Roman Story & Book of Mormon Similarities

[_marg]

What data? We don't have any data from Nehemiah King. Not a thing. Not a word. Not a piece of evidence.

The handwritten letter given to the N.Y. Library in 1914 by Mrs. Hiram Lake, discovered to exist in 1980 is data relevant to the S/R theory. It mentions Nehemiah King. I appreciate you wish to dismiss it. In evaluating it, it points to Hurlbut being the writer, it points to it being a draft statement that was to be presented to the Painesville citizen's committee. the statement mentions that the person giving the statement has reviewed Hurlbut's returned with Spalding MS. On the existing Spalding MS in Hurlbut's handwriting he says he's shown a few witnesses the manuscript one of them being Aaron Wright. The draft is consistent with the statement by Aaron Wright a few months earlier in Aug 1833. We know for a fact the Splaldking MS exists, we know for a fact it's Hurlbut's writing on the back of the M.S., we know Aaron Wright was a neighbour of Spalding, and a friend of Nehemiah King..there is no reason to doubt that Hurlbut showed Aaron Wright the Spalding Roman story. Aaron never claimed Hurlbut misrepresented him in the signed Aug 1833 statement, the Aug 1833 statement is consistent and similar in much of the content to the draft recently found in 1980 letter, Hurlbut's method of taking statements was to question, write up a draft and then prepare a good copy for signature...hence there is good reason to conclude that the found 1980 in the N.Y library draft letter is a draft of a statement taken from Aaron Wright written down by Hurlbut to be given to the Citizen's committee. Since Aaron Wright didn't claim misrepresentation of his Aug 1833 there is little reason to doubt the draft statement found in the library was simply a fabrication by Hurlbut and fabricated.

The is little motivation for Aaron Wright to lie about remembering his friend attending a talk given by Mr. Hyde and the fact that it is not denied that Mr. Hyde gave such a talk, adds further credibility that Aaron is telling the truth with regards to Nehemiah King.

You don't like this bit of data, because you wish the S/R theory to be presented as if it was the fabrication by Hurlbut.

As I pointed out previously you have extremely high standards of proof for the S/R theory and extremely low standards of proof for the Book of Mormon as indicated by your accepted of the Book of Mormon witness testimonies to extraordinary events even though they were witnesses with a vested interest, even though they signed a prepared statement, a statement which lacked details and which when they were questioned later they used the excuse that they saw and heard with spiritual eyes and ears and hence couldn't be specific. Yet with the Spalding witnesses who were numerous, who had no vested interest, in fact were disinterest, were sought after they didn't see anyone to give their statement to, in which they aren't making any unusual claims, they have memories albeit not perfect but of Spalding reading to them approx 20 years previous to their statements a novel he was working on which had unique names such as Lehi and Nephi, and which they remember as a tale explaining how Indians came to America. by the way that is not unusual for people to remember some things better than others. Malcolm Gladwell calls this the "stickiness factor" some ideas catch on quickly and are easily remembered..so it would not be unusual if Spalding read frequently that they would remember names but not remember other details in the story.

Your inconsistency in how you critically evaluate the data..that is you very high standard of proof for Spalding witnesses and your very low standard of proof for the Book of Mormon witnesses to the point that it is just a matter of faith, indicates your intellectual dishonesty.

And now I'm going out...

[_wenglund]

[ /merry-go-round]

[ Comprehension Problem...]

For your benefit, let me quote again what I said, but this time include the important section that you conveniently left off:

and rather than using proven scholarly methods of textual critical analysis or even wordprint studies, cherry-pick phrases from the extant manuscript

Please note the words "rather" and "scholarly" and "methods" and "studies" in the first clause. Also, please note the comma separating those words from the phrase "cherry-pick phrases".

Now, take a moment to contemplate why I would intentionally separate by comma those two clauses.

If you are having trouble figuring out why, there is a huge clue in the word "rather". There is also another clue in my use of the word "scholarly" in reference to the "methods" and "studies", though not in reference to "cherry-pick phrases".

Hopefully, with those hints you will be able to correctly assertain that I am differentiating between the scholarly methods/studies as contrasted with the non-scholarly APPROACH of "cherry-pick phrases".

And, if you were able to correctly ascertain this, then perhaps you can also correctly ascertain that what I was speaking directly to in my post WAS the "cherry-pick phrases" APPROACH rather than the scholarly methods/studies (i.e wordprint studies).

