Roman Story & Book of Mormon Similarities

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Roger writes:

Not necessarily. Nevertheless, I think you have to at least acknowledge that the claims being made by the Book of Mormon witnesses are--by their very nature--much more incredible on their face than the claims being made by the Spalding witnesses and therefore much more difficult for a rational person to accept.

This is far afield topicwise, and I don't acknowledge this point. I believe that it comes down to your basic assumptions. If you assume the existence of God, then belief in supernatural events connected with that God are both easy to accept, and that acceptance is quite rational.

And when you throw in all the other problematic data revolving around Joseph Smith, then, for me personally I can rationally come to the conclusion that there never were any plates with genuinely ancient writing on them.

And I also believe that this can be a rational position. However, this issue has nothing to do with the question of how to explain the similarities you are talking about. Disproving the Spalding theory does not suddenly require that you believe in angels.

Well I think if you are going to accuse them of flat out lying, then, yes, their testimony may not tell us what actually happened, but if you're going to allow that they were not lying but stating what they actually believed then I think you need to note commonalities in the testimony and the more overlap you have, the greater the chances are that something like that actually happened. Which is ironic, because Brodie claims there is too much overlap!

Yes, and this would indicate that their belief was created by what they had been told, not by independant knowledge or investigation (i.e. their witness was led).

This is where we disagree and I've stated my case several different times now. It appears we aren't going to resolve that difference of opinion, but I do stick by my assertion that the context of the parallels is as important as the parallels.

The context of the parallels is the texts themselves, not the alleged (and controversial) statements collected later. But we can agree to disagree.

Well I appreciate that concession. Yes, I agree they do tell us that we ought to look at the texts... and then what happens when we do? We see parallels. Isn't that odd?

It's not odd. It happens all the time when we compare texts. That's part of the problem. We have to have something that goes beyond simple parallels - and it has to be in the parallels - it can't be from all the rest of the theory.

But since the witnesses "tell us that we ought to look at the texts" I suggest they are not coincidental.

And I disagree with you - in part because once we have the texts, the witnesses are irrelevant. But again, we can agree to disagree.

I disagree. The Book of Mormon needs to be explained in some manner. How did it get here. Do we accept the official version? Do we conclude that Smith produced it on his own with no help from Rigdon? Or was Rigdon involved? I think those are important questions.

This doesn't address my point. Either the argument that Joseph plagiarized from Spalding is true or it isn't. This ought to be demonstratable without the need to disprove or prove the orthodox version, don't you think? In fact, if it was plagiarized, it should be demonstratable independant of any other argument about its origins. So why the need to discuss the orthodox narrative?

However your answer to the question of where the Book of Mormon came from IS relevant to the discussion because it shows which evidence you are willing to accept and which evidence you prefer to reject.

Actually, since I haven't made my views clear on the three witnesses, you are actually making a lot of assumptions. And this is why this aspect of your discussion has no place here. I have actually been quite clear about what kind of evidence I would accept with regards to the parallels. I have a paper that has been published and should be available soon laying out a formal methodology for discussing this kind of issue. I am not interested in expanding that issue to talk about the witnesses which I suggest have no real bearing on this particular issue. This isn't about the witnesses, its about the parallels.

That is correct. But I assume you think those who are going to consider production theories for the Book of Mormon should also at least consider the possibility of the official version? Or are you willing--for the sake of discussion--to temporarily abandon that position and argue as though you were Dan Vogel?

I am completely willing to temporarily abandon that position - I already said so.

Hmm... it appears as though you do want to argue as though you were Dan Vogel. Certainly you can understand why I would inwardly question your desire to approach the discussion that way... ?

Let me explain my position (others here in this forum are well aware of this). I have argued this issue with numerous individuals now in various internet forums for the better part of 20 years. What I constantly get is the angel issue being thrown back in my face. One of the problems that comes up is a basic premise. If the supernatural is irrational to believe (as you noted earlier), than any competing theory, no matter how unlikely on its own, is to be preferred - regardless of whether it is a coherent argument in its own right. So, I find it easier to simply toss the angel out the window.

