KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

[_Joseph]

I think there is more evidence for Batman, Superman, Godzilla, Mothra and Harry Potter.

[_Kishkumen]

Six remarkably evasive posts and counting--all full of sound and furry.

I am woundering if the count will reach 10 by later this evening?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

My opinion about these things is that such tallies are ultimately meaningless. I know it is hard to resist needling people, but I am not sure that you are on solid ground when it comes to goading Kevin on this issue. Agree with him or not, I think his knowledge of the Book of Abraham issue is a little more impressive than yours. No offense intended. He is, after all, the guy that Will learned from.

[_wenglund]

I do find it interesting that you would say that people can still "hold onto their unbelief" and yet accept Will's thesis. Of course, I don't think that has ever been at question.

It hasn't been at question to me. But if you read Kevin's earlier post, as well as Sock Puppet's, they are of the decided opinion that the KEP somehow makes Joseph Smith, as a prophet and claimed translator of sacred writ, an alleged fraud.

I meant to point this out earlier because I don't think some of you understand just how much importance certain critics and former members place on the old interpretation of the KEP and what a negative impact it had on their testimonies regarding Joseph as a prophet--even though you and I think it shouldn't.

And I would wager that those who feel a need to rely on abstruse apologetic arguments about the Book of Abraham (because at this point, no matter where one stands on the issue, these arguments have decidedly long since passed into the realm of esoterica), they perhaps need a reminder of the real basis of their belief in Mormonism before they try to make heads or tails of this mess.

Again, I believe your wise advise is mis-directed. It isn't the apologists, but rather certain critics, who seem to mis this astute point. As itereated and reiterated earlier, the only reason the KEP is of any importance to we apologists is because of how important it is to the critics and how it has mistakenly and negatively impacted the testimonies of some people--including certain critics posting here.

Now, if you are interested in feeding the interest of Mormon historians, well, that is something else entirely. I am sure many of us are eager to see what Will, you, and others come up with, whether we agree with it in the end or not. And I sincerely doubt that we will ever hold a grudge against Will for not having persuaded us, since the ride has already been so entertaining and has sparked a great deal of interest.

You see, the issues we are discussing can be of interest outside of deciding testimonies, and that is where I prefer to leave them.

I can appreciate this. And, I look forward to your educated responses to my questions once you have had a chance to look over the KEP documents.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_Kishkumen]

It hasn't been at question to me. But if you read Kevin's earlier post, as well as Sock Puppet's, they are of the decided opinion that the KEP somehow makes Joseph Smith, as a prophet and claimed translator of sacred writ, an alleged fraud.

I meant to point this out earlier because I don't think some of you understand just how much importance certain critics and former members place on the old interpretation of the KEP and what a negative impact it had on their testimonies regarding Joseph as a prophet--even though you and I think it shouldn't.

Interesting thoughts, Wade. But I am not sure I agree with you there. No, I am more inclined to think that the unfortunate approach taken to the issue of Joseph Smith's translations in traditional LDS apologetics did its fair share to set people up for this grand disappointment. You see, if apologists hadn't traditionally placed such a premium on the importance of the literal antiquity of Joseph Smith's literal translations of actual ancient documents he had sitting in front of him, then these folks' interpretations of that not really matching up well with what they were seeing wouldn't have been such a big problem for them.

Now we find ourselves at a point in time when a number of apologists have belatedly caught up and accepted the notion that this doesn't work so well, so they are now acting as though these critics are "fundamentalists" who just don't see that all of this doesn't matter in a postmodernist apologetic. Well, fundamentalists don't just train themselves, my friend. They were helped down this path by some apologists who to this very day continue to talk of missing scrolls and who expect that if we could only look at the document Joseph Smith possessed and did translate, we would see Joseph Smith's Book of Abraham in Egyptian, which any trained Egyptologist could readily translate.

Again, I believe your wise advise is mis-directed. It isn't the apologists, but rather certain critics, who seem to mis this astute point. As itereated and reiterated earlier, the only reason the KEP is of any importance to we apologists is because of how important it is to the critics and how it has mistakenly and negatively impacted the testimonies of some people--including certain critics posting here.

I think I have covered this point fairly well above. You can, of course, continue to blame others, but you might miss a rare opportunity to take some proactive steps to improve your own approach to Book of Abraham apologetics. Or, you can forever chase after the same tired arguments in the hopes that your latest footnote will be the coup de grace, when you could instead be a paradigm changer in a real sense, not in the bogus "you see, there was this missing manuscript" sense.

[_Kevin Graham]

As itereated and reiterated earlier, the only reason the KEP is of any importance to we apologists is because of how important it is to the critics and how it has mistakenly and negatively impacted the testimonies of some people--including certain critics posting here.

Mistakenly??? Here you go again wade, proving you don't even understand the apologists, let alone the critics. What exactly do you think Will has done here, even if his theses are correct? How has he in any way rendered the traditional arguments moot? How?

