Jonathan Neville’s passive–aggressive personality

In a post the other day, I mentioned Jonathan Neville’s “continual posting of passive–aggressive statements.” He dropped another blog post today that perfectly reflects this, so I thought I’d use that as an example of his style.

For those who aren’t familiar with the term or are are uncertain of the definition of passive–aggressive:

Passive–aggressive behavior is when you express negative feelings indirectly instead of openly talking about them.…

Someone who uses passive aggression may feel angry, resentful, or frustrated, but they act neutral, pleasant, or even cheerful. They then find indirect ways to show how they really feel.

Examples of passive aggression show up in most of Neville’s blog posts. Most often, they’re reflected in how he refers to those who disagree with Heartlander views of Book of Mormon geography and the hill Cumorah.

In his October 19, 2020, blog post “Logos and perspective,” he criticizes Book of Mormon Central’s use of a Mayan glyph in their logo. (This is the same logo that was formerly used by the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies.)

In this post, Neville tells us:

Those who read my blogs know that I have great respect and fondness for the members of the M2C* citation cartel. All those I’ve met are great people, sincere, dedicated, smart, etc.

While I disagree with their interpretations of the text and the relevant extrinsic evidence, it doesn’t bother me in the least that other people have different opinions.

Despite his supposed “respect and fondness” for these “great people” with whom he disagrees, he persists in referring to them as “the M2C citation cartel.” That term that is not just inaccurate; one can also reasonably infer from its use that he is comparing his opponents to an international crime syndicate.

Neville responded to that concern back on September 3rd, not by apologizing and changing his terminology, but by making any offense taken at the use of the term “cartel” the fault of those who interpreted it in a negative light (!):

Apparently some of the members of the M2C citation cartel…consider the acronym “M2C” pejorative, and they think the term “citation cartel” invokes images of drug cartels in Latin America.

Such paranoia is a good example of how members (and employees) of a citation cartel think and operate. The credentialed class all too often take personal offense to differences of opinion, resort to academic bullying, and employ censorship to protect their intellectual cartels.

So, according to Neville, the problem isn’t his choice to use potentially offensive words; the problem is those who take offense, because they are “paranoid,” “resort to academic bullying, and employ censorship”—a textbook example of blame-shifting.

Back to his October 19th post:

After expressing his “respect and fondness” for these “great people” with whom he disagrees—as well as claiming that the matter is “a simple difference of perspective” and accepting “diversity of thought”—he then proceeds to belittle and disparage these “great people”:

• He claims that, for people such as himself, the Book of Mormon Central logo “represents completely closed minds and bias confirmation presented in the guise of scholarship.”
• He claims “this logo is the antithesis of the Church’s position of neutrality.” (A subject that he completely misunderstands or continually misrepresents.)
• He calls the “great people” who work for Book of Mormon Central “hirelings,” a defamatory term that refers to “a person who works only for pay, especially in a menial or boring job, with little or no concern for the value of the work.” (These “hirelings” are the same people he has referred to as “fine young scholars” nearly seventy times in other passive–aggressive posts.)
• These “hirelings,” he tells us, “spend their time trying to convince Church members that the prophets are wrong,” and Book of Mormon Central’s logo “represents a deliberate choice to repudiate the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah.” Yet this completely contradicts his earlier claim that these same people are “sincere” and “dedicated”!

“Once those who identify themselves with this M2C logo understand how the rest of us perceive it,” Neville concludes, ”maybe they will be a little more understanding of our point of view.”

Absolutely incredible. Neville longs for people who are part of the “M2C citation cartel” to understand how he and other Heartlanders perceive its meaning, yet he himself is completely unaware of how deeply insulting he is—over, and over, and over again—toward them.

“Unlike some of my critics,” he writes, “I don’t resort to name-calling, accusations of apostasy, etc.” Yet he calls those with whom he disagrees “hirelings” in the very same post.

When I claim that Neville and his cohorts are flirting with apostasy, I’m not “resorting” to anything—I mean it. For evidence of this, look no further than his other post today on one of his other blogs where he criticizes Saints, the Church’s new official history with a foreword by the First Presidency: In that post he clearly implies that the Church historians who wrote Saints are like employees of the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s dystopian novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

The Church’s General Handbook defines apostasy as “repeatedly acting in clear and deliberate public opposition to the Church, its doctrine, its policies, or its leaders.” If Neville’s continual public opposition to the way the Church’s leaders and historians describe its history isn’t apostasy, then I don’t know what else one could legitimately call it.