To put it more bluntly, I don't believe the Spalding argument is a good argument. But if all you are going to do is say that it is a good argument compared to the argument involving an angel, then there isn't anywhere the discussion can go. So, I am simply trying to remove that obstacle so that we can talk about the merits of your argument unfettered by an evidentiary bar created by comparison. Maybe this will help you better appreciate why I am uninterested in dealing with the testimony of the three witnesses in this thread. As an aside, these numerous discussions I have had with Metcalfe, Vogel, Broadhurst and others are generally all still available in various internet archives. They weren't private discussions.

Do you see the official version as more difficult to defend on a discussion board?

No, but its hard to get past the point that you started your last post with, that belief in it is inherently irrational.

By the way, I am not terribly interested in arguing Vogel's point. But his version is exclusively opposed to yours. That is, both he and you cannot be right. And he doesn't have an angel either. This means that there are competing theories out there that in general Spalding advocates compeltly ignore. It took years to get Vogel to engage in a forum like this with Spalding advocates.

However, after further investigation, the text actually supports the prior claims.

This is an issue which I am claiming is not true. Further investigation has not supported the prior claims.

Long standing problems? Really? I don't think so. I think that makes for a nice phrase when criticizing a theory you obviously don't accept, but, in the first place the crediblity of the witnesses IS more important than possible motives, and in the second place I think there has been plenty of assertions as to possible motives. I merely mentioned one possibilty. Another is that Smith was raised for much of his life in poverty. Coming out with a new Bible promised to eliminate that problem.

This isn't the issue. Why does Smith use Spalding in the way he does? That is the question. Of course, I understand where your problems inherently lie. Without the alleged Spalding source text, you can't actually be certain where Smith used Spalding (if he used him at all) - beyond what you can attempt to claim from your various witnesses. But we know that he added the religious material (which seems to be quite substantial in the book of course). So I suppose I should let you slide for now on this issue .... on the flip side of the coin, it is relevant for comparisons between the narrative discoveries.

In terms of his specific motivation to copy Spalding's discovery narrative, assuming he had already copied Spalding before and had gotten away with it, ...

Once more, we have this assumption. But its not really based in evidence.

Now that is a good question. Smith was either confident he had eliminated the Spalding problem or stupid or he really had a genuine discovery experience that paralleled Spalding's---but you just agreed to rule out the latter. I don't think he was terribly stupid, do you?

Or perhaps, as Vogel suggests, he didn't use Spalding and instead used something else from his environment .... its not an either/or position here.

Actually that is not quite correct. There are also parallels between the Book of Mormon and the Roman story--no doubt you are aware of that--which you also--no doubt--see as insignificant, but others don't.

Of course. And should you parade them out, we can start talking about how (in)significant they are.

That is very problematic because you have Miller definitely mentioning the "Straits of Darien" as part of his testimony in 1833 and only Roper's speculation that he's getting that specific detail from the "buzz" around him that wasn't actually put in print until 1840.

I have an 1832 account mentioning Orson Pratt in connection with the Straits of Darien which was printed in at least two newspapers - following preaching on the subject of the Book of Mormon geography in which he appears to have suggested that Zarahemla was near the Straits of Darien. Marquardt also mentions this in his book. So, what you are saying isn't actually accurate.

Now there's a good question. If I could put them together before 1830 would you then be willing to consider additional S/R claims or would you want to find a way to discredit the evidence?

I suspect it would have a lot to do with the quality of the evidence. Some things generally are pretty incontrovertable. I am not interested in making arguments that I don't actually believe.

Then duplicate it. You can't have it both ways. If it's typical you should easily be able to duplicate it. If you can't duplicate it, it's not that typical.

All righty then. Sometime soon (hopefully next week but we will see how much time I need), I will produce a couple of texts - completely unrelated, as far as we know, with a complex set of parallels connecting them.

[_marg]

Quoting previous exchanges

marg: Throughout this thread Roger has brought up the concept that there are too many coincidences to the point that he doesn't think they are mere coincidences and in Roger's reasoning to that conclusion, he has been taking more into account more than just parallels of the discovery narrative, he has argued for the credibility of the Spalding witnesses as well.

Ben: And yet he fails to deal with the issue of the circular logic particularly in this case.

In other words, you have to make a whole seried of assumptions to include all of this together in a single argument. Which is fine if you accept those assumptions, but isn't if you don't. You can't, for example, use the similarities of these narratives to bolster claims of the reliability of these Spalding witnesses while at the same time using the Spalding witnesses to bolster claims that you are right in comparing the texts.

marg:Ben I don't see anyone using the parallels of the discovery narratives between Spalding's Ms and Smith's later account as bolstering the reliability of the Spalding witnesses. If it does I'm failing to understand why.

