Have you ever wondered about being at a famous event in history? Have you ever imagined what it would be like to be there, at that time? Don’t we all? I think it’d be nice to be able to ‘look’ in on any event that we’re told of in history and be able to judge for ourselves whether this or that happened. History, as we’re told, is told by the winners. I’m reading this graphic novel right now that paints a pretty sordid picture of the 500 year resistance that has been waged by the Indigenous peoples against the ‘White Man’. I’ve never heard anyone dog Christopher Columbus before and say that he was a slaver who enabled the killing/raping of many people. It’s interesting cause in our doctrine, the LDS think of him as being inspired to find the Americas. In Nephi’s Vision, he said, “And I looked and beheld a man among the Gentiles, who was separated from the seed of my brethren by the many waters; and I beheld the Spirit of God, that it came down and wrought upon the man; and he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land” (1 Nephi 13:12). We interpret that “man among the Gentiles” to have been Columbus. And yet, it is generally understood that Columbus thought that the Americas was India.
There are a few different instances of misinterpreted history even within the Book of Mormon. Ammoron, a king of the Lamanites, accuses the Nephite people of forcing Zoram to come into their caravan. And yet, we know that Zoram loved Nephi and followed him willingly. We also know that after the Nephi/Laman split, that generations after the Lamanites believed the tradition that their Father Laman had been wronged by Nephi. This tradition of lies that was passed down to the Lamanites is why when Ammon and his crew taught the Nephites that it was important for them to help them “to the knowledge of the truth, to the knowledge of the baseness of the traditions of their fathers, which were not correct” (Alma 17:9).
The same occurs today. What is history? As church members we understand the history of the world so differently than most of the world. We believe that the history of mankind has been its acceptance and rejection of God. We believe that these are the last days as we prepare for the Second Coming of Christ. We believe that not only did Jesus live, but that He died for all mankind and was also resurrected. He lives. Elder Christofferson said this last General Conference:
"The scriptures enlarge our memory by helping us always to remember the Lord and our relationship to Him and the Father. They remind us of what we knew in our pre-mortal life. And they expand our memory in another sense by teaching us about epochs, people, and events that we did not experience personally. None of us was present to see the Red Sea part and cross with Moses between walls of water to the other side. We were not there to hear the Sermon on the Mount, to see Lazarus raised from the dead, to see the suffering Savior in Gethsemane and on the cross, and we did not, with Mary, hear the two angels testify at the empty tomb that Jesus was risen from the dead. You and I did not go forward one by one with the multitude in the land Bountiful at the resurrected Savior’s invitation to feel the prints of the nails and bathe His feet with our tears. We did not kneel beside Joseph Smith in the Sacred Grove and gaze there upon the Father and the Son. Yet we know all these things and much, much more because we have the scriptural record to enlarge our memory, to teach us what we did not know. And as these things penetrate our minds and hearts, our faith in God and His Beloved Son takes root.”
One day we will have the truth of history. And Satan’s attempts at changing history to a myriad of untruths will be replaced with the eternal truth that God is over all. The history that God has told, as told by past and living prophets, is the truth. Though many may oppose the truth of history, the “truth will endure to the last, /And its firm-rooted bulwarks outstand the rude blast / And the wreck of the fell tyrant’s hopes.”
