Kevinf, I agree that there are differences in the details of historical accounts of the Zelph episode. However, common threads run through accounts that diverge in other ways: Joseph claimed revelatory insight that Zelph was connected with the Book of Mormon. Given that commonality, the other divergences don’t undermine the episode as evidence that Joseph felt divine confirmation for a hemispheric geography — because even people who remember the event differently share that general sense.

I’ve read another version of Godfrey’s research into the Zelph story, and combined with this one, it’s obvious that Joseph Smith said something about Zelph after a skeleton was unearthed on a mound during the Zion’s Camp march. Beyond that, it’s sketchy, and the conclusions that can be drawn start to diverge wildly. I’m not taking sides in the LGT discussion, it’s just that I knew a little about Zelph, and thought that particular argument weak. I was just speaking directly to the Zelph accounts, not a broader view of Book of Mormon geography.

The Zelph account has been brought under scrutiny, as noted here.

The lack of good contemporary accounts makes determining what Joseph Smith said, and what has been handed down, hard to determine. I’m not sure that I would use it as an example.

The point with the Moroni vision — and the Hill Cumorah visions and the Zelph vision and the Lucy Mack Smith account — is that they supply evidence that Joseph Smith thought there was a revelatory basis for his interpretation of the Book of Mormon as a hemispheric history. Joseph may have been foolish in thinking this, and such foolishness would certainly account for all of the evidence. My argument is simply that there is some reason to think he thought his argument was based in revelation.

Please note that I’m not at all arguing about DNA.

You are using this issue about “the” in support of an argument that doesn’t follow anyway; that is, that modern-day Central and South Americans will have to give up their understanding that they are descended from Lehi, Ishmael, and Mulek. In other words, accepting a limited geography theory — even if it is on an intellectual basis as you have repeated pointed out — does not require that an educated “elite” is denying the tribe of Manasseh its heritage. I guess that I am wondering why you are holding firm on the argument that Central and South American Lehite heritage understanding depends on the hemispheric model.

As for earlier Church leaders including Joseph Smith believing in a hemispheric model, unless it is based on revelation about that point, then it is not binding. I would bet that Joseph Smith and other Church leaders — including many Church leaders today — thought and think that Job actually existed or have distorted views of Biblical geographies, even though sources about those issues are at anyone’s fingertips today and weren’t entirely out of reach in Joseph Smith’s day as well.

I remember limited geography coming up before on your blog and us having a discussion about the DNA evidence. Do you remember that post? I can’t find it and I’m hoping you can point it out.

“historians, by contrast, use hearsay evidence all the time.”

There is a difference between _using_ hearsay evidence and _abusing_ hearsay evidence over correct usage of definite articles. It just isn’t that precise when dealing with tertiary things (like this surely is, compared to the more relevant concerns of the testimonial).