Abstract: The Codex Project

[Limnor]

Limnor, I might wonder if I am being a bit slow here missing something but I am puzzled as to why Joseph would create hidden confessions. To whom is this communication directed?

I find it easier to think Joseph saw spiritual meaning in his recent past so could use them as a pattern to tell stories with spiritual weight. If this is the reason I would imagine reading a confession of real hidden history would be a hit and miss sort of thing. . .

I feel like Smith would have used any technique possible to consistently tell his stories, given he had to present them as "scripture" from "plates."

What better strategy than using real life events as a prompt?

According to what I've read of limnor's theory it doesn't seem like Joseph Smith left much out, but I do need to read more. This is a great thread for getting caught up on that, thanks Limnor!!

What’s funny is I believe the text more than the external explanations about it.

[Gadianton]

Are you saying that brothers getting killed off in the Book of Mormon is figurative -- or was Alvin literally murdered in real life?

[Limnor]

Are you saying that brothers getting killed off in the Book of Mormon is figurative -- or was Alvin literally murdered in real life?

I’m saying Alvin literally being murdered in real life is a possibility worth considering, though I’m not claiming I can establish that historically. It certainly wouldn’t hold up in court. It’s also why I consider it an encoded confessional, and a record to blackmail others.

I would ask why the story consistently and repetitively describes the loss of a central figure as a violent ending of life. Maybe it’s psychological, but the idea of using the book to trap others’ into compliance fits.

Do you see that pattern?

[Gadianton]

what do you mean here, "trap others’ into compliance" ?

[Limnor]

what do you mean here, "trap others’ into compliance" ?

I think he wrote his accomplices— I think there was an “combination” that committed the act—into the story so that he could use the book to blackmail the witnesses into doing his bidding.

The book of ether is a condensed version, particularly chapter 8. I see the stories of Omer and Alma as telling the story of a single person, Oliver, from different perspectives.

[huckelberry]

what do you mean here, "trap others’ into compliance" ?

I think he wrote his accomplices— I think there was an “combination” that committed the act—into the story so that he could use the book to blackmail the witnesses into doing his bidding.

The book of ether is a condensed version, particularly chapter 8. I see the stories of Omer and Alma as telling the story of a single person, Oliver, from different perspectives.

There are important things you are thinking here but not saying. I understand Alvin died of medical treatment by mercury, mercury poisoning. It was a treatment some tried. You are speaking of murder but are being vague about by whom and for what reason. You point to a nexus of conspirators without laying out actual connections. Rigdon has ideas pointing in the same direction of Joseph's project but is there any connection directly before the publication of the Book of Mormon?

Perhaps you are counting on readers being intimately familiar with the Book of Mormon text. I am a more ordinary reader. It is over 50 years since I read through the entire book. I have reviewed selections from time to time since.

[Limnor]

There are important things you are thinking here but not saying. I understand Alvin died of medical treatment by mercury, mercury poisoning. It was a treatment some tried. You are speaking of murder but are being vague about by whom and for what reason. You point to a nexus of conspirators without laying out actual connections. Rigdon has ideas pointing in the same direction of Joseph's project but is there any connection directly before the publication of the Book of Mormon?

Perhaps you are counting on readers being intimately familiar with the Book of Mormon text. I am a more ordinary reader. It is over 50 years since I read through the entire book. I have reviewed selections from time to time since.

I don’t believe the mercury poisoning account. And yes I do count on people being intimately familiar with the text.

There are historical claims that Alvin was given a mercury-based medicine, but zero physical or forensic evidence that mercury poisoning occurred, much less that it caused his death.

If you mean historical connections you are correct. I see the connections as laid out in the book.

For example: If Pratt is Ammon, then the text presumes a prior link between Limhi and Mosiah—meaning Harris and Rigdon are already connected before the “official” story begins. That doesn’t come from Hurlbut or Pomeroy Tucker, it’s coming from the text itself as another source.

[Gadianton]

Just looking it up as I admit I don't have a good timeline in my head, but the Internet says Joseph met Sidney seven years after Alvin died. I have to assume you've taken things like this into account several times over, but I guess my thinking is, okay, let's assume the Book of Mormon is a confessional. I don't put it past Smith as I figure he was most likely a sociopath.

In my thinking, certain characters would need to be locked in significantly into the story first, a core indisputable cluster, in order to make someone like Alvin so central without any external evidence. So who are the core players -- the characters that map to the real people with the cleanest connection? Then again, maybe I have the wrong model -- well, I'd think, in real time as you were working on this, the names must have connected in time in a certain order. So independent of the model, Limnor must have made a first connection. This person in the Book of Mormon = this person in real life. And then after that, perhaps a split second or a day later, a second mapping fell into place. I guess there could be an alternative to that, where several names in real life were tried against several characters until a match was found, and so the first five were matched at the same time.

In either case, I imagine matching Alvin would have been by sheer implication by this other core group getting matched first. ?

[Limnor]

Just looking it up as I admit I don't have a good timeline in my head, but the Internet says Joseph met Sidney seven years after Alvin died. I have to assume you've taken things like this into account several times over, but I guess my thinking is, okay, let's assume the Book of Mormon is a confessional. I don't put it past Smith as I figure he was most likely a sociopath.

In my thinking, certain characters would need to be locked in significantly into the story first, a core indisputable cluster, in order to make someone like Alvin so central without any external evidence. So who are the core players -- the characters that map to the real people with the cleanest connection? Then again, maybe I have the wrong model -- well, I'd think, in real time as you were working on this, the names must have connected in time in a certain order. So independent of the model, Limnor must have made a first connection. This person in the Book of Mormon = this person in real life. And then after that, perhaps a split second or a day later, a second mapping fell into place. I guess there could be an alternative to that, where several names in real life were tried against several characters until a match was found, and so the first five were matched at the same time.

In either case, I imagine matching Alvin would have been by sheer implication by this other core group getting matched first. ?

I didn’t start with a full cast or with Alvin. I started with Joseph—he occupies the same roles as Nephi and Mormon (record keeper) and share similarities within their lives. Only after that did I encounter the D&C code names, which shows a real substitution system already in use, and that changed the question from “is this symbolic?” to “is this a repeatable pattern?”

The number of variations in the book of the name Olihah is too much for me to dismiss as coincidental. The D&C specifically identifies Oliver as Olihah. So I’ve tentatively considered every Oli- name in the book to see if there is historical overlap with Oliver in the real world. There are a couple of other similar sounding names with shared characters as well—Martin Harris/Mahemson/Limhi—that I’ve also considered. It’s not a particularly challenging code.

Alvin shows up not because I forced him in, but because that’s where the book and coding system seemed to require a slain brother.

I’m not convinced there wasn’t an earlier meeting between Joseph and Rigdon. Pomeroy Tucker indicates Rigdon may have been in the vicinity earlier, though Tucker’s statements are late and mostly second-hand, so I can’t lean on them as firm evidence or proof.

But with the inferential information from the book there seems to be some correspondence, and the theological overlap is real. For my purposes it actually doesn’t matter too much—my model doesn’t require Rigdon early, only that he can be absorbed into an already forming group.

[Marcus]

...For my purposes it actually doesn’t matter too much—my model doesn’t require Rigdon early, only that he can be absorbed into an already forming group.

but Rigdon brought the book, right? AM I remembering that correctly?