Faithful Christians have attacked scientific findings for centuries, claiming that they run counter to the scriptures. As it has turns out, scientific findings have, instead, cleared up multiple misinterpretations of the scriptures. In this episode, I give three examples of how latter-day technology has helped to answer latter-day scriptural questions. The first story is about Nicolas Copernicus, who, in 1530, concluded that the earth revolved around the sun. This went against all logic and the scriptures. The second and most famous story is of Charles Darwin, who in 1859 published his book on evolution. The third story is about the charge made in 2000 that DNA sequencing proved that the Book of Mormon was false. The charge was inaccurate, but it led to a better understanding of our scripture.
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S2E05 – How Science Changes Religious Understandings – DNA and the Book of Mormon
This is the podcast Science and Scriptures, Season 2, Episode 5, or “How Science Changes Our Religious Understandings – DNA and the Book of Mormon”.
Hello again. This is Scott Frazer of the podcast Science and Scriptures. Today’s episode is more of a classis Science / Religion interface discussion. I want to give you three examples of how latter-day technology has helped to answer latter-day scriptural questions.
In my discussions with friends, family, and other associates, it turns out that many Christians don’t like Science in general. Science has been portrayed as an enemy to religion for far too long. Faithful Christians have attacked scientific findings for centuries, claiming that they run counter to the scriptures. As it has turns out, scientific findings have, instead, cleared up multiple misinterpretations of the scriptures. Science has helped us clarify many principles of truth, for which we should be grateful. I have three stories I want to tell you today about how such clarification works. The stories range from the 16th century to today.
The first story is about Nicolas Copernicus, an astronomer from the Renaissance period. In 1530, Copernicus collected his astronomical observations and concluded that the earth revolved around the sun. This conclusion was groundbreaking! It contradicted the universally-held idea that, since man was the greatest of God’s creations, the earth had to be the center of the universe. Authorities of the Catholic Church pointed to the scriptures that supported their belief that the sun circles an immovable earth. In Ecclesiastes 1:4–5, we read,
“One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth forever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.”
Obviously, the verse states that the sun moves. It sets and then returns to where it will arise the next day. In Psalms 96:10, we read,
“Say among the heathen that the Lord reigneth: the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved.”
From this verse, it was understood that the Earth is established in one place and it shall not move. These verses seem very direct, with little room for misinterpretation.
So, Christians of the time had to make a choice. Were these scriptures actually describing the design of the solar system or were they simply making the point that the Lord reigns over the earth forever? In truth, these early Biblical writers simply used the Earth as the best metaphor for longevity and stability. That’s all those writers intended their comparison to be.
However, the Catholic Church feared that this new theory would cause church members to lose their faith in God and potentially cause the collapse of the church. Consequently, the church fought the concept at every step. Even the famous Galileo Galilei, an Italian astronomer who made many of the first observations of our solar system, was forced to renounce all belief in Copernicus’s theories… and then he was sentenced to imprisonment for the rest of his life. But data was data, truth was truth, and the truth eventually won out. As we know, the Catholic Church was wrong - not only for its oppression of progressive astronomers of the time, but also for thinking that the faithful would lose their faith simply because they learned a new fact about the universe. In accepting Copernic’ findings, our understanding of the universe and its planetary orbits became more accurate. Our home planet is NOT the center of the Universe, a fact that should humble us a bit.
But this exchange between science and religion pales when we compare it to my second story. In the Evolution vs. Genesis debate, our main character is Charles Darwin, who was born in England in 1809. He graduated from Cambridge in 1831, ironically with plans to become a clergyman. But that same year, Darwin’s interest in geology and natural history won him an appointment as the naturalist on the surveying ship H.M.S. Beagle, bound for South America. This simple diversion in Darwin’s life led to a firestorm of events. From observations developed on his voyage to the Galapagos Islands and South America, Darwin published the theory of evolution in 1859. His now-famous book, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection was a smashing success. His first edition sold out immediately and evolution made headlines.
Actually, Darwin delayed publishing his results for years, understanding that his theory would generate both attention and hostility. He knew there would be a major conflict between science and religion. Understandably I suppose, Darwin didn’t want to be in the middle of the clash. Exactly as Darwin had feared, members of the social elite, scientists, and celebrities worldwide hailed the book as the discovery of a lifetime and that it removed the need for God in the creation of our world.
Demonstrations for and against evolution continued for decades. School boards hostilely debated if evolution should be taught in the schools. In 1925, the state of Tennessee prosecuted a teacher named John Scopes for teaching evolution in high school. The trial, commonly referred to as the Scopes Monkey Trial, captured national attention and was seen as a contest between the faithful followers of God and disbelieving evolutionists.
