DNA Part 1: Putting Jesus on the dis-mantle

Almost all believing Mormons have a shelf.  On this shelf they put those pesky doubts they want to doubt, but that are promised to be answered in the next life, presumably at the same time they get their promised treasure and mansions in heaven. 

“Here,” Pearly-gate Peter says pointing to a mailbox with your temple new-name on it, “we’ve for you a chest of diamonds and a river-mountain chateau.  And there,” Peter adds gesturing to a pile of glowing books, “is GUD – the grand unified doctrine of everything.”

Some shelves sit in a closet.  Some new-order Mormon shelves sit in the open, like a mantle over the fireplace.  But all of them are getting heavier as science and academics roll forward.  Now the LDS Church is transforming that shelf into a "dis-mantle".  Let's see what dis they lay on their new mantle.  

In their latest Topic Essay on DNA and the Book of Mormon, they concede many things while actually pulling a "Does Not Answer" (DNA) anything.  Part 1 here deals with some interesting concessions and their implications.

DNA Topic Essay Concessions:

- “the majority of Native Americans carry largely Asian DNA.”

- “the DNA of Book of Mormon peoples likely represented only a fraction of all DNA in ancient America.”

- “Book of Mormon peoples were ‘among the ancestors of the American Indians.’ “

These concessions make it very clear that the LDS Church now affirms that the Americas were heavily populated before the alleged migration of the Book of Mormon clans.  The essay never directly admits that these “others” already here came 10,000 – 30,000 years ago, but says, loosely that “…people migrated from northeast Asia to the Americas by way of a land bridge that connected Siberia to Alaska.” For this claim, they reference  a paper by Ugo Perego, Mormon geneticist, which does date the migrations to older than 10,000 years ago.  

Indeed the essay references over a dozen scientific articles (several more authored by Ugo Perego) to support its discussion on why ancient American DNA studies do not discredit the claims of the Book of Mormon.  All of these references state directly or imply strongly that the DNA studies of ancient American migrations date to more than 10,000 years ago, pre-dating any events described in the Book of Mormon, or the bible and Pearl of Great Price, for that matter.

The upshot is, the LDS Church concedes that humans in America arrived before Adam and Eve were on the earth. 

Regardless whether or not the DNA of the Lamanites, Lehites, Mulekites or Jaredites are lost in the sea of population dilution, the desert of genetic drift or even the confusing city of religious myth, the LDS Church now affirms that humans lived before the “the first flesh upon the earth, the first man also” called Adam (Moses 3:4). 

This is a huge concession.  It has many implications.

Recall, Adam and Eve are taught by LDS doctrine as literally the first mortals.  Because, “if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end” (2 Nephi 2:22).  

Emphasis on all created things remaining forever in the created state.   If Adam and Eve had never fallen into mortality, then “they would have had no children” (v. 23) and no one but Adam and Eve would have existed.  Furthermore because they fell, “the Messiah cometh in the fulness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall” (v. 26).  “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Cor 15:22).

Either Eve “was the mother of all living” (Moses 4:26) and Adam is “the Ancient of Days and father of all” (D&C 138:38) who together “brought forth children; yea, even the family of all the earth” (2 Ne 2:20) and of “every soul who belongs to the whole human family of Adam;” (Mormon 3:20).  Or, they didn't really exist and are just allegories.

I’ll repeat the upshot:  the LDS Church concedes that humans in America arrived before Adam and Eve were on the earth.   And yet, they teach clearly that Adam and Eve are the parents of all living people.

Even if you believe in evolution, and you argue for extending the age of Adam to 100,000 years ago, or even 1 million years ago, you cannot easily dismiss the idea that before the fall, there was no death, and no birth (2 Ne 2:20-25).  Where in evolution did (human) death and birth suddenly appear?

They can’t have it both ways.  Either the DNA of the Book of Mormon people was diluted and drifted in a sea of pre-adamites, and there were no literal Adam and Eve.  Or science is wrong and they can stop trying to use it to buttress their essay on DNA.

The LDS Church wants to have its DNA cake and sequence it too.

There are staggering implications to the concession that Adam is not really the father of all.  Then if humans existed long before Adam, then there wasn’t really a Fall as taught in scriptures and in the Mormon temple endowments.  If there was no fall, then there’s no need for saving from the effects of the fall. 

Wait, I mean, we can put a lot of stuff on the shelf, but putting Jesus on the dis-mantle for the sake of buttressing the Book of Mormon?  

Did they just "dis-mantle" Jesus Christ? 

