Origins of the Book of Mormon

[_SatanWasSetUp]

Of everything you list here, Nahom is surely the most interesting. Evidently it did appear on maps of the day, but still... I rather doubt that Joseph Smith had access to everything people like to conjecture he did.

Thank you. Finally a critic who doubts he had a 5,000 volume library in the the Smith family barn.

5000 volume library in his barn? Ok, which critics make this claim, or is this another apologetic straw man? FYI, if a critic points out contemporary literature as potential sources for Joseph Smith, it doesn't mean Joseph had to read it. The literature, newspapers, sermons, maps, etc. that were published and available in libraries in 1830 Palmyra simply paint a picture of the environment Joseph Smith lived in. We are all products of our environment. If I was to make up a story about aliens, I would base my characters, setting, and plot on the conventional understanding of aliens today in 21st century America. Does it mean I've read every Sci-Fi book published? Of course not, but we all have a general understanding of Aliens.

[_Trevor]

No, you can understand that I can't put my finger on the article I read. Which is a pitiful excuse, I know. But it doesn't mean it wasn't said. However, as an editor and proof reader I can tell you, that while I have no professional credentials in literary criticism, I have worked with authors through second, third, fourth drafts, and this is just not a possible process.[/b]

I was just curious about how they could test a document no one has found (second Spalding manuscript).

Thank you. You seem to be a pretty honest person. I haven't run into too many anti-Mormons who are actually willing to admit that some claims are not very good. Most of the critics and anti's I've seen seem to be pretty much a lockstep bunch[/b].

Well, I do not consider myself to be an anti-Mormon. I am a historian. And, I am interested in the rise of Mormonism. The Book of Mormon is an important part of the story.

Passages from it. I'm not impressed. Have you read Matthew Roper's review of it? You can find it on-line at the FARMS review. But since you don't believe that this is really a way to explain away the Book of Mormon, why are we talking about it?[/b]

Well, I think they have argued pretty well for Rigdon's early presence in Pittsburg and the existence of a second Spalding manuscript. As a historian, I think those are valuable discoveries, if they turn out to be true. This is why I am involved in this conversation.

I have read two reviews of the book. I don't know whether one was Roper's. I would be surprised if Roper had much positive to say about it. But, I like to make up my own mind by actually reading the whole book myself. I think that in many ways their argument has big problems, but this does not negate the real evidence that they bring to the table. This evidence is useful to historians who are interested in these issues.

[_SatanWasSetUp]

The problem with your premise here is that the Book of Mormon is not "demosntrably false" as you say. If it were Dan would not have had to work so hard at trying to discredit it. A lot of people have tried to kick to the dirt and haven't been able to do it yet.

Sorry to jump in, but I have to correct this. The Book of Mormon has been about as discredited as it is going to get. The only people who accept it as true are a tiny, tiny minority, literally 0.2% of the world population. 0.2% is statistically irrelevant. More people believe in a 9/11 conspiracy than in the Bok of Mormon. I wouldn't be surprised if 0.2% of the world population believed the Earth was Flat. If the Book of Mormon was not a discredited work, the non-mormon world would at least accept historical aspects of it, while dismissing the spiritual parts as ancient superstitions. But nobody outside the church accepts it as a true book (true meaning non-fiction, not "I know the Book of Mormon is true"), and many inside the church, including GAs hafve come right out and said it is not a historical text, only a spiritual text. How is it NOT discredited? How can apologists claim that critics have failed to discredit the Book of Mormon when 99.8% of the world population doesn't believe it is true, and some of the 0.2% don't believe it is a historical text?

[_charity]

Because of all the stuff in the Book of Mormon that he would have needed to know to get it right that weren't taught in one room schools in upper New York State, and weren't found in the libraries in Manchester or at Dartmouth College, which were the only 2 libraries that were where he could have had access. Not that he did, but that he could have.

I hear this a lot, but I see very little in the Book of Mormon that wasn't well-known folk mythology and Bible-based theology. Can you give me an idea of the amazing things Joseph would have had to have known from the Dartmouth library?

Do you mean couldn't have found in the Dartmouth Library?

Because the claim was that Joseph didn't even know that Jesus was born in Bethlehem and said He was born in Jerusalem. First off, they couldn't even read. The Book of Mormon says "at" Jerusalem. Not "in." And it is a proven phrase to refer to places around Jerusalem. It even occurs in the Bible referring to a place about 20 miles away from Jerusalem. Bethlehem is six miles.

I've always thought this was a dumb argument (one step above "adieu") but I don't see how this blew up in anybody's face.

I meant that when somebody stands on a soap box and says, "Joseph Smith is a fraud because he said that Jesus was born in Jerusalem" and then it is proven that, first of all, the Book of Mormon does not say "in" and second of all "at" is a term used anciently and in modern times to denote an area around a city and not just the city itself, then the argument blows up. If you are standing to close to it, you get rotten egg all over you.

I am glad you see this and the adieu argument as being silly. You have more credibility when you distance yourself from the idiot critics.

I will start a new thread later today to talk about this. Okay?

