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Commentary on M. D. Bown's Book of Mormon / Spalding MS Parallels Numbers 48-59 (Full Commentary) by Dale R. Broadhurst Revision 0a: September, 1998 Editorial and Bibliographic Information |
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ITEMIZED LIST OF PRESUMED SIMILARITIES Between Spaulding's "Manuscript Story" and the Book of Mormon Specific and single similarities have been isolated, listed separately, and numbered, with the paralleling citations from each work following. Whenever possible, direct quotations have been made. Only when necessary has discussion been utilized, and here care has been taken that the duplicating references are amply and accurately recorded -- but even so, errors no doubt will appear. This method of listing parallels is cumbersome perhaps, and has involved exceeding labor in preparation; but it seems to have the merit of providing direct comparison between the two works with a minimum of vagueness. "MS" refers to Solomon Spaulding's "Manuscript Story," the edition used being published at the Millennial Star Office, Liverpool, England, 1910, 116 pages. "BM" refers to the BOOK OF MORMON, and the edition used was published by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, 1920, 522pp. Please Read These Notes First: 1. All additions to Bown's original paper are shown in blue. 2. Commentary here as a summary; For full commentary follow the links. 3. The Commentator's Personal Ratings of Bown's Parallels: * poor parallel or not a parallel: should have been dropped Some On-line Textual Resources: 1. Search the Book of Mormon: LDS and RLDS texts (side-by-side scrolling comparison) 2. Search the Book of Mormon: Current LDS edition (includes phrase search) 3. Search the Book of Mormon: 1830 edition (includes concordance functions) 4. Search the Spalding MS: Special e-text version (includes concordance functions) 5. Search the Spalding MS: Special e-text (side-by-side with 1830 Book of Alma) 6. Search the Spalding MS: LDS 1910 edition (the edition used in Bown's citations) 7. Read Holley's book: Book of Mormon: A Closer Look (Spalding / BoM Comparisons) 8. Search the Bible: King James version (includes Apocrypha & concordance functions) 9. Search Ethan Smith's Book: View of the Hebrews (includes concordance functions) |
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48. The people had furnaces. Full comments on item #48: The Nephites and Jaredites no doubt possessed various types of furnaces, including metallurgy furnaces, perhaps even casting foundries. It's hard to say what kind of a furnace the "transfigured" Nephites were cast into, but if it was large enough to hold a person, it may have been a pottery or brick kiln. Normal cooking ovens and metallurgy furnaces probably would have been too small to hold a human body. Nephi himself appears to have been something of a metal-smith and furnace operator. At least he is shown as such in the famous Arnold Friberg painting illustrating his bellows operation and tool-making story of 1 Nephi 17:8-16. Like Nephi, and probably even more so, Spalding's Lobaska was a master of metal-smithing and metallurgy furnace operation. The Lobaska account may contain a fragment of autobiographical material, for Lobaska's real-life alter ego, Solomon Spalding, was also something of a metallurgy furnace operator. Spalding tried to get a metal-working business going in frontier New Salem, Ohio. Perhaps he was doing more than reshaping scrap iron and melting down the occasional bit of especially rich hematite that reached the shores of Erie from further north. Some of the Ohio countryside offered up chunks of "bog iron" which could be melted, refined, and cast at fairly low temperatures. There is some evidence that the Hopewell people who were once resident in that region had operated furnaces not unlike those mentioned in the ex-clergyman's romance. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that, when he rebuilt an old furnace there, Spalding actually reconstructed the ancient equivalent of an "Ohian" furnace. 49. They refined ore. Full comments on item #49: Although various native tribes in the Americas did a bit of primitive ore mining, refining, and metal-working, it is difficult to picture their limited operations (mostly with gold and copper) ever being carried out on the scale evident in both the Spalding MS and the Book of Mormon. The more significant parallel here is based upon as much upon their similar large scale of operations as it is upon their common level of metals technology. Although the Ohians are said to have engaged in some trade to the southwest of the Ohio Valley, it is likely that their iron ore came from their own Great Lakes region. Similarly, the Book of Mormon peoples are pictured as deriving their various ores from the land where they lived, and not by way of long-distance trade with other peoples. 50. They manufactured their own tools from steel. Full comments on item #50: Bown arrives at this weak parallel through the stretch of the imagination required in order to equate Spalding's "the consistency of steel" with the actual manufacture and working of steel. If the Jaredites and descendants of Lehi actually made and used steel plows, the claim of their growing pre-Columbian Old World wheat becomes slightly more believable. Spalding had his Ohians plowing their fields behind teams of elephants and horses. Since this plowing is mentioned in the same breath as wheat cultivation, it would appear likely they used their hardened iron to make plowshares. The Ohians and the Book of Mormon peoples made similar metallic tools, but only the latter are said to have manufactured true steel. Even that word is of uncertain meaning in the Mormon text. True pre-Colombian steel is unknown in the archaeological record; so perhaps Book of Mormon "steel" was little more than Spalding's hardened iron. 51. These tools were somewhat similar. Full comments on item #51: Bown should have combined this information with his previous parallel. The quote from the Isaiah texts in the small plates of Nephi isn't necessarily relevant to the Jaredites or the descendants of Lehi in the New World. The Nephites would have known of the mattock from their traditions and scriptures, but that does not mean that they chose to use that tool themselves. Similarly, the shovels and mattocks introduced by Lobaska are nowhere else mentioned in the romance text. It is rather dificult to believe that edged tools like shovels and mattocks would be abandoned by any people possessing such useful knowledge, but a strict reading of his text would allow for that possibility. 