Translation Process for Documents

[_sr1030]

Sorry guy but the way Joseph is described as 'translating' doesn't allow for this. God made the words appear in English. Joseph read them as they appeared to the scribe who wrote them. The scribe read them back and only after they were correct would new words appear on the magic peepstone.

If God put them there and the next words did not appear until the writing was 'correct' where is the leeway for Joseph to add his own words?

Either someone is wrong in describing the process or it didn't happen like that.

Sorry guy, but what you describe isn't translating. And it wasn't translating in the time of Joseph Smith either.

It is not up to someone who does not believe in the Book of Mormon to explain how contemporary words were include in the Book of Mormon.

thanks,
sr

[_beefcalf]

Joseph,

Although multiple witnesses described the process as you stated earlier, the problem there is the multitude of grammatical and other errors in the 1830 addition. If you cling to the 'read verbatim from the spiritual light from God' theory, you then have to concede that God is illiterate.

Which is why you'll have a tough time getting any believer to commit to anything substantial about the method. Any way you slice it, it comes up bad for the LDS church.

[_Simon Belmont]

Joseph,

Although multiple witnesses described the process as you stated earlier, the problem there is the multitude of grammatical and other errors in the 1830 addition. If you cling to the 'read verbatim from the spiritual light from God' theory, you then have to concede that God is illiterate.

Which is why you'll have a tough time getting any believer to commit to anything substantial about the method. Any way you slice it, it comes up bad for the LDS church.

So you believe that the Lord should have also made punctuations appear on the seer stone?

Joseph: I
Scribe: I
Joseph: correct...
Joseph: comma - it looks like a little line directly after the I, on the bottom side
Scribe: comma
Joseph: correct...
Joseph: Nephi... N-e-p-h-i
Scribe: N-e-p-h-i
Joseph: correct
Joseph: another comma
Scribe: What does that look like, again?
Joseph: It's sorta a little line directly following the last letter of the word, on the bottom side.
Scribe: Right, comma.
Joseph: correct
Joseph: having...
...
...

[_beefcalf]

Have you, even once, ever looked at an 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon?

Did I even mention the word 'punctuation' in my post? No.

Examples of grammatical errors:

"… my soul was wrecked with eternal torment …"

"… there was no wild beasts …"

"… Moroni was a coming against them"

reference

There are thousands of these types of problems, without mentioning punctuation, and without even discussing the changes made which completely altered the doctrines of the original 1830 Book of Mormon.

So, did Smith actually read the words from spiritual light from a magic stone at the bottom of a hat?

If you say 'yes', you are accusing God of being illiterate.

If you say 'no', you are admitting that Smith duped Martin Harris by pretending to translate through the stone.

Either way, it's not so good for one's faith in Joseph Smith, Jun., the Prophet of the Restoration.

[_Joseph]

"you then have to concede that God is illiterate."

Or maybe that there was no 'God' involved?

[_truth dancer]

Hey Joseph,

It wasn't God, it was the Holy Ghost who put those words in the hat, and who has ever stated the Holy Ghost was perfect?

;-)

~td~

[_Simon Belmont]

Have you, even once, ever looked at an 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon?

Did I even mention the word 'punctuation' in my post? No.

Examples of grammatical errors:

"… my soul was wrecked with eternal torment …"

"… there was no wild beasts …"

"… Moroni was a coming against them"

reference

There are thousands of these types of problems, without mentioning punctuation, and without even discussing the changes made which completely altered the doctrines of the original 1830 Book of Mormon.

So, did Smith actually read the words from spiritual light from a magic stone at the bottom of a hat?

If you say 'yes', you are accusing God of being illiterate.

If you say 'no', you are admitting that Smith duped Martin Harris by pretending to translate through the stone.

Either way, it's not so good for one's faith in Joseph Smith, Jun., the Prophet of the Restoration.

I've read every edition that I know of, including the original 1830 edition (it is readily available online).

Textual changes are a non-issue. The Book of Mormon itself says that there will be some errors:

1 Nephi 19:6, for example:

evertheless, I do not write anything upon plates save it be that I think it be sacred. And now, if I do err, even did they err of old; not that I would excuse myself because of other men, but because of the weakness which is in me, according to the flesh, I would excuse myself.

Also, Mormon 8:17:

And if there be faults they be the faults of a man. But behold, we know no fault; nevertheless God knoweth all things; therefore, he that condemneth, let him be aware lest he shall be in danger of hell fire.

Some of the changes were grammatical, as I said before. Other changes were made by Joseph Smith himself, and still other changes were due to transcription or printing errors. They are all insignificant.

