Murder among the Mormons

[Res Ipsa]

Wasn't Hoffman planning on forging the lost Pages of the Book of Mormon??

According to the documentary, that was his endgame with the church. Because the Salamander Letter and the lost pages were in Martin Harris’s handwriting, acceptance of the former as genuine would help authenticate the latter.

[Res Ipsa]

Are there dramatic revelations to come?

The dramatic revelations to come are when members realize that their leaders are capable of being fooled and led astray. This is when members begin to question just how much of a prophet is a prophet?

The BBC production is professional to a Tee and fair and balanced. I think the Church didn't want to play anymore role than they did because it certainly raises difficult issues about the claims that the President of the Church is entitled to the gift of discernment and it's plainly manifested that this gift was wholly lacking.

My guess is that the series will be a hit. There is probably more topics to follow because the interesting and shadowy past of Mormonism makes heads turn. Let's see what happens. I hope that more documentaries come to light and BBC takes the bull by the horn.

The dog ate my long reply. TL/DR I finished it, and think it was an ok True Crime mini-series. I thought overall it was kind of uneven and lacked a clear vision of the story it wanted to tell. I don’t think it will grab audiences the way The Making of a Murderer did. (Or any number of other True Crime documentaries.)

The documentary takes the easy way out and offers “evil” as the only explanation for Hofmann. Little to no attention is given to the Church‘s role in the entire incident, other than as the victim of a hoax.

I don’t see this show as a significant testimony breaker, and I don’t see any evidence that the BBC has developed an appetite for investigative reporting on the LDS church.

[IHAQ]

The dog ate my long reply. TL/DR I finished it, and think it was an ok True Crime mini-series. I thought overall it was kind of uneven and lacked a clear vision of the story it wanted to tell. I don’t think it will grab audiences the way The Making of a Murderer did. (Or any number of other True Crime documentaries.)

The documentary takes the easy way out and offers “evil” as the only explanation for Hofmann. Little to no attention is given to the Church‘s role in the entire incident, other than as the victim of a hoax.

The Church's involvement, and the impact on Mormonism was 50% of the story in my opinion. That the producers missed it seems a shame.

[Meadowchik]

The Church's involvement, and the impact on Mormonism was 50% of the story in my opinion. That the producers missed it seems a shame.

I wonder what went on there. The director was active LDS Jared Hess, who was also a co-creator and they originally planned a 6-part series, which was then whittled down to 3-part once Netflix/BBC picked it up.

[IHAQ]

The Church's involvement, and the impact on Mormonism was 50% of the story in my opinion. That the producers missed it seems a shame.

I wonder what went on there. The director was active LDS Jared Hess, who was also a co-creator and they originally planned a 6-part series, which was then whittled down to 3-part once Netflix/BBC picked it up.

Tyler and I had pitched this as a six-part series. We felt the story was too vast. There’s so much incredibly fascinating material that we wanted to tell. We were just swimming in all these stories just by the nature of living in Salt Lake City and being in such close proximity to people that knew him or had some kind of a connection to what happened. So we initially pitched it as a six-part series and then when BBC and Netflix became involved, they said, “We want it to be a three-part series.” That’s what Netflix is doing now, is doing true crime series that are three, one-hour episodes or four, sometimes. We really had to kind of curate what were the most relevant moments and the biggest parts of the story that that were crucial to understand. We also had to tell enough about the foundational beliefs of Mormonism to set them up for an audience so that they could understand and comprehend the impact of Mark Hofmann’s forgeries.

https://www.deseret.com/faith/2021/2/23 ... rk-hofmann

[Res Ipsa]

I wonder what went on there. The director was active LDS Jared Hess, who was also a co-creator and they originally planned a 6-part series, which was then whittled down to 3-part once Netflix/BBC picked it up.

Tyler and I had pitched this as a six-part series. We felt the story was too vast. There’s so much incredibly fascinating material that we wanted to tell. We were just swimming in all these stories just by the nature of living in Salt Lake City and being in such close proximity to people that knew him or had some kind of a connection to what happened. So we initially pitched it as a six-part series and then when BBC and Netflix became involved, they said, “We want it to be a three-part series.” That’s what Netflix is doing now, is doing true crime series that are three, one-hour episodes or four, sometimes. We really had to kind of curate what were the most relevant moments and the biggest parts of the story that that were crucial to understand. We also had to tell enough about the foundational beliefs of Mormonism to set them up for an audience so that they could understand and comprehend the impact of Mark Hofmann’s forgeries.

https://www.deseret.com/faith/2021/2/23 ... rk-hofmann

Thanks IHAQ. The process of condensing a six-hour story into three hours could explain my reaction to the documentary.

[Aristotle Smith]

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[Shulem]

If anything the documentary serves to remind people (especially Mormons) to question and analyze their faith from new perspectives that perhaps they've not yet considered. How is it that the First Presidency can be deceived by a conman whose sole intent was to swindle money from the Church and mock the so-called inspiration and discernment of the prophet? How can that be?

I think that it's reasonable to assume that members of the Church would think it not possible that Jesus could have been swindled and lied to and handed money over to a conman thinking he was getting something of value in return. Could Jesus have been fooled? Jesus is supposed to be a step ahead of the Holy Ghost and just one step down from the Father -- so it seems unreasonable from a faith promoting point of view to think he could have been fooled -- after all, he's supposed to be perfect. You'd think that the First Presidency would draw upon that perfection wherein the Hofmann affair crosses the line!

So, what about a First Presidency combined together as one -- how can they be fooled? How can the First Presidency with the support of the Quorum of the Twelve be duped into being swindled and lied to? It just doesn't make sense from a faithful point of view. Oh, the apologists will simply say they are human, mere mortals, and capable of making mistakes. But I say, that's a cop out. It goes to show that the collective strength of Mormonism even when combined as one force relying on the inspiration of the so-called Holt Ghost is fatally flawed and that claims of so-called inspiration and revelation spelled out in the Doctrine and Covenants are simply not true. These are things that need to be taken into consideration by testimony bearing Latter-day Saints who think their prophet is directed by God when in fact he's little more than a puppet repeating the same old things everyone already knows and has heard countless times.

[hauslern]

An article appeared in https://thebulwark.com/fraud-fortune-an ... FTpF7YE6-k

I shared over on DCP's blog and Midgley's comment " I just happen to have met at a Mormon History Association meeting, and hence I actually actually know Mr. Daniel N. Gullotta, who has yet to finish his PhD. This item is merely an example of journalism--it is not an instance of solid scholarship. I think that Mr. Gullotta should be busy trying to finish his education, and not opining about this sort of thing."

Dan did reference a critique more favorable to LDS interests.
https://publicsquaremag.org/editorials/ ... gJmBAQsv18

This site gives his other "conservative" views. "https://publicsquaremag.org/author/ccunningham/

[Philo Sofee]

The dog ate my long reply. TL/DR I finished it, and think it was an ok True Crime mini-series. I thought overall it was kind of uneven and lacked a clear vision of the story it wanted to tell. I don’t think it will grab audiences the way The Making of a Murderer did. (Or any number of other True Crime documentaries.)

The documentary takes the easy way out and offers “evil” as the only explanation for Hofmann. Little to no attention is given to the Church‘s role in the entire incident, other than as the victim of a hoax.

The Church's involvement, and the impact on Mormonism was 50% of the story in my opinion. That the producers missed it seems a shame.

The church probably paid them to skim over their involvement.......