52. They coined their own money. Full comments on item #52: This is one of Bown's better parallels. Both the Ohians and Nephites minted and circulated "pieces" of metal that served as money. Neither account calls these bits of metal "coins," and they were not necessarily flat disks like our modern metal money. There were some differences in the two nation's money, however. Nephite "pieces" of precious metal had an intrinsic value, while the Ohian "pieces" of base metal received their value from the Emperor's "stamp." Different denominations of the Nephite pieces had certain names, based upon their precious metal weight, while the Ohian denominations probably were nothing more than different numeric stampings on similar bits of iron. The odd ancient coin occasionally pops up in the archaeological record of the Americas, and some were possibly lost or deposited in pre-Colombian times. Whether they were traded through the Arctic regions down into the more populated areas, or whether they came over in unrecorded ocean crossings cannot presently be determined. However, outside of Greenland, it appears safe to say that native pre-Colombian coins were never minted and circulated in identifiable quantities. Holley adds the interesting observation that in both accounts the description of the metallic pieces arises in the context of the larger topic of paying salaries to public officials. It appears that the metal pieces in both societies were first minted as a means of paying government officers like the judges (rev. 1), priests, councilors, etc. Both stories hold the honesty of public servants and priests in suspicion at times, and Holley's linking of this potential dishonesty to a discussion of their respective money systems is probably a valid extrapolation from the available information. (rev. 1) Spalding probably avoided using gold and silver for his Ohian "pieces" because he wished to present a society in which money and wealth were not so important as in modern times. In particular, he wished to show that public servants should not be allowed to accumulate great wealth just because they occupied positions of power. Spalding begins his discussion of Ohian money "pieces" as a continuation of his remarks on tithing and the support of the priests of the state religion, and he ends it with some further remarks on the support of other state officers. In his discussion of Ohian coined money Spalding says: "Nor shall the Emperor or his councilors receive any more of it than [is] an adequate compensation for their services." Spalding felt that when public servants were not tempted by the accumulation of personal wealth, the entire society benefited: ". . . avarice and corruption did not contaminate the ruling powers nor bribery infect the seats of justice . . . To such causes may be ascribed the rapid increase of population and the apparent contentment and felicity . . ." Spalding linked pride and greed with social destruction: "It is pride; it is cursed ambition and avarice which devastate the world." And he saw the greed of national leaders as being especially dangerous: "It was avarice, cursed avarice, which induced me to engage in this horrid war and now the mischief and cruelties, intended as the means to acquire wealth and aggrandizement are justly turned upon my own head." 53. They made their own cloth. Full comments on item #53: Bown's obersation is valid, but hardly unexpected. Pre-Columbians were known to have manufactured various kinds of textiles and Spalding was no doubt aware of the fact that some peoples in the ancient Americas wove their own cloth. He may have even seen some evidence of this among the "mound-builder" artifacts and trade goods which he found preserved in the Ohio mounds. Bown missed seeing the Ohian cotton, which would have almost certainly been used to make textiles. (rev. 1) The Nephites, who had cloth "of every kind," must have made cotton textiles. If they did not, their neighbors from Mexico southward did. (See also my comments for Bown's item #37.) Although there is only scant information available on the subject in the two accounts, Bown might also have provided a better parallel if he had shown some similarities in the design and manufacture of Ohian and Book of Mormon garments. 54. Pottery was made by the people. Full comments on item #54: Bown's tiresome application of the Isaiah texts on the small plates of Nephi to Lehi's descendants provides less than the definitive statement on Nephite pottery. The Nephites would have known of Old World ceramics from their traditions and scriptures and it would have been a remarkable omission for the Lehites not to have carried numerous pieces of pottery with them to the "promised land." If the Nephites and Lamanites were not making pottery, they should have done so. Somebody left all those thousands of examples found in the archaeological record, and it wasn't the Ohians. Nor, it seems, was it any one from ancient Palestine. New World ceramic sequences show the expected local development from clay-lined baskets and other primitive forms, right up to modern Hopi fired earthenware. Although ancient oriental pieces made a minor impact on American Pacific coast pottery and some Mediterranean-style amphora have been recovered from a shipwreck site on the Atlantic coast, the intrusion of ANE methods and motifs into local ceramic sequences has yet to be found. This can be contrasted with just the opposite findings in the Old World, where pieces like intrusive Philistine ceramics make their sudden appearance on foreign soils, along with the bones of their importers. 