[_beefcalf]

I've read every edition that I know of, including the original 1830 edition (it is readily available online).

Textual changes are a non-issue. The Book of Mormon itself says that there will be some errors:

1 Nephi 19:6, for example:

evertheless, I do not write anything upon plates save it be that I think it be sacred. And now, if I do err, even did they err of old; not that I would excuse myself because of other men, but because of the weakness which is in me, according to the flesh, I would excuse myself.

Also, Mormon 8:17:

And if there be faults they be the faults of a man. But behold, we know no fault; nevertheless God knoweth all things; therefore, he that condemneth, let him be aware lest he shall be in danger of hell fire.

Some of the changes were grammatical, as I said before. Other changes were made by Joseph Smith himself, and still other changes were due to transcription or printing errors. They are all insignificant.

These are 'non-issues'? They are 'insignificant'?

Because the Book of Mormon says so? Yeah, there is no way Smith could have fabricated such a disclaimer, knowing as he did that his English was sub-par...

You just dismiss these problems with a wave of your hand: Poof! Gone. Yet these are the fingerprints of fraud. At the very least, they give lie to Smith's claims of divine origin of his book.

Fact 1): Smith convinced Harris that he needed the magic seer-stone to translate, going so far as to feign a stupor when Harris surreptitiously swapped the stone with another.

Fact 2): The only person who could have possibly seen any 'spiritual light' on the stone when the hat was dark was Smith himself, whose face was buried in the hat. Therefore, the witnesses who gave the 'English Words In Spiritual Light, As If On Parchment' description must have gotten that description from Smith himself. There could be no other source.

Fact 3): The 1830 Book of Mormon is full of grammatical errors.

Conclusion: If Smith was telling the truth to those witnesses who described the method of reading the spiritual light, then God is the source of those errors. If you cannot accept that God was having a hard time speaking proper English, then you must conclude that Smith was lying about the words appearing in a 'spiritual light' on the stone in his darkened hat.

So...

Let me ask you to please answer the question: "did Smith actually read the words [of the Book of Mormon] from spiritual light from a magic stone at the bottom of a hat?"

[_Simon Belmont]

Let me ask you to please answer the question: "did Smith actually read the words [of the Book of Mormon] from spiritual light from a magic stone at the bottom of a hat?"

Among other methods, yes.

Some get hung up on the "peep stone", but it was just a stone. There was nothing magical about it. The Lord allowed Joseph to see the words of the Book of Mormon using the stone as a catalyst. In order to see it clearly, he put it in a dark container, and he happened to have a hat that he used.

Why do these things bother some people? I do not know.

[_beefcalf]

Some get hung up on the "peep stone", but it was just a stone. There was nothing magical about it. The Lord allowed Joseph to see the words of the Book of Mormon using the stone as a catalyst. In order to see it clearly, he put it in a dark container, and he happened to have a hat that he used.

Why do these things bother some people? I do not know.

Ok, Simon, stay close on this, ok? I will walk you through it, so that you will know.

During a break from translating, Smith and Harris head out by the river to chill for a bit. Harris spies a stone amongst the river rocks which looks, to him, remarkably like Smith's peep-stone. He pockets it. They head back inside to resume the work. During a moment when Joseph is otherwise engaged, Harris replaces Smith's actual peep-stone with the one he found in the river. Smith returns, grabs his hat and the stone, and attempts to resume translation. He is silent for a bit and exclaims that there is some sort of problem, the stone was silent!

Harris, apparently lacking the faith he should have had in Smith, is now mollified, and reveals his subterfuge. Smith takes back his actual stone and they begin again.

Now, this is the reason that your 'catalyst' argument fails. Think about it. If the rock was simply another 'magic feather' (ala Dumbo) which emboldened Smith to unleash his prophetic talents, then one stone is like any other stone. Smith would have had no issue with Harris' stone-swap test.

From this we must conclude one of two things:

1) Smith was honestly unable to translate with the wrong stone because the power that Smith wielded actually lay in the peep-stone itself.

2) Smith knew the simple-minded Harris had swapped the stone and feigned the stupor to convince Harris it was a genuine process (in other words, he lied).

You still with me, Simon? Just one more small step and we're there...

If you select 1), that the power actually lay in the stone, you then have to deal with Smith's use of that same exact stone to illegally bilk credulous farmers with his treasure-digging schemes.

If you select 2), congratulations, you accept that Smith was willing to deceive his followers to convince them of his authenticity, a pattern he used throughout his life.

In either case, the 'catalyst' theory does not work because of Harris' stone-swap test.