Possible Modern Source for the Book of Mormon

[_Tim the Enchanter]

What it does mean though is that we can cross a rigid translation off the list. Those who say he translated word for word, etc., and was instructed on what words to use, are probably wrong. I would say that with 99% certainty.

What do you make of the following?

Here is Emma Smith. This quote is contained in Russell Nelsons July 1993 Ensign article about the Book of Mormon.

When my husband was translating the Book of Mormon, I wrote a part of it, as he dictated each sentence, word for word, and when he came to proper names he could not pronounce, or long words, he spelled them out, and while I was writing them, if I made any mistake in spelling, he would stop me and correct my spelling although it was impossible for him to see how I was writing them down at the time. Even the word Sarah he could not pronounce at first, but had to spell it, and I would pronounce it for him.

David Whitmer, one of the Three Witnesses, described the translation process in An Address to All Believers in Christ this way:

Joseph Smith would put the seer stone into a hat, and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the interpretation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to Oliver Cowdery, who was his principal scribe, and when it was written down and repeated to Brother Joseph to see if it was correct, then it would disappear, and another character with the interpretation would appear. Thus the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, and not by any power of man.

[_Equality]

Uncle Ed's post called my attention to this interesting passage:

... the Book of Mormon introduced a lot of philosophical and religious concepts into the Christian world which were revolutionary, even still today. Wildly unique. For the logical mind the LDS gospel is the only form of Christianity that makes any sense, and it is very different from any other sect. Scholars, including non-LDS, have written PhD dissertations entirely based on new concepts introduced by the Book of Mormon and how they have impacted the Christian world and the pool of philosophical thought.

OK, then:

1. Please give me an example of a revolutionary religious or philosophical concept unique to the Book of Mormon, with reference to the chapter and verse in which it is introduced.

2. Please show me how the said concept was 'introduced into the Christian world', in the sense of becoming familiar to significant numbers of non-LDS Christians.

3. Please show how (say) John Polkinghorne, a former Professor of Mathematical Physics in the University of Cambridge who is an Anglican priest rather than a Mormon, does not have a logical mind.

4. Please give me an example of one of the new concepts introduced by the Book of Mormon which have had PhD theses written on them by non-Mormons and have "impacted the Christian world and the pool of philosophical thought" in any noticeable sense.

As Chap was posting these questions, I was starting a new thread asking pretty much the same. I think it would be better to not let this thread go down any more tangents unrelated to The Late War. Perhaps we could move the discussion of these assertions by Water Dog over to the thread I just started? viewtopic.php?f=1&t=32367

[_Chap]

Agreed, Equality.

Water Dog: on the issues I raised, please respond on the other thread.

[_Bazooka]

You're not keeping up with the conversation. This fits with a loose translation theory. If a modern translator where translating from language A to B and the writing included a quote from a prominent text, which the translator already has access to in language B, would he not simply copy the existing translation? That's what I'd do. That's what translators do all the time.

You seem to be suggesting that, for the parts of the Book of Mormon identical to parts of the KJV Bible, Joseph stopped using the rock in the hat/Urim & Thummim and simply dictated the relevant parts from the Bible he owned. Is that what you are suggesting?

[_Chap]

[The Book of Mormon] was translated by [Joseph Smith] into strangely inaccurate KJV-like prose from an as yet unattested language that he did not know;

You're not keeping up with the conversation. This fits with a loose translation theory. If a modern translator where translating from language A to B and the writing included a quote from a prominent text, which the translator already has access to in language B, would he not simply copy the existing translation? That's what I'd do. That's what translators do all the time.

You seem to be suggesting that, for the parts of the Book of Mormon identical to parts of the KJV Bible, Joseph stopped using the rock in the hat/Urim & Thummim and simply dictated the relevant parts from the Bible he owned. Is that what you are suggesting?

I don't think Water Dog understood me at all. He apparently thinks I was referring to the occurrence of actual quotes from (e.g.) KJV Isaiah in the Book of Mormon. However, when I referred to "strangely inaccurate KJV-like prose" I was referring to Book of Mormon's oddly imperfect imitation of the kind of 17th-century English used in the KJV. Remember the OP of this thread?

