Spalding-Rigdon Theory: Fatal flaws

[_jhammel]

Can you (or whoever) quote or point to evidence or statements reflective of Joseph's reading and writing abilities or interests prior to September 1827? (not saying the evidence or statement has to be before then, but it should at least be somewhat relflective of earlier abilities.)

I'm not refering to his story-telling or speaking abilities. I suspect there is more agreement on that.

I'm curious to see why there is such stark disagreement about the reading and writing.

I'll admit, I tend to see thing's as marge does, and I wonder why I shouldn't. I'll also admit that although I base my view on memories of things I have seen or read, I am too lazy and busy at the moment to do an exhaustive search of my sources, so I'm hoping that others have such statements and evidences readily available to make my life easier.

Or if anyone can point to such compilations already attempted, that would be great!

Jeff

[_marg]

Regarding burden of proof for myself it doesn't automatically rest with Smith and never did. If how the book was produced wasn't so "fishy" then I probably could have accepted Smith as the author. If the Book of Mormon had taken him a reasonable amount of time to dictate, if there were no obvious cons being presented such as seer stones, head in the hat type stuff. If he had sat down with Oliver and dictated and credible independent witnesses observed this and later it was verified to be the same as in the final version then I would agree burden of proof would rest with Smith as sole or primary author. But one doesn't accept an established con artist's version of events and his accomplices without a high degree of skepticism so high that no burden of proof should be given them.

Hi Marg,

just curious - I'm wondering by reading your post if your initial impression was some sort of con that likely involved more than Smith (maybe w/ Oliver or others) and then you updated that to include Spalding and Rigdon, too, after learning about them? or were you exposed to a Spalding/Rigdon explanation from the beginning? I'm not asking becasue I think it matters to anything - it really is just out of curiosity. (Hmmm, I'm sensing some chiasmus in my e-mail.)

Jeff

I first began to learn about Mormonism from the internet I believe 8 or 9 years ago. As I did research I quickly came across the Spalding theory as part of my readings. As I gathered more information about Mormonism, from the beginning the Spalding theory made sense to me, whereas Smith's/ the Church's version was highly suspect. At the beginning I wasn't trying to determine who wrote the Book of Mormon, didn't really care, I just happened to gather information from which I formed an opinion. And the more information I would gather the greater my conviction. As far as forming greater details such as who Smith's accomplices were that's more speculative. The basics that a spalding manuscript was used I am confident about.

Rigdon would have been the first person that I associated as a major accomplice or rather primary accomplice. He was the one to first come across Spalding's manuscript written in King James version english to sound like the Bible, and would likely have thought it would sell well given the Bible's success. Later I learned Cowdery was the primary scribe for I believe over 90% of the Book of Mormon and so I believe he had to have been entirely in on it all.

[_Trevor]

Can you (or whoever) quote or point to evidence or statements reflective of Joseph's reading and writing abilities or interests prior to September 1827? (not saying the evidence or statement has to be before then, but it should at least be somewhat relflective of earlier abilities.)

Well, Jeff, Lucy Mack Smith said something about her son's tendency to reflect and study deeply. He also had roughly three years of education, If I recall correctly.

My theory, however, is that the Book of Mormon was an oral composition which was organized in advance. As a treasure seer, Joseph was accustomed to creating narratives on the fly for the benefit of his treasure digger audience. He also had experience telling his family stories about the ancient Native Americans. I think the evidence we have for the composition of the Book of Mormon is consistent with an oral method. I do not think it is necessary to posit much prior experience writing at all.

[_marg]

A witness may deeply believe something happened, have no reason to lie, and still misremember. Whole groups of people may trade in a false memory, like the memory of Gore's claim to have invented the internet, because it seems to accord so well with what we know and want to believe. This is precisely the kind of thing I am talking about with the Spalding witnesses. If Spalding didn't write the Book of Mormon, he should have, based on what we know of him and Joseph Smith. Unfortunately, that doesn't make it true.

I don't discount all the spalding witnesses Trevor they are simply highly credible and there are too many to discount all of them. It would be too time consuming for me to elaborate in greater detail the evidence pertaining to the witnesses. One the one hand we have Smith and a few friends who come up with a highly unrealistic story, who are motivated to concoct such a story in order to sell a book. On the other hand we have Spalding witnesses who didn't seek out anyone to discredit Mormonism. Some missionaries happened to come into their town to sell the Book of Mormon and a few recognized it as essentially the same story their deceased friend had told them. With greater investigation other witnesses who were not interested in getting involved, they were sought out, and when questioned remembered part of the Book of Mormon being the same as Spalding's work. The investigation may not have been ideal by today's standards but these witnesses were intelligent obviously honest individuals and i simply can not discount all their testimonies and think they all had false memories.

[_marg]

Can you (or whoever) quote or point to evidence or statements reflective of Joseph's reading and writing abilities or interests prior to September 1827? (not saying the evidence or statement has to be before then, but it should at least be somewhat relflective of earlier abilities.)

Well, Jeff, Lucy Mack Smith said something about her son's tendency to reflect and study deeply. He also had roughly three years of education, If I recall correctly.

My theory, however, is that the Book of Mormon was an oral composition which was organized in advance. As a treasure seer, Joseph was accustomed to creating narratives on the fly for the benefit of his treasure digger audience. He also had experience telling his family stories about the ancient Native Americans. I think the evidence we have for the composition of the Book of Mormon is consistent with an oral method. I do not think it is necessary to posit much prior experience writing at all.