—Peter Pan

* “M2C” is Jonathan Neville’s acronym for the theory that the Book of Mormon took place in Mesoamerica and that the hill Cumorah in the Book of Mormon is not the same hill in New York where Joseph Smith received the plates of Mormon.

Jonathan Neville continues to dismiss the First Presidency’s counsel

It must be deeply frustrating to be Jonathan Neville. Nearly everything produced and published by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints contradicts his heterodox views, so he has to continually look for ways to dismiss and disregard the teachings of the Church and its leaders.

He’s railed against what he considers to be false teachings in Church-published magazines, the Church’s new official history, and Church lesson manuals, as well as the teachings of Church missionaries at its historic sites.

One particular thorn in his side has been the Church’s Gospel Topics Essay on Book of Mormon geography. He’s published at least 120 blog posts attacking it, doing everything in power to convince uninformed people that it has no authority, despite ample evidence to the contrary.

In his latest effort—“Rethinking the entry on Book of Mormon Geography” (June 12, 2020)—he tells us that “it hardly qualifies as an essay” because “it omits scripture references and the many quotations from General Authorities on the topic” of Book of Mormon geography. By “many quotations,” he of course is referring his cherry-picked list of quotes that have no revelatory or official standing and represent the views of the leaders who spoke them—even if those views were popular and traditional ones.

He asserts:

The amazing thing is that the New York Cumorah has been consistently and persistently taught by every Church leader who has addressed the topic. It has never been contradicted by Church leaders. It has been contradicted only by scholars, beginning with RLDS scholars in the late 1800s who rejected the teachings of LDS leaders on several topics. Then, in the mid-1900s, LDS scholars began claiming the prophets were wrong because of M2C.* Now, thanks the academic cycle, M2C has spread its influence throughout the Church.

There are numerous falsehoods in this single paragraph:

• Neville fails to tell us that not one apostle or prophet has stated that the location of Cumorah has been revealed by God, and that some have expressed doubts about the New York location, including apostles John A. Widtsoe and (possibly) Robert D. Hales.
• Neville here repeats his false narrative that the proposed Mesoamerican setting for the Book of Mormon originated with the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in “the late 1800s”, even though there’s no evidence for an RLDS Mesoamerican model before 1917 and a Central American model by an unknown Latter-day Saint exists from 1887. (See John L. Sorenson, The Geography of Book of Mormon Events: A Source Book [1992], pp. 15–22, 87–89, 135–137.) Louis Edward Hills’s (1917 RLDS) proposed geography (Sorenson, 87–89) bears little resemblance in its details to models published by Latter-day Saints Willard Young (before 1920; Sorenson 205–206) and Jean Russell Driggs (1925; Sorenson, 67–68), let alone to the proposed maps published at Brigham Young University by Professor M. Wells Jakeman in the 1940s (Sorenson, 98–100), Thomas Stuart Ferguson in 1950 (Sorenson, 73–74), and Professor John L. Sorenson in 1955 (Sorenson, 178–182).
• And, of course, Neville continues to insist that “M2C intellectuals” claim “the prophets were wrong.” In his mind, apparently, all teachings of prophets are authoritative and revealed. In Neville-Neville Land, prophets (at least the prophets he quotes) don’t have opinions and personal beliefs. In the real world, however, prophets are more fallible than that (as many prophets themselves have testified).

Jesus Christ Visits the Americas (a.k.a. Jesus Teaching in the Western Hemisphere) by John Scott, 1969

But the most insidious thing about Neville’s latest blog post is the way he disparages the authority of the Gospel Topics Essay by claiming that it omits “quotations from General Authorities,” when, in fact, it contains direct counsel from the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles:

The First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles urge leaders and members not to advocate those personal theories in any setting or manner that would imply either prophetic or Church support for those theories. All parties should strive to avoid contention on these matters.

As I’ve written previously, it’s obvious to anyone with “ears to hear” that the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve want Jonathan Neville and other Heartlanders to stop claiming that their theories of Book of Mormon geography are supported by “the teachings of the prophets,” while other theories (including the Mesoamerican geography) “reject the teachings of the prophets.”

