Editing the Book of Mormon

A friend sends along this article in the Salt Lake City paper concerning an interesting silent edit in the new introduction to the Book of Mormon.

The book's current introduction, added by the late LDS apostle, Bruce R. McConkie in 1981, includes this statement: "After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are the principal ancestors of the American Indians."

The new version, seen first in Doubleday's revised edition, reads, "After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are among the ancestors of the American Indians."


Further discussion of the change can be found here at the Juvenile Instructor.

Comments

Marcus said…
Last year I attended a class at BYU where a couple of professors mentioned that this change was coming. They claimed that since recent DNA studies had proven the lineage of many surviving Native American tribes to be of Asian decent, that it was time for the church to reassess its stance. Now a large number of people within the Mormon faith maintain that only a portion of Native Americans were ever decendants of Nephi, Lehi, etc.

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