The Book of Mormon is the record of two great civilizations—at least allegedly. First the Jaredites, who left the Tower of Babel and migrated to the Americas twenty-two hundred years before Christ. The second migrated from Jerusalem around six-hundred BC, and divided into two great nations—the Nephites and the Lamanites.

The Lamanites, according to the Book of Mormon, were “white and exceedingly fair and delightsome;” however, due to sin, “the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them” (2 Nephi 5:21). The lone Nephite survivor in the final battle with their Lamanite enemies was a mighty military commander named Moroni. (You, of course, see him on steeples of Mormon temples.)

Along with his father Mormon, Moroni inscribed the most correct of any book on earth in Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics and buried it in the hill of Cumorah. After bring resurrected as an angel, Moroni appeared to the prophet Joseph Smith, and instructed him relative to its destined translation into the English language. Smith, in due course, found the book inscribed upon golden plates along with a pair of magical eye glasses that he used to translate the Egyptian into English. The result was a new revelation called the Book of Mormon.

There is a problem. No archaeological evidence for a language such as Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics. No archaeological evidence for the great civilizations chronicled in the Book of Mormon. No archaeological evidence for lands such as the land of Moron that is described in Ether 7. No anthropological evidence that the Nephites and the Lamanites migrated from Jerusalem to Mesoamerica. Indeed, both archaeology and anthropology militate against the people, places and particulars that are part and parcel of the Book of Mormon and demonstrate conclusively that the book is little more than the product of a fertile and you might say enterprising imagination.

Here is the deal. Like the Book of Mormon, the Bible has been roundly denounced, as a cleverly invented story. But, there is a difference. Unlike the Book of Mormon, the Bible is buttressed by history and evidence. While the archaeologist spade continues to mount up evidence against the Book of Mormon, it has piled up proof upon proof for the people, places, and particulars that are inscribed in the parchment and papyrus of biblical manuscripts. I’ve written about that evidence in my book Has God Spoken?

—Hank Hanegraaff

For further related study, please access the following:

Is the Book of Mormon Credible? (Hank Hanegraaff)

DNA Science Challenges LDS History (Bill McKeever)

LDS Apologetics and the Battle for Mormon History (Bill McKeever and Eric Johnson)

Book of Mormon Word Change (Bill McKeever)

Problems with the Gold Plates of the Book of Mormon (Bill McKeever)

LDS Church Acknowledges Anniversary’s Ban on Priesthood for Blacks (Eric Johnson)

Historical Artifacts and Biblical Sources: Determining what is True (Jerry Pattengale)

Biblical History: The Faulty Criticism of Biblical Historicity (Paul Maier)

Biblical Archaeology: Ally or Adversary (Paul Maier)

Blog adapted from the January 12, 2017 Bible Answer Man broadcast.