Proposed Book of Mormon geographical setting

The geographical setting of the Book of Mormon is the set of locations of the events described in the Book of Mormon. There is no universal consensus among Mormon scholars regarding the placement of these locations in the known world, other than somewhere in the Americas. A popular "traditional" view among many Latter Day Saint faithful covers much of North and South America; while many Book of Mormon scholars, particularly in recent decades, believe the text itself favors a limited Mesoamerican or other limited setting for most of the Book of Mormon events.

The largest of the churches embracing the Book of Mormon—the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church)—has not endorsed an official position for the geographical setting the Book of Mormon, although some of its leaders have spoken of various possible locations over the years. There have also been multiple attempts to identify the several civilizations in the Book of Mormon, which are dated in the text as living from 2500 BC to 400 AD, but no consensus has ever been reached.

Mainstream scholars and archeologists do not accept the proposed locations as plausible. For example, in a 1998 letter to the Institute for Religious Research, the National Geographic Society stated that "Archaeologists and other scholars have long probed the hemisphere's past and the society does not know of anything found so far that has substantiated the Book of Mormon."

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.