Taught hat-looking and seer stones today. So......?

[_Scottie]

I'm sure that a very sophisticated theory of cross-cultural translation must undergird this confident assertion, but I can't quite figure out what it must be.

I thought you didn't particularly like the Tapir theory?

[_wondering]

Hmm. So far we have this:

“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. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the interpretation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to Oliver Cowdery, who was his principal scribe, and when it was written down and repeated to Brother Joseph to see if it was correct, then it would disappear, and another character with the interpretation would appear. Thus the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, and not by any power of man.” (David Whitmer, An Address to All Believers in Christ, Richmond, Mo.: n.p., 1887, p. 12.)
Russell M. Nelson, “A Treasured Testament,” Ensign, Jul 1993, 61

I asked:

I wonder what you will say if one of your audience comes up to you next week and asks:

"Y'know <bcspace>, I've been thinking: seeing as the Lord gave Joseph the exact words of the right translation through the seer-stone, and he just had to read them off, and they couldn't get to the next bit until the Lord had checked they had written it down just right - seeing all that, how come the Book of Mormon as we have it today isn't exactly the same as when it was first published?"

bcspace responded:

Any significant changes made (if any) were made by Joseph Smith himself to clarify, not alter the meaning.

Wait a minute - the Lord himself causes to appear on the stone an English text, which is read off by Joseph from the stone, and written down by Oliver at his dictation. Oliver then reads what he has written back to Joseph - and if and only if what Oliver has written is correct, then the Lord makes the text disappear, and shows the next portion. The process is then presumably repeated until the book is completely translated. That is what David Whitmer is telling us, is he not?

Now if that account is right:

(a) The text of the Book of Mormon translation written down by Oliver was the Lord's own translation, word for word. The idea that this could ever need 'clarifying' seems simply blasphemous, since it would suggest that Joseph Smith was claiming to know what the Lord meant better than the Lord did himself. Do no LDS find this idea disturbing?

(b) A subsidiary point arises: if the translation comes from the stone, why does Joseph need the plates at all? Clearly many features of the early stories about the Book of Mormon suggest that the plates were essential, and that Joseph looked at them, either directly or with the aid of special spectacles while translating. It appears that generations of LDS have been raised on stories and pictures based on such accounts. But the seer-stone makes the plates unnecessary, does it not?

Does question (a) never get raised at DCP's "firesides" when he tells the story of the seer stone? If so, I wonder how he responds, or how he or other LDS intellectuals would respond if the questions were to be put.

Please note that I just want to hear how one would respond in the context of an informal conversation, when only a few sentences of answer are possible, and one cannot argue at length, with footnotes and learned citations. That should make it possible for the response to be posted on this board. (Of course if someone wants to post a link to a 20,000 word article as well as giving a "fireside" style answer, why not?)

(Obviously one way of avoiding the difficulties of (a) and (b) is simply to say that Whitmer's account is unreliable in crucial respects. In that case someone, somewhere (Whitmer?) was very careless with the truth in relation to an important matter, and it does seem odd that his story was given so much publicity amongst modern LDS by an Apostle without very strong caveats being entered.)

[/quote]

I'm sure many readers would be interested in what BC or Dr. Peterson can tell us in response to Chap's questions.

[_Daniel Peterson]

I thought you didn't particularly like the Tapir theory?

I didn't originate it and I'm not particularly committed to it, but, linguistically and anthropologically, it seems to me relatively plausible. Parallel phenomena occur all the time (e.g., "Lucanian cow," "prairie dog," "sea horse," "buffalo," "turkey," "river horse," etc., etc.), and most of the cackling that I encounter among some critics on this point tells me more about their naïveté than about the "tapir hypothesis."




.

[_Daniel Peterson]

actually gets a response from the more learned of the two people who have told us that they have taught the 'rock in a hat translation' story to audiences of believing LDS.