Ben: But I do. I suspect that there is a lot here that is simply a matter of perspective.

I've given this exchange some more thought. I didn't understand your point regarding circular reasoning.

I tend to think you are being disingenuous Ben. Your argument goes beyond poor reasoning. I think you are making the most ridiculous argument all in an effort to support your faith based beliefs. And that's annoying, it's very time wasting in discussion and this sort of stuff we shouldn't have to deal with. I know you don't want me bringing up your religious beliefs but I suspect that is why you are so intent on dismissing the Spalding theory..and don't mind the secular Smith only theory because at least that lines up with your religious beliefs. But this circular reasoning argument you are making is ridiculous.

Obviously if the Spalding witnesses allege plagiarism, then any and all evidence which turns up, which further substantiates or points to evidence for plagiarism, is going to support/bolster the witnesses' accusation in their statement, which in turn adds credibility to their statement. That's a given. It's obvious. This is not circular reasoning...the findings of plagiarism based upon the parallels are independent to the witnesses' statements. The witnesses didn't create the parallels. Not finding parallels does not automatically discount the witnesses statements, however finding parallels does support their statements.

As far as your point 'you can't use the Spalding witnesses to bolster claims that you are right in comparing the texts'... what on earth are you talking about'? It's the question to the hypothesis under consideration 'was Spalding's manuscript plagiarized from to write the Book of Mormon?' which drives the search for evidence. And finding parallels between texts is what one would expect by an author, so it is something to look for. One would expect to find parallelsin phrases and words used between an author's own texts, it is not necessary but one would expect to find that particularly is the subject matter is similar. But if any of those texts where plagiarized from then one might see those parallels carried over. And that is what is found in this case and it is another warrant to support the hypothesis of plagiarism. And yes the "parallels" it does add credibility to the Spalding witnesses' statements..supporting their accusation of plagiarism.

[_marg]

Ben I'm going to respond to your note in stages, that is address one concept at a time.

Previous exchange:

marg: Well I participated slightly and read Dan Vogel's perspective in a thread on this board in Celestial and I didn't find his arguments to discount Spalding witnesses ...a good one.

Ben: And neither Dan Vogel nor I find the arguments propping up the Spalding witnesses to be ... good ones. See? A matter of perspective. But that doesn't change the fact that there is quite a bit of literature devoted to exclusive theories of the origins of the Book of Mormon that you simply don't touch or look at - and that's why I question whether or not you are in a position to suggest that you are looking at all the issues.

marg: But rather than bring up Vogel, Ben, feel free to argue his points, bringing up his name does no good, at least not for me.

Ben: Why? They are easily accessible. The challenge again is that you (not me) brought up the point about examining all the evidence. You want to be completely dismissive of Vogel, that's fine. But don't be overly critical if I am also dismissive of your hypotheticals that I find to be unsupportable.

First of all Ben I don't know all the evidence which exists available and I doubt you do either and it might be that even if I know less that you I might know more crucial evidence than you or I might evaluate evidence better than you or not, and vice versa applies to you as opposed to me.

I'm not asking you to not bring up Vogel's position. I am saying that in a discussion which essentially I initiated with Vogel I was open to him presenting evidence and reasoning which would counter the S/R theory and I didn't see it. So I'm not against you presenting evidence for Smith only theory, but don't expect me to be impressed with the Smith only theory by simply giving me Vogel's name. So I'm not restricting what evidence you present..Vogel's name isn't evidence by the way. What I'm against is you wishing to look at evidence solely piecemeal and exclude other evidence in the evaluation of that piecemeal bit of evidence. So in this case as I argued in my previous post, evidence of parallels does support witnesses statements and is relevant in evaluating their credibility and the reliability of their statements. There is a connection between the evidence presented by the statements and the evidence of parallels. There's a synergism that when considered together rather than simply independently enables one to increase the reliability of each bit of evidence. And it appears you are trying to prevent that because it works against your argument, rather than it being the right thing to do because it's good reasoning.