But, amid the uproar, data kept coming in. Carbon dating of organic material and uranium-lead dating of the inorganics in fossils was published. The results continued to point to an earth that was millions of years old. Then DNA sequencing, which will be given its own podcast episode soon, confirmed the proposed routes of evolution and their approximate timeframes.
Today, the basic tenets of evolution, as proposed by Charles Darwin, are no longer being debated in scientific circles. The age of the earth is no longer being questioned either. There is simply too much data supporting both of those conclusions.
Gradually, though haltingly at times, the general public accepted the realities of these scientific advances. Unlike a few generations ago, today there are only a relatively few people who still believe in a six-day, or 144-hour, Creation period, though that is what one might conclude in reading the first chapters of Genesis. The interpretation of those verses was changed as linguists point out that the word “day”, used profusely in Genesis, should actually be interpreted as an “epoch” or “unspecified length of time”. It does not mean a 24-hour day. In my youth, it always seemed strange that the Lord might create the world in an awe-inspiring 6 days. It did not seem His style, and as it turned out, it wasn’t.
Today, evolution is being taught in our schools, not creationism. Many people, including myself, believe there is a place for God in the process of evolution. Actually, He directs it. Evolution may be His tool, but God is the Master Creator. The weakest claim of evolution - no, the impossible claim of evolution - is that the evolution of all living things was directed by random chance of DNA rearrangements. The idea that something as complex as the human brain could evolve from non-living raw materials through a series of millions of lucky, random chances is…very, very unlikely. Some higher intelligence had to be involved in the more beneficial rearrangements of those DNA strands. I think that Darwin would be pleased to know that God was not written out of the story of evolution.
Please note - it’s a good thing that Darwin and his followers helped us to change our religious understanding of the creation. It helps us to read the poetry of Genesis and understand it better - because Science has explained some of the details behind the story. What we understand is closer to Truth.
DNA of the Book of Mormon Peoples
The last story I have for you today is a bit more complicated and more specific to the Latter-day Saint Church. DNA sequencing has changed much in our understanding of the genetics behind medical issues. But it was also being applied to genealogy questions about our ancestors. In the year 2000, a charge was made that DNA sequencing had discredited the Book of Mormon. It was the subject of many discussions, though most church members have never heard of it. Though we are about to discuss human DNA, I promise this won’t be a technically demanding podcast. But first we need to review the utility of DNA sequencing in genealogy.
Genealogists are well aware that DNA sequencing may be used to identify from where in the world your ancestors originated. Those of you who have had your DNA sequenced know that you must simply collect saliva in a small test tube and send it to a genetics lab. For a small fee, the DNA of the body cells suspended in your spit will be sequenced. Geneticists have found that there are certain unique DNA sequences that are associated with a given part of the world, say, Northern Europe, or Africa, or Turkey. A computer analysis of your entire DNA sequence uncovers how many such unique sequences you have - and then calculates what percentage of your DNA comes from those locations.
As DNA sequencing progressed over the last fifty years, LDS critics announced that DNA evidence proved that the Lehi and his family could not have immigrated to the New World, as claimed by the Book of Mormon. DNA found in the indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica does not contain the expected DNA sequences that are common to the peoples of the Near East and Jerusalem. If the indigenous people of the Americas really descended from an immigrant people from Jerusalem, critics declared that DNA sequences common to Jerusalem should be found in their DNA.
As an aside, in the DNA of indigenous Americans were found DNA sequences common to peoples of Southeast Asia. This was not really a surprise. For decades, archeologists have taught the Bering Land Bridge Theory. During the world’s ice ages, water was frozen into ice sheets and glaciers, shrinking the oceans, and exposing a land bridge from Russia to Alaska. The first Americans were believed to be nomadic Asian tribes who crossed over that land bridge and gradually populated the Americas, though they could have come by boat just as easily. These immigrations occurred over thousands of years. For example, the 9,000-year-old skeleton of a man was found and named Kennewick Man for the location in Washington state where it was found. It appears he too originated from a people of the coasts of Asia. Such findings indicate that for millennia, people have immigrated to the Americas, established civilizations, and moved throughout the two continents.
At this point you are probably expecting me to explain why the LDS critics were wrong. However, I can’t do that. For years, many members of the church believed and taught that indigenous peoples of the Americas were all descendants of the Lamanite people. If that was true… if Father Lehi and Ishmael really were the ancestors of all the indigenous peoples of the Americas, then their DNA absolutely should contain DNA sequences common to the Near East and Jerusalem.
