Possible Modern Source for the Book of Mormon

[_Always Changing]

There is another option, however.

Suppose Dartmouth graduates got wind that Rigdon had Spalding's manuscript. They (particularly Ethan Smith) got it, somehow, and reworked it and added a lot more material, and turned it into a reasonably decent piece of fantasy fiction (E. Smith was certainly capable of doing so) They then gave it to O. Cowdery and the J. Smith clan to rework it and take credit for it. Rigdon (like Gollum) followed his nose, and got re-involved with it. Smith & Co mangled it magnificently, so now we see the Book of Mormon, which could have been a decent book, if Joseph hadn't gotten his hands on it. This way, Rigdon does not have to be involved for the writing of the Book of Mormon, but we could still see Spalding's influence.

[_Roger]

Equality:

Yup. See this classic blog post from Lunar Quaker:

Yes, very interesting in light of the discussion here.

It is apparent from the existing records that many of the early church leaders viewed the cave experience as a legitimate event....

So again, if one views this from the skeptical point of view (as I do) the question is raised, is the cave association with the hill Cumorah coincidental to Spalding's cave? If Smith did not really uncover ancient plates, then where did the idea of a cave inside the hill Cumorah come from?

[_Themis]

Nevo, I appreciate you sticking around and answering questions that are posed to you. I dig how you don't do the old bob-and-weave that some of the other Mormon believers who post here engage in. I agree with you that some of the theories of Book of Mormon authorship that involve multiple co-conspirators seem farfetched. But when placing the various theories on a scale from "most likely" to "most unlikely" I would still place them far above the "ancient resurrected American Indian delivered gold plates engraved in Reformed Egyptian along with magical translating spectacles" theory on our plausibility scale.

Only certain questions.

[_Themis]

You seem to have forgotten that Joseph Smith's original claim to "authority", i.e. his religious calling from the Lord, was to bring forth the Book of Mormon and pretend to nothing else. http://josephsmithpapers.org/paperSummary?target=x1463

AFTER the Book of Mormon, his efforts were in direct conflict with this earlier "revelation" (and words were added to allow Joseph Smith to continue his religion-making). There was no organization of a legally recognized church in the works yet, but only the one "taught by my disciples" , i.e. a group effort of true disciples with no one pointed out as a "prophet" at all: Joseph Smith was the instrument to bring about new scripture to point the way to that "church". The Book of Mormon was a physical fact and Joseph Smith's followers were a fact without a church. All that came after the Book of Mormon could be laid down as Joseph Smith skidding inexorably off the rails, getting some things "right" but a great deal wrong too.

Imagine that the Book of Mormon actually becomes validated more or less by subsequent ancient American scholarship. I know, that's asking a lot. But if the Book of Mormon attained the stature of a mystery work, accurate enough to be considered a valid source of belief if you chose to believe, what would that say about Joseph Smith's subsequent religion-making? Would the Book of Mormon being validated as a mysterious ancient history make Joseph Smith the religion-maker into a holistic "prophet"? Not at all. Each step along his career requires validating. The Book of Abraham is a mess, clearly derivative and not nearly as impressive or substantial as the Book of Mormon. The subsequent episodes of Joseph Smith's "translation" efforts are even worse. Then we have his problematic "revelations": the ones that have clearly never materialized and never will, and the ones that taught doctrines that were subsequently dumped by his successors. We have a false prophet woven in with the lucky guesswork religion-maker. But the Book of Mormon, his first and most impressive work, remains apart from anything that came later, by his own admission - which was later ignored or explained away, by interpolating the original text (as the Joseph Smith Papers project clearly publishes for the whole world to see)....

I haven't forgotten. My point is that the Book of Mormon has a lot of evidence against it's historicity, and no good evidence for. Joseph has claimed the ability to translate ancient languages with God's power from the Book of Mormon onward. The Book of Abraham just gives us even more damning evidence against this claim. It is also the one in which we have source text. There is no reasonable doubt he was making up these claims.

[_mentalgymnast]

[The Book of Mormon] is not wise or historic or well written. To an outsider, it reads like the phone book.

After having read Grant Hardy's, "Understanding the Book of Mormon", I'd respectfully say to you that this statement you've made is plain silly. There is more under the hood than you're apparently willing to recognize. Such is the result of failure to thoroughly diagnose the Book of Mormon with an open mind. OTOH, if you have given the Book of Mormon a thorough study and have read Hardy's book, I find it difficult to understand why you'd have the gall to make this statement, unless it's simply to jump on the Book of Mormon is a fabrication bandwagon without literally giving it a second thought.

I would not by any stretch consider myself to be a renowned scholar of the Book of Mormon, but I have enough sense to see that your simple diagnostic is false at first glance. But that is a direct result of taking the time to consider the fact that there is a rather complex narrative contained within the covers of that book.

My guess is that if you were sitting in front of a Grant Hardy kind of guy you would probably soften your stance, but on this forum you can get away with saying some pretty off the wall things and get away with it. Someone will back you up.

