Those Mormons - Horses

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A friend asked that I start writing about Mormons. Given they fucked over California, I think it is a good idea.

There was a time in my life when I spent a lot of time studying the LDS church. I was young, a devout Christian, and dating a Mormon girl. Let's just say I was motivated.

The Book of Mormon is a tedious work of fiction set in the Americas around 2000 years ago. The book is full of contradictions and outright mistakes. My first encounter with this was the mention of horses. 

Horses arrived in the Americas with Cortez in 1519. Horses had populated the Americas as recently as 10,000 years ago. The fossil record shows they disappeared well before the arrival of the ancient civilizations of the Americas. Yet the Book of Mormon mentions hours several times. This single discrepancy should be enough to cause the mindless minions of Joseph Smith to question their faith. But no... I've heard the weirdest possible rationales.

Here is the proof.

Enos 1:21

And it came to pass that the people of Nephi did till the land, and a raise all manner of grain, and of fruit, and flocks of herds, and flocks of all manner of cattle of every kind, and goats, and wild goats, and also many horses.

Alma 18:9

And they said unto him: Behold, he is feeding thy horses. Now the king had commanded his servants, previous to the time of the watering of their flocks, that they should prepare his horses and chariots, and conduct him forth to the land of Nephi; for there had been a great feast appointed at the land of Nephi, by the father of Lamoni, who was king over all the land.

3 Nephi 3:33

And it came to pass in the seventeenth year, in the latter end of the year, the proclamation of Lachoneus had gone forth throughout all the face of the land, and they had taken their horses, and their chariots, and their cattle, and all their flocks, and their herds, and their grain, and all their substance, and did march forth by thousands and by tens of thousands, until they had all gone forth to the place which had been appointed that they should gather themselves together, to defend themselves against their enemies.

Nephi 18:25

And it came to pass that we did find upon the land of promise, as we journeyed in the wilderness, that there were beasts in the forests of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the ass and the horse, and the goat and the wild goat, and all manner of wild animals, which were for the use of men. And we did find all manner of ore, both of gold, and of silver, and of copper.

Of course, there is no archeological evidence for horses in the non-existent civilizations mentioned by Book of Mormon. As far as I can tell, there is no viable explanation for the discrepancy. The most creative explanation I've heard on this subject was from a friend. He posited that the horses mentioned were not old world horses, but instead were some of type of horse that had not yet been found in the fossil record. And that someday... Of course, I blew Guinness through my nose at this point, so I missed his wish.

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