Yes, it seems so. Because, like it says in that book: “For behold, and also [Christ’s] blood atoneth for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam” (Mosiah 3:11)

And “For as death hath passed upon all men, to fulfil the merciful plan of the great Creator, there must needs be a power of resurrection, and the resurrection must needs come unto man by reason of the fall; and the fall came by reason of transgression; and because man became fallen they were cut off from the presence of the Lord.” (2 Ne 9:6)

And “or behold, as in Adam, or by nature, they fall, even so the blood of Christ atoneth for their sins” (Mosiah 3:16)

LDS scriptures make it clear, if there was no Adam, there’s no need for Jesus Christ.  In fact, it says there’d be no God, in the Book of Mormon,  if there were no fall, no sin, no law, “no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not” (2 Ne 2:13).  Without the fall, “the works of justice would be destroyed, and God would cease to be God” (Alma 42:22)

Did the new Topic Essay on DNA just make us all disappear?  Or did it just cause God to cease to exist?

Well, I know I am here, therefore…

In a mid-blog summary, you have the following options it seems from analysis of behind-the-essay meaning:

1) Adam and Eve are literal and tied to a young earth as the first humans -- science debunks this completely.

2) Adam and Eve are literal and tied to old earth age as first humans with spirits -- stay tuned below on how that works out...

3) Adam and Eve are figurative -- then the atonement is probably unnecessary since what was introduced by God through evolution can just be dismissed with a change in evolution without a mysterious sacrifice to atone for God's oops in evolution.

4) It's all bullshit.

Other implications of the concession of pre-adamites also dismantle the universal flood of Noah, otherwise, the humans who migrated across the Bering Strait would have drowned.  LDS scriptures seem to be clear on a universal flood.  The Book of Mormon Jaredites inherited the Americas after the land was empty when the flood "waters had receded from off the face of this land it became a choice land above all other lands " (Ether 13:2).

No flood means the Pearl of Great Price errs when it teaches that “God will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh” (see Gen. 6:17;  Moses 7:34, 43, 50–52; Moses 8:17, 30 ).

How can the LDS Church stand both in science and a literal interpretation on their own scriptures regarding the fall, flood and atonement?

Let’s ask their chief scientist—who’s referenced often (in at least five of the footnoted papers) in the Topic Essay.  That would be Mormon favorite Ugo Perego, a trained molecular biologists and geneticist.  What does Dr. Perego have to say about this dichotomy?  After all, he is their leading mind on the DNA and early human matters. 

One paper or talk by Ugo Perego the LDS Church will not reference is one that Dr. Perego presented at a Mormon conference on transhumanism.

See

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ilin4lt0nQ

Or
http://signaturebooks.com/2012/09/mormon-scientist-concedes-native-american-origins/

Basically, Perego’s argument is that he believes that pre-adamites are “pre-human hominids” that existed before Adam and Eve.  Yes, “pre-human hominids” without spirits...   Quoting him: “We became children of God in the moment God decided to put the spirit of man inside the physical bodies that have a different evolutionary path”  -- than near-relatives in the animal world...

In other words, pre-adamites are inferior because they were not god's offspring. There is a bit of something very racist about the idea.

In other places, however, Perego has stated that from a genetics POV, the race 40,000 years ago are practically identical to modern humans.  Yet, he distinguishes them as pre-human hominids.   He offers no explanation on how to close the gap between the spiritual haves and have nots at the boundary of Adam & Eve.

For example, the paleo-Amerindians would have crossed into the new world long before there was an Adam who was allegedly the first spirit-based human. The same for the Australian aborigines. How does one holding the Mormon pre-adamite doctrine view the aborigines when modern Europeans (who are by their view descendents of Adam and god's children) "discovered" and mixed with the aborigines? If Adam is the father of the human race, how did spirit enter into the lives of these that were cut-off geographically?

Yeah, sounds vaguely like some form of racism, Mr. Perego—oops, I mean “Dr” Perego.  I wonder if they’ll let him keep his doctorate when they learn about his bizarre views on the different classes of hominids.  

And this lecturer of possible racism, ladies and gentlemen, is the leading expert the LDS Church relies on for its scientific understanding of DNA problems related to the Book of Mormon account.

Yes, I know, some apologists will clamor that I did a "ad-hominid" attack on Perego by implying he's racist, all the while not addressing the real issues raised by the essay, by Perego's statements and more.

You think they made a lot of problems for themselves when they disavowed their own prophets and scripture in "Race and the Priesthood" essay?   They may have disavowed racism there, but they re-opened that can of worms again with the DNA essay.  This is a whole new class of anthropological racism generated by a cross-breed of science and myth.


 In "DNA Part 2: Defense Now Amorphous – two-fisted cherry picking"  I will discuss more on the science of the Topic Essay.