The evidence against Joseph Smith's ability to translate documents is so overwhelming, your apologists had no choice but to drop the idiotic "hide the missing scroll" theory for a while and leave it up to someone who had nothing to lose (meaning no reputation to lose) to present some kind of "game changer" that proposes the KEP project was this massive effort to encipher the entire translation of the Book of Abraham. Your argument to that effect rests on so many weak assumptions it is difficult to even take it seriously, and the problems it creates find no answers as you guys just place them on the backburner and insist it must be true because you so desperately need it to be. Why? Because you love these delusions of having proved the critics wrong, no matter how irrelevant the point.The fact is all the evidence pointing to Joseph Smith as the mastermind behind the KEP is dismissed out of hand as some mysterious culprit is imagined the same way these mysterious nonextant documents have to be imagined for your apologetic theories.

For example, the smoking gun found in Abr 1:12, which pretty much solidifies the fact that the Sensen text was used to translate the Book of Abraham. While the "old apologetic" has been to claim a missing scroll, Will comes along and declares the entire passage unoriginal to the translation itself. He does so by pointing to textual evidence found in a document that he claims wasn't the original translation manuscript anyway. Amazingly idiotic!

So we have the translation itself referring to its own document that Will says "it ain't so." For Will, it is more plausible that some mysterious culprit inserted that later on and Joseph Smith just went along with it.

We have multiple manuscripts written by the hands who were hired as Joseph Smith's scribes, aligning the same exact Egyptian characters with the Book of Abraham translation. Will say's "it ain't so." His evidence? None. In Will's world, just because these men were hired as his scribes, and just because one of them testifies to having been a participant in the actual translation via dictation scenario proposed by the "critics," none of this excludes the "possibility" that they were all hallucinating for a short time, getting confused over which scroll was actually the source document. I mean it could happen, right? In your corner of the apologetic universe, "it could happen" is all that matters to you guys, so if something could technically "happen" then you guys run with it and pretend it is the more probable scenario. The only reason it is entertained to begin with is due to a perceived apologetic meaning, which in this case, neither of you have explained how this is so.

So all three scribes meticulously scribbled in the corresponding characters, including characters that could have only derived from Joseph Smith's "revelations", as they coincidentally originate only in the lacunae. And we're supposed to believe all scribes went rogue and tried to do the translations on their own! I mean these are the idiotic scenarios your apologists are left with.

And as we have already demonstrated, Will's presentation deals with none of the evidence that matters. He even admitted this before the presentation was given. He said all he argued was that the GAEL was based on a prior translation of the Book of Abraham. Even if we granted this, so what? Do you really think I left the Church because I thought the GAEL produced the Book of Abraham??? This is nonsensical, so stop pretending you understand the reason why people leave the faith over this issue. If you were half aas serious as you pretend to be, you'd understand our reasons and stop reinventing them to set up straw men arguments for your mentor. Will's argument was designed to refute a straw man, namely that the GAEL was used to produce the Book of Abraham. So please wade, stop pretending Will has actually presented anything of apologetic value. All he has done is deflect the real questions by focusing on these idiotic sidebars that have meaning only because the apologists insist they must be meaningful. The rest of us are scratching our heads wondering if this is all a big joke or something.

[_wenglund]

My opinion about these things is that such tallies are ultimately meaningless.

Yes...it is almost as meaningless as pointing out the meaninglessness of tallies. :)

I know it is hard to resist needling people, but I am not sure that you are on solid ground when it comes to goading Kevin on this issue. Agree with him or not, I think his knowledge of the Book of Abraham issue is a little more impressive than yours. No offense intended. He is, after all, the guy that Will learned from.

Not that I care about such things, but I am sure you are right about Kevin's superior KEP knowledge. It was made self-evident by his uncommon willingness to thoughtfully and insightfully engage my reasonable questions.

Speaking of solid ground, you are to be commended for the fair and balanced way in which you assessed Kevin's and my exchange. You honed right in on the more significant problem, and didn't hesitate to speak up.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_Markk]

Wade,

Why would some one create a code for a document that no one could read in the first place?

You never answered this...third request?

MG

[_Kevin Graham]

You never answered this...third request?

Duh.

Wade is only here to ask questions on behalf of his puppet master, Wilbur. When in the hell does wade ever respond to questions with actual answers? He'll insist these are questions for another thread or something to that effect. Speaking of which, this is my thread, and it isn't called the Politically Incorrect Guide to village idiocy. If you're not here to deal with the evidence for dictation, then stop polluting the thread.

[Guest]

Some of our visitors may wish to understand better the dynamic between Fratello Schryver and Wade. To that end, may I recommend:

[_Markk]

You never answered this...third request?

Duh.

Wade is only here to ask questions on behalf of his puppet master, Wilbur. When in the hell does wade ever respond to questions with actual answers? He'll insist these are questions for another thread or something to that effect. Speaking of which, this is my thread, and it isn't called the Politically Incorrect Guide to village idiocy. If you're not here to deal with the evidence for dictation, then stop polluting the thread.

Kevin,

I don't know if what you write makes any sense or not, and I really don't care, your debating a con artists tool as if it makes some sort of sense in the first place. If this was the story of the emperor's new clothes you would be debating what kind of weave the fabric is instead of just saying there are no clothes. But either way, until you learn to have a discussion with a person in a half way humanistic manner no one will take you as creditable.

I like you Kevin but you had better slow down before you have a stroke.

Take care.

MG