[_marg]

Previous exchange:

marg: evidence points to 2 similar Spalding historical manuscripts

ben: What evidence? What do we have of the 2nd Spalding manuscript? What quote do we have? What information is contained in that text that we know must come from that text and not from some other source? What you have isn't evidence of a second text. It may be evidence that some people thought there was a second text - but it comes after the realization that the found text didn't match up with descriptions. And without anything beyond a few vague comments - quite late, and in response to the obvious problem that the discovered manuscript didn't match their own expectations, a second manuscript is created.

Ben evidence does not have to be verifiable facts, there just needs to be good justification for acceptance that the information is relevant, reliable and will help with the hypothesis, conclusion, case. The witnesses' statements for example are evidence. The parallels are evidence. That they reinforce each other is evidence of increased reliability of witnesses' statements. That Rigdon was an avid reader of history and the Bible is evidence. etc etc. Arguments can be made against accepting information as reliable evidence, but none the less it's still presented as evidence, given as a warrant to justify conclusion. There is lots and lots of evidence for a 2nd manuscript Ben, and it's good reliable evidence and reasoning. In this thread, the focus so far has been the parallels between texts, which support the Spalding witnesses plagiarism accusation.

[_Uncle Dale]

...
In this thread, the focus so far has been the parallels between texts, which support the Spalding witnesses plagiarism accusation.

What I find particularly interesting (and what Mormons typically ignore)
are the patterns of distribution of "Spaldingish" language in the Book of Mormon

Browse through this list of word-strings shared by the two texts (that is
Spalding's Roman story and the Book of Mormon) -- and notice the book and chapters
where most of them are located.

The word-strings parallels were compiled by my reading through Spalding,
one sentence at a time, and comparing each set of two, three and four
words in a row that I encountered, with a Book of Mormon concordance. By using that
method of locating phraseology parallels in the two texts, we might expect
that my compilation would indicate a more or less "uniform" distribution
throughout the Book of Mormon. If Spalding's writings did NOT go into the Mormon book,
then no particular part of that book should resemble Spalding's language
more (or less) than the average phraseology overlap found in all the book.
Or, at least no particular part of the Book of Mormon should stand out, as containing
many, many more textual parallels than the remainder of the book.

But, as I suggested, notice the Book of Mormon book and chapters in this tabulation:
http://solomonspalding.com/SRP/SCIOTA/T ... .htm#part3

UD

ps -- Ben, Nevo and WhyMe will attribute all of this to pure "coincidence."

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Marg writes:

I know you don't want me bringing up your religious beliefs but I suspect that is why you are so intent on dismissing the Spalding theory..and don't mind the secular Smith only theory because at least that lines up with your religious beliefs. But this circular reasoning argument you are making is ridiculous.

Actually, I have a pet peave with people using parallels inappropriately. It has little to do with my religious beliefs. Truth be told, the Spalding theory isn't really a mainstream theory - it has far more detractors than supporters, and has had very little support in scholarly literature. My presence here is precisely because of its use of parallels and not for any other reason. I have had this kind of discussion with many others about a range of related issues. Seeing as the track record is quite publicly available, you can verify this if you want.

However, these kinds of arguments are not religious arguments. The issue of using parallels to make claims like Roger is making in the OP is not a new issue. There is a body of literature devoted to dealing with methods for answering these kinds of questions. These are not religious arguments. There is, I think, a substantial amount of room to engage a discussion like this over claims of plagiarism without invoking religious beliefs. And I am always disappointed (but not surprised) when I get this kind of response. You don't actually want to discuss the literary theory, you want to place the discussion back in the context of religion where, I am fairly confident, you along with Roger can dismiss beliefs on the basis that it isn't rational.

Obviously if the Spalding witnesses allege plagiarism, then any and all evidence which turns up, which further substantiates or points to evidence for plagiarism, is going to support/bolster the witnesses' accusation in their statement, which in turn adds credibility to their statement. That's a given. It's obvious. This is not circular reasoning...the findings of plagiarism based upon the parallels are independent to the witnesses' statements. The witnesses didn't create the parallels. Not finding parallels does not automatically discount the witnesses statements, however finding parallels does support their statements.

The kind of evidence you use for plagiarism is an examination of the texts. But do you see how you have created an unfalsifiable argument? You suggest that any parallel must be evidence for the accuracy of the witnesses statement. And then you explain that not finding parallels doesn't discredit their statements. Well, how do you suppose those statements could be discredited? Obviously, I am taking an entirely different route.

