Possible Modern Source for the Book of Mormon

[_Always Changing]

Episcopalianism was blamed because it kept all other aspects of Roman Catholicism except the Pope. I guess with that attitude, Restorationism is only a little bit down the road. A Catholic national magazine from between 1844 and 1850 made that very comment-- slippery slope. The colonies welcomed all the religious radicals and were notorious for religious intolerance. Mormonism shouldn't be surprising in that context.

Except that we were raised with the fiction that our country is the bastion of religious freedom.

The history of the Catholics of Maryland should illustrate that quite well.

[_Kishkumen]

Episcopalianism was blamed because it kept all other aspects of Roman Catholicism except the Pope. I guess with that attitude, Restorationism is only a little bit down the road. A Catholic national magazine from between 1844 and 1850 made that very comment-- slippery slope. The colonies welcomed all the religious radicals and were notorious for religious intolerance. Mormonism shouldn't be surprising in that context.

Except that we were raised with the fiction that our country is the bastion of religious freedom.

The history of the Catholics of Maryland should illustrate that quite well.

This is shaping up to be very interesting indeed. I wonder whether Daymon Smith's new book covers these kinds of topics at all. I know it has something to do with cultural history, but I have not seen whether it covers the pre-Book of Mormon context very much. I should pick it up, in any case.

[_Always Changing]

Penny books at Amazon are as good as ILL.

[_Tim the Enchanter]

Guys,

I love you both. You have equally big d--ks. Please either go to your corner of the ring or get a room.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

I'm bumping this because the thread got lost in personality conflict.

What was the final assessment? I'm admittedly having a hard time figuring it out after 57 pages...

- Doc

[_Always Changing]

The assessment, based on the data available at this time, is that the Book of Mormon reflects the culture of those people who wrote it. We don't know yet if the Johnson brothers found works which directly influenced the Book of Mormon, but the similarities, and genre, are definitely indicative of the fact that the Book of Mormon was not all that unusual of a production for 1830 upper New England.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Thank you, Ms. Harris.

It's be interesting if each passage of the Book of Mormon could be linked to its plagarized counterpart. That would make for a great read!

- Doc

[_Always Changing]

Oh, cm'on, Mr. Cam. Let's give them some credit for imagination. And there is a line between plagiarism and simple borrowing of themes and vocabulary.

[_AlmaBound]

Thank you, Ms. Harris.

It's be interesting if each passage of the Book of Mormon could be linked to its plagarized counterpart. That would make for a great read!

- Doc

An earlier goal of mine was to make such an attempt.

It's more than simple plagiarism, though. You'd have to put yourself in the shoes of the author and sift out the plagiarism from the description of the events surrounding the coming forth of the book itself.

In other words, as it was being written, the borrowings were incorporated - and then talked about by the characters, real life people and events - and those conversations were written about as well and incorporated into the book.

I've never gotten much traction with that theory, though it may be because I haven't explained it well enough.

[_Always Changing]

I ams busy with other things at the moment, but maybe you could direct them to the passages where that is obvious. As well as all the----or, rather----'s