 years Mormons believed that American Indians would turn white. Mormon prophets believed it, taught it, prophesied that it would happen, prayed in their temples for it to happen soon and finally announced that prophecy was being fulfilled.

But none of it was real.
_ClarkGoble
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _ClarkGoble »

tapirrider wrote:Mormon prophet Wilford Woodruff prayed for Indians to turn white when he dedicated the Salt Lake Temple in 1893,


Yes, so? I have no problem with people misinterpreting religious texts and acting on that interpretation with the best of intentions.
_tapirrider
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _tapirrider »

ClarkGoble wrote:Yes, so? I have no problem with people misinterpreting religious texts and acting on that interpretation with the best of intentions.


I was taught that temple dedicatory prayers were inspired revelation so if Woodruff was wrong, that is a problem to me. Kimball telling people that Navajo children were turning white was sick. No good intentions can excuse that. There just doesn't seem to be much of anything that was really ever inspired. That's just my take on things. The apologist excuses and reasons given today like skin markings aren't even the same church I grew up in.
_I have a question
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _I have a question »

ClarkGoble wrote:
tapirrider wrote:Mormon prophet Wilford Woodruff prayed for Indians to turn white when he dedicated the Salt Lake Temple in 1893,


Yes, so? I have no problem with people misinterpreting religious texts and acting on that interpretation with the best of intentions.


That's not "people" misinterpreting a religious text. That's a Prophet communing with God.
Of whom much is given, much is expected. Sadly, but unsurprisingly, Mormon Prophets always over promise and under deliver. Especially when it comes to determining what God is saying.
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
_Themis
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _Themis »

ClarkGoble wrote:By normal population genetics with even a little diffusion amongst groups there would be descendants of Nephi among all the survivors of the final Nephite wars.


Something we should have found given how successful these groups were for thousands of years.

But as you note for a period there was massive intermixing of groups with the later grouping most likely being primarily political. Apologists argue that even early on during the main narrative of Mosiah-Helaman that the categories are primarily political.


It start's off as a separation of one group into two. One of them is then cursed with a skin of blackness. The text is quite clear it is about skin color, and other sections support this. It's interesting this book comes out at a time when many were suggesting the Indians were a lost tribe of Israel, and one of the questions was about how they would have gotten a darker skin. Joseph's book seems to be answering both questions. It's also interesting that the first group came shortly after Noah's Flood. It is Noah's earth covering flood that created the questions of how people got here after that, and from where they came.

As to skin, there's a lot of debate as to what that means. I've always thought that it made most sense as ritualistic marking and not the skin itself. While there's not consensus on where the Book of Mormon transpired, if it was in the general mayan region then the painting of bodies black and red is a well attested tradition. This would easily explain how the skin would change. It wasn't the skin proper so much as a cultural marking. Much like you could distinguish the typical EFY kid from a certain subgroups of San Francisco kid by the amount of tattoos and piercings.


The text is clear that laman's group was cursed with a skin of blackness, and that this curse was handed down to their children. Ritualistic markings don't come close to explaining the text. The text looks like someone in the early 1800's is answering many of the questions of the day, and makes many incorrect assumptions about population growth and what kinds of technology, animals and plants they used. I understand you don't like the fact the text fits so well with it being made up fiction based on the poor ideas of the 1800's.
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_Choyo Chagas
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Re: bofmgeography, are Navajos Nephites?

Post by _Choyo Chagas »

tapirrider wrote:...
"At one meeting a father and mother and their sixteen-year-old daughter were present, the little member girl–sixteen–sitting between the dark father and mother, and it was evident she was several shades lighter than her parents–on the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather."
http://scriptures.byu.edu/gettalk.php?ID=1091&era=yes
...
:idea:
maybe in the background of the scene there were sitting the little member girl's white and delightsome - and biological - father

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0itzW8Siqg - (2:50)
Choyo Chagas is Chairman of the Big Four, the ruler of the planet from "The Bull's Hour" ( Russian: Час Быка), a social science fiction novel written by Soviet author and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov in 1968.
Six months after its publication Soviet authorities banned the book and attempted to remove it from libraries and bookshops.
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