In an
attempt to preserve his belief in creationism (Old Earth), one anti-Mormon
tried to give the impression that science supports the naïve view that all
human languages came from the Tower of Babel (albeit, with significant recalibration
of biblical chronology):
The findings of modern
science and archaeology demonstrate the need to recalibrate traditional views
about the chronology of the early events in Genesis but do not undermine their
historicity. While no archaeological remains of the Tower of Babel described in
Genesis 11 have yet been found, recent discoveries have pushed back the origin
of temple buildings many thousands of years earlier than many scholars thought
possible just two decades ago. Currently the oldest man-made structure in the
world thought to be a temple is Göbekli Tepe, a site in southeastern Turkey
dating from at least 9000 BC and perhaps as far back as 11,000 BC (Curry 2008;
Schmidt 2010; Mann 2011), though the site has also been explained as consisting
of houses with religious symbolism (Banning 2011). A recent study has suggested
that the human languages of Eurasia evolved from a common ancestral language
originating in the vicinity of the Middle East roughly 13,000 BC (Pagel,
Atkinson, Calude, and Meade 2013; see also Ghose 2013). The authors noted a
plausible link “the near concomitant spread of the language families that
comprise this group to the retreat of glaciers in Eurasia at the end of the
last ice age” (Pagel, Atkinson, Calude, and Meade 2013, 8474). These recent
studies provide some admittedly tentative support for the conclusion that
Genesis was correct in claiming that human languages diversified from an
original language in the Middle East, but some ten thousand or more years
before the time of the Jaredites by any current LDS reading of the Book of
Mormon. (Robert M. Bowman Jr., “The Sermon at the Temple in the Book of Mormon:
A Critical Examination of its Authenticity through a Comparison with the Sermon
on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew” [PhD Dissertation; South African
Theological Seminary, 2014], 419-20)
In reality,
none of the sources he references would agree that Gen 11, even with a
recalibrated biblical chronology, would support the belief (common among LDS, I
will grant) that all human languages came from Babel as a result of God
confounding the languages of the area. This is a blatant example of abusing
sources (in a dissertation, no less!)
I will pause
to state that if a Latter-day Saint were to pull a similar stunt to support an
aspect of our theology, this critic would (rightfully) call the LDS author(s)
up on such.
As an aside,
for a brief discussion of the diversity of human languages in light of Gen 11
and the Book of Ether, see Brant Gardner, “Excursus: The Confusion of Tongues in
Light of Historical Linguistics” in Second
Witness: Analytical and Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Volume 6:
Fourth Nephi Through Moroni (Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2007), pp.
171-76