Of course, within the scope of this thread - those witnesses are alrgely irrelevant. We aren't talking about the Book of Mormon, we are talking about the Roman Story in contrast to the later discovery narrative provided in LDS sources. In this case, not only do we have both texts, we also don't have any witnesses who claimed similarities. In lieu of an actual Spalding source which the Book of Mormon plagiarizes, you are now looking for other sources of parallels. And this is the part that I find problematic. The listed parallels between the Roman Story and the later discovery narrative seem contrived, sperficial, and not significant enough to substantiate charges of plagiarism. Now, you want to bolster your position - not by an appeal to the texts (which you haven't really discussed at all) but by a hypthetical scenario about the Book of Mormon. And of course, this is also part of the problem - because you aren't really claiming that Joseph plagiarized his discovery narrative from the Roman story - but from this hypothetical second manuscript, which you claims was probably like the Roman story.

So, we have this problem of an argument built entirely on hypotheticals. Ultimately, you want to use the parallels between the Roman Story and the discovery narrative to suggest that there are similarities - which in turn (as you suggest) bolsters the witnesses accounts, which in turn bolsters the claim that Joseph plagiarized from this unknown manuscript which was similar to the Roman Story, and so on. So forgive me if I sense a bit of circular reasoning here.

It's the question to the hypothesis under consideration 'was Spalding's manuscript plagiarized from to write the Book of Mormon?' which drives the search for evidence. And finding parallels between texts is what one would expect by an author, so it is something to look for.

Not really. And this is why you should take a look at the accept methods for this kind of inquiry.

One would expect to find parallelsin phrases and words used between an author's own texts, it is not necessary but one would expect to find that particularly is the subject matter is similar. But if any of those texts where plagiarized from then one might see those parallels carried over. And that is what is found in this case and it is another warrant to support the hypothesis of plagiarism. And yes the "parallels" it does add credibility to the Spalding witnesses' statements..supporting their accusation of plagiarism.

We actually expect to see parallels in phrases and words between any two texts. This is primarly because when two writes write books in a common millieu, they share a language, they share common phrasing, they share a lot of features. In terms of common vocabulary, the Book of Mormon and the Roman story share similarities at about the same frequency as comparing most other books from the same period. The rate at which we find common locutions is also likewise similar. The statistics don't appreciably help your argument here. So just finding common vocabulary, and common phrases has never been accepted in literary studies as evidence of plagiarism without other text based arguments.

First of all Ben I don't know all the evidence which exists available and I doubt you do either and it might be that even if I know less that you I might know more crucial evidence than you or I might evaluate evidence better than you or not, and vice versa applies to you as opposed to me.

This isn't the issue. You want to accuse me of not looking at all the evidence - yet there we have Grant Palmer, and Dan Vogel, and Marquardt and other presenting evidence arguing for alternate naturalistic origins of the Book of Mormon which by nature exclude the possibility of the Spalding theory. And yet you ignore them. And when I challenge you, you don't respond to my arguments, but instead attempt to attack an assumed faith based response.

I'm not asking you to not bring up Vogel's position. I am saying that in a discussion which essentially I initiated with Vogel I was open to him presenting evidence and reasoning which would counter the S/R theory and I didn't see it. So I'm not against you presenting evidence for Smith only theory, but don't expect me to be impressed with the Smith only theory by simply giving me Vogel's name.

And I am asking you not bring up my beliefs whatever they are. Both points are really quite immaterial. The Spalding theory is either a good argument or its not without appealing to other theories or beliefs. My point in bringing up Vogel is merely that one does not have to be a believer to not find the Spalding theory tenable. So if we can dispense with these distractions and return to discussing the parallels, I would be quite happy.

What I'm against is you wishing to look at evidence solely piecemeal and exclude other evidence in the evaluation of that piecemeal bit of evidence. So in this case as I argued in my previous post, evidence of parallels does support witnesses statements and is relevant in evaluating their credibility and the reliability of their statements. There is a connection between the evidence presented by the statements and the evidence of parallels. There's a synergism that when considered together rather than simply independently enables one to increase the reliability of each bit of evidence. And it appears you are trying to prevent that because it works against your argument, rather than it being the right thing to do because it's good reasoning.