The findings of DNA studies forced the church to reevaluate the belief that the American Indians were all descendants of the Lamanites. In 2006, the church made a slight but significant change in the Introduction of the Book of Mormon, which rather signaled their decision. The sentence, “After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are the principal ancestors of the American Indians” now reads, “After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are among the ancestors of the American Indians.
This question became such an issue for the church that at the end of 2014, the essay entitled “Book of Mormon and DNA Studies” was included in the Gospel Topics Essays. In that paper, the church makes the following declarations. These quotes are a bit long but essential to our discussion. Reading excerpts from the Gospel Topics Essay,
“The Book of Mormon provides little direct information about cultural contact between the peoples it describes and others who may have lived nearby. Consequently, most early Latter-day Saints assumed that Near Easterners or West Asians like Jared, Lehi, Mulek, and their companions were the first or the largest or even the only groups to settle the Americas.”
“The Book of Mormon itself, however, does not claim that the peoples it describes were either the predominant or the exclusive inhabitants of the lands they occupied. In fact, cultural and demographic clues in its text hint at the presence of other groups.”
“Nothing is known about the extent of intermarriage and genetic mixing between Book of Mormon peoples or their descendants and other inhabitants of the Americas, though some mixing appears evident, even during the period covered by the book’s text. What seems clear is that the DNA of Book of Mormon peoples likely represented only a fraction of all DNA in ancient America.”
This DNA evidence simply confirmed (and, admittedly, accelerated) the belief by many Book of Mormon scholars that the Nephites and Lamanites made up only a small fraction of the total number of inhabitants of the Americas. Let’s look at their reasoning…
To start with, let’s consider the total land area involved in the Book of Mormon. According to a definitive book by John Sorenson, An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon, the Book of Mormon history all took place in southern Mexico and Guatemala. The total distance from the city of Nephi (in the very south of the Book of Mormon lands) to the last battlefield at Ramah or Cumorah (in the very north) was probably no more that 450 – 500 miles. The distance east and west varies between 75-125 miles because of the “narrow neck of land” that exists in Oaxaca and Veracruz, Mexico. Doing the math, the Book of Mormon history all took place in an area of approximately 50,000 square miles, or an area about the size of Guatamala. The Americas total 16.4 million square miles, so the Book of Mormon peoples only took up 0.3% of the land available to them. Granted, much of the Americas was uninhabited, but it gives you some perspective of the limited geographic area of the Book of Mormon.
We also know this small area of land in Mesoamerica was inhabited by other peoples as well. Archeology tells us that the Olmecs were the dominant culture there from 1200 BC to 200 BC, so would have overlapped with Lehi’s families for several hundred years. The Zapotecs established themselves in 600 BC and declined around 800 AD, so would have definitely been neighbors of the Book of Mormon people. The extensive Mayan civilization ran from around 1000 BC to 1600 AD, which easily encompasses the timeline of the Book of Mormon. Millions of Mayan still live in Mesoamerica today.
The Atlas of World Population History approximates that there were about 150,000 people living in Central America in 600 BC, when Lehi and his family landed in Central America. Lehi’s family had a total head count of about 50 individuals at that time. Thus, they made up about 0.03% of the Central American population. Such a percentage is not significant.
You see, significant civilizations had already been built when Lehi and his family arrived. Archeology Magazine has just reported the discovery of a Mayan ceremonial platform, almost one mile long and up to 50 feet tall. It was found in Tabasco, Mexico near the Guatemala border. This places the platform right in the middle of Book of Mormon territory. It was constructed between 1000 BC and 800 BC. This made the structure at least 200 years old by the time Lehi’s family landed in the New World. There are hundreds of other such archeology finds in Central American, witnessing to the many non-Book of Mormon peoples who lived in the land before the arrival of Lehi. Recognizing the fact that Lehi and his family made up a small minority in their Book of Mormon lands should not be interpreted as a concession. It’s just an historical fact, supported by archeology and DNA sequencing research.
Let’s get back to the question of whether Lehi’s family could have passed their Near East DNA sequences on to present-day indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica. If Lehi’s family made up a very small proportion of Mesoamericans, it is much less likely their DNA would have been successfully passed on. But beyond just being “diluted out”, there are several historical events in Mesoamerica that would have reduced the likelihood that Lehi’s and Ismael’s genetics were passed on. These events, called “population bottlenecks”, are worth reviewing.
To define our term, we read in the Gospel Topic Essay, “A population bottleneck is the loss of genetic variation that occurs when a natural disaster, epidemic disease, massive war, or other calamity results in the death of a substantial part of a population. These events may severely reduce or totally eliminate certain genetic profiles.” In other words, if a person born with a Jerusalem DNA sequence dies before having children, the sequence is lost to that bloodline. If enough people with that sequence die, the Jerusalem DNA sequence could be lost entirely.
