Report: David Calderwood and Voices from the Dust

I recently attended a presentation given by David Calderwood, author of Voices from the Dust. Brother Calderwood served a mission in Uruguay and has subsequently lived in, and traveled to, South and Central America throughout his career. After retiring he returned to graduate school at the University of Texas at Austin to study at the Institute of Latin American Studies where he earned an M.A. Over the years he has collected over 70 chronicles written by Spanish and Portuguese explorers, priests, and soldiers. He was apparently a popular speaker at the recent CES Education Week at BYU.

What follows is my report of his talk, according to my notes.

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The main theme of Bro. Calderwood's talk was that Spanish and Portuguese chronicles, written in the 15-1600's but not published until at least the late 1800's, contain descriptions of native history and folklore that correspond with the Book of Mormon.

Early in the talk he said that researchers are tied to "make-believe histories." The first is evolution and that there was no creation. The second is that Native Americans migrated from Asia 15,000 years ago and that there were no significant outside contacts until Columbus. (He did not specify whether he objected to the early migration, or just the isolation.)

He spent most of the time talking about interesting elements in various chronicles. I will provide names (where I have them) and some of the things they described.

Miguel Cabello Valboa (1586): recorded legends of the earth shaking, the sun being darkened, and the graves being opened.

Felipe Huaman Poma De Ayala (1609): legends of natual disasters including volcanoes, fire from heaven, sand flattening a city, earthquakes and tidal waves.

Diego de Landa: described baptism in the Yucatan. Bro. Calderwood said that the practice was more widespread and that the Maya term "caput sihil" means to be born again or anew.

Martin de Murua: described Incan religious cleansing that involved confession. Bro. Calderwood said that they had rules that correspond well with the Ten Commandments, and that some of the punishments also correspond (eg. adultery punished by stoning). As part of purification, people would say, "I have confessed my sins to my father, the Sun."

Fernando de Montesinos: His reports are ignored by many scholars because they seem outlandish. His writings include a reference to a transition from government by kings to wise men (judges). Describes how ancient records were used to eradicate homosexuality from the civilization [apparently through repentance].

Pedro de Cieza de Leon: wrote that the Chachapoya indians were the whitest he had seen, and that their women were beautiful.

Bro. Calderwood described other documents refering to white indians, and said that there are still white Amerindians in some places. He also showed iconography depicting white and dark figures. In the picture he showed, it appeared that the dark figures were conquering the white figure.

Alonso de Ercilla Y Zuniga: Araucanos used implements of war including bow and arrows, swords, and scimitars. Bro. Calderwood made a point of telling us that Alonso had seen Old World scimitars.

He related a story about a Jewish rabbi in the 1600's named Aaron Levi [I think], who lived in South America. During his prayers he kept having the thought that Native Americans were Jewish. He was introduced to a group who claimed Abraham, Issac, and Jacob as their patriarchs and said that Joseph lives in the middle of the ocean, divided in two parts.

He also discussed metallurgy and the skill with which some ancient American cultures could manipulate gold, silver, and copper. He also mentioned their skill with cloth and their ability to make a fiber derived from animal hair that was likened to silk.

All in all I thought that the presentation was interesting. At first glance it seems remarkable that the various chronicles contain things that really seem to reasonate with the Book of Mormon. Yet without having studied the material myself--and again, having not read his book--I was at times a little skeptical of the connections he was making. For example, he showed some complicated iconography and explained the interpretation of many of the elements. Since they were of a religious nature it was pretty easy to draw connections to the Book of Mormon. But beyond that, he then pointed our attention to a figure whose meaning is unknown, and suggested that the meaning comes from a particular part of the Book of Mormon. There were a couple of other instances of the same type of thing, and I found myself skeptical that it is really that easy.

It seems to me that it is rather easy to fool ourselves on an issue like this, and although the intent of his talk was to build faith, I did not see evidence of skepticism except as applied to mainstream thought. But if there are real connections to be made, there must also be a host of false positives as well. If LDS scholarship is to have a credible voice, it must separate out the wheat from the chaff. I look forward to seeing how his book fares in the FARMS Review.