Did it compute this time?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_Benjamin McGuire]

I don't thin you think you understand the argument.

The handwritten letter given to the N.Y. Library in 1914 by Mrs. Hiram Lake, discovered to exist in 1980 is data relevant to the S/R theory. It mentions Nehemiah King. I appreciate you wish to dismiss it.

First, its irrelevant to the question of plagiarism. You have to be very careful of circular argumentation. You can't use the spalding theory as evidence for plagiarism and use the alleged plagiarism as evidence for the spalding theory.

That is an ongoing theme on this issue.

Your inconsistency in how you critically evaluate the data..that is you very high standard of proof for Spalding witnesses and your very low standard of proof for the Book of Mormon witnesses to the point that it is just a matter of faith, indicates your intellectual dishonesty.

Second, I don't really care much about the Book of Mormon witnesses. I haven't invoked them in this argument. I am not trying to demonstrate anything with their inclusion. I am pretty much ignoring them, as they don't have anything to do with this particular discussion. So, I am not sure why you keep bringing this up except as a distraction. You are playing games with it, I am not. In fact, I don't think I have asserted a single thing in this thread about the three witnesses - so, I am not sure what your point is.

It is clear that one does not have to be a believer to dismiss the Spalding theory. So this sideshow about belief is largely irrelevant. Please stop bringing it up. I promise, I won't invoke the angel.

[_Roger]

Ben:

Due to time limits I will respond to a few things now and the rest when time permits....

Roger, the issue is that it ezplains the totality of the evidence as you INTERPRET it. But that's a circular argument. In discussions involving textual criticism (like claims of dependancy, borrowing, plagiairism and intertextuality), you start from the text, you don't start by creating scenarios and then interpreting the text to fit.

Note the bolding above.... you seem to be nit-picking about the order of things. The most likely scenario for "claims of dependancy, borrowing, plagiairism and intertextuality" to develop is for someone to notice similarities between the two texts in question. This is EXACTLY what happened in both cases--BOM/Spalding; Spalding-1838 Smith. You might want to argue that Hurlbut concoted the witness statements linking the Book of Mormon to Spalding, but I think you would be hardpressed to prove it. I've read Brodie and I'm not convinced.

And in the case of Spalding-1838 Smith this is exactly what has happened. Dale noticed similarities in the two texts which prompted him to further investigation.

If you think that those of us who see a relationship between the data and the Spalding-Rigdon authorship claims have "created" that scenario and then attempt to "interpret the text to fit" you are simply mistaken in that assumption. We did not create the S/R claims. Nevertheless, for those who reject S/R it must be annoying that the text can so easily be interpreted to fit.

I have seen such evidence. Unfortunately you are going to have to wait, since I don't feel it is appropriate for me to discuss it at this point in time. I know this sounds like a cop out. I am more than happy to talk about other issues though. I will say that on the flip side of the coin, I haven't yet seen any solid, logical arguments that actually support the S-R theory.

Yes, it does sound like a cop-out. I can't do much with what you've seen but can't share.

And my response to this is quite simple Roger - presenting a mountain of bad evidence doesn't make a good case.

I agree. You have not demonstrated tainted evidence. Instead you acknowledge the parallels are indeed parallels. You simply want us to believe they are not significant parallels because you can allegedly cite "thousands" of others. To demonstrate your point you cited another story with three similar items and a number of differences. So far I do not find your counter-argument compelling for reasons I've already stated.

You might have a point if many of these similarities were good - that is, they were somehow unique, or weren't found in other sources - but that really isn't the case here. When we start pulling the bad examples out, it isn't really a context of "all the similarities". And testimony has no real place in this discussion.

I beg to differ. I think testimony has a prominent place in this discussion. When Oliver Cowdery claims to have a personal witness of the Book of Mormon, I have to take that in to account along with all the other things Oliver Cowdery said. If Oliver can be show to have been a habitual liar, then his testimony of the Book of Mormon is suspect. If not, then one must seriously consider his Book of Mormon testimony.

As far as I am aware, the vast majority of those who testified to hearing Spalding's manuscript and say that it was very similar to the Book of Mormon did not have reputations of being habitual liars.

The testimony is the key. It is the spark that got investigations going. And since you want textual investigation to start with the text, you should appreciate & at least consider the testimonies of those who first claimed to be acquainted with both texts to such an extent as to recognize similarities.

