The first rule of historical criticism in dealing with the Book of Mormon or any other historical text is, never oversimplify. For all its simple and straightforward narrative style, this history is packed as few others are with a staggering wealth of detail that completely escapes the casual reader.
—Hugh Nibley[1]
Some books are just a little over 100 pages, while other
books spill that much ink just talking about methodological considerations. Any
guesses as to which kind of book the 826 page Mormon’s Codex: An Ancient American Book is? The first six chapters,
equaling 115 pages, of Sorenson’s new tome comprise “Part 1. Orientation.” Yes,
Sorenson follows Nibley’s first rule to “never oversimplify.” These chapters
focus on laying the groundwork for the correlation Sorenson intends to make
between Mesoamerica and the Book of Mormon record. Such lengthy introductory
material is not for the faint of heart, or those who wish to jump right into
the “meat” of the book (i.e., the evidence for the Book of Mormon in
Mesoamerica), but all the best books have these sorts of sections (though they
don’t all span across more than 100 pages!). Understanding the method being
applied is an important part of evaluating the quality of the arguments, and
understanding how to subsequently apply those arguments and evidences. (Even
good evidence/arguments can be misused when there is a lack of methodological
rigor.)
Despite its being called “Introduction,” I still read the
first chapter. As in most introductions, Sorenson explains what the book is
about, and this is naturally were the reader learns about the methodology
Sorenson intends to employ. Sorenson notes that the problem the Book of Mormon
presents is a familiar one to scholars. “The Book of Mormon belongs to a class
of texts that claim or appear to be historical documents and therefore invite
comparison with what archaeology and other historical disciples have revealed
about the claimed place and era of origin.” Hence, the method is to do just
that. “The primary method employed in this study will be to compare statements
in the text of the Book of Mormon with scholarly reports on the results of
archaeological investigations and related scholarly research…. If the document
in question agrees at a large number of points—as it does in this case—with
what the external sources tell us, then the text must be deemed historical.” (p.
3)
Of course, this general method is not new or unique to
Sorenson. He is not the first to use it, and he is not even the first to apply
such a method to the Book of Mormon. (As Sorenson notes on pp. 9-10, Nibley
began apply this sort of method to the Book of Mormon long ago.) It is the
basic methodology used in cases like the Book of Mormon by all kinds of
scholars, though the exact application and sophistication of this method varies
from scholar to scholar. Here, Sorenson appeals to the method as applied to the
Bible by William G. Dever and Kenneth A. Kitchen (pp. 7-9), noting in
particular that Kitchen’s is “more to my taste” because it has “broader
evidential scope” (p. 8). That is, while Dever narrowly focuses on archaeology,
Kitchen expands the scope to “a wider range of information made available by
the complete array of methods used to study the ancient world such as art
history, language, and epigraphy, as well as archaeology” (p. 9).
Despite expressing preference for Kitchen’s “more
anthropological and hence stronger” approach (p. 9), Sorenson spends more time
describing Dever’s methodology of “convergences” between text and archaeology. It
is evident, however, in the subsequent pages, which include some discussion on
the limitations of archaeology and the complexity of interpreting in context
with other disciplines, that Sorenson himself intends to draw on the same kind
of wider, more anthropological scope of evidence that Kitchen uses. I draw from
this the impression that Sorenson intends to apply a method more akin to
Dever’s to a set of evidence more like Kitchen’s.
Sorenson’s method is not going to be exactly like Dever’s, however. For more than a year now, Sorenson
has conspicuously chosen to use the term “correspondences” as opposed to
Dever’s term “convergences,” despite using Dever to introduce the concept.[2]
In Chapter 2, entitled “Getting Ready for the Comparison,” Sorenson provides
this clarifying comment.
Dever’s term convergences has many synonyms—correspondences, parallels, analogies, similarities, agreements, conformities, counterparts, and congruencies. Each has a slightly different shad of meaning. Convergences may suggest distinct processes that end up with similar results; parallel connotes a general or unfocused degree of similarity…. The comparisons upon which this relies will be called correspondences, in the dictionary sense of “a particular similarity.” Occasionally, synonymous terms will be employed to avoid excessive repetition, but no variation in meaning is intended when that is done. (p. 16)
This careful statement suggests to me that Sorenson’s word
choice is deliberate. Sorenson understands a correspondence to be something different from a convergence, and hence his choice to use
a different word than Dever suggests, to me, that Sorenson won’t quite be doing
the same thing Dever does. It is Sorenson’s own unique variation of this common
general method of comparing a text to its alleged setting.
You can learn more about Sorenson particular understanding
and use of correspondences, and even see a few preliminary examples, in his sixth
chapter, “About Correspondences” (pp. 109-115). The rest of chapter 2 (pp.