That, I believe, is the real reason Jonathan Neville continues to pound away at the Book of Mormon geography Gospel Topics Essay: The Brethren are calling him to repentance, and yet he refuses to hear and hearken to their counsel.

—Peter Pan

(An earlier version of this blog post misread Neville’s date of “the mid-1900s” as “the mid-1990s,” and included a rebuttal to the mistaken, later date. I’ve since removed that section; I apologize for the error.)

* “M2C” is Jonathan Neville’s acronym for the theory that the Book of Mormon took place in Mesoamerica and that the hill Cumorah in the Book of Mormon is not the same hill in New York where Joseph Smith received the plates of Mormon.

Jonathan Neville persists in telling untruths

Jonathan Neville is back from taking a few days off, and today (July 24, 2019) he blogged about Willard Bean, the “fighting parson” of Palmyra. (The Ensign had a lovely article about Bean back in June 1985.)

Apparently Bean believed that the hill Cumorah of the Book of Mormon was in New York, and even wrote a book about it. This is, of course, useful to Neville, who chose today to highlight Bean’s book for no other reason than it confirms his bias.

But, Neville being Neville, he couldn’t help but persist in making claims that are simply not true:

Every member of the Church--everyone who accepts the Book of Mormon whether or not they are LDS--should at least be informed about why every member of the Quorum of the Twelve and First Presidency who has ever addressed the question of Cumorah has reaffirmed the New York setting.

Every member of the Quorum of the Twelve, Brother Neville? Surely you’re forgetting Elder Robert D. Hales and Elder John A. Widtsoe, whose statements contradict your sweeping claim.

…

In addition to Neville’s fib, please note that he’s still claiming that the Gospel Topics essays can be dismissed if one disagrees with them because they are “anonymous”:

Earlier this year, an anonymous Gospel Topics essay stated that as of now, the Church's position on Cumorah has changed; the Church no longer takes any position on any Book of Mormon settings. But, as we've seen, those anonymous essays are subject to change at any moment without notice.

This flies in the face of the introduction to the essays, which clearly states that they “have been approved by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.”

—Peter Pan

Has the location of Cumorah really been revealed? An apostle says no.

In my last post, I discussed Jonathan Neville’s two-column list of those who purportedly believe the hill Cumorah of Mormon 6:6 is in New York versus those who believe it’s in Mesoamerica.

Neville’s “New York” list includes Church presidents, apostles, and other general authorities, while his “southern Mexico (M2C)*” column lists scholars, academics, and authors. His point—one that he makes over, and over, and over—is along the lines of “the prophets have spoken, so you can side with them or the disbelieving scholars who are leading the Church astray.”

What Neville fails to note is that not one apostle or prophet has directly stated that the location of Cumorah has been revealed by God, and some have expressed doubts about the New York location.

For example, Elder John A. Widtsoe, an apostle and member of the Quorum of the Twelve, wrote an article entitled “Is Book of Mormon Geography Known?” for the July 1950 issue of the Improvement Era, the Church’s official magazine. In it he stated:

As far as can be learned, the Prophet Joseph Smith, translator of the book, did not say where, on the American continent, Book of Mormon activities occurred. Perhaps he did not know.

Elder Widtsoe’s comment is most interesting, because Jonathan Neville is certain that Joseph Smith knew where the Book of Mormon took place, yet a senior apostle of the Lord freely conceded that “perhaps” Joseph ”did not know” where it happened.

Elder Widtsoe continued:

However, certain facts and traditions of varying reliability are used as foundation guides by students of Book of Mormon geography.

First, it is known by revelation that Adam, the father of the human race, lived in or near the territory now known as the state of Missouri. This has no bearing on Book of Mormon geography, since it deals with a period long before the coming of Book of Mormon people to America.

Again, Elder Widtsoe’s statement that the location of Adam has “no bearing on Book of Mormon geography” is at odds with Jonathan Neville’s view (and the views of others who promulgate the Heartland hoax). Neville’s book, Moroni’s America – Maps Edition, repeatedly makes a point of noting the location of Adam-ondi-Ahman and implying the importance of its proximity to Neville’s proposed Book of Mormon lands. (See maps 3, 4, 23, 87, 93, 122, 126, 138.)

Second, on the journey into northwestern Missouri, led by the Prophet, the skeleton of a large man was uncovered near the Illinois River. Joseph Smith said it was the remains of a white Lamanite named Zelph, a leader among this people. This is not of much value in Book of Mormon geographical studies, since Zelph probably dated from a later time when Nephites and Lamanites had been somewhat dispersed and had wandered over the country.

