The 5 ways Joseph translated

[_zeezrom]

Hey, what about the Cup of Jamshid?

Maybe Joseph used a form of this method for translation?

[_zeezrom]

by the way,

I'm still not clear on the hat method. Did God make English words show up in fiery font on the surface of the stone or did God produce a holographic parchment to appear?

Or both?

That would give us another method! One is hologram and the other is Lord of the Rings style.

We are well on our way to solving this puzzle without the help of TBs!

[_ldsfaqs]

Known main methods are:

1. Head in Hat with Stone
2. Head in Hat with Urim and Thummim (Spectacles)
3. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate looking at Plates
4. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate no plates
5. Sitting Looking at plates
6. Sitting Revelation plates elsewhere or other side of curtain.
7. Nothing at all, no Plates, stones, etc. pure Revelation!

(Note, some of the methods mentioned above have aspects that sometimes also occurred with the other methods. In other words, there was a lot of mixture and variety depending on the moment.)

Also, the vast majority of accounts (including hostile accounts) DO NOT state head in hat, most state the translation occurred with the Urim and Thummim (spectacles/interpreters), and Revelation. Yes, head in Hat was ONE of the most dominate methods, maybe 2nd or 3rd method, but it wasn't the dominate method, nor was it the only method as anti-mormons claim.

The dominate method of the translation was clearly with the Spectacles, in both eyewitness and other accounts.

http://fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon/Translation/Method

In conclusion, anti-mormons are LIARS as always..... Using a little truth to tell great lies.

[_zeezrom]

Thanks ldsfaqs for taking the time to reply!

Can we just refer to the U. and T. as crystal goggles? That is a lot easier for the layperson to understand and it gets right to the point.

[_thews]

Known main methods are:

1. Head in Hat with Stone
2. Head in Hat with Urim and Thummim (Spectacles)
3. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate looking at Plates
4. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate no plates
5. Sitting Looking at plates
6. Sitting Revelation plates elsewhere or other side of curtain.
7. Nothing at all, no Plates, stones, etc. pure Revelation!

(Note, some of the methods mentioned above have aspects that sometimes also occurred with the other methods. In other words, there was a lot of mixture and variety depending on the moment.)

Also, the vast majority of accounts (including hostile accounts) DO NOT state head in hat, most state the translation occurred with the Urim and Thummim (spectacles/interpreters), and Revelation. Yes, head in Hat was ONE of the most dominate methods, maybe 2nd or 3rd method, but it wasn't the dominate method, nor was it the only method as anti-mormons claim.

The dominate method of the translation was clearly with the Spectacles, in both eyewitness and other accounts.

http://fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon/Translation/Method

In conclusion, anti-mormons are LIARS as always..... Using a little truth to tell great lies.

Here's a little "truth" for you Obiwan, as what you call "quote mining" is actually acknowledging the facts...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Smith

She later wrote in an interview with her son, Joseph Smith III: "In writing for your father I frequently wrote day after day, often sitting at the table close by him, he sitting with his face buried in his hat, with the stone in it, and dictating hour after hour with nothing between us."

http://www.mrm.org/translation

Martin Harris was one of the scribes Joseph Smith used to record the writing on the plates. This enabled him to give a first-hand account of how Smith performed this translation. Harris noted,

"By aid of the Seer Stone, sentences would appear and were read by the Prophet and written by Martin, and when finished he would say 'written;' and if correctly written, the sentence would disappear and another appear in its place; but if not written correctly it remained until corrected, so that the translation was just as it was engraven on the plates, precisely in the language then used" (CHC 1:29).

Harris' description concurs with that of David Whitmer, another one of the three witnesses whose testimony appears at the front of the Book of Mormon. Whitmer details exactly how the stone produced the English interpretation. On page 12 of his book An Address to All Believers in Christ, Whitmer wrote,

"I will now give you a description of the manner in which the Book of Mormon was translated. Joseph Smith would put the seer stone into a hat, and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine.

[_brade]

On SP's thread about JSJr face in hat, this statement was made by one of our fine members of MDB:

I'm STILL not "troubled".....

Head in the Hat as ONE of the 5 or so Methods used to translate the Book of Mormon doesn't bother me at all. It wasn't the only method, and not only that, it WAS NOT the "dominate" method used.

haa haa.... You anti's are a joke.