Did the Nephites and Lamanites lose people to natural disasters? Think of the many people who died from earthquakes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters that occurred just before the Savior arrived.
Did the Nephites and Lamanites lose people to massive wars? Of course. Besides the dozens of “normal” battles related throughout the Book of Mormon that killed thousands, think for a moment about the final war in Mormon’s own book in the Book of Mormon. The Nephite civilization was totally lost and the Lamanite people were nearly destroyed as well. The survivors’ bloodlines would have been severely diluted when integrated with surrounding peoples.
Did the Nephites and Lamanites lose people to diseases and epidemics? Indeed they did, but the most severe losses occurred well after the Book of Mormon timeline. After Columbus discovered America, the Spanish Empire expanded for four centuries (1492–1892) across most of present-day Central America, the Caribbean Islands, and Mexico. The European diseases they brought with them, such as smallpox, decimated the indigenous peoples. For example, in Mexico, there were 25 million natives alive in the year 1500 AD. By 1600 AD only one million Mexican natives lived – a loss of fully 96% of the starting population (Who Are the Children of Lehi, pg.46). So, yes, there were several very severe population bottlenecks that we know about (and probably a few that we don’t) that would have been pivotal in eliminating Lehi’s DNA sequences he brought with him from Jerusalem.
With the Gospel Doctrine Essay, the church has pretty well reputed the charge that DNA evidence invalidates the Book of Mormon. The defense is a good one and this attack on the Book of Mormon is quickly diminishing.
What Have We Learned from DNA evidence?
Where does leave us in our understanding of the Book of Mormon? Once you accept that the Book of Mormon peoples were actually a minority in Mesoamerica, several questions are answered. For example, in Mosiah 25:3, we read,
“And there were not so many of the people of Nephi and of the people of Zarahemla as there were of the Lamanites; yea, they were not half so numerous.”
Well, how in the world did that happen? The Nephite and Lamanite groups were similar in size when they split. Where did all these Lamanites come from? Starting out at their arrival, if the Lamanites had gone out and incorporated small villages of Olmecs, Zapotecs, or Mayan into their ranks (either by force or negotiation) those additions would have made a big difference in their population over the years. As their tribe grew larger, they could have incorporated even larger populations of surrounding peoples into their ranks. However, the Nephites would not have used force to recruit other populations. It was not their way. This difference in foreign policy between the two groups may explain their size disparities.
Another verse that bothered me for years is found in Alma 8:19-20. In these verses, Alma reentered the city of Ammonihah, after a rather unsuccessful first attempt at missionary work. Alma was hungry and he said to a man (whose name was Amulek), “Will ye give to an humble servant of God something to eat?”
In verse 20 we read, “And the man said unto him, I am a Nephite…”
At this point, I thought, “Well Amulek, of course you are a Nephite. This is a Nephite city after all! What else could you be?” But with a new understanding that the Nephites were surrounded by other peoples and almost assuredly associated with them, Amulek’s statement makes sense. The city of Ammonihah could have easily been the home of Olmecs, Zapotecs, Mayan, Mulekites, and smaller tribes that we don’t know about. Amulek probably said, “I am a Nephite” to indicate he knew Alma’s history and people. He knew about their belief in prophets of God. He then indicated that he knew that Alma was a holy prophet of God, because an angel had told him so in a vision.
Please note that critics of the Latter-day Saint church are mortified whenever leadership adjusts its doctrine. Those changes shouldn’t be surprising really. After all, we believe in latter-day revelation. But we can also adjust doctrine by learning new truths through science. As Saints, we should be thrilled with these new learnings. They bring us closer to truth and to a fuller understanding of our scriptures and the universe. We are not done learning. We need to take the instructions in D&C 88:78 seriously. And I quote…
“Teach ye diligently and my grace shall attend you, that you may be instructed more perfectly in theory, in principle, in doctrine, in the law of the gospel, in all things that pertain unto the kingdom of God, that are expedient for you to understand;”
Science gives us a source of those instructions. We should welcome new scientific findings, assess them, and determine how they may affect our understanding of the Gospel and the kingdom of God.
So, that is all I have for you today. Thanks for listening. I hope we can all understand that science will continue to change our understandings of scriptures and even religious principles.
I want to encourage everyone to be sure to listen to next week’s podcast episode when I will be interviewing Tony Goodall, an attorney who served a mission in the Church Legal Department in Germany. He will tell us what this group of unsung heroes does in the church.
As always, if you can think of someone who might enjoy today’s discussion, please share this episode with them. This is Scott Frazer from the podcast “Science and Scriptures”. Have a great week and take care.