All testimony does is to provide us what some people thought - but my experiences is that most of these people were likely unfamiliar with the texts themselves - to the extent that it calls their testimony into question.

Your experience? Who said anything about your experience? The S/R theory is not built on your experience. It is built upon the testimonies of those who were actually there at the time, actually knew Spalding, actually heard him read from his manuscript or read it themselves. What possible basis do you have for suggesting they never read or heard a manuscript they explicity claim to have read or heard read? Many of them go into specific detail as to what they heard, and yet your experience suggests otherwise?

The problem with the notion of a modern finder of ancient records is that it isn't particularly special.

Of course. But we're not merely talking about two generic "finders of ancient records." We're talking about a pre-1816 fiction writer who had been associated with the Book of Mormon as earlier as 1832 writing a fictional account that has a number of parallels to an allegedly true account written by the "translator" of the Book of Mormon in 1838. A rather large difference.

How familiar are you (serious question) with early 19th century literature? How much have you actually read? I have read a great deal, and have a large personal collection.

Good for you. Aside from LDS history, I am not terribly well read when it comes to 19th century material.

So I can suggest with some degree of confidence that these kinds of stories are not all that uncommon - but I suspect that you haven't actually read any beyond the immediate context.

Which I suppose makes you an expert and me a pauper. Nevertheless, despite your superior knowledge, from what you have posted here so far, I'm not buying your argument.

I think this is one of the weaker comparisons since Dale is drawing from the Book of Mormon and not Smith's account. Nevertheless, Dale is going on a hypothesis that links the two to a common author and then offers evidence to support the hypothesis. That is certainly reasonable. And since the wp study supports the connection, it is reasonable to consider all possible parallels. But the susequent parallels are certainly stronger.

I don't think it is reasonable. In fact, it isn't a normal process. There is a term used in literary studies to describe this process. You may have heard it. It is called the Intentional Fallacy.

You know Ben, you can throw out whatever labels you want to throw out, but when you do so you're just blowing off steam. You want textual criticism to start with the texts and that's how it happened--people seeing similarities between two texts--which you yourself have admitted to seeing as well on this thread. Your only point of contention with them is that--according to you--they just aren't that significant. Since that conclusion is subjective, we may just have to disagree on that.

I do have justification. The parallels which Dale proposes are not exact. They are broad enough that I can probably find tens of thousands of similar statements in contemporary literature.

Be my guest. I challenge you to find a contemporary account that has an equal or greater number of parallels to Smith's discovery narrative. This must be a single source written by one author prior to 1838 and must follow a similar chronology to Smith's narrative. Then once you have that, the author's writings must have been publicly accused of having a connection to the Book of Mormon prior to 1838. Let me know when you have something.

Now the following exchange is really interesting....

Not really. In fact your reasoning here is tautological. The fact that "Both narratives are written within a few years of each other and describe contemporary events" is NOT the reason why "the events described occur within a few years of each other," rather you're simply stating the same thing twice--that the accounts describe contemporary events and are written by relatively contemporary authors. If this were all there were to it then, yes, the notion of contemporary writers writing about their personal experiences is unimpressive. But that is NOT Dale's point. He says it pretty well himself:

I think you miss the point. The point is that Dale's statement doesn't actually make a lot of sense. He says, as you note:

Considering the vast reaches of this planet and the millenia of recorded history, the two discoveries of ancient records happened in practically the same place (in terms of time and space).

Why limit it to this planet? Or even to recorded history? Every coincidence can be described in this way. It is the definition of coincidence. What you are saying is that it seems more likely to be a coincidence than if the two had been a million miles apart. But this doesn't help us determine (a) whether or not it is a coincidence, and (b) whether or not there is plagiarism. Assuming that it is coincidence, the fact that both writers are dealing with near contemporary events also explains why both texts deal with near contemporary events. Since the one comes from the other, Dale's comments really don't have a lot of application to the narrative content beyond the first point - that both are talking about contemporary events. But more than that is simply a way of rephrasing this same point (much as you are suggesting of me).

First you complain that:

Both narratives are written within a few years of each other, and describe contemporary events involving a discovery. This then is the reason why the events described occur within a few years of each other (this, of course, is not surprising, and shouldn't be seen as evidence of borrowing - if on the other hand, both narratives described a particular and not contemporary discovery, we might have something).