This is news to me. I didn't realize there were 5 different methods used. Can we talk about them so I can learn?

1. Face in hat, looking at a rock - English words appeared on the rock or in a hologram
2. Crystal goggles fastened to a harness and breastplate - The crystal goggles projected the English words onto the surface of the gold plates
3. Looking at the characters on the plates and having the English words written into the sensory neurons of the brain
4.
5.

Could someone help me with 4 and 5?

Are there more possibilities out there?

Thank you! Your contributions to this thread will help me as I consider ways to translate.

Zee.

Since apologetics is all about mere possibilities, it's possible that God advanced Joseph a MacBook, several backup batteries, and a copy of the yet to be produced Reformed Egyption edition of the Resetta Stone language learning software.

[_Sethbag]

Considering the never-ending debate over how exactly the Book of Mormon was translated, D&C 9 is perhaps the biggest piece of evidence and for some reason the most overlooked by those on every side of the issue.

That's because it doesn't make any sense at all. None. Not even a little bit.

Are you saying that Joseph Smith, who obviously had no knowledge whatsoever about what Reformed Egyptian characters meant, was supposed to look at these characters and try to figure out what they meant, and then ask God if what he'd come up with was correct?

Ok, so someone hands you a book written in Chinese (assuming you can't speak Chinese), do you think you could figure out what they meant, and then ask God for confirmation, and if he felt like helping you out, you could come up with sentences like "I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents, therefor I was taught in all the learning of my fathers" or whatever the hell 1 Nephi starts out with?

Do you imagine that Joseph just opened a dictionary and started praying to God to ask whether the first character on the plates matched the first word, and then the second word, and on down until he found the right word? What about the proper names?

[_Equality]

Known main methods are:

1. Head in Hat with Stone
2. Head in Hat with Urim and Thummim (Spectacles)
3. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate looking at Plates
4. Urim and Thummim/Breastplate no plates
5. Sitting Looking at plates
6. Sitting Revelation plates elsewhere or other side of curtain.
7. Nothing at all, no Plates, stones, etc. pure Revelation!

(Note, some of the methods mentioned above have aspects that sometimes also occurred with the other methods. In other words, there was a lot of mixture and variety depending on the moment.)

Also, the vast majority of accounts (including hostile accounts) DO NOT state head in hat, most state the translation occurred with the Urim and Thummim (spectacles/interpreters), and Revelation. Yes, head in Hat was ONE of the most dominate methods, maybe 2nd or 3rd method, but it wasn't the dominate method, nor was it the only method as anti-mormons claim.

The dominate method of the translation was clearly with the Spectacles, in both eyewitness and other accounts.

http://fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon/Translation/Method

In conclusion, anti-mormons are LIARS as always..... Using a little truth to tell great lies.

Hey, ldsfuq, there is a 16-page thread on this still going. And you are spouting the same falsehoods without supporting evidence here that you spout there. Telling lies and then calling the people who provide actual facts and evidence, with references, liars (no, wait, LIARS) is not just bad form, it makes you look like you are completely unhinged.

[_zeezrom]

Lol, Sethbag.

"A". Nope.
"The". Nope.
"Today". Nope.
"It". Nope.
"When". Nope.
"I". Yes!

"alright, Oliver I got one! It starts with I."
"said". Nope.
"like". Nope.
"never". Yes! Oh, wait. What?
"never?" Ah, I thought you said something else. Nope.
"starts with an "n"? Yes!
"is it a verb?" Nope.
"is it someone's name?" Yes!
"Oliver, pull out that old Parish record again. I need some names."
"How about Nephi?"
"Ok, Nephi?" Yes!
"alright. Oliver, that was it!"
"am". Nope.
"walked". Nope.
...etc

[_why me]

Do you imagine that Joseph just opened a dictionary and started praying to God to ask whether the first character on the plates matched the first word, and then the second word, and on down until he found the right word? What about the proper names?

Joseph is not saying that at all. The D&C is stating it. And that is the problem. How the book was translated over a period of time would depend on what Joseph and Oliver said about the process. But the end result is basically that Oliver found the process amazing and wonderful.