I'd rather see his answers on the other thread in any case.

[_Everybody Wang Chung]

The depictions of this warfare were laughed at by critics of the Book of Mormon for over a hundred years. Scholars were not of the opinion that Mesoamerican cultures were warlike, because there was no significant archaeological evidence that had been discovered. Joseph Smith didn't have any knowledge of warfare, and certainly not from the Mesoamerican time period, nobody did in his day. So it was thought an evidence of his fraud.

CFR that "scholars were not of the opinion that Mesoamerican cultures were warlike."

Actually, three hundred years before Joseph Smith, Cortés kept detailed journals of his campaign. Cortés wrote extensively about the warfare among the different Mesoamerican groups, including numerous wars, human sacrifice and tribal alliances.

Hell, there was so much warfare among the Mesoamericans that Cortés was even offered support from a number of enemy groups and rivals of the Aztecs, including the Totonacs, and the Tlaxcaltecas, just to name a few.

Cortés and his writings were well known during Joseph's time. I look forward to your CFR about these "scholars" who felt the Mesoamericans were not warlike.

[_ControlFreak]

ControlFreak - I find your response to be very contrived and disingenuous. If the matter is as cut and dry and you say, if that's your genuine opinion, then why are you here? Live your life, spend your time in a more productive manner. If you're going to discuss an issue, do so objectively, and stay on topic. Waiving your hand and dismissing me with vague generalizations about the Book of Mormon being on its ass for a long time now is not a very compelling argument. I know you are but what am I! LOL. You defend the conclusions of your current argument with the conclusions of some other argument, which are facts not in hand for one, but also not established as reliable either way. I think we could also agree to just disagree with regards to your statements about the Book of Mormon being such an utterly unoriginal and uncomplicated work that clearly any 19th century simpleton was capable of compiling. Fraud or not, and even without regards to literary quality, the Book of Mormon introduced a lot of philosophical and religious concepts into the Christian world which were revolutionary, even still today. Wildly unique. For the logical mind the LDS gospel is the only form of Christianity that makes any sense, and it is very different from any other sect. Scholars, including non-LDS, have written PhD dissertations entirely based on new concepts introduced by the Book of Mormon and how they have impacted the Christian world and the pool of philosophical thought. Even if Joseph Smith somehow borrowed those ideas from other places, he did an amazing job of applying them to Christianity. Not only were they radical, but a lot of Bible scholars even acknowledge the LDS interpretation as being "more biblical" than any other Christian denomination. So Joseph Smith would have had to have a pretty strong command of the KJV. I assume you've read the KJV? It's a pretty daunting problem to tackle. People spend lifetimes studying the Bible and trying to piece that puzzle together. If Joseph Smith was a fraud, the implications of this are far reaching. It means that at a young age he already had such a thorough command of the Bible and the gospel that he was able to see all of its logical fallacies and devise a scheme for plugging those holes.

Hi Water Dog,

I'll respond to you, because believe it or not, you come across as a pretty nice guy despite your eagerness to invalidate the Late War's influence on the Book of Mormon.

I was not being disingenuous at all. I was trying to help you see the perspective of the critic (or really any objective person). I could name every bullet hole in the Book of Mormon, but it would take a long time and I don't feel is particularly relevant. Here's a short list, just so you know what kinds of things I'm referring to:

- The Book of Mormon refers almost exclusively to old world crops and animals, NONE of which have been found in new world archaeology. There is a fairly weak argument for a form of barley, but other than that horses, cows, sheep, pigs, goats, wild goats, wheat are NOT found anywhere near the Book of Mormon story lands (go ahead and count all of North and South America) either chronologically or geographically.
- The Book of Mormon frequently refers to technology that has not been found ANYWHERE on the American continents in the time frame of the Book of Mormon. Steel, iron, coins, chariots, Hebrew, Egyptian, etc.
- The Book of Mormon is riddled with nonsensical stories that are beyond belief if not completely impossible. Jaredite barges full of livestock and food for a year, Jaredites literally slaughtering every man woman and child until only the 2 great heroes are left standing, where one dramatically beheads the other, global flood of Noah, Tower of Babel, etc. etc. (B.H. Roberts has a good and entertaining work on the matter, you should read it)