When I point out that that is tautological reasoning, you change your criticism to:

The point is that Dale's statement doesn't actually make a lot of sense.

Well it may not make a lot of sense to you. I can't help that, but Dale's statement does in fact make a lot of sense and I demonstrated that it does by stating:

Dale's point is that it is truly remarkable that Spalding is writing a fictional account of the discovery of ancient writings in pre-1816 Ohio and then Smith just happens to produce an allegedly true account of the same type of discovery happening to him in practically the same time in history and practically the same geographical location and in roughly the same chronological sequence.

Even if Smith's story is true (and I don't think it is) it is still a remarkable coincidence. That is Dales's point--not that two contemparary writers chose to write about contemporary events.

I can't help it if you can't or won't see the argument for what it is, but it is spurious to insist that an argument that does in fact "make a lot of sense" doesn't. Obviously you don't agree with the argument. That is fine. Nothing wrong with disagreeing. But to say that it does not make sense doesn't work.

Why limit it to this planet? Or even to recorded history? Every coincidence can be described in this way. It is the definition of coincidence.

I doubt that "every coincidence can be described in this way." But the problem here is that you are simply assuming a priori that it is a coincidence we are talking about. I am not making that assumption. Certainly I hold open the possibility, but then I logically ask... what would I need to conclude that it was in fact a couple of remarkable coincidences converging in 1838? With all due respect I would certainly need more than your assumption that it isn't.

Something along the lines of what I challenged you to above would do the trick. No doubt you will say that the bar is set way too high! You couldn't possibly find a work with parallels to Smith's 1838 account that also happened to be written by a guy who was accused years before of having a connection with the Book of Mormon... could you?!

And that is the point. I didn't set the bar... that is simply reality.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Roger writes:

I agree. You have not demonstrated tainted evidence. Instead you acknowledge the parallels are indeed parallels. You simply want us to believe they are not significant parallels because you can allegedly cite "thousands" of others. To demonstrate your point you cited another story with three similar items and a number of differences. So far I do not find your counter-argument compelling for reasons I've already stated.

I suspect we are at an impasse. Unless you produce some sort of recognized methodology to demonstrate that your parallels are indeed significant, there isn't much else I care to say. Taking your word for their significance is something I will not do. And obviously, you aren't too interested in saying anything else.

Well it may not make a lot of sense to you. I can't help that, but Dale's statement does in fact make a lot of sense and I demonstrated that it does by stating:

You didn't demonstrate it. You simply want me to take your word for it that it is somehow a "remarkable coincidence" (a point which I agree with, but not in the way you intend). What makes it remarkable? How do you distinguish a remarkable coincidence from an unremarkable coincidence? The probability of rolling a 6-sided dice and getting the sequence 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 is no different whatsoever from rolling the same dice and getting 2 5 6 4 3 5 6 4 1 3. Yet one seems on the surface to be much more remarkable than the other, don't you think? It's all in how you describe it I think ...

I doubt that "every coincidence can be described in this way." But the problem here is that you are simply assuming a priori that it is a coincidence we are talking about. I am not making that assumption. Certainly I hold open the possibility, but then I logically ask... what would I need to conclude that it was in fact a couple of remarkable coincidences converging in 1838? With all due respect I would certainly need more than your assumption that it isn't.

And I need more than your assumption that it is.

My position is quite simple.

1) The parallels are not strong and are certainly not unique. So while I admit that they exist, there is a burden of proof on those arguing for plagiarism to show that such a borrowing occured - and this it occured between Smith and Spalding and not from some other source.
2) Similar kinds of parallels occur everywhere between texts. Literary criticism in general deals with this issue by suggesting that there has to be a mechanism that distinguishes from accidental or coincidental parallels and those created by deliberate mimesis. You seem to be completely avoiding this issue. It is never as simple as just providing a list of parallels.
3) Dale (and those like you who favor his arguments) hasn't really dealt with this issue of deliberate mimesis - which is a problem. Obviously, if Joseph can creatively conceal the details he uses, why does he use the details at all? What about the narrative is so problematic that he must have taken it from Spalding instead of either from his own creativity or the larger body of literature of his time describing such event?
4) You want to suggest that something would be a "remarkable coincidence", but what exactly does this mean? How do you determine that something is a remarkable coincidence as opposed to a coincidence which isn't quite so remarkable? From what I have seen here, its largely based on your own purely subjective point of view, which also doesn't seem to have much experience with this kind of argument outside the narrow confines of the Spalding theory.