Interestingly, a more polite and quite carefully phrased enquiry (see below) drew no substantive reaction.

I apologize to everybody here for not following everything posted on every thread on this board more closely and devotedly. I candidly acknowledge, in front of everybody, that I don't read most of what's written here.

That may well throw some light on why people who are by their own self-description very busy with serious academic work, intercultural bridge-building, teaching and pastoral activity ever feel motivated to waste their precious time in posting on a board like this.

Then again, it may not.

Incidentally, if anybody here actually doubts that I spend my time as I've indicated I do, I'll be in my bishop's office tonight from 6:30 until roughly midnight, doing counseling and interviews. Earlier today I'll be meeting with an associate about the next books to be published in the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative and about an academic conference that we're planning and co-sponsoring with the Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Science in Kuwait City in mid-November. Next week, I'll be speaking in another state, but I won't mention it so as not to provoke Scratch into yet another round of dark mutterings about my lavish compensation. And I'll be speaking in Amman, Jordan, on 4 March; traveling in Israel and Egypt in late April; and engaging in discussions in Iran in late May -- subject, of course, to veto by war. My teaching schedule is on the wall outside the door of my office. Feel free to drop by during any of these activities to see if I'm really there.

I wonder what you will say if one of your audience comes up to you next week and asks:

"Y'know <bcspace>, I've been thinking: seeing as the Lord gave Joseph the exact words of the right translation through the seer-stone, and he just had to read them off, and they couldn't get to the next bit until the Lord had checked they had written it down just right - seeing all that, how come the Book of Mormon as we have it today isn't exactly the same as when it was first published?"

bcspace responded:

Any significant changes made (if any) were made by Joseph Smith himself to clarify, not alter the meaning.

Wait a minute - the Lord himself causes to appear on the stone an English text, which is read off by Joseph from the stone, and written down by Oliver at his dictation. Oliver then reads what he has written back to Joseph - and if and only if what Oliver has written is correct, then the Lord makes the text disappear, and shows the next portion. The process is then presumably repeated until the book is completely translated. That is what David Whitmer is telling us, is he not?

Now if that account is right:

I'm not sure that it's entirely right. David Whitmer was not privy to the translation process, and his account seems to me too automatic. It's pretty clear that Joseph's mindset entered into the translation process (think of the time he couldn't translate when he'd had a spat with Emma), and I suspect that the process depended upon an interaction between his mind and, for lack of a better or more precise way of putting it, the stone.

A computer or a television set flips on when we hit the appropriate button, indifferent to our mental, emotional, or spiritual state. The Urim and Thummim and/or seerstone did not.

The text of the Book of Mormon translation written down by Oliver was the Lord's own translation, word for word.

I don't find that hypothesis compelling.

A subsidiary point arises: if the translation comes from the stone, why does Joseph need the plates at all? Clearly many features of the early stories about the Book of Mormon suggest that the plates were essential, and that Joseph looked at them, either directly or with the aid of special spectacles while translating. It appears that generations of LDS have been raised on stories and pictures based on such accounts. But the seer-stone makes the plates unnecessary, does it not?

Does question (a) never get raised at DCP's "firesides" when he tells the story of the seer stone? If so, I wonder how he responds, or how he or other LDS intellectuals would respond if the questions were to be put.

As I've written in more than one place:

"A knowledgeable academic friend who does not believe in the historical authenticity of the Book of Mormon once asked me, since it seems that the plates were not actually necessary to the translation process and were sometimes not even present in the room, what purpose they served. I responded that I did not know, exactly, except for one thing: They are an indigestible lump in the throats of people like him who contend that there were no Nephites but that Joseph Smith was nonetheless an inspired prophet. If the plates really existed, somebody made them. And if no Nephites existed to make them, then either Joseph Smith, or God, or somebody else seems to have been engaged in simple fraud. The testimony of the witnesses exists, I think, to force a dichotomous choice: true or false?"