And what I am opposed to is your priviledging a bad argument on the basis that it has support in other ways. Having a theory doesn't make the argument good. Having a theory doesn't somehow make bad parallels better, or insignificant parallels significant. But this is what you are trying to do. You are avoiding the discussion of the parallels by suggesting that such a discussion is not important given the mountain of other evidence available. It is important, because no matter how many witnesses you have, you cannot show plagiarism except by examining the texts.

Ben evidence does not have to be verifiable facts, there just needs to be good justification for acceptance that the information is relevant, reliable and will help with the hypothesis, conclusion, case.

Ok ....

The witnesses' statements for example are evidence.

Unless, as you point out, there isn't good justification that the information is reliable or helps with the hypothesis, the conclusions, or the case - as happens here. Now you may disagree with me, but, until this is established, they aren't good evidence.

The parallels are evidence.

But not until you establish your good justification. Repeating that they are significant parallels doesn't establish this, and until this is established, they aren't useful evidence.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Dale -

There is no such thing as "Spaldingish" language. If you think there is, please list the specific characteristics that identify it, so that I can show you several other text that contain this Spaldingish language.

There are good reasons why I dismiss this notion.

[_Jersey Girl]

Dale -

There is no such thing as "Spaldingish" language. If you think there is, please list the specific characteristics that identify it, so that I can show you several other text that contain this Spaldingish language.

There are good reasons why I dismiss this notion.

I don't see that he needs to give you a list of "specific characteristics that identify it" when he's supplied you with a list of comparative phrases.

Why can't you use the phrases that he's supplied to show that there are "several other text[s] that contain this Spaldingish language"?

[_Uncle Dale]

Dale -

There is no such thing as "Spaldingish" language.

Well, that's your opinion. However, were I to present you with two lengthy texts,
with no apparent identifying subject matter included -- one by Gandhi and one
by Hitler, I have the strong feeling that you would be able to discern which
text came from which writer, merely by studying their language. In comparing
one to the other, I think we might speak of "Hitlerish language" and "Gandhish
language" -- don't you agree?

With Spalding there are some repetitive themes, told and re-told with similar
language -- accounts of bloody massacres, accounts of blood staining swords,
etc. He was a Revolutionary War veteran and may have seen bloodshed in
and after battles. The town he lived in (Cherry Valley, NY) was all but wiped out
in a bloody massacre. He probably pondered such things now and then.

Does that mean stories of brethren slaughtering one another in bloody massacres,
wherein the slain noble warriors rise at once to heavenly realms is something
unique to Spalding? Of course not -- other writers used much the same language.

If you think there is, please list the specific characteristics that identify it, so that I can show you several other text that contain this Spaldingish language.

There are good reasons why I dismiss this notion.

Now and then my wife and I attend a weekly smorgasbord offered a local restaurant.
The food dishes are always the same (with slight varieties in the desserts) and my
selection from those food offerings is always the same (with slight variations in the
quantities I pile on my plate).

On any given lunch date, gather up all the plates from the 200+ patrons in the
restaurant and place all of those plates in a row. I'll bet dollars to doughnuts
that my wife could pick out my plate, from all the rest, every single time.

Is there such a thing as "Daleish food selections?" Probably not -- I'm eating pretty
much the same stuff as the other customers -- we make our selections from the
same food offerings.

But who else puts the anchovies on his ice cream, and places six helpings of olives
next to his single boiled egg, with yoke removed and discarded?

My wife can tell my plate, if I have not yet finished eating all the food piled upon it.

I can discern Spalding texts, if they are unadulterated and are at least a few paragraphs
in length. Test me on that, if you wish.

UD

[_Markk]

Hi Dale,

On any given lunch date, gather up all the plates from the 200+ patrons in the
restaurant and place all of those plates in a row. I'll bet dollars to doughnuts
that my wife could pick out my plate, from all the rest, every single time.

My wife could also do the same, mine would be the empty plate with a crumpled napkin and a tums wrapper.

What is your brief belief of the origin of the Book of Mormon as a whole, while I understand that you have forgotten more than I know on all the different "theories", I look more at theology end, I came to the conclusion along time ago that Joseph Smith was just one very "street smart" person who started something that just snow balled and he just rode it all the way to his murder, and that the KJV of the Bible being the main sourse, along with the "times" of his era in history...i.e Indians, treasures, wars.

Anyway I would be interested in your breif view of how the Book of Mormon was written?

Thanks

MG