[_marg]

I don't thin you think you understand the argument.

Look Ben you have been attempting to argue that the data for the Nehemiah King should be dismissed. I quoted you when you wrote: "What data? We don't have any data from Nehemiah King. Not a thing. Not a word. Not a piece of evidence." I addressed and explained why the draft letter mentioning Nehemiah was relevant to the S/
R theory, and gave reasons why there is good reason to conclude it was a legitimate draft letter of a statement from Aaron Wright taken by Hurlbut and therefore legitimate as to his claim he first heard of the Book of Mormon being plagiarzied from Spalding's work via his friend Nehemiah King. You did not address the content of my response to you.

The handwritten letter given to the N.Y. Library in 1914 by Mrs. Hiram Lake, discovered to exist in 1980 is data relevant to the S/R theory. It mentions Nehemiah King. I appreciate you wish to dismiss it.

First, its irrelevant to the question of plagiarism. You have to be very careful of circular argumentation. You can't use the spalding theory as evidence for plagiarism and use the alleged plagiarism as evidence for the spalding theory.

That is an ongoing theme on this issue.

I'm in agreement here with karl...I don't know what you are talking about now. It's obvious, that if Aaron Wright first heard of plagiarism from Nehemiah King and that the draft letter statement taken by Hurlbut from Aaron Wright appears legitimate, then it's relevant to plagiarism. Is your goal simply to wear people you discuss with down?

And I don't know what the heck you are talking about when you say, you can't use the S/R theory as evidence.

Your inconsistency in how you critically evaluate the data..that is you very high standard of proof for Spalding witnesses and your very low standard of proof for the Book of Mormon witnesses to the point that it is just a matter of faith, indicates your intellectual dishonesty.

Second, I don't really care much about the Book of Mormon witnesses. I haven't invoked them in this argument. I am not trying to demonstrate anything with their inclusion. I am pretty much ignoring them, as they don't have anything to do with this particular discussion. So, I am not sure why you keep bringing this up except as a distraction. You are playing games with it, I am not. In fact, I don't think I have asserted a single thing in this thread about the three witnesses - so, I am not sure what your point is.

They are relevant to our discussion Ben. How you evaluate information is relevant. You are questioning my judgment as to what I use as evidence, I'm now critiquing how you evaluate evidence and your lack of consistency in how you evaluate which indicates you aren't interested in this discussion in order to reach a best fit truth. Your inconsistency indicates you are interested in reaching a best fit scenario which supports your faith based beliefs.

You are the sort of person I have little interest in discussing with. I want to discuss with individuals who seek best fit truths based on the data, not based on their religious faith. Now there are some religious individuals who are intellectually honest in these sorts of discussion, but you aren't one of them..it seems.

It is clear that one does not have to be a believer to dismiss the Spalding theory. So this sideshow about belief is largely irrelevant. Please stop bringing it up. I promise, I won't invoke the angel.

That's true, however in evaluating the data one must be willing to be objective and consistent. You raise the bar of proof so high for Spalding evidence in order to dismiss. And this isn't because you are being skeptical. If you were skeptical you'd apply that same high burden of proof to the Book of Mormon witnesses and reject their claims.

Your discussion with me, regarding Nehemiah King was an example in which your goal in the discussion was to show there was no verifiable signed statement from him that he ever heard Mr. Hyde give a talk and read from the Book of Mormon...and therefore your point was that any data regarding N. King to this effect should be disregarded. It certainly is not how you deal with Mormonism claims. You don't discard the Book of Mormon witness testimonies in the Book of Mormon because there is no verifiable signed statement in existence.

[_Roger]

Ben:

Stop responding or I'll never get any work done.

(I'm kidding.)

Actually I find your arguments worthy... just not enough for me to change my mind.

My position is quite simple.

1) The parallels are not strong and are certainly not unique.

Subjective. We just disagree. The parallels are unique in their clustering and chronology and when you consider who wrote them.

So while I admit that they exist, there is a burden of proof on those arguing for plagiarism to show that such a borrowing occured - and this it occured between Smith and Spalding and not from some other source.

That's where testimony enters the debate.

2) Similar kinds of parallels occur everywhere between texts.

Acknowledged. But these are not typical parallels. There is a specific context that needs to be considered along with the parallels.

