LDS: The 'first copy' of the Book of Mormon??

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Lion_of_Narnia said:
Perhaps–but not lets forget high in the heirarchy Momon’s paid substantial money to forger (and later murderer) Mark Hoffman for his bogus manuscripts so they could hide them–I suspect a LOT of the more educated Mormon heirarchy know their religion cannot withstand critical historical query–but they have way too much invested in maintaining the system
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I think that you have hit the nail on the head. Any history of mormonism that is not “faith-promoting” is locked away. Only God knows what is locked away in the vaults of the old men of Salt Lake City.:eek: I’m pretty sure that 'Ol Joe’s “peep-stone” is there and maybe even his sacred underwear.😃
 
For those who haven’t seen it yet, here is the definitive thesis on the Spalding-Rigdon theory of the fabrication of the Book of Mormon.

It is fascinating and thoroughly researched and I agree with it wholeheartedly.

Paul
 
Lion_of_Narnia said:
Perhaps–but not lets forget high in the heirarchy Momon’s paid substantial money to forger (and later murderer) Mark Hoffman for his bogus manuscripts so they could hide them–I suspect a LOT of the more educated Mormon heirarchy know their religion cannot withstand critical historical query–but they have way too much invested in maintaining the system
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Common sense would tell you that Smith and Cowdrey weren’t going to insert a piece in the handwriting of Spalding in the middle of their Book of Mormon manuscript. I’m sure that manuscript was destroyed as soon as they were done using it. The naysayers of the Spalding Theory like to point to another manuscript by Spalding as proof a Spalding manuscript had nothing to do with the Book of Mormon, but common sense would tell you that any manuscript Smith and Cowdrey worked from was destroyed before the publication of the Book of Mormon. They weren’t dumb.

The Spalding theory makes the most sense of any theory regarding the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. Joseph looking into a hat and dictating the entire Book of Mormon is simply ludicrous.
 
PaulDupre said:
For those who haven’t seen it yet, here is the definitive thesis on the Spalding-Rigdon theory of the fabrication of the Book of Mormon.

It is fascinating and thoroughly researched and I agree with it wholeheartedly.

Paul
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Whether you agree or not with the theory does not make it true. This debate ( as to how the book of mormon came to be) has been conducted by lds critics as to whether Sidney is the author of the book of mormon and the sides taken seem to cancel each other out. For example, Dan Vogel has debunked the Ridgon theory and claims a more automatic writing process to the book of mormon. You can google Dan Vogel and get a copy of his biography of JS.

In other words, the critics can not agree on a set theory and so, no slam dunk for either side. In fact they seem to cancel each other out as they debate one another. It also needs to be remembered that sidney never claimed that he wrote the book, even after he left the lds church. And he certainly had the opportunity to do so. Sidney was beaten and dragged through the town and left for dead, plus he lost favor with the lds church. And just how the missionaries found Sidney when canvassing seems to discount the Ridgon/Spaulding theory. He gained nothing from the book of mormon if he wrote it and allowed JS to take all the credit if he wrote it. Highly unlikely in my opinion.

Of course for a disbeliever any theory is good as long as it discounts the original story of the book of mormon. 🙂
 
hosemonkey said:
I think that you have hit the nail on the head. Any history of mormonism that is not “faith-promoting” is locked away. Only God knows what is locked away in the vaults of the old men of Salt Lake City.:eek: I’m pretty sure that 'Ol Joe’s “peep-stone” is there and maybe even his sacred underwear.😃
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The spaulding theory has been around for quite some time…from the very beginnings of the lds church. No secret there. Fawn Brodie in her biography has debunked the theory.

Trust me… if I search through catholic history, I will find a lot of non-faith promoting history. I just read a biography of St. Teresa of Avila. The in-fighting in the spanish church was terrible and harsh between the monasteries and convents who had different ideas about convent and monastorial life. Not faith promoting at all during her time.
 
zerinus said:
For those who are interested, here is a good article on the translation of the Book of Mormon that I found. I agree with his conclusions:

farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=jbms&id=167

zerinus
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Here are some more:

Richard Lloyd Anderson, “Explaining Away the Book of Mormon Witnesses,” (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, August 2004) Richard Lloyd Anderson discusses the strength and consistency of the Book of Mormon witnesses and responds to common criticisms of their testimonies. (2004 FAIR Conference presentation.)

Michael R. Ash, “Book of Mormon Witnesses, Part 1: Motives,” (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, March 2003) FAIR Brochure. Critics often dismiss the first-hand testimonies of Book of Mormon witnesses by questioning their motives.

Michael R. Ash, “Book of Mormon Witnesses, Part 2: Oliver Cowdery,” (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, March 2003) FAIR Brochure. Because Oliver Cowdery had a falling out with Joseph Smith and left the Church for a time, should his testimony of the Book of Mormon be suspect?

Michael R. Ash, “Book of Mormon Witnesses, Part 3: Martin Harris,” (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, March 2003) FAIR Brochure. Martin Harris, a witness to the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, has been maligned and dismissed by critics. What is the real story?

Michael R. Ash, “Book of Mormon Witnesses, Part 4: David Whitmer,” (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, March 2003) FAIR Brochure. David Whitmer left the Church and never rejoined. Did he recant his testimony of the Book of Mormon?

