Book of Mormon Borrowings from the New Testament

[_Res Ipsa]

Tobin, I think part of the problem is that nothing in the text of the New Testament indicates that Peter is repeating something God told him word for word. Even if it was, the evidence is that Acts is not a contemporaneous account of what Peter said. In fact, the author may not be an earwitness. Then, to get from the original Greek source to the KJV introduces all kinds of potential changes in wording and tone. So, whatever Peter actually said, the odds are very low that the verse in Acts is an exact translation.

Much of the same criticisms could be made against the Gospels. The writers were not present at all the events and they were written much later than the events in which the depict. If these are inspired works from God, we either have to trust they are genuinely representative of what was said and what happened, or we should just discount them entirely. You can make this criticism of most biographical and auto-biographical works though.

I agree that the same criticisms could be made of the gospels, although that leads you and I to different conclusions.

[_Res Ipsa]

Now as far as my point, I highly doubt Peter (or whoever wrote what was said in Acts) originated the idea instead of God. I do not find it odd that God would say similar or parallel things in remote locations since he is the same person. Do we have record of Jesus saying it before then in the Bible? No, but much of what Jesus said and did is not in the Bible. As the scriptures state, many books could be written about that.

Why do you "highly doubt" that Peter originated the idea? I'm just working off the text, which doesn't indicate that Peter was quoting someone or that he was purporting to be delivering actual words from God. And I don't think it's valid to assume Jesus said specific words based simply on the fact that all his words were not written down.

But, so we don't lose the overall point, if the Book of Mormon is a legitimate translation of ancient American records written in reformed Egyptian, then I think your description of the "translation" process must be correct. Since God would have done the actual translation, I don't see myself in the position of being able to say it was unreasonable for god to mirror the words that Peter said as recorded in the commonly accepted Bible at that time and location.

So, in fact, I think I'm agreeing with you, given your starting place.

[_vessr]

If Joseph Smith knew reformed Egyptian and the translation was something he did himself, then perhaps you might have a point. However, that is not what happened here. I have no idea how closely the Book of Mormon reflects what Nephi or any of them wrote since we don't have the originals and can't compare them. I am aware the process did not involve Joseph Smith being able to read or understand the text he was translating and as far as I know, he did not have the Bible present while translating either. The English words and concepts were formed in his mind in some manner and came in the KJB English (as best he understood it). Since that is clearly the case, finding parallels with the KJB is not that remarkable.

Tobin, you’re best understanding (as I understand you) about Joseph Smith’s translation process was that “[t]he English words and concepts were formed in his mind in some manner and came in the KJB English (as best he understood it). Since that is clearly the case, finding parallels with the KJB is not that remarkable.”

We are talking about parallelisms, however, rather than merely parallels. Parallelisms are giving two or more parts of word clusters a similar form so as to give the whole a definite pattern. This definite pattern is what is so obvious when comparing many Book of Mormon phrases with their New Testament counterparts.

To accept your view of the process, one would have to assume that not only “English words and concepts were formed in [Joseph’s] mind,” but exact or near exact language as it appeared in an imperfect document, the New Testament, would appear in his mind as well, so as to create imperfect but definite patterns in the Book of Mormon that were carried over from the New Testament. That does not seem like how God would work. It would mean that God gave Joseph words that are the imperfections of men, rather than giving him new words that are perfect in their translation; but God is not merely a man and is capable of doing his own work in a perfect way.

You can say that Joseph Smith was imperfect, but claiming that God used language from an imperfect New Testament and then had Joseph call it a translation "by the gift and power of God" does not make any sense. The word clusters that formed in Joseph Smith's mind were word clusters from an imperfectly translated book (the New Testament) that you say Joseph didn't rely on while receiving the translation.

[Guest]

We are talking about parallelisms, however, rather than merely parallels. Parallelisms are giving two or more parts of word clusters a similar form so as to give the whole a definite pattern. This definite pattern is what is so obvious when comparing many Book of Mormon phrases with their New Testament counterparts.

To accept your view of the process, one would have to assume that not only “English words and concepts were formed in [Joseph’s] mind,” but exact or near exact language as it appeared in an imperfect document, the New Testament, would appear in his mind as well, so as to create imperfect but definite patterns in the Book of Mormon that were carried over from the New Testament. That does not seem like how God would work. It would mean that God gave Joseph words that are the imperfections of men, rather than giving him new words that are perfect in their translation; but God is not merely a man and is capable of doing his own work in a perfect way.

You can say that Joseph Smith was imperfect, but claiming that God used language from an imperfect New Testament and then had Joseph call it a translation "by the gift and power of God" does not make any sense. The word clusters that formed in Joseph Smith's mind were word clusters from an imperfectly translated book (the New Testament) that you say Joseph didn't rely on while receiving the translation.

Not quite. The KJB existed when Joseph Smith was alive. I'm sure God was fully aware of it and how it was translated (it seems to be the template he preferred to use after all). Your observations assume this happened in a vacuum which is simply untrue.

[_Bazooka]

No quite. The KJB existed when Joseph Smith was alive. I'm sure God was fully aware of it and how it was translated (it seems to be the template he preferred to use after all). Your observations assume this happened in a vacuum which is simply untrue.

So, if the KJV was the template etc why waste time with all the props (hat, rock, curtain, crystals in a breastplate etc)...
...why didn't God just say "Joseph, for this next bit just copy Isaiah from the version of The Bible you've got on the table in front of you"?

