The tragedy of the Book of Mormon is not what became of the Nephites but what the Nephites became.
Hugh NibleyWherever we look in the ancient world the past has been controlled, but nowhere more rigorously than in the history of the Christian church. The methods of control, wherever we find them, fall under three general heads which might be described as (a) the invention, (b) the destruction, and (c) the alteration of documents.
Hugh Nibley