Thanks for your welcomes. I have found this board fascinating to browse.
One thing though, I can't let go of my pet cockatrice!
beastie wrote:The cockatrice issue they’d likely dismiss by saying that once Joseph Smith recognized the verses as Isaiah, he’d save time by simply using the KJV.
I have heard the ‘speed things up with the KJV’ argument, but I don’t think it can hold as a mopologetic argument these days. Sperry originally said this in 1967:
“…199 verses are word for word the same as the old English version. We therefore freely admit that Joseph Smith may have used the King James version when he came to the text of Isaiah on the gold plates. As long as the familiar version agreed substantially with the text on the gold plates, he let it pass; when it differed too radically he translated the Nephite version and dictated the necessary changes.” (Sperry, ref below)
This might be an option if Joseph Smith were sitting at a table, with the Book of Mormon and a KJV both open side by side in front of him (as Sperry probably assumed), wearing the interpreters as spectacles. But, it doesn’t make sense for Joseph Smith to switch to the Book of Mormon if he were translating as reported – either line by line or word by word from the peepstone in his hat. Surely it would take longer and no sense at all to read out the translation, have Oliver repeat it back, then compare with the KJV to see if it were the same or not, then copy the KJV. It would be easier for Oliver to just write down the words as Joseph Smith spoke them. Basically, in order to know that the translation was the same, he had to translate it first – scanning the text was not an option. Also, 2 of the 3 cockatrice chapters contain other major text changes from the KJV.
The more recent apologists have dropped the KJV copying argument. Tvedtnes’ analysis of Isaiah in the Book of Mormon is quite clear that Joseph Smith translated these portions, using KJV language (explaining both similarities and differences) rather than copied them:
“It has long been my contention that the best scientific evidence for the Book of Mormon is not archaeological or historical in nature, as important as these may be, but rather linguistic. This is because we have before us a printed text which can be subjected to linguistic analysis and comparison with the language spoken in the kingdom of Judah at the time of Lehi.” (Tvedtnes, ref below)
Allred’s analysis for FAIR makes the same assumption – that Joseph Smith translated from ancient texts rather than plagiarised the KJV. Allowing for plagiarism opens up a huge can of worms – massive, massive, chunks of LDS doctrine are reliant on the translation of one other word in 2 Nephi Chapter 24 – the same chapter as the second cockatrice. (That word is ‘Lucifer’, mentioned below)
So, I think the cockatrice is very special – my point is this:
For most Book of Mormon anachronisms of possible KJV origin, there is an alternate (if unlikely!) explanation, which results in not conclusively excluding an ancient origin for the Book of Mormon to the satisfaction of my mum. Usual explanations are loan-shifting (e.g. horses), or translation of a defined concept into 19th century vernacular (thus Isaiah’s ‘heleyl’, mopologized as a double reference to the king of Babylon and the devil, ends up as ‘Lucifer’ in the Book of Mormon – in spite of ‘Lucifer’ being a Vulgate/KJV error).
The Cockatrice is a supernatural chimera with evil super-powers. These Book of Mormon references parallel Isaiah in the KJV: Isaiah 11:8/2Nephi 21:8/2Nephi 30:14; Isaiah 14:29/2Nephi 24:29.
The Jewish Masoretic Text Isaiah and the Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran do not refer to the word or concept of cockatrice. The words used by both of these Jewish texts are Hebrew for ‘hissing serpent’. The intended concept is clear and it is a ‘natural kind’ recognised on all continents ~ poisonous snake.
It is not possible that any sort of conceptual contamination occurred (somehow) from the Septuagint, written in the third century BCE. Although the Greek translation used the word ‘basiliskos’ (as well as aspis), the basilisk at that time was just a lethally poisonous but normal snake, probably derived from the Egyptian cobra. The basilisk did morph into the supernatural chimera concept circa the 12th century when it became linked to the cockatrice – too late to contaminate the Book of Mormon.
The Vulgate circa 400CE uses ‘basiliscus’ and ‘regulus’, again, the terms refer strictly to the concept poisonous snake.
Both the term and concept of cockatrice as a supernatural chimera originate around the 12th century. Once the heraldic age was over, the term dropped from the vernacular outside of the KJV. Even had the concept remained in use to some degree, it is completely removed from ‘poisonous snake’.
So – given that the concept ‘serpent’ does not require loan-shifting when moving from Hebrew to reformed Egyptian to English, the word that Joseph Smith would have seen on his peepstone should have been ‘serpent’ or ‘snake’. With maybe an appropriate adjective attached at most.
It defies reason to expect that Isaiah’s hissing serpent is more accurately translated as ‘cockatrice’ rather than serpent or snake, or even some actual local American species. Given the minor changes to other phrases (‘ships of the sea’!), this phrase is not insignificant. The 2 Nephi chap 21 story describes how created nature is made safe in the millennium – the insertion of a non-existent monster amongst the wolf, lamb, leopard, kid, calf, lion, cow, bear, lion, and human child is ludicrous. Cockatrice not only substitutes a concept, it is out of context for Isaiah’s story.
The use of the single term ‘cockatrice’ is sufficient proof of erroneous, contextually inappropriate, and inexplicable material from the KJV in the Book of Mormon, and therefore disproves the Book of Mormon as an ancient Hebrew-American text.
References:
Alexander, R. McN. The Evolution of the Basilisk. Greece & Rome, Second Series, Vol. 10, No. 2, (Oct., 1963), pp. 170-181
Allred, Alma. http://www.fairlds.org/Book_of_Mormon/B ... ormon.html
Breiner, Laurence A. The Career of the Cockatrice. Isis, Vol. 70, No. 1. (Mar., 1979), pp. 30-47.
Sperry, Sidney B. The ‘Isaiah Problem’ in the Book of Mormon. Answers to Book of Mormon Questions pp 73-97. http://www.shields-research.org/Books/S ... y_Isa.html
Tvedtnes, John A. http://farms.BYU.edu/display.php?id=2&table=transcripts
Now I just have to try this out on the maternal unit. I have my big-girl shoulderpads on, please critique my argument.
Cheers, Danna
P.S. I would not accept that Quetzalcoatl is a reasonable approximation for ‘snake’ at any stage of transmission – if anything Isaiah’s seraph would have loan-shifted into Quetzalcoatl but Joseph Smith still ‘translated’ seraph as ‘fiery flying serpent’.