Anyway, the list goes on and on. The point of the Late War is NOT to disprove the Book of Mormon directly, because I think most people agree with you that writing in a style similar to the time and place is not a problem (although picking a hokey faux-bible style is a bit strange). The point of the Late War IS that it disproves one of the main apologetic arguments that tries to prove the Book of Mormon came from supernatural sources, because Joseph would have NO WAY of writing such things otherwise. Well, guess what? We just found a direct, easy way for Joseph to learn and incorporate a "Hebraic" style of writing.

So it is what it is. You are of course free to continue to believe that it is a true book despite all of the bullet holes (you had to do that already). But now, you can't gush over the chiasmus and Hebraisms as proof of divine origin.

Please feel free to list even one "wildly unique" idea in the Book of Mormon. You may be disappointed when you find out that while the compilation as a whole is somewhat unique, the individual items were all present at the time. Joseph didn't come up with any wildly unique ideas. Joseph also didn't have to see all of the flaws in the Bible and plug them. He only had to be aware of the public debates and pick his favorite arguments of the time and put them all together. They were all there.

As to why I am still interested in this despite being an obviously disaffected member? The church was my life for 35 years. It is still the central pillar in the lives of my entire extended family. The Book of Mormon and Mormon history is quite interesting! It is also my culture and heritage. Most of my friends are Mormon. Oh, and don't forget, I am obviously a child of Satan and am driven by a burning desire to bring the whole church crashing down. OK, just kidding. I'm really a regular guy just like you. There is even a decent possibility that we are friends and don't even know it. The church is a small world.

[_Tim the Enchanter]

You're not keeping up with the conversation. This fits with a loose translation theory.

I mentioned this earlier, but you haven't responded so I'm mentioning them again. Do the following quotes fit with a loose translation theory?

Here is Emma Smith. This quote is contained in Russell Nelsons July 1993 Ensign article about the Book of Mormon.

When my husband was translating the Book of Mormon, I wrote a part of it, as he dictated each sentence, word for word, and when he came to proper names he could not pronounce, or long words, he spelled them out, and while I was writing them, if I made any mistake in spelling, he would stop me and correct my spelling although it was impossible for him to see how I was writing them down at the time. Even the word Sarah he could not pronounce at first, but had to spell it, and I would pronounce it for him.

David Whitmer, one of the Three Witnesses, described the translation process in An Address to All Believers in Christ this way:

Joseph Smith would put the seer stone into a hat, and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the interpretation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to Oliver Cowdery, who was his principal scribe, and when it was written down and repeated to Brother Joseph to see if it was correct, then it would disappear, and another character with the interpretation would appear. Thus the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, and not by any power of man.

[_Tim the Enchanter]

You seem to be suggesting that, for the parts of the Book of Mormon identical to parts of the KJV Bible, Joseph stopped using the rock in the hat/Urim & Thummim and simply dictated the relevant parts from the Bible he owned. Is that what you are suggesting?

Yep

To my knowledge, the idea you suggest was never stated or alluded to by anyone who was involved with the translation process. Why is this? Or am I ignorant of statements made by Joseph, Oliver, Emma or anyone else who was close to Joseph Smith stating this is how it happened?

[_Spanner]

Water dog, did you follow this link from the early pages to check out the thematic parallels?
http://www.rickgrunder.com/parallels/mp193.pdf

What do you think about the numerous thematic parallels? These were discovered by a completely independent researcher. The two were oblivious to each other, but on the same track. In science (and probably other fields as well), this is convergent evidence. It is very persuasive.

There is quite a bit of convergent evidence accumulating for the general hypothesis that the Book of Mormon had multiple 18/19th century influences (if not multiple authors), and was constructed in the 19th century by Joseph Smith (probably with some degree of assistance/collaboration). If you are interested in investigating the evidence for multiple authors (a hypothesis totally compatible with Late War influence), check out Mormonleaks.com