The next naturalistic explanation of Book of Mormon emerged around the beginning of the twentieth century, positing that Joseph Smith stole from Ethan Smith's 1823 View of the Hebrews. Blending scientific opinion with biblical interpretation, the book outlined parallels connecting Indians and Israelites to argue that Native Americans were descendants of the lost ten tribes. By 1922, noted Latter-day Saint apologist B. H. Roberts had studied these similarities and concluded they represented "a serious menace to Joseph Smith's story of the Book of Mormon's origin." Others soon became attracted to this theory, and it remains popular today, despite numerous differences between the two texts.

If the View of the Hebrews did serve as source material for the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith ignored its description of the skin color of Native Americans. Quoting the opinions of influential historians, Ethan Smith noted the consensus among scholars, all of "the same opinion;" that "the colour of the Indians generally is red, brown, or copper." Though "different shades of complexion [are] found among different tribes of Indians," they were, in essence, "of one colour," red.

The enlarged and enhanced 1825 edition of View of the Hebrews added the additional opinion of the well-traveled explorer Alexander von Humboldt that Native Americans from "Canada, Florida, Peru, and Brazil" all had "the same swarthy and copper colour." The Book of Mormon's portrayal of two groups of Indians, one with black skin and the other with white skin, is in conflict with the description of Native Americans in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres as red or copper-colored in Ethan Smith's View of the Hebrews.