Won't take long.

Regards,
MG

[_Nevo]

I also agree that "He could easily have come up with the story independently." That notion begins to weaken, however, when we consider the timeline coupled with the question of whether or not Joseph needed to make anything up in the first place.

I think that Joseph Smith really was going to the hill in the 1820s, and that he did bring back something in September 1827. See, e.g., the accounts of Joseph Knight, Willard Chase, Fayette Lapham, etc. At the very least he was telling people that he was going to the hill to recover the plates long before the Conneaut witnesses make their appearance, so I'm not sure why you think it significant that Joseph's written accounts of the recovery of the plates postdate their affidavits.

Regarding Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon meeting pre-1830, it's not just that I'm "inclined to believe . . . testimony that suggests they did not meet until 1830"—although I do happen to believe that Rigdon was telling the truth about it. It's also the fact that they lived in different states, hundreds of miles apart, with no known family or business connections, and that their movements during the mid-to-late 1820s are fairly well known—particularly Joseph Smith's—and their known movements don't ever overlap.

[_Darth J]

Just a point of clarification:

The LDS Church requires 8 year-old children to read Gardner's six-volume set and Grant Hardy's "Understanding the Book of Mormon" before they can say they have enough reason to believe in the Book of Mormon to make a lifetime commitment to Mormonism by being baptized. Right?

[_Darth J]

Nevo, since I had not read Gardner's six-volume set in 1993 when the signature machine Ezra Taft Benson called me on a mission to Italy, I really had no business telling people in Italy that the Book of Mormon was true, did I?

[_Roger]

Hi Lucy:

Excellent points.

But Smith's discovery narrative appeared shortly after the Geauga county committee retrieved Spalding's writings.

Exactly.

And apparently Hurlbut was working as a double agent (or money was the goal);

Hurlbut is an odd fellow. Difficult to say. I tend to think Hurlbut was working for Hurlbut. I think his first motivation was revenge but he began to find out how much power Joseph Smith had in Kirtland and began to realize that things might not go well with him if he continued on the path he had begun. That's just my take on it, of course.

therefore, acquisition of the Oberlin Manuscript Story was the trigger for Smith adding that.

Again, yes, it would seem so.

Unless-- it was part of both stories.

The loss of the 116 pages may play into this. Who knows how the story began? Also, keep in mind that the Oberlin Manuscript is not the Spalding manuscript that the witnesses claim was the basis for the Book of Mormon. It is merely another manuscript written by the same author on a similar subject.

Then, why wasn't it included in the Book of Mormon? There was no cave in the discovery narrative, it was only in Smith's previous version.

Again, it may have been included in the lost 116 pages. We will likely never know.

But, then, why did they go to the trouble of retrieving Spalding's writings?

Who is the "they" you reference?

There is another option, however.

Suppose Dartmouth graduates got wind that Rigdon had Spalding's manuscript. They (particularly Ethan Smith) got it, somehow, and reworked it and added a lot more material, and turned it into a reasonably decent piece of fantasy fiction (E. Smith was certainly capable of doing so) They then gave it to O. Cowdery and the J. Smith clan to rework it and take credit for it. Rigdon (like Gollum) followed his nose, and got re-involved with it. Smith & Co mangled it magnificently, so now we see the Book of Mormon, which could have been a decent book, if Joseph hadn't gotten his hands on it. This way, Rigdon does not have to be involved for the writing of the Book of Mormon, but we could still see Spalding's influence.

As critics of S/R are keen to point out, the more conspirators you add to your theory, the less credible it becomes, unless there are solid reasons for suspecting specific individuals.

What I think is germane to this thread is the fact that parallels exist between the stories of how Joseph Smith discovered and translated the plates and how Solomon Spalding discovered and translated his parchments. It is even more significant, in my opinion, that these parallels did not exist until approximately 1838 (there may have been earlier accounts, but none to my knowledge pre-date the original Spalding witness allegations of 1833.)

[_Roger]

Nevo:

At the very least he was telling people that he was going to the hill to recover the plates long before the Conneaut witnesses make their appearance, so I'm not sure why you think it significant that Joseph's written accounts of the recovery of the plates postdate their affidavits.

Fair enough. What is the earliest testimony we have regarding Joseph's discovery of the plates?

Regarding Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon meeting pre-1830, it's not just that I'm "inclined to believe . . . testimony that suggests they did not meet until 1830"—although I do happen to believe that Rigdon was telling the truth about it.

Why? What is the reason you happen to believe Rigdon in this instance? Do you believe Rigdon when he suggests he knows the content of the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon?

It's also the fact that they lived in different states, hundreds of miles apart, with no known family or business connections, and that their movements during the mid-to-late 1820s are fairly well known—particularly Joseph Smith's—and their known movements don't ever overlap.

Again, fair enough. Can you tell me where was Joseph Smith in the late summer of 1826?