That particular passage comes from an essay of mine entitled "Not So Easily Dismissed: Some Facts for Which Counterexplanations of the Book of Mormon Will Need to Account," which was the editor's introduction to FARMS Review 17/2 (2005).

I've also described the plates (and the Urim and Thummim) as, in a certain sense, "training wheels" for a young fledgling prophet who is learning how to receive revelation and who might have even needed reassurance, in the form of tangible objects, that what he was experiencing was no mere subjective delusion.

Anyway, I don't believe in perfect revelations. And neither, interestingly, did Brigham Young:

"I do not even believe that there is a single revelation, among the many God has given to the Church, that is perfect in its fulness. The revelations of God contain correct doctrine and principle, so far as they go; but it is impossible for the poor, weak, low, grovelling, sinful inhabitants of the earth to receive a revelation from the Almighty in all its perfections. He has to speak to us in a manner to meet the extent of our capacities."

[_gramps]

Daniel Peterson wrote:

I've also described the plates (and the Urim and Thummim) as, in a certain sense, "training wheels" for a young fledgling prophet who is learning how to receive revelation and who might have even needed reassurance, in the form of tangible objects, that what he was experiencing was no mere subjective delusion.

What do you mean by 'young fledgling prophet?' When you use the word 'young' are you suggesting age or are you suggesting 'time in the saddle' so to speak?

[_Daniel Peterson]

What do you mean by 'young fledgling prophet?' When you use the word 'young' are you suggesting age or are you suggesting 'time in the saddle' so to speak?

Perhaps both, but mostly the latter.

[_gramps]

What do you mean by 'young fledgling prophet?' When you use the word 'young' are you suggesting age or are you suggesting 'time in the saddle' so to speak?

Perhaps both, but mostly the latter.

I guess your 'training wheels theory' only works in situations where modern-day prophets have to make serious translations of ancient texts? Or is there some other situation in which your theory can be applied?

[_Dr. Shades]

The text of the Book of Mormon translation written down by Oliver was the Lord's own translation, word for word.

I don't find that hypothesis compelling.

If not, then what, in your opinion, was Joseph seeing on the stone?

[_Daniel Peterson]

I guess your 'training wheels theory' only works in situations where modern-day prophets have to make serious translations of ancient texts? Or is there some other situation in which your theory can be applied?

I suggested my "training wheels" hypothesis in the context of a situation where a dispensation is being opened via a very young and unsophisticated man in a biblicistic culture that rests on a nearly-2000-year-old denial of the possibility of new revelation. I've attempted no generalization beyond that.

If not, then what, in your opinion, was Joseph seeing on the stone?

The question isn't what Joseph was seeing on the stone. David Whitmer may well be right on that (although he seems never to have actually seen it himself). The question is whether it originated mechanically, automatically, and in entire independence of Joseph Smith's own emotional state, cultural background, educational limits, intellectual capacities, and spiritual receptivity, or whether it didn't. That is, was it "God's translation," simpliciter, or something more complex than that? I'm not in a position to know the answer to that precisely and with certainty. Neither is anybody else who is not a member of the class Joseph Smith. Some suggestions can be made, but they should be made humbly and tentatively. In principle, though, I disbelieve and reject any notion of prophets as divinely-controlled automata, and find the notion of a perfect revelation or perfect translation not only historically insupportable but conceptually incoherent.

[_John Larsen]

I guess your 'training wheels theory' only works in situations where modern-day prophets have to make serious translations of ancient texts? Or is there some other situation in which your theory can be applied?

I suggested my "training wheels" hypothesis in the context of a situation where a dispensation is being opened via a very young and unsophisticated man in a biblicistic culture that rests on a nearly-2000-year-old denial of the possibility of new revelation. I've attempted no generalization beyond that.

I find it strange that the training of prophets includes the methods of charlatans and conjurers rather than the serious devotion required in most trades. I guess that says something about the nature of prophets.