Trying to do the math

[slavereeno]

I have been wanting to ask this for a long time...

4th Nephi...

Year 35 Nephi keeps the record
Year 100 Nephi dies his son Amos starts record
year 190 Amos dies (having kept the record for 84 years?), his son Amos II keeps the record
year 305 Amos II dies, his brother Ammaron keeps the record
year 319 Ammaron gives the plates to Mormon
year 320 Ammaron dies

I can't ever get the math to work out here... There are three generations mentioned over a span of at least 285 years. Are these guys having kids when they are in their 90's? Ammaron dies in 320 a full 130 years later than his father!?! And that is with his dad living to be at least 84, assuming he came out of the womb with a stylus in his hand and could record on metal plates as a newborn...

Am I missing something? were there entire generations not mentioned? or is there another definition of "Son" used here? Or did somebody need to cover a few hundred years of time in a story they wrote and forgot to do the math?

I wanted to point this out a few times, but legit want to make sure I am not missing something.

[Korihor]

WAIT - There's an inconsistency in the BoM?!?!

[wtfluff]

Math is logical.

Logic and religion don't mix.

Seriously.

[slavereeno]

WAIT - There's an inconsistency in the BoM?!?!

I know, add it to the list, but I have never seen this one anywhere else as of yet. So I wonder if I am missing something or if I can truly add this to the trove of BoM screw-ups, particularly because DW is the one that discovered this during family scripture reading one night.

[slavereeno]

Math is logical.

Logic and religion don't mix.

Seriously.

This is very true, and really annoying for me as a Software Engineer for 3 hrs every Sunday.

[Josephsmith]

Are these guys having kids when they are in their 90's? Ammaron dies in 320 a full 130 years later than his father!?! And that is with his dad living to be at least 84, assuming he came out of the womb with a stylus in his hand and could record on metal plates as a newborn...

Stranger things have happened in the Bible. Sarah had children as an older person. Yes, it was a miracle but miracles happened among the Nephites as well!

Plus, I'm telling you that hat was a little dark. Numbers were a little hard to see.

[Hagoth]

Are these guys having kids when they are in their 90's? Ammaron dies in 320 a full 130 years later than his father!?! And that is with his dad living to be at least 84, assuming he came out of the womb with a stylus in his hand and could record on metal plates as a newborn...

Stranger things have happened in the Bible. Sarah had children as an older person. Yes, it was a miracle but miracles happened among the Nephites as well!

Plus, I'm telling you that hat was a little dark. Numbers were a little hard to see.

The Bible also tells us that donkey's and snakes talk, which would lead me to conclude that it's about as historical as Charlotte's Web on such matters.

[wtfluff]

Are these guys having kids when they are in their 90's? Ammaron dies in 320 a full 130 years later than his father!?! And that is with his dad living to be at least 84, assuming he came out of the womb with a stylus in his hand and could record on metal plates as a newborn...

Stranger things have happened in the Bible. Sarah had children as an older person. Yes, it was a miracle but miracles happened among the Nephites as well!

Plus, I'm telling you that hat was a little dark. Numbers were a little hard to see.

The Bible also tells us that donkey's and snakes talk, which would lead me to conclude that it's about as historical as Charlotte's Web on such matters.

Now hold on just a minute there Mr. Tapir Rider...

[Hagoth]

Now hold on just a minute there Mr. Tapir Rider...

Of course, of course.

[Corsair]

Am I missing something? were there entire generations not mentioned? or is there another definition of "Son" used here? Or did somebody need to cover a few hundred years of time in a story they wrote and forgot to do the math?

I suppose that you have come up with the lame apologetic there. But it's not the only time when a generation is so short. Jacob is born before 588 BC and his son Enos is writing his book in 420 BC. That means that 90 year old Jacob gives birth to his son, Enos, who is also still writing scripture when Enos is 90 years old. That's the only way this father-son age gap works out without one of them being more than 100 and still doing whatever it is they were doing.

[slavereeno]

I suppose that you have come up with the lame apologetic there. But it's not the only time when a generation is so short. Jacob is born before 588 BC and his son Enos is writing his book in 420 BC. That means that 90 year old Jacob gives birth to his son, Enos, who is also still writing scripture when Enos is 90 years old. That's the only way this father-son age gap works out without one of them being more than 100 and still doing whatever it is they were doing.

