If Joseph 'saw the words in English'

[_Daniel Peterson]

And (to make it worse) totally unprovoked. How unfair the internet can be.

Well, dear fellow, who attacked whom?

[_Chap]

And (to make it worse) totally unprovoked. How unfair the internet can be.

Well, dear fellow, who attacked whom?

If I have attacked you, and if you found that uncongenial, I am happy to apologise. No doubt you would reciprocate if the need arose.

To me your views seem to come from another planet, and it is sometimes hard to remember that I am talking to a real person rather than some kind of oddly programmed chatbot. I shall try harder in future to remember our common humanity.

[_Daniel Peterson]

To me your views seem to come from another planet, and it is sometimes hard to remember that I am talking to a real person rather than some kind of oddly programmed chatbot. I shall try harder in future to remember our common humanity.

Do that.

Don't sink to the level of the lesser fry here.

[_Ray A]

Oh, I think we have all understood DCP's views on the 'ancient text revealed by man gazing at rock in his hat' story some time ago. Though there is a certain delicious frisson to be gained from hearing them repeated, and realising that he intends them to be taken in dead earnest.

I know it sounds very weird, but, to me anyway, not as weird as the Spalding conspiracy theory. As Mormon Matters so well phrased it:

In the end, the Spaulding manuscript theory amounts to a tale about significant portions of the Book of Mormon being stolen from a manuscript that is nowhere to be found, purportedly authored by a man who died 17 years before the theory was ever concocted, and supposedly left in the hands of a printer who disclaims having ever seen it. And that’s the story that’s supposed to be far more convincing than the idea of Joseph Smith translating the Book of Mormon from a golden book that was received from, and returned to, an angel?

I don't believe the Book of Mormon is history (a matter upon which Dan and I disagree), but given a choice, I'd still go with the rock in the hat story before Spalding (because that is what the witness evidence overwhelming substantiates). The third choice is Joseph Smith as author, but let's face it, much of the impetus for Spalding comes from the rejection of the idea that Joseph Smith could have written it (and supernatural claims).

This isn't an invitation to hijack this thread into another Spalding debate either. Only a comparison.

[_beastie]

Regarding the instructions to Oliver Cowdery in his attempts to translate, my impression is that Olive worked with the "Rod" rather than the seer stone.

http://www.gospeldoctrine.com/Doctrinea ... DC%208.htm

“It seems evident that the Lord entrusted Oliver with a sacred instrument through which he could translate by the Spirit of revelation… Having received instructions on the use of the sacred instrument which he possessed, Oliver Cowdery sought to translate from the Plates of Mormon, probably through the instrument which had been entrusted into his care. But he failed.” (Hyrum L. Andrus, Doctrinal Commentary on the Pearl of Great Price [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1967], 6.)

7:3 O remember, these words and keep my commandments. Remember this is your gift. Now this is not all, for you have another gift, which is the gift of working with the rod: behold it has told you things: behold there is no other power save God, that can cause this rod of nature, to work in your hands, for it is the work of God; and therefore whatsoever you shall ask me to tell you by that means, that will I grant unto you, that you shall know.

7:4 Remember that without faith you can do nothing. Trifle not with these things. Do not ask for that which you ought not. Ask that you may know the mysteries of God, and that you may translate all those ancient records, which have been hid up, which are sacred, and according to your faith shall it be done unto you.

http://www.2think.org/hundredsheep/boc/boc7.shtml

[_Ray A]

http://www.gospeldoctrine.com/Doctrinea ... DC%208.htm

“It seems evident that the Lord entrusted Oliver with a sacred instrument through which he could translate by the Spirit of revelation… Having received instructions on the use of the sacred instrument which he possessed, Oliver Cowdery sought to translate from the Plates of Mormon, probably through the instrument which had been entrusted into his care. But he failed.” (Hyrum L. Andrus, Doctrinal Commentary on the Pearl of Great Price [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1967], 6.)

That's a curiosity I had forgotten. It looks like Oliver may have been signed up with the wrong theocommunications company.

[_KimberlyAnn]

Maybe he saw the words in Engrish, hence the confusion?

KA

[_Chap]

Don't sink to the level of the lesser fry here.

This gives me an idea.

Not sure that I like it, though.

[_Brackite]

Oh, I think we have all understood DCP's views on the 'ancient text revealed by man gazing at rock in his hat' story some time ago. Though there is a certain delicious frisson to be gained from hearing them repeated, and realising that he intends them to be taken in dead earnest.

I know it sounds very weird, but, to me anyway, not as weird as the Spalding conspiracy theory. As Mormon Matters so well phrased it:

In the end, the Spaulding manuscript theory amounts to a tale about significant portions of the Book of Mormon being stolen from a manuscript that is nowhere to be found, purportedly authored by a man who died 17 years before the theory was ever concocted, and supposedly left in the hands of a printer who disclaims having ever seen it. And that’s the story that’s supposed to be far more convincing than the idea of Joseph Smith translating the Book of Mormon from a golden book that was received from, and returned to, an angel?

I don't believe the Book of Mormon is history (a matter upon which Dan and I disagree), but given a choice, I'd still go with the rock in the hat story before Spalding (because that is what the witness evidence overwhelming substantiates). The third choice is Joseph Smith as author, but let's face it, much of the impetus for Spalding comes from the rejection of the idea that Joseph Smith could have written it (and supernatural claims).

This isn't an invitation to hijack this thread into another Spalding debate either. Only a comparison.

Hi Ray A,

I have virtually the same views of the Book of Mormon and its translations, as you do have.

[_Chap]

I have to disagree respectfully with the attitudes expressed by Ray A and Brackite about the relative plausibility of these two stories:

1. Smith really had a piece of rock in his hat that showed him, a bit like a computer screen, groups of 25-30 words that he then dictated to his scribes to make up the Book of Mormon.

2. The Book of Mormon is a text in some way dependent on or derived from another piece of writing, perhaps by Spaulding.

Never in the history of the world has there ever been an well-authenticated instance of someone having a rock that behaved like that. Rocks as we know them just don't have the physical complexity to do that kind of thing. Using the word 'implausible' in the sense in which we usually use it in making practical decisions in life ("is the accused guilty as charged?"; "is this a safe investment?"), such a story is highly implausible.

On the other hand there have been many many instances of people using older texts to produce new ones, and there is nothing at all hard to understand about the process of copying and adaptation: it is about quite ordinary things like eyes reading marks on paper, and pens writing down words. It is perfectly plausible that such a thing can happen. Things like that happen all the time.

Now I am not a student of the Spaulding (-Rigdon?) theory, but I am aware that there are gaps in it, of the "who was where when, who met whom" kind. It may be that the text, if there was one, on which the Book of Mormon was based was really written by another (19th C.) person altogether. But pretty well any story that just involves real flesh and blood people writing on paper, reading what was written, and writing more stuff - however many gaps there are in it - has to be judged, from the practical point of view, as infinitely more plausible than a story that requires us to believe in events of a kind absolutely without reliable known precedent, and without any known physical mechanism to explain them.

We know a lot about rocks. They don't do that kind of thing.

We know a lot about people. They do do that kind of thing. And they also, notoriously, make up stories about stuff like magic rocks, and pass them on to others who believe them eagerly because they find that kind of 'evidence of the divine' exciting and comforting (I am not saying that applies to Ray A and Brackite, by the way).