Now the Lamanites number about sixty million; they are in all of the states of America from Tierra del Fuego all the way up to Point Barrows, and they are in nearly all the islands of the sea from Hawaii south to southern New Zealand. The Church is deeply interested in all Lamanites because of these revelations and because of this great Book of Mormon, their history that was written on plates of gold and deposited in the hill. The translation by the Prophet Joseph Smith revealed a running history for one thousand years – six hundred years before Christ until four hundred after Christ – a history of these great people who occupied this land for that thousand years. Then for the next fourteen hundred years, they lost much of their high culture. The descendants of this mighty people were called Indians by Columbus in 1492 when he found them here. Spencer W Kimball, article Ensign July 1971, ‘Of Royal Blood’
I think the biggest shock for me after sorting through all of the historical problems with the church ... was the realization that I’m not a descendant of Lehi ... It’s kind of like my special status as a Lamanite was wiped away. When you’ve grown up your entire life believing and being taught that you are a special people ... It’s kind of a shock to all of a sudden come to different a conclusion.
I’ve read pretty much every book I can get my hands on, after reading Southerton’s book on the DNA research it really made me realize that us native Americans are of Mongolian descent, not descendants of some tribe of Israel. Our cultures and languages are so diverse because we have been on this continent for a very long time, somewhere on the order of 10,000 to 15,000 years. Which also proves that there is something wrong with the Book of Mormon story; there is no way the number of languages and cultures could have developed over such a short period of time. Nathaniel P Wilkerson, board post 11th December 2006, ‘Loss of Identity – I Guess I’m Not Lamanite’
My wife and I left the church 7 years ago in 1998. We separated in 2003 for a period of almost 2 years. Several months after we separated I met a woman and we were close friends for about a year. She was in the process of leaving the church, lives interstate, and was separated from her husband (now divorced). The relationship ended and about 6 months later my wife and I got back together. We have been together for about 9 months and things are going well.
I am proud to be an apostate and deliberately never requested that my name be removed from the records ... I wrote Losing a Lost Tribe because I want to pressure the church to change its teachings and doctrines that are racist and wrong. Native Americans and Polynesians are not descended from Israelites and they are not the descendants of the imaginary cursed Lamanite race. I was looking forward to a court because it would give me an opportunity to admit to the charge of apostasy and defend my integrity.
Like many church leaders in Australia, my Stake President is aware that I have publicly challenged the teachings of the church for several years. Rather than hold a court on the charge of apostasy, he chose to take the sleazy route. He arranged for church leaders in another state to meet with my friend and to get a signed confession that she had had a relationship with me. She admitted she had before she knew what they were up to, and then refused to sign anything ...
I deserve to be excommunicated. I fully expect to be excommunicated. But I am disappointed that the Stake President has engaged in official backbiting and snooping in order to avoid discussion of the more difficult issues related to Polynesian and Native American ancestry. Dr Simon Southerton, board post 18th July 2005, ‘Simon Southerton – My Court of Love’
The question scientists are asking is: ‘Who are the ancestors of the American Indians?’ As of March 2006, 8,223 American Indians have been DNA tested in scientific experiments aimed at discovering where their founding ancestors came from. About 99.5% of their maternal DNA lineages are most closely related to Asian DNA. Most LDS adherents believe, and all the LDS prophets have taught, that Israelites are the principal ancestors of the American Indians. This belief is based on their understanding of the Book of Mormon narrative. It is therefore absurd to claim that what the scientists are discovering about Indian heritage is irrelevant. Scientists are inadvertently asking the same question posed by the Book of Mormon. Dr Simon Southerton, board post 31st July 2006, ‘Answers to Apologetic Claims about DNA and the Book of Mormon’
If there were so many Native Americans there when Lehi arrived, how in the heck did the tiny Lehite group usurp control so quickly and why is the Book of Mormon silent about this remarkable takeover? Simon in Oz (Dr Simon Southerton), board post 6th January 2009, ‘Book of Mormon Histrionics Still Kicking’
Did President Hinckley personally suppress human DNA genealogy research at Brigham Young University?
From several first and second hand reports I believe the following is true:
1) President Hinckley spoke one-to-one with Scott Woodward in 2002 or 2001, at which time President Hinckley instructed Scott Woodward to stop some or all of his DNA research at BYU. Scott Woodward mentioned the content of this meeting during faith-inspiring communications to members of his Campus Plaza single student ward of the BYU 3rd Stake while he was serving as Bishop.