17-25) consists mainly of a summary of his important Mormon’s Map, establishing the general configuration of Book of
Mormon lands,[3] and then
a bullet list of the geographic features of Mesoamerica, showing the
correlation. The purpose of this chapter is, of course, to establish the
location we need to start looking at for comparisons. “Without a geography in
mind, comparison of external materials with the book’s text will lead nowhere
useful” (p. 17). Chapter 5, “The Nature of History in the Book of Mormon” (pp.
104-108), likewise summarizes the content of Sorenson’s previous work on the
Book of Mormon as “lineage history.”[4]
Understanding the nature of the Book of Mormon record as it relates to history
is obviously an important preliminary to making historical comparisons.
Although it is a summary previous work, I still gained new insights from this
latest iteration of a very important idea.
Chapters 3 and 4 make up the bulk of this “orientation” (pp.
26-103). They are also the most unique and important contribution of the books
introductory phase. In chapter 3, “The Book of Mormon in Culture History
Terms,” Sorenson provides a comprehensive summary of the Book of Mormon. But in
this summary, Sorenson doesn’t spend anytime talking about revelation or
miracles. He speaks of tribal, ethnic, and class differences, culture shock and
socio-cultural traits, “cults” (in a technical sense) instead of “churches.”
You see, while Sorenson no doubt believes
in the miraculous events spoken of in the Book of Mormon, Sorenson is
aiming to describe the narrative of the text in terms that an anthropologist
would use. And while some other LDS anthropologists might quibble with some
bits and pieces of his interpretation, overall it is a fair reading of the
text.
This is important because one tendency we have as Latter-day
Saints is to mentally and verbally affirm the Book of Mormon as real history,
but then treat the text like it is a set of fairy-tales. If we are going to
believe it is history, we should read it like history. This kind of reading of
the text helps put flesh and bones on the people in the text, helps readers
better relate to the seemingly larger-than-life characters, and makes us aware
of the implications that understanding the Book of Mormon as history really
has. Of course, scholars have been speaking of the Book of Mormon in culture
history terms for some time now in their various papers and books; but this is,
to my knowledge, the first time that a full summary of the book has been made
in those terms, and done so relatively unattached to any other argument or
theory (though there are a few occasional references to real world locations in
Mesoamerica, for the most part readers can gain insight from this without
necessarily excepting the Mesoamerican setting). As such, this is a valuable
and useful contribution to the literature on the Book of Mormon.
Chapter 4 comes from the other direction. “The Early Culture
History of Mesoamerica,” provides a summary of socio-cultural trends in
Mesoamerica from about 2000 BC—AD 400 without any reference or correlation to
the Book of Mormon. Sorenson is careful to note where knowledge is more limited
than usual, and often mentions various interpretations. When he is proffering
scenarios that fall outside the mainstream views, he always mention the more
orthodox view before going over the evidence that he sees as suggesting
something different. What’s more, although Mormons like John E. Clark, Richard D.
Hanson, Gareth W. Lowe, Ray T. Matheny, and Bruce W. Warren frequently show up
in the footnotes (though they are by no means the bulk of the sources cited),
not a single source aimed at a Mormon audience is used in this section.
This chapter is important because it gives a broader view of
Mesoamerican history, not so narrowly focused on the Book of Mormon. Most
interested Latter-day Saints probably lack much of any kind of background on
Mesoamerica, so having a go-to chapter where readers can get somewhat oriented
to Mesoamerican culture history is another contribution that should prove
useful and valuable.
Overall, Sorenson gives his readers a solid and thorough
“orientation.” Parts of it give the all-important explanation of methodology,
others provide the summaries of his previous work necessary to make this book
comprehensible to those who haven’t read his other books and articles (or at
least haven’t read them recently), while yet others are all-new and
all-important contributions to the literature on the Book of Mormon in
Mesoamerica. Having been properly oriented, I am excited to sink my teeth into
the meaty section of socio-cultural correspondences!
[1] Hugh Nibley, Lehi in the Desert/The World of the
Jaredites/There Were Jaredites, The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley:
Volume 5 (Provo, UT: FARMS/Salt Lake
City, UT: Deseret Book, 1988), 237.
[2]
See, for example, John L. Sorenson, “Reading Mormon’s Codex,” 2012 FAIR Conference Presentation, given August 3,
2012. Online at http://www.fairlds.org/fair-conferences/2012-fair-conference/2012-reading-mormons-codex
(accessed September 18, 2013).
[3]
See John L. Sorenson, Mormon’s Map
(Provo, UT: FARMS, 2000). In contrast to Mormon’s
Codex, Mormon’s Map is more the
just-over-100-pages variety of book, and is quite reader friendly.
[4]
For the fullest iteration of this, see John L. Sorenson, “The Book of Mormon as
a Mesoamerican Record,” in Book of Mormon
Authorship Revisited, Noel B. Reynolds, ed. (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1997),
391-521, esp. 418-429, though the other parts of the paper also have things are
that summarized in Mormon’s Codex,
chapter 5.
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