Thanks. I look forward to it.

I'm sure you do like his work. He is a careful historian

And a really nice guy.

The problem with your premise here is that the Book of Mormon is not "demosntrably false" as you say. If it were Dan would not have had to work so hard at trying to discredit it. A lot of people have tried to kick to the dirt and haven't been able to do it yet. Doesn't it bother you that the anti-Mormons and the critics started out with a lot of claimes against the Book of Mormon and one by one those claims have fallen by the wayside.

You seem to believe that people like me started out trying to prove it was false. You knew me when I was a believer like you, so you ought to know that such is not the case. Nobody is ever going to "prove" it false, but the evidence is quite overwhelming, at least for me, that it's false. That you and others choose to dismiss the evidence is of no consequence. Of course, you'd probably say the same thing about me. I look at the Book of Mormon and see which is a better fit: a 19th-century production, or an ancient text. It's not a close call.

You can still maintain your position and recognize that, while you have made one decision, others can reasonably make the other decision.

That isn't the whole list. These threads get very long and convoluted with too much information. But since nothing has been said that effectively deals with these, we don't have to get into the others yet.

I readily grant that there are parallels. But there's a huge difference between a few parallels (and really, there isn't a very long list of compelling parallels) and substantive evidence of the Book of Mormon's authenticity. As long as no one can "effectively deal" with the obvious anachronisms, textual dependencies, and liftings from 19th-century theology and folk mythology, NHM and the other possible "bullseyes" (why do I keep thinking of consiglieri?) are just not enough to warrant belief.

Can you give me the list of anachronisms?

[/quote][/quote]

[Guest]

Can you give me the list of anachronisms?

some food for thought --

i) Reference to synagogues:

The word synagogue or some derivative of it appears at least 25 times in the Book of Mormon.

Alma 16:13: "And Alma and Amulek went forth preaching repentance to the people in their temples, and in their sanctuaries, and also in their synagogues, which were built after the manner of the Jews."

This statement assumes that these inhabitants of ancient America were aware of how the Jews built their synagogues.

Synagogues were an integral part of Jewish society in the times of Jesus as we see in the New Testament. The synagogue was established for the study of the Law, and differed very much from the temple worship of the Old Testament period, which involved many sacrifices in keeping with the Law of Moses. Scientific and archaeological evidence points to the origin of synsgagues as being about the latter part of the intertestamental period.

How could Alma and Amulek know how the Jews built thier synagogues when the Jews themselves weren t building them before Lehi (supposedly) left for the Americas in 600 BC?

ii) St. Peter is quoted hundreds of years too early:

St. Peter paraphrases Moses' words from Deut. 18:15, 18f in Acts 3:22f. However, I Nephi 22:20 mistakenly represents these words as Moses' own words! Therefore Peter is accidentally quoted centuries before Acts was written or Peter had ever uttered his words.
Similarly, the words of Malachi 4:1 appear in I Nephi 22:15 over a century before Malachi wrote them.

iii) Confusion of the Old Covenant with the New Covenant:

The Book of Mormon confuses the Old and New Covenants. It stresses that before the coming of Christ the faithful kept the Law of Moses (II Nephi 5:10; 25:23-25, 20; Alma 30:3), yet they also established churches, taught and practiced Christian baptism, and were conversant with New Testament doctrines and events (e.g. II Nephi 9:23; Mosiah 18:17).

iv) Jeremiah in Prison:

According to I Nephi 1:4, Nephi and his family left Jerusalem in the first year of the reign of King Zedekiah . In I Nephi 7:14 we are told that Jeremiah is in prison. However, according to the Bible, Jeremiah was imprisoned in the TENTH year of King Zedekiah (Jeremiah 32:1-2). So... perhaps Nephi was rferring to an event which happened AFTER he and his family left? This might explain the anachronism. But no, this is discounted in light of I Nephi 17:4, which is chronologically some time after the events of I Nephi 7:14.

v) Greek names in a book with no Greek influence:

Why are Greek names and words such as Jonas, Lachoneus, Timothy, and Alpha & Omega found in a book that should have absolutely no Greek influence? Anyone familiar with Old Testament history will know that Alexander the Great's conquests of biblical lands came many centuries AFTER Lehi's supposed departure for the Americas.

vi) Anachronistic Metal Artefacts:

The Book of Mormon mention bellows (1 Nephi 17:11), brass (2 Nephi 5:15), breast plates & copper (Mosiah 8:10), gold and silver currency (Alma 11), silver (Jarom 1:8), and steel swords (Ether 7:9)? However, no evidence indicates that these items existed during Book of Mormon times. In fact, metallurgy did not appear until the 800s AD.

vii) Anachronistic agricultural methods: Livestock

Why does the Book of Mormon mention cattle, cows and calves, bulls, asses, horses, oxen, domestic sheep, pigs and & even elephants, when in fact none of these animals existed in America during Book of Mormon times?
The only domesticated animals in pre-Columbian America were llamas, alpacas, guinea pigs, and turkeys (none of which are mentioned in the Book of Mormon).

viii) Anachronistic agricultural methods:Crops

Why are plough-based crops such as barley (Alma 11:7) and wheat (Mosiah 9:9) mentioned in the Book of Mormon when they didn't exist at that time?

ix) Disappearing Place Names:

Why didn't any of the Book of Mormon place names still exist when Columbus discovered America? The place names seem to have existed only BEFORE the Book of Mormon was written, but not after.

x) Seven Day Week:

Why does the Book of Mormon imply a seven day week (Mosiah 13:18) when this calendrical method was unknown in Ancient America?