2) At the time of the meeting, Scott Woodward was scientific director of the Molecular Genealogy project at BYU. This project aimed to create a large DNA genealogical database to allow people to find their ancestral homelands through their DNA, and had collected many samples from indigenous Americans and Polynesians.
3) By the end of 1998, Scott Woodward had carried out DNA tests on over 6,000 Native Americans, mostly from Peru. At least 98% of their mitochondrial DNA lineages were most similar to Asian mitochondrial DNA lineages. The results of this research remain largely unpublished today.
4) Some time after the meeting between Scott Woodward and President Hinckley, the BYU Molecular Genealogy research project was moved off campus to the Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation in Salt Lake City. For a period, Scott Woodward was not affiliated with BYU.
On the basis of this information I suspect that President Hinckley used his authority as President of the LDS Church to suppress human DNA research at Brigham Young University because he believed Scott Woodward’s research had yielded, or may yield, results that were at odds with common beliefs Mormons hold about Native American and Polynesian ancestry. The direct interference in biological research should alarm scientists at BYU, an institution that takes pride in the search for truth and the quality of its scientific research.
... There are individuals who can verify all of the four claims. For example, the fact that Scott Woodward had DNA tested 6,000 Native Americans, predominantly in Peru, comes from an email I received from Scott Woodward on the 19th November 1998.
... I am essentially saying that the sum of the parts leads me to believe that President Hinckley acted to suppress DNA research at BYU. If my suspicion is unfounded, I will be more than happy to retract anything that I have suggested in my post that is false. Dr Simon Southerton, board post 6th December 2005, ‘Did President Hinckley Personally Suppress Human DNA Genealogy Research at BYU?’
Many Mormons, including several church presidents, have taught that the Americas were largely inhabited by Book of Mormon peoples. In 1971 Church President Spencer W Kimball said that Lehi, the family patriarch, was ‘the ancestor of all of the Indian and Mestizo tribes in North and South and Central America and in the islands of the sea’.
After testing the DNA of more than 12,000 Indians, though, most researchers have concluded that the continent’s early inhabitants came from Asia across the Bering Strait ...
DNA has revealed very clearly how closely related American Indians are to their Siberian ancestors. Dr Simon Southerton, ‘The Lamanites Are Invisible, Not Principle Ancestors’, email cited Salt Lake Tribune 8th November 2007
But Woodward [BYU professor and Mormon apologist] is not always so open with his research. Back in 1998 Woodward told me that his group had DNA tested 6,500 American Indians from Peru. I could hardly believe it. All other research groups combined at the time had only DNA tested about 2,000 American Indians across the entire New World! There can be little doubt that Woodward had been hunting for Lamanite DNA but apologists of course would deny this. Woodward clearly found none because those Peruvian DNA lineages remain unpublished over a decade later. Simon in Oz (Dr Simon Southerton) board post ‘Woodward and His DNA Data’
Yes, if God is a conniving bastard who would stop at nothing to trick his children, he could have changed the DNA. But why did he have to change it so that it matched Asian DNA? How could a Heavenly Father, who supposedly loves us more than we can comprehend, stoop to such depths?! We’ve already offended the Blacks and the Indians. Do we need to offend the Asians, too?! Dr Simon Southerton, board post 16th February 2005, ‘Answering the DNA Apologetics’
The truth is that Native Americans have occupied the New World for at least 13,000 years. This is an indisputable fact that the LDS Newsroom overlooks. They widely colonised North and South America for TEN THOUSAND years before Lehi allegedly arrived. For over a century mainstream archaeologists, geneticists and anthropologists studying Native Americans have believed their ancestors migrated from Asia across dry land (Beringia) exposed during the last ice age. The DNA evidence suggests a slightly earlier arrival date of about 16,000 years ago. It hasn’t changed things much ...
The problem is all that Asian DNA (99.5%) which arrived in the Americas in excess of 15,000 years ago. The only non-Asian DNA (0.5%) is either European or African and derived from post Columbus admixture. Simon Southerton, board post February 2014, ‘Book of Mormon and DNA Studies’
The original manuscript of the Book of Mormon was placed in the cornerstone of the Temple at Nauvoo and only reclaimed years later by the RLDS. Only a quarter of the manuscript remained in readable form due to the effect of moisture.
1) The Original Manuscripts as dictated by Smith. No punctuation. Bad spelling. Much correction.
2) The Printers Manuscript – copied from the Original Manuscript and presented to the Printer. Not substantially improved over the original.