There is a big difference between telling a short simple story versus telling a long extremely complicated one which transpired over many centuries, with many different characters...and topping it off dictating it orally at such a speed that one has little time for reflection or revision. If Smith had such an ability when else did he show it? And as far as his education my understanding was he was observed spending more time out of school about town, when he should have been in school.

[_Trevor]

Some missionaries happened to come into their town to sell the Book of Mormon and a few recognized it as essentially the same story their deceased friend had told them. With greater investigation other witnesses who were not interested in getting involved, they were sought out, and when questioned remembered part of the Book of Mormon being the same as Spalding's work. The investigation may not have been ideal by today's standards but these witnesses were intelligent obviously honest individuals and i simply can not discount all their testimonies and think they all had false memories.

And this is the problematic part. In the passage of time, and memory being what it is--malleable, these folks upon hearing something of the Book of Mormon would likely associate it with what they recalled of Spalding. They need have no particular motivations to do exactly that. There is also no need to impugn their intelligence. Intelligent people are as liable to these faults as any one. Their memory was, in effect, contaminated by the Book of Mormon, which was much more popular than the writings of Spalding.

[_Trevor]

There is a big difference between telling a short simple story versus telling a long extremely complicated one which transpired over many centuries, with many different characters...and topping it off dictating it orally at such a speed that one has little time for reflection or revision. If Smith had such an ability when else did he show it?

While this is true, you are not taking my entire argument into account. I believe that he had years in advance to construct the story. The oral performance came in the so-called "dictation" process. In the midst of this process there was plenty of time, including the time of the loss of the 116 pages, to compose the details of the story. The Bible was his major source, and more than simply reading it, it was a document that he heard read over and over again. If one examines his sermons closely, his capacity to use Biblical allusions skillfully and on the fly is easily demonstrated. All of this suggests to me that Joseph Smith composed the Book of Mormon, and much of that composition was oral composition.

[_Trevor]

Here is another, counter question for the Spalding crowd. When did Joseph exhibit the ability to memorize and repeat long passages of text that he stole from other authors and passed off as his own?

If the uniqueness of the feat is to be the question, this is just as good a question as the ones you pose.

[_marg]

Some missionaries happened to come into their town to sell the Book of Mormon and a few recognized it as essentially the same story their deceased friend had told them. With greater investigation other witnesses who were not interested in getting involved, they were sought out, and when questioned remembered part of the Book of Mormon being the same as Spalding's work. The investigation may not have been ideal by today's standards but these witnesses were intelligent obviously honest individuals and i simply can not discount all their testimonies and think they all had false memories.

And this is the problematic part. In the passage of time, and memory being what it is--malleable, these folks upon hearing something of the Book of Mormon would likely associate it with what they recalled of Spalding. They need have no particular motivations to do exactly that. There is also no need to impugn their intelligence. Intelligent people are as liable to these faults as any one. Their memory was, in effect, contaminated by the Book of Mormon, which was much more popular than the writings of Spalding.

Unfortunately Trevor to discuss this with you in greater detail I'd have to pull out my web print-outs, my book etc and I'm not interested in doing so..at least not at this particular moment. I need to get some exercise, some sun and do things other than sit at the computer.

by the way, Trevor, you are wrong about the Book of Mormon being more popular that spalding's writings to these witnesses. At the time these witnesses were questioned the Book of Mormon was not a big deal, was not taken seriously by most people, was not the least bit significant to them. As an added note, one of Spalding's nicknames in town was "old came to pass"..none of his books available contain that repeated phrase. Do you really think neighbours, friends and family lied about this? Do you think this an implanted memory? This is the sort of data you are excluding, and there is more.

[_jhammel]

Can you (or whoever) quote or point to evidence or statements reflective of Joseph's reading and writing abilities or interests prior to September 1827? (not saying the evidence or statement has to be before then, but it should at least be somewhat relflective of earlier abilities.)

Well, Jeff, Lucy Mack Smith said something about her son's tendency to reflect and study deeply. He also had roughly three years of education, If I recall correctly.

My theory, however, is that the Book of Mormon was an oral composition which was organized in advance. As a treasure seer, Joseph was accustomed to creating narratives on the fly for the benefit of his treasure digger audience. He also had experience telling his family stories about the ancient Native Americans. I think the evidence we have for the composition of the Book of Mormon is consistent with an oral method. I do not think it is necessary to posit much prior experience writing at all.

good point. do you think he still would have had to do a lot of reading in advance prior to producing the Book of Mormon? If so, then maybe just information on his reading ability and interests is what I should be after.

by the way, I will add for the record that my "conversion" to favoring a Spalding/Rigdon explanation for Book of Mormon origins had nothing to do with this issue at all at the time. I was converted by the evidence in its favor, rather than any doubts of Smith as author. I will acknowledge though that Joseph's ability or inability to produce the book does have some impact on how much more likely I consider the Spalding/Rigdon explanation now, which explains my interest in the question. I used to think and say it didn't matter at all, but after reflecting on it, it really does, though it's more a matter of how much more likely is the Spalding/Rigdon explanation. In other words, if I were fully convinced right now that Joseph could have written the Book of Mormon, I would still favor the Spalding/Rigdon explanation (though not as lopsidedly), but if I were highly convinced he couldn't have done it, then my favoritism of the Spalding/Rigdon explanation would no doubt be greatly strengthened.

I'll also add that I have plenty of skepticism toward Lucy Mack Smith's version of things, but hopefully I can be fair and spread that skepticism to statements on all sides.

Jeff