Literary criticism in general deals with this issue by suggesting that there has to be a mechanism that distinguishes from accidental or coincidental parallels and those created by deliberate mimesis. You seem to be completely avoiding this issue. It is never as simple as just providing a list of parallels.

When the conversation gets beyond layman's terms, I leave it to the experts. A lot of smart people think Craig Criddle et al has used an appropriate mechanism which supports Dale's previous observations. I've seen nothing to suggest otherwise.

3) Dale (and those like you who favor his arguments) hasn't really dealt with this issue of deliberate mimesis - which is a problem. Obviously, if Joseph can creatively conceal the details he uses, why does he use the details at all? What about the narrative is so problematic that he must have taken it from Spalding instead of either from his own creativity or the larger body of literature of his time describing such event?

You're asking me to read Joseph Smith's mind. The answer could be that he was simply lazy--an attribute, by the way, that some of those who knew him claimed he possessed. Why should it be up to me to attempt to discover Joseph's motives?

4) You want to suggest that something would be a "remarkable coincidence", but what exactly does this mean? How do you determine that something is a remarkable coincidence as opposed to a coincidence which isn't quite so remarkable?

You could easily demonstrate that the coincidences I am suggesting are extraordinary, are not, by simply taking me up on the challenge I put to you in my previous post. I note that you ignored that challenge. If you can produce a genuine text written by one author prior to 1838 that has an equal or greater number of parallels to Smith's 1838 discovery narrative and was written by an author that people had been associating with the Book of Mormon since 1832, I will be convinced.

From what I have seen here, its largely based on your own purely subjective point of view, which also doesn't seem to have much experience with this kind of argument outside the narrow confines of the Spalding theory.

I see. Attacking my "experience" might work where other arguments have not?

[_wenglund]

Roger,

When you get a moment, could you answer a similar question to the one I posed to Marg:

If you view the Criddle wordprint study and Dale's parallel phrases study, both of which rely exclusively on the extant manuscript, as evidence that the Book of Mormon was a plagiarism, they why don't you think the Book of Mormon was plagerized from the extant manuscript?

In other words, why aren't the reasons you believe the extant manuscript wasn't plagerized, not also the same reasons to reject Criddle's and Dale's studies as sufficient evidence of plagerism?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_marg]

Why do you believe "the existing Spalding manuscript obviously was not plagiarized from to write the Book of Mormon"?

The short of it...because reading it one can see it's a different story. The Roman story does not account for how the Indians arrived in America they were already in America when the Roman army arrived.

The discovery narrative of finding an ancient historical record makes for an interestng opening in a fictious novel. It makes for absurdity when presented as nonfiction.

So, let me see if I understand your reasoning. You believe that the discovery narrative for the Book of Mormon was plagerized from a hypothetical manuscript because it was absurd to do so?

I believe Smith got the idea either via Rigdon's suggestion or reading the Spalding manuscript used for plagiarism. I don't think he created the discovery narrative himself, not that he couldn't because that would be fairly easy to do, but because I believe the evidence points to him plagiarizing a spalding work and the evidence points to Spalding using a discovery narrative which is strikingly similar to Smith's version. The remark of "absurd" I made was for people like yourself who hold to the theory that Smith's claims actually happened, that Smith actually was led by an angel to find ancient plates buried and in a stone box.

If one held to the Smith alone theory, it's quite possible Smith could create a discovery narrative, but I think the whole point of Roger's opening post was that the narrative found in extant MS is too strikingly similar to Smith's version, and consequently the appearance is that Smith used a Spalding discovery narrative. If there was no other evidence supporting the S/R theory such a conclusion would have much weaker warrant but because there is lots of evidence to support an S/R theory with another manuscript to the extant MS... it is not unreasonable to suspect Smith stole the idea...thinking that the existing MS didn't have a discovery narrative in it. I don't believe he ever saw the extant Spalding MS, nor Rigdon. When Hurlbut got back to Painseville I believe he had the Manuscript Found along with MS...and that Smith did get from Hurlbut the Manuscript Found but for whatever reason didn't get the MS one. So I don't think Smith ever concerned himself with the notion that a similar Spalding discovery narrative would ever turn up.

[_mikwut]

Marg,

I think the overuse of the term "intellectual dishonesty" by you, is says a lot, particularly when you throw at individuals like Ben.

my regards, mikwut