Response: Because Smith knew he couldn’t produce a new identical copy–even if Smith had all of his “crib sheets” it would have been near impossible for someone to recount exactly what he said several weeks prior. By the way–I remember it took Smith 6 weeks before he came up with the excuse God didnt want him to do a “do-over”
This is why I made this thread, obviously if a new copy could be made he should have done it and it would have been great proof for Smith and eternal shame (on the level of Judas’ betrayal) for the Harris people burning the writings of God’s most important prophet.
Response: I dont think any of the transcription withnesses said the plates were visable–at most, it was a lump (supposedly the plates) under some old blanket. Smith was doing his old “seer stone” routine–a fortune tellers/con man trick on par with crystal gazing
The BoM “witnesses” fall into the “3 Witnesses” who all admited they “saw” the plates in visionary experience and the “8 witnesses” --all close relatives or friends on Smith, in two seperate groups, under very brief circufstances (can we say some cheap gilded prop?)
This is part of what Im trying to figure out, just how many witnesses and more importantly what did they really see. If it was a lump in a blanket then that not only doesnt cut it, that is borderline deception.
That’s one difference with how you view things and how Mormons view them. Mormons don’t believe in verbal inerrancy; nor that God provided the translation.
I was under the impression the BoM was seen as the most perfect and uncorrupted book of all history. That is hard to believe if you reject verbal inerrancy and even harder to believe if God didnt provide the translation because that would mean it wasnt so much a “translation” but rather someone’s opinion dictating what they THINK God meant.
Translations of the Bible into English are inferior to the Bible in its original languages because there is always the translators bias that plays a role in the translation into English, not to mention some things which there is no English equivalent (eg English only has one term for “love” and that is the word “love” where as other languages like Greek have MULTIPLE terms for love which distinguish between different types of love).
Joseph Smith always claimed that he translated it by the power of God rather than that God translated it. If he did it twice there’d be differences each time.
Then we have to ask what kind of a task God had in store for humanity if the most important translation of all time was subject to such error. Does God want us to know what those plates say or not? I would assume that He would ensure a inerrant and consistent translation into English. It goes from what the plates actually say into what Joseph Smith THINKS they should say in English, that is a dangerous way of passing on the Truth.
If it was a one to one, word for word, translation then having two different stories would be virtually impossible.
I’d say that’s probably why no two manuscripts of the New Testament are identical.
There are two huge problems with this claim.
First of all the differences in NT manuscripts are minor, most often it is at most a verse or letter or word are altered. For arguments sake lets say the manuscripts are in 95% agreement with eachother. If Joseph Smith produced a second copy of the original it should and could easily be 95% identical with the original. If the two are compared and there is a low percentage of agreement then that raises red flags.
Second problem is that the original Bible manuscripts were directly inspired by God and came out perfect when written by the human authors, they were NOT copies translations. Any difference in copies of Biblical manuscripts is due to UNinspired human error. It should raise some eyebrows if the greatest prophet of all time didnt receive inspiriation or guidance to ensure a good and consistent translation.
None of them claimed that the plates were inside the hat. But eleven other people did say that they saw the plates. Eight of them said they handled them as well. Some of those were scribes.
NONE of them claimed the plates were in a hat? That is impossible if Joseph Smith had to read out of a hat and Mr Harris was right next to him writing stuff down.
Who were these 11 and 8 people, and what did they say. I remember something on these forums a while back where some people retracted some claim they made (though I dont remember if it was in reference to the plates).
