In Ether 13:2, we read the following:
For behold, they rejected all the words of Ether; for he truly told them of all things, from the beginning of man; and that after the waters had receded from off the face of this land it became a choice land above all other lands, a chosen land of the Lord; wherefore the Lord would have that all men should serve him who dwell upon the face thereof. (Ether 13:2)
Some critics of the theory that the Book of Mormon peoples encountered and incorporated indigenous natives into their numbers use this text as “proof” that there were no “others” in the Book of Mormon as it (purportedly) teaches a global flood. If there was a global flood, ipso facto, the New World would have been a vacuum, they argue.
The text, however, is not referencing Noah’s flood and its scope; instead, it is a reference to the primordial waters of Genesis 1:
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters . . . And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters . . . And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so . . . And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so . . . And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good . . . And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. (Gen 1:2, 6, 7, 9, 10, 20-22)
In the book of Psalms, there is a psalm where the Genesis 1 creation and the waters thereof is said to cover the earth:
Thou coveredst it with the deep as with a garment: the waters stood above the mountains. At thy rebuke they fled; at the voice of thy thunder they hasted away. They go up by the mountains; they go down by the valleys unto the place which thou hast founded for them. Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass over; that they turn not again to cover the earth. (Psa 104:6-9)
When Moroni writes of the waters receding from the land, it is a reference to the primordial waters of Genesis 1. It does not teach that Noah’s flood was global.