Moroni quotes a scribal forgery

[_Buffalo]

From MAD:

Hi nack,

What is your theory for Mormon 9?

22 ...Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature;
23 And he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned;
24 And these signs shall follow them that believe—in my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover;

Except for the superfluous "And" at the beginning of verse 23, this passage is identical to KJV-Mark 16:15-18.

How did Moroni get hold of this late scribal addition to the text?

It reminds me a bit of Nephi's ability to quote a forged piece of Isaiah written after Nephi was dead. Any thoughts on this one?

[_jon]

Buff, can't see you getting a substantive reply on this one for some time so whilst we are waiting could you expand the Nephi quoting a forged Isaiah reference?

Thanks.

[_DarkHelmet]

If I was an apologist I would say that God knew those future verses would be written and revealed them to Moroni before they were written in the Bible. Since I'm not an apologist I don't have to make stuff up like that.

[_Buffalo]

Buff, can't see you getting a substantive reply on this one for some time so whilst we are waiting could you expand the Nephi quoting a forged Isaiah reference?

Thanks.

Sure. Isaiah was written by several different authors. The actual Isaiah wrote chapters 1-39.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Is ... h_40-55.29

Deutero-Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55) was written by some unknown author, long after Isaiah's death, and after Jerusalem had already fallen. It could not have been on the Brass plates, yet that is claimed to be the source of it when it's quoted by Nephi

Anachronistically, Nephi quotes the following chapters from the Deutero-Isaiah:

1 Nephi 20 - Isaiah 48 (D)
1 Nephi 21 - Isaiah 49 (D)
2 Nephi 7 - Isaiah 50 (D)
2 Nephi 8 - Isaiah 51 (D)

It would be like Elvis quoting Kurt Cobain.

The reason Joseph includes these chapters is they include the prooftexts that Christians have long used to point to Jesus as the Messiah, even though they aren't messianic and don't point to a supernatural son of God.

[_stemelbow]

From MAD:

Hi nack,

What is your theory for Mormon 9?

22 ...Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature;
23 And he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned;
24 And these signs shall follow them that believe—in my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover;

Except for the superfluous "And" at the beginning of verse 23, this passage is identical to KJV-Mark 16:15-18.

How did Moroni get hold of this late scribal addition to the text?

It reminds me a bit of Nephi's ability to quote a forged piece of Isaiah written after Nephi was dead. Any thoughts on this one?

Buffalo,

if one is to hold to more of a loose translation theory, then I see no reason for me to think these were Moroni's exact words. You see, Moroni could have expressed a similar idea, in his own tongue, and through translation the words came out the same as other scripture--thereby accentuating the point moreso than accentuating Moroni's prose.

[_Buffalo]

Buffalo,

if one is to hold to more of a loose translation theory, then I see no reason for me to think these were Moroni's exact words. You see, Moroni could have expressed a similar idea, in his own tongue, and through translation the words came out the same as other scripture--thereby accentuating the point moreso than accentuating Moroni's prose.

Every witness to the translation process describes a tight translation. What makes you think it was loose?

And if it was loose, why would it almost exactly match up with a piece of forged scripture?

[_bcspace]

If I was an apologist I would say that God knew those future verses would be written and revealed them to Moroni before they were written in the Bible. Since I'm not an apologist I don't have to make stuff up like that.

I wouldn't make anything up. I would merely suppose that Joseph Smith knew he Bible fairly well, which is not a stretch, and merely quoted it when he came upon somthing familiar.

[_Buffalo]

If I was an apologist I would say that God knew those future verses would be written and revealed them to Moroni before they were written in the Bible. Since I'm not an apologist I don't have to make stuff up like that.

I wouldn't make anything up. I would merely suppose that Joseph Smith knew he Bible fairly well, which is not a stretch, and merely quoted it when he came upon somthing familiar.

God did the translation for Joseph. Are you saying Joseph misrepresented the English translation that God gave him?

[_stemelbow]

Every witness to the translation process describes a tight translation. What makes you think it was loose?

What do you mean by tight? I don't' think you are correct. Tight would suggest that what we have in english is somehow a direct word for word translation from Moroni's writings. I don't even think that is a possibility. I'm no expert on translations of course, but I'm under the impression they are never, ever, ever, word for word. That would cause far too much confusion. Skousen's take, I believe, would be that the "tight" involved would have to be that the transcription, or the words Joseph spoke match the words written by the scribe, rather than the character on the plate somehow was equivalent word for word with the english.

And if it was loose, why would it almost exactly match up with a piece of forged scripture?

I already answered this in the previous post--well I offered a possibility anyway. They matched because the idea expressed by Moroni matched to some extent a piece that was already considered scripture by Christians of Joseph's day--and our day for that matter.

[_Buffalo]

Every witness to the translation process describes a tight translation. What makes you think it was loose?

What do you mean by tight? I don't' think you are correct. Tight would suggest that what we have in english is somehow a direct word for word translation from Moroni's writings. I don't even think that is a possibility. I'm no expert on translations of course, but I'm under the impression they are never, ever, ever, word for word. That would cause far too much confusion. Skousen's take, I believe, would be that the "tight" involved would have to be that the transcription, or the words Joseph spoke match the words written by the scribe, rather than the character on the plate somehow was equivalent word for word with the english.

Tight as in, God gave Joseph Smith the exact words to use as a sort of close captioning in the seer stones. Joseph didn't have to translate a foreign language. God just showed him the English words to use. If something was misspelled by the scribe, the word(s) in the stone wouldn't go away until it was corrected.

And if it was loose, why would it almost exactly match up with a piece of forged scripture?

I already answered this in the previous post--well I offered a possibility anyway. They matched because the idea expressed by Moroni matched to some extent a piece that was already considered scripture by Christians of Joseph's day--and our day for that matter.

Yes, but why does loose = copying word for word a scribal forgery that should never have made it into the Bible?