I guess I missed that one before too. I know there is a bunch of population analysis where the math doesn't work either.

To Hagoth's point, I guess if you are willing to believe a multitude of impossibilities in the bible a few math errors aren't going to do squat to convince otherwise...

[Hagoth]

To Hagoth's point, I guess if you are willing to believe a multitude of impossibilities in the bible a few math errors aren't going to do squat to convince otherwise...

Last month we had a GA speak at our stake conference. He spent his whole talk on Book of Mormon apologetics, mostly setting up straw men and shooting them down (Jesus was born AT Jerusalem no IN Jerusalem). One of his points was about critics finding similarities between the BoM and other books. According to the GA it is unimaginably laughable to suggest that a young man in 19th century rural New York would have access to such books. I wanted to stand up and say, "Yeah, that's pretty far-fetched. It's far more likely that he got it from a gold book that was buried in his future back yard a thousand years ago by an ancient American prophet from a vast civilization thousands of miles away that left no material traces, who then came back to life so he could give a farmboy some magic spectacles to translate the gold book that would kill him if anyone looked at it, but instead the farmboy decided to ignore both the gold book and the magic spectacles, and instead read the translation off a rock that he found in a well. And then God told him to have sex with a lot of girls or he would be killed by a sword-wielding angel."

[wtfluff]

Last month we had a GA speak at our stake conference. He spent his whole talk on Book of Mormon apologetics, mostly setting up straw men and shooting them down (Jesus was born AT Jerusalem no IN Jerusalem). One of his points was about critics finding similarities between the BoM and other books. According to the GA it is unimaginably laughable to suggest that a young man in 19th century rural New York would have access to such books. I wanted to stand up and say, "Yeah, that's pretty far-fetched. It's far more likely that he got it from a gold book that was buried in his future back yard a thousand years ago by an ancient American prophet from a vast civilization thousands of miles away that left no material traces, who then came back to life so he could give a farmboy some magic spectacles to translate the gold book that would kill him if anyone looked at it, but instead the farmboy decided to ignore both the gold book and the magic spectacles, and instead read the translation off a rock that he found in a well. And then God told him to have sex with a lot of girls or he would be killed by a sword-wielding angel."

I think I've read through this more than a dozen times, and I still can't get over how epic it is.

Seriously EPIC.

Seriously.

[moksha]

Am I missing something?

Logical inconsistencies can occur in many fictional works. They even crept into the work of J.R.R. Tolkien who spent a much longer length of time working on his detailed narrative. Fortunately, Tolkien was able to take that information and make necessary changes in a subsequent reprinting. I understand there have been around 5000 changes to the Book of Mormon, but none of those have involved a critical rewrite of characters or chronology. If such a rewrite were to occur it would be interesting to have Laban awake and menacing Nephi so that he would be justified in pulling out his magic stone and placing Laban in a deep sleep that could only be interrupted once the Lehi Voyage of Discovery was underway.

[moksha]

Jacob is born before 588 BC and his son Enos is writing his book in 420 BC.

Looked this one up on the Biblical Timeline. Jacob and Esau were born around 2006 BCE. At about the time of the Lehite exodus, was the Rebellion of Jehoiakim in 2 Kings 24. That resulted in the Babylonian Captivity under King Nebuchadnezzar.

Enos was the son of Seth. Groucho was the son of Enos.

[Josephsmith]

Are these guys having kids when they are in their 90's? Ammaron dies in 320 a full 130 years later than his father!?! And that is with his dad living to be at least 84, assuming he came out of the womb with a stylus in his hand and could record on metal plates as a newborn...

Stranger things have happened in the Bible. Sarah had children as an older person. Yes, it was a miracle but miracles happened among the Nephites as well!

Plus, I'm telling you that hat was a little dark. Numbers were a little hard to see.

The Bible also tells us that donkey's and snakes talk, which would lead me to conclude that it's about as historical as Charlotte's Web on such matters.

Heathen!

[1smartdodog]

When questions like these pop up I just say it is fiction, it can say anything it wants.

[Palerider]

Incorrect post

[Palerider]

Times two

[2bizE]

1) maybe the wrong math formula is being used. Try T-D(JS) / 3 Tapirs
2) How the he'll did moroni get the sword of laban in that small box? Perhaps it was a hobbit sword or a telescoping sword.