According to Randall Spackman, in certain types of Asian vessels, the foremost (and less frequently the aftermost) compartment is made free-flooding. Holes are placed in the planking; however, the vessel does not sink because the watertight compartment bulkhead keeps the remainder of the vessel dry. According to Chinese tradition, a free-flooding compartment reduces the vessel's resistance to water to a minimum and cushions the shocks of pounding when the vessel pitches in rough water. The vessel acquires and discharges water ballast just at the time when it is most desirable to counteract the buffeting at the bow or stern.
Assuming that the Jaredites used extremely tight construction methods, placing holes in the tops of the free-flooding compartments would have been required for the free movement of the water ballast. The illustrations below show the "normal" and "submerged" conditions of such theoretical free-flooding compartments. While there is no way of determining that the Jaredite devices were like those proposed, this interpretation is much more simple than one requiring submarines and compressed air devices and it is based upon East Asian technology. Except for an occasional stoppage due to "mountain waves," the air supply could have been continuous. [Randall P. Spackman, The Jaredite Journey To America, p. 96-97, unpublished]
Ether 2:20 Thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom ([Illustration]): Free-flooding compartment under submerged conditions [Randall P. Spackman, The Jaredite Journey to America, p. 98, unpublished]
“Thou Shalt Make a Hole in the Top and Also in the Bottom”
According to Paul Hedengren, it should not be assumed that just because the Lord authorized the cutting of two holes in each vessel, one "in the top, and also in the bottom" (Ether 2:20), He was also acknowledging that the vessel could be used either right side up or up side down. Since the ends of the barge were peaked, it would not move so easily upon the water upside down as right side up. Furthermore, tumbling about with other people and unsecured cargo is likely to produce serious injuries. It is difficult to imagine a nearly year long voyage in which this was a normal occurrence.
One might ask, If the plug in the hole in the bottom of the barge were removed, would not the barge sink? Not necessarily. Remember, the barge settles in the water only as far as is necessary to displace water of the same weight. Since the barge is light upon the water, it is not settling far. All that would be necessary to keep the barge from sinking would be to place a watertight extension around the hole and extend it from the bottom of the barge higher than the water line outside the barge. Water would then rise in that extension up to the level of the water line outside the barge and no further (see illustration). If the Jaredite boats had a watertight extension from the hole on the bottom to the hole on the top, with stops near and above the waterline, then in addition to ventilation, the stops could also have served as a source of seawater for washing and as a source for waste removal. [Paul Hedengren, The Land of Lehi: Further Evidence for the Book of Mormon, p. 79]
Ether 2:20 Thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom (Illustration): Barge Cross Section, Opening with Plug [Paul Hedengren, The Land of Lehi: Further Evidence for the Book of Mormon, p. 79]
“Thou Shalt Make a Hole in the Top and Also in the Bottom”
In the Lord's instructions to the brother of Jared concerning the barges he was to build, He said:
"thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom; and when thou shalt suffer for air thou shalt unstop the hole and receive air. And if it be so that the water come in upon thee, behold, ye shall stop the hole, that ye may not perish in the flood." (Ether 2:20)
According to Richard Gudmundsen, in reading the remarkable account of the eight barges designed by the Lord for transporting the Jaredites to the new world, it seems at first somewhat ludicrous that one should make a hole in the bottom of the boat and one in the top of the boat as described by the writer and translator. However, when one realized that the abridger Moroni was probably not an expert in hydraulics and pneumatics, then his explanation of the truth seems more reasonable.
The account requires a design which will remain upright in heavy seas which on occasion break completely over the vessels. The stones touched by the finger of the Lord provide the light necessary. The air conditioning system as envisioned by Gudmundsen consists of a wave-driven water-piston which when falling, allows air from the top to be admitted by a flapper valve normally held upwards by a stretchable cord made of animal skin. (see illustration for Ether 2:16))
When the water in the "pump" made of a hollowed out tree, rises due to wave motion, the water piston drives the trapped air into the vessel's interior. Fresh air is pumped into the vessel on one side, and foul air is exhausted at the other end of the boat through a flap valve also made of animal hide. In this design, the air is admitted through the pump's entrance valve placed such that any water which washes over the top falls back into the sea in rough seas. In really terrible storms, it would be necessary to clamp the exit valve closed if too much water flowed into the pump volume. By making the pump's exit port face into the human quarters, a natural draft would be set up to insure that only the stale air from the animal quarters will be pumped out of the vessel's exit flap port. [Richard A. Gudmundsen, Scientific Inquiry Applied to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, pp. 99-103]
Ether 2:20 Thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom(Illustration): Possible Jaredite Barge Construction. [Richard A. Gudmundsen, Scientific Inquiry Applied to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, p. 99]
“Thou Shalt Make a Hole in the Top and Also in the Bottom”
Glenn Scott asks the question, Now what kind of oceangoing vessel would be built intentionally, with "a hole . . . in the bottom" (Ether 2:20)? Scott then says that Edward Butterworth (Pilgrims of the Pacific, 1974, pp. 64-65) has suggested what is probably the most logical solution to this intriguing problem. Scott feels that Butterworth "may have reasoned that the barges the Jaredites had built in the wilderness were most likely a kind of raft, consisting of a simple platform supported on two large logs. They would have built them as simple and easy to construct as possible for they had to build them again and again as they crossed many waters in the wilderness. That concept certainly agrees with the description given Butterworth by two elderly Tahitians, of the great oceangoing catamarans in which the ancient Polynesians sailed the Pacific (Pilgrims, pp. 56-59).
Those long-distance vessels were basically two long, hollow logs, connected by a platform which might explain the Lord's instruction to build them "after the manner of barges which ye have hitherto built" (Ether 2:16). Those Polynesian catamarans were up to one hundred feet long, and the platform sometimes had a double-deck superstructure. The largest Polynesian oceangoing catamarans carried more than 200 warriors or migrating colonists, for thousands of miles across the Pacific. However, since Ether wrote that the Jaredites took "flocks and herds, and whatsoever beast, or animal, or fowl that they should carry with them" (Ether 6:4) it is not likely that there were half that many persons in each barge.
The most convincing reason for accepting this design, is that it provides a reasonable solution for a ship; having a hole in the bottom. His concept would in all but the roughest weather have kept the hole above the water and at the same time provided means for air circulation, fishing, and disposal of refuse. When the weather became rough, the holes could be sealed by doors making them as watertight.
Some have suggested that the Jaredite barges may have looked like a submarine (essentially a tube pointed at both ends), but that would not fit the description of being "light . . . like unto the lightness of a fowl upon the water" (Ether 2:16). Neither would it explain how they could have had a hole in the bottom without sinking. [Glenn A. Scott, Voices from the Dust, pp. 38, 40]
Ether 2:20 Thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom ([Illustration]): These illustrations show how the Jaredite barges may have looked based on F.E. Butterworth's concept of seagoing Polynesian catamarans in his book Pilgrims of the Pacific. [Glenn A. Scott, Voices from the Dust, p. 42]