Edit to add reference http://www.angelfire.com/ms/seanie/bomanachrons.html[/url]

[_Mercury]

The problem with your premise here is that the Book of Mormon is not "demosntrably false" as you say. If it were Dan would not have had to work so hard at trying to discredit it. A lot of people have tried to kick to the dirt and haven't been able to do it yet.

Sorry to jump in, but I have to correct this. The Book of Mormon has been about as discredited as it is going to get. The only people who accept it as true are a tiny, tiny minority, literally 0.2% of the world population. 0.2% is statistically irrelevant. More people believe in a 9/11 conspiracy than in the Bok of Mormon. I wouldn't be surprised if 0.2% of the world population believed the Earth was Flat. If the Book of Mormon was not a discredited work, the non-mormon world would at least accept historical aspects of it, while dismissing the spiritual parts as ancient superstitions. But nobody outside the church accepts it as a true book (true meaning non-fiction, not "I know the Book of Mormon is true"), and many inside the church, including GAs hafve come right out and said it is not a historical text, only a spiritual text. How is it NOT discredited? How can apologists claim that critics have failed to discredit the Book of Mormon when 99.8% of the world population doesn't believe it is true, and some of the 0.2% don't believe it is a historical text?

Because time and time again they purport the Mormon worldview as true contrary to reality. Its as simple as that. Psychosis, delusions, ignorant unwillingness to examine the evidence that is in glaring contradiction to their laughably ignorant opinion.

Its really absurd, almost like they live in this bizarro world where truth means a small opinion disproven MANY times over, almost initially from the religions inception. We will never convince them and they will go to their graves believing this crap.

[_Runtu]

Do you mean couldn't have found in the Dartmouth Library?

No, I mean, what amazing stuff is in the Book of Mormon that Joseph Smith needed a library or more to have known?

I meant that when somebody stands on a soap box and says, "Joseph Smith is a fraud because he said that Jesus was born in Jerusalem" and then it is proven that, first of all, the Book of Mormon does not say "in" and second of all "at" is a term used anciently and in modern times to denote an area around a city and not just the city itself, then the argument blows up. If you are standing to close to it, you get rotten egg all over you.

I am glad you see this and the adieu argument as being silly. You have more credibility when you distance yourself from the idiot critics.

People on both sides have made stupid arguments. I call 'em like I see 'em (nods to Mercury).

You can still maintain your position and recognize that, while you have made one decision, others can reasonably make the other decision.

Of course, I don't think I was being irrational when I was a believer. But your reasonable decision involves ignoring a lot more information than my reasonable decision does. ;)

Can you give me the list of anachronisms?

I was thinking of textual anachronisms, wherein Book of Mormon prophets pick up on a phrase from the KJV and then expand on it. Similarly, the use of post-exilic deutero-Isaiah is a clear and problematic anachronism. Do you agree with David Bokovoy that Joseph Smith simply inserted these texts into the ancient record?

[_Trevor]

Enoch legends, but not Enoch details. You should run over to the MA&D board and read a thread titled" 20 Bulleyes for Joseph" about the Book of Moses and real Enoch literature, not just legends. You would have your eyes opened. Let me know what you think when you have read it.[/b]

Masonic and magic literature is not real?

[_Trevor]

Trevor: Here is a discussion of NHM, the oft-called "best evidence." I'm grabbing it from another source, but its one you may be familiar with (its not Jeff Lindsay's site, though ; ) ). Even if so, I think its an argument that has relevance to this discussion, so others may find it interesting.

Thanks, Blixa, I have been waiting to see this. ;-)

There are two arguments here that I find especially convincing.

First, the coincidence of the tribe called Nihm having a cemetery in the vicinity means absolutely nothing.

Second, Wright is surely correct when he points to the disparity in roots between nahom and Nihm.

I think that pretty well wraps it up. NHM is dead in the water as a proof of the antiquity of the Book of Mormon.

[_Trevor]

Enoch legends, but not Enoch details. You should run over to the MA&D board and read a thread titled" 20 Bulleyes for Joseph" about the Book of Moses and real Enoch literature, not just legends. You would have your eyes opened. Let me know what you think when you have read it.[/b]

Charity,

I ran over to MA&D and looked up the thread. I don't see a lot of evidence for bullseyes there. A few suggestive coincidences, a fair amount of stretching on consiglieri's part, and not a whole lot more than that. I also note that the first translation of Enoch occurred in 1821, and that Joseph Smith's scribe for the project was Rigdon... someone who may very well have read the Enoch translation.

T