[_ludwigm]

No quite. The KJB existed when Joseph Smith was alive. I'm sure God was fully aware of it and how it was translated (it seems to be the template he preferred to use after all). Your observations assume this happened in a vacuum which is simply untrue.

So, if the KJV was the template etc why waste time with all the props (hat, rock, curtain, crystals in a breastplate etc)...
...why didn't God just say "Joseph, for this next bit just copy Isaiah from the version of The Bible you've got on the table in front of you"?

You know, "God's way is not our way"...

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The KJB existed when Joseph Smith was alive. I'm sure God was fully aware of it and how it was translated (it seems to be the template he preferred to use after all).

Yes, God preferred English - against all other language.
For example against Hebrew, the language spoken by his chosen nation.

[_Roger]

vessr:

Very interesting thread. There is much too much here to take the time to read, but I've gone over a lot of the posts.

Brad wrote:

I'll out myself in the beginning as a parallel skeptic, meaning I personally place a heavy burden of proof on any argument based on parallels.

One possible conclusion could be something like this: If you had a person who was familiar with the Bible who wanted to write a book of scripture, it would seem natural to try and make the language sound like the style of the Bible (King James, in this case). Given the number of phrases in Bible and the length of the Book of Mormon, I don't think it would be surprising to find parallel phrases or even whole sentences. So, I'm not sure it would be fair to conclude that Smith simply copied from Bible into the Book of Mormon.

I don't think it's a question of fairness or lack thereof. I think it's a question of what is most reasonable? If there were only a few similar phrases, then I would see it as more reasonable that the language emulation produced a few false hits, but when there are hundreds of examples, it seems more reasonable to lean toward a physical connection.

Another would be similar to Tobin's. God supplied Joseph with the words and sentences that went into the book. God knew the expectations for what scripture should sound like, at least to Joesph and his contemporaries, and so he used language similar to that found in the KJV. Once you posit an omnipotent and omniscient god, it's not difficult to construct possible explanations for the parallels.

But why would God copy translation mistakes made by King James' flawed (but still pretty good) translators? There are at least 4 clear examples of this. I don't remember the references off the top of my head, but they've been posted here before and anyone can look them up. They are two uses of "seraphims" and another two uses of "cherubims." These are clearly translation mistakes introduced into the text by King James' translators. Both words are plural without the "s." So using either of them as they are found in both the 1611 KJV and the 1830 Book of Mormon text is like saying "mices" or "geeses."

Clearly God would have known this and could have made it obvious that neither He nor Joseph were copying from the KJV by simply using correct English. Whoever copied these words from the KJV was either not aware of this or really intent on messing with us.

All I would draw from the parallelisms is that the author of the Book of Mormon was familiar with the Bible and chose to make the Book of Mormon language sound like the KJV.

That is undoubtedly true and due to the above examples, I think we can rule out God.

[_Tobin]

Another would be similar to Tobin's. God supplied Joseph with the words and sentences that went into the book. God knew the expectations for what scripture should sound like, at least to Joesph and his contemporaries, and so he used language similar to that found in the KJV. Once you posit an omnipotent and omniscient god, it's not difficult to construct possible explanations for the parallels.

But why would God copy translation mistakes made by King James' flawed (but still pretty good) translators? There are at least 4 clear examples of this. I don't remember the references off the top of my head, but they've been posted here before and anyone can look them up. They are two uses of "seraphims" and another two uses of "cherubims." These are clearly translation mistakes introduced into the text by King James' translators. Both words are plural without the "s." So using either of them as they are found in both the 1611 KJV and the 1830 Book of Mormon text is like saying "mices" or "geeses."

That isn't very compelling for two reasons. First, the Book of Mormon was produced by a human being with the help of God - not by God directly. Assuming the production must be perfect is unrealistic unless you claim Joseph Smith was merely a sock puppet for God. In that case, then why have Joseph Smith involved at all? God could just have printed the book himself. The second problem is that you haven't established these are actually mistakes or not. Any translation is going to be relatively inexact no matter what, so stating there exists some perfect translation is unreasonable. If you define any translation, such as the KJV, less than this perfect translation that can't possibly exist as a mistake, then you are just manufacturing issues.

[_LittleNipper]

[
But why would God copy translation mistakes made by King James' flawed (but still pretty good) translators? There are at least 4 clear examples of this. I don't remember the references off the top of my head, but they've been posted here before and anyone can look them up. They are two uses of "seraphims" and another two uses of "cherubims." These are clearly translation mistakes introduced into the text by King James' translators. Both words are plural without the "s." So using either of them as they are found in both the 1611 KJV and the 1830 Book of Mormon text is like saying "mices" or "geeses."

That isn't very compelling for two reasons. First, the Book of Mormon was produced by a human being with the help of God - not by God directly. Assuming the production must be perfect is unrealistic unless you claim Joseph Smith was merely a sock puppet for God. In that case, then why have Joseph Smith involved at all? God could just have printed the book himself. The second problem is that you haven't established these are actually mistakes or not. Any translation is going to be relatively inexact no matter what, so stating there exists some perfect translation is unreasonable. If you define any translation, such as the KJV, less than this perfect translation that can't possibly exist as a mistake, then you are just manufacturing issues.

God used the right person at the correct time to express perfectly what God needed to reveal and without error. Mr. Smith was not that man. And even Mormons make excuses for him.

[_Tobin]

God used the right person at the correct time to express perfectly what God needed to reveal and without error. Mr. Smith was not that man. And even Mormons make excuses for him.

If God can magically make us perfect in this life, why is there any sin at all? Is God just toying with us?