55. Music and musical instruments used. Full comments on item #55: There is a parallel here, but Bown has neglected to cite the proper texts in order to demonstrate it. What might be better spoken of here is the commonalty of similar trumpets being sounded in Ohian and Jaredite battles. The commonalty of people dancing in both accounts might also constitute a valid textual parallel. While Bown's quotation from the Isaiah texts is not directly applicable, it is difficult to imagine the Nephites carrying on the rites of Solomon's temple without ANE musical instruments. Still, speculation does not constitute a parallel and there is little information in the texts to show that their peoples had the same kinds of music or musical instruments. 56. They practiced polygamy. Full comments on item #56: Multiple simultaneous marriage does not seem to have been widely practiced in either record, although provision for polygamy is made under certain circumstances. The Jacob reference of its allowance to "raise up seed" may be dimly echoed in its allowance among the Ohians to make the "numbers" of marriage partners "equal." Presumably, in a warlike society, a few more females would be necessary to raise up families, because a certain proportion of the males would die in military activities. The more substantial parallel here lies in the observation that polygamy is only allowable, in both accounts, upon receipt of specific authorization of God or the King. Since the Ohian religion and government were inseparable, and marriages were performed by the priests of the state religion, the permission of the King implies the consent of God. The parallel is somewhat enhanced by our consideration of how the texts permitting polygamy fit into their scriptural contexts. The Jacob reference is a single, short statement which could be removed and never missed. In order words, it has the hallmark of being a redactor's addition. The Ohian statement also fits uneasily into its context. Spalding wrote the words as a one of his "extracts" from the Ohian scriptures, but he later crossed out that quotation from the "sacred roll." He left in place, just prior to the excised words, a statement on monogamous marital fidelity. This would pretty much also be the case in the Nephite record if the single statement permitting polygamy were bracketed as being an intrusion into the intended scriptural message. A brief consideration of external factors will remind us that early Mormonism condemned polygamy as late as 1852. Mormon elders of the Nauvoo period were excommunicated for teaching the practice openly. Secret multiple "celestial marriage" was seen as being something apart from common polygamy or "spiritual wifery," and could only be entered into in accord with God's commandments. Priesthood permission from the highest levels of the Nauvoo theocracy was required before the polygamous rites could be performed. Since Joseph Smith, jr. was secretly crowned "king" near the end of this period, Mormon allowance of polygamy was quite literally "with the permission of the King." 57. There were robbers in the land. Full comments on item #57: Bown's supposed parallel relies upon a single reference to the fear of possible "robbers" in the minds of the Roman explorers. Spalding does not tell us whether there really were organized bands of robbers plundering the Deliwan and Ohian countryside. And, while Georgians standing in the way of Sherman's march to the sea may have called the Federal troops "robbers," they were no more Gadianton bands than were the Sciotan troops who ravaged the Kentucks during their own march of destruction. In an external (but possibly related) source, Spalding's nephew wrote of fictional organized bands of "robbers" carrying out secret murders and works of darkness. Has these sorts of bad-men been written into the Roman account, I might credit Bown with a useful discovery. As it stands, the only parallel here is that both texts use the word "robbers." 58. The people kept public records. Full comments on item #58: The common words: "RECORDS (ARE) KEPT OF THE . . ." constitute a minor phraseology parallel between the two accounts. Spalding tells of "THE RECORDS OF their Emperors AND kings;" while the Book of Mormon has: "THE RECORDS OF the prophets AND of the twelve." Again the phraseology is somewhat the same. Nephites and Ohians both had record-keepers and they maintained record depositories. Information from the records mentioned in the two accounts was used in composing the accounts themselves. Nothing is said as to whether these records were open for public inspection. 59. They kept sacred records apart. Full comments on item #59: In the Nephite writings, at least, sacred and civil accounts were similar enough so that the small plates of Nephi could be substituted for the large plates of Nephi (the lost 116 Book of Mormon MS pages) without creating too many problems for the reader. So it may not be exactly correct to say that these different kinds of records were kept "apart" from one another. Even so, both accounts speak of civil and sacred records being kept and added to through the ages, and that commonalty makes a good textual parallel. |
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