Like most members of the LDS Church, I was taught from my earliest years by parents and religious teachers that all Native Americans, from the top of North America to the most southern tip of South America (and the inhabitants of the Polynesian Islands), were literal descendants of Israelite immigrants who were brought to the Americas by the Lord. I was taught that the terms "American Indian" and "Lamanite" were interchangeable. I was assured by Church teachers and writers that Native American speech, customs, and physiology were all consistent with their fullblooded (or nearly so) Hebrew origins.
Therefore, it came as a bit of a shock to me, in my mid-30's, when I discovered that within the LDS Church there was a decades-old, minority-held, notion that not all Native Americans are Israelite. This revelation came about one day during an on-line discussion of the Book of Mormon when a believing, "intellectual" Latter-day Saint started talking about "indigenous people" who were already occupying the entire American continent at the time Lehi and his family arrived at the Land of Promise (not the Jaredites, but Asians we now call Native Americans).
I can't tell you how much this astounded me - to have a believing member spout such obvious (to me) heresy! I had never before heard of the ideas he was putting forth, nor had I heard anything close to it in my sheltered, but I believe typical, LDS upbringing. Throughout my entire youth, my parents, numerous teachers, leaders, and General Authorities made it clear that all Native Americans (and Polynesians) were Lamanites - literal descendants of Lehi, and, hence, Hebrew.
When I questioned this "heretical" on-line LDS member further, he explained that Joseph Smith had simply been mistaken in his understanding that all Native Americans were Lehi's descendants and that he had unwittingly transferred this error to his followers. My on-line friend assured me, however, that the Book of Mormon didn't exclude the possibility of an already-existing indigenous people on the American Hemisphere during Lehi and family's arrival.
He even claimed that the Book of Mormon mentioned these indigenous people several times. This piqued my curiosity immensely, so I asked him for references, which he promptly gave me.
Unfortunately, his references seemed far too obscure to convince me that the Book of Mormon was talking about anyone but Nephites/Lamanites. I thought his interpretations were stretched much too thin to be believable — as if he were grasping at anything in the text of the Book of Mormon that could possibly hint of Native Americans predating and co-existing with the Lehites. I felt at the time, and still do today, that these references can be interpreted more than one way, and the references are certainly not strong enough to negate the Hemispheric Model on their own.
My friend went on to assert that the Nephites and Lamanites were simply rulers of these existing indigenous people who had migrated from Asia long ago. According to him the literal Nephites and Lamanites (i.e. direct descendants of Lehi) were too small in number to make a significant genetic/linguistic/cultural impact on this continent, and lived only somewhere in Meso-America (the exact place yet unknown). But, even though they were in this extreme minority, they were able to take political control of the surrounding Native Americans, and were able to coerce these Natives into fighting very bloody, almost constant wars for the majority of 1000 years. "Nephite" and "Lamanite", therefore, took on a political meaning, and did not necessarily imply any genetic relationship with Nephi or Laman.
One of my first objections to my friend's claims was that such a feat would be quite miraculous from the Nephite/Lamanite perspective — to start off as a family of a little more than a dozen, in a strange unknown land, only to marshall Native American troops just a few years later, and begin wars with each other! I know of no other tale like this anywhere else in the world, and surely such a miracle would warrant being mentioned in the Nephite religious history — after all, much lesser miracles are mentioned in the Book of Mormon. Why not this very large miracle? My friend responded with, what to me was, a very lame excuse. According to my friend the Nephites were such a separatist people that they could not bring themselves to mention the non-Hebrews that they were ruling over — not even a passing reference. I won't go into the many problems I have with this particular assertion, but I will say that it certainly didn't ring true to me.
After our conversation ended, I was rather inclined to see my friend as a bit of a crackpot. I couldn't imagine any other Latter-day Saint believing such nonsense, especially in light of everything our leaders had said for such a long time. However, I was soon to be surprised again. Not long afterwards, as I became more acquainted with the "Internet Mormon" scene, I learned that this theory of his was actually decades old and that it had been debated back and forth in the LDS intellectual community for a long time. In fact, I was very surprised to learn that few apologists now support the "Hemispheric Model", as the traditional view of Book of Mormon lands is often called. Most apologists seem to have abandoned the view embraced Joseph Smith, and defend the "Limited Geography Theory" instead, which is what my on-line friend was describing to me. In essence, this Limited Geography Model limits the Nephite/Lamanite lands (including the Hill Cumorah) to a section of Meso-America.
While I don't find the concept of Lehi's family being surrounded by a large indigenous population very plausible (in light of the prophetic statements below, as well as the complete lack of direct reference to them in the Book of Mormon), I thought that in fairness, I should at least refer you to a strong defender of this position.
William Hamblin, at http://www.lightplanet.com/ mormons/response/bom/ Geography_Archaeology.htm, asserts that many of the critics of the Book of Mormon "have not read the text of the Book of Mormon carefully; they distort both what the text of the Book of Mormon says and the variety of Latter-day Saint interpretations of the text; they attempt to make all Latter-day Saint scholars responsible for the private opinions of some Latter-day Saint authors or General Authorities." I believe that Hamblin's criticism would also apply in large part to those believing Latter-day Saints who insist that the Hemispheric Model of the Book of Mormon is the correct one.
Therefore, after reading this essay, I highly recommend that the reader visit Mr Hamblin's site. Hopefully, the reader can then form their own opinion regarding the Limited Geography Theory vs. the Hemispheric Model.
As this essay will show, Hamblin, and the many other LDS scholars and apologists who embrace the Limited Geography Theory, would likely also be quite critical of Joseph Smith's reading and understanding of the Book of Mormon, as well Brigham Young's, Wilford Woodruff's, and Spencer W. Kimball's, if these men were alive today.
I find it ironic that many apologists today tend to defend Joseph Smith's claims of the divinity of the Book of Mormon by tearing down other claims of his about this same book.
Since Joseph Smith is considered to be a prophet of God by faithful Latter-day Saints, I think it is worthwhile to examine his claims regarding the origins of Native Americans to find out just what statements we are being asked to reject. Many apologists are adamant that Joseph Smith was just speaking "as a man" on this subject, rather than "as a prophet". I believe, however, that the following statements will cast doubt on that assertion.
Part Two: Joseph Smith, the Angel Moroni, and the Lord Speak Out on the Lamanite/Native American Question