Yet again, Neville is at odds with an apostle: For Heartlanders, Joseph’s statement regarding Zelph is one of three key points in determining the geography of the Book of Mormon (the other two being a New York Cumorah and Zarahemla on the Mississippi River). Yet Elder Widtsoe explained that the Zelph account “is not of much value in Book of Mormon geographical studies” due to the dispersing of Book of Mormon peoples from the place Lehi landed.

Next we come to what may be the most important point in Elder Widtsoe’s article:

Third, the hill from which the Book of Mormon plates were obtained by Joseph Smith is definitely known. In the days of the Prophet this hill was known among the people as Cumorah. [Widtsoe cited History of the Church 1:15.] This is a fixed point in Book of Mormon later history. There is a controversy, however, about the Hill Cumorah—not about the location where the Book of Mormon plates were found, but whether it is the hill under that name near which Nephite events took place. [He cited Mormon 6:2, 6; 8:2; Ether 15:11.] A name, says one, may be applied to more than one hill; and plates containing the records of a people, sacred things, could be moved from place to place by divine help.

However, the hill known today as Cumorah in northern New York is a fixed, known point.

According to Jonathan Neville, “the prophets and apostles have always taught about the New York Cumorah,” yet here we have John A. Widtsoe, an apostle and senior member of the Twelve, telling us that there exists a “controversy” regarding this point and admitting that the name “may be applied to more than one hill” and the plates may have been moved after Moroni’ death.

This is quite remarkable, and an interesting blow to Neville’s most important theory.

For his fourth point, Widtsoe included a purported statement by Joseph Smith that “has been very generally accepted by the Church” that Lehi and his party “landed on the continent of South America, in Chile, thirty degrees, south latitude.” However, Widtsoe noted that “much doubt has been cast upon the reliability of this statement, since diligent search has failed to trace it to the Prophet.”

Widtsoe continued:

Fifth, a statement from the days of Joseph Smith, seldom quoted, bears on this subject. In the Times and Seasons, 1842, Zarahemla, a great Book of Mormon city, is partly identified with the ruins of Quirigua, spoken of in [John L.] Stephens’ great book Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan. The article in the Times and Seasons positively stated that Zarahemla, while not necessarily where the Quirigua ruins now stands, was in “this land.” This seems to place many Book of Mormon activities in that region. The interesting fact in this connection is that the Prophet Joseph Smith at this time was editor of the Times and Seasons, and had announced his full editorial responsibility for the paper. [He cited Times and Seasons 3:710.] This seems to give the subjoined article an authority it might not otherwise possess.

Elder Widtsoe then proceeded to quote from the very Times and Seasons article that Jonathan Neville argues was a fraudulent attempt by the dastardly Benjamin Winchester to throw Joseph Smith and his prophetic knowledge of Book of Mormon geography under the bus. A member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles believed and taught that Joseph Smith believed that Zarahemla and the Book of Mormon were in Central America, but Neville apparently doesn’t believe this teaching.

Whom should we believe, Brother Neville? You, or an apostle of the Lord?

Elder Widtsoe then summarized his earlier points:

They who work on the geography of the Book of Mormon have little else than the preceding approaches with which to work, [namely]: that Nephites found their way into what is now the state of Illinois; that the plates of the Book of Mormon were found in a hill in northwestern New York State; that a statement exists of doubtful authenticity that Lehi and his party landed on the shore of the land now known as Chile; and that under the Prophet’s editorship Central America was denominated the region of Book of Mormon activities.

I note with interest that Elder Widtsoe did not mention in his “approaches with which to work” the risible Heartlander claim that D&C 125:3 revealed the ancient location of the Nephite city of Zarahemla to be in Iowa, across the Mississippi River from modern-day Nauvoo, Illinois. (And no other prophet or apostle has made this connection, either.)

Contrary to what Neville continually persists in asserting, there is no revealed geography of the Book of Mormon, including the location of the hill Cumorah that appears in the pages of that book of scripture. Elder Widtsoe’s published statements support that.

—Peter Pan

* “M2C” is Jonathan Neville’s acronym for the theory that the Book of Mormon took place in Mesoamerica and that the hill Cumorah in the Book of Mormon is not the same hill in New York where Joseph Smith received the plates of Mormon.