Michael R. Ash, “The Book of Mormon,” Mormonism 201 (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR) Ash rebuts the charges made in Mormonism 101 concerning the Book of Mormon (including issues, such as, the Three Witness, the Fullness and the Fullness of the Gospel).

Which can be found here:

fairlds.org/apol/ai109.html

The first one by Anderson is very good. 🙂
 
why_me said:
The spaulding theory has been around for quite some time…from the very beginnings of the lds church. No secret there. Fawn Brodie in her biography has debunked the theory.
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Brodie didn’t debunk the theory. There is more and more research being done which confirms the theory as the Criddle article demonstrates. For example people did not know in Brodie’s time that Rigdon and Spalding shared the same post office in Pittsburgh. Read the entire Criddle article as well as some of Dale Broadhurst’s research (Google him) and perhaps you will begin to see how much more sense the Spalding theory makes than anything else out there. Mormon historians like to claim Spalding has been debunked so they don’t have to deal with it seriously. You might want to look at Vernal Holley’s work, especially the maps:

solomonspalding.com/docs2/2001vern.htm

Just be Catholic why me. Mormonism can’t be trusted.
 
BartBurk said:
Skousen assumes we can trust those who witnessed the translation. Since I believe Oliver Cowdrey was in on the fraud, I can’t trust anything he says about the method of translation. Most people didn’t see Oliver and Joseph working together. It’s plausible that Joseph could have done the head in the hat trick to impress people who happened to pop in on their work. When they left, he and Oliver probably just used the manuscript they were working from to create the Book of Mormon. I really doubt that Joseph was looking into a hat the whole time he was translating the Book of Mormon. It is interesting that Oliver and Joseph are very quiet when it comes to how the translation occurred.
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Emma, Joseph Smith’s wife had claimed that no manuscript was present. Also, no one to my knowledge ever saw JS working on a book. Do you know how much paper it would have taken to write such a book…and the pens and ink involved. Not to mention ink stains on the fingers since writing was not so clean as it is today? And here we have the problem. No evidence at all that JS was writing a book or that he made a lot of purchases of paper and ink.

Plus, how to find the time to write a book when one is working on the farm?? And in secret without the knowledge of the family??
 
why_me said:
Emma, Joseph Smith’s wife had claimed that no manuscript was present. Also, no one to my knowledge ever saw JS working on a book. Do you know how much paper it would have taken to write such a book…and the pens and ink involved. Not to mention ink stains on the fingers since writing was not so clean as it is today? And here we have the problem. No evidence at all that JS was writing a book or that he made a lot of purchases of paper and ink.

Plus, how to find the time to write a book when one is working on the farm?? And in secret without the knowledge of the family??
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My guess is that Oliver Cowdrey and Sidney Rigdon had plenty of time to write a book. And Emma simply is untrustworthy. Mormonism was her bread and butter.
 
why_me said:
Emma, Joseph Smith’s wife had claimed that no manuscript was present. Also, no one to my knowledge ever saw JS working on a book. Do you know how much paper it would have taken to write such a book…and the pens and ink involved. Not to mention ink stains on the fingers since writing was not so clean as it is today? And here we have the problem. No evidence at all that JS was writing a book or that he made a lot of purchases of paper and ink.

Plus, how to find the time to write a book when one is working on the farm?? And in secret without the knowledge of the family??
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What do you mean? even if the story of it being translated are true there would still be paper and ink. And if he was so busy out on the farm how did he have time to do the translation?
 
A very interesting discussion of the Spalding theory and the Tanners rejection of it can be found here:

solomonspalding.com/tanrpg/TanrRev1.htm

As Broadhurst states, it would be interesting to know if Sidney Rigdon or Parley Pratt might have been involved in creating these 12 pages. They occur in the portion which replaced the lost pages destroyed by Martin Harris’ wife. That Rigdon or Pratt might have been involved in a scheme to quickly replace these lost pages would not be surprising.

Especially look at this note:

solomonspalding.com/tanrpg/TanrRev1.htm#note3
 
Thanks, Bart. Dale has helped me in innumerable ways. His scholarship on the subject goes way back. 👍

I would not be surprised if under the hostile rhetoric there is some cooperation between UTLM and LDS, to maintain another double bind.
 
Finally a LDS emerges and no mention of things in post #103, is this intentional avoidance of these beliefs? The two that really blow my mind are:
  1. That the Virgin Mary really wasn’t a virgin at all but had sex relations with their heavenly father to produce the Mormon version of Jesus Christ.
  2. That Jesus was really Lucifer’s brother in the spirit world, and it was only due to a “heavenly council” vote that Jesus became our redeemer instead of Satan!!
Do they really have that warped view of our Lord and Blessed Mother? I hope I am not passing through Utah when the second coming happens. I wouldn’t want to be in the middle of that catastrophe and mistaken for one of them. 😃
 
wmscott said:
Finally a LDS emerges and no mention of things in post #103, is this intentional avoidance of these beliefs? The two that really blow my mind are:
  1. That the Virgin Mary really wasn’t a virgin at all but had sex relations with their heavenly father to produce the Mormon version of Jesus Christ.
  2. That Jesus was really Lucifer’s brother in the spirit world, and it was only due to a “heavenly council” vote that Jesus became our redeemer instead of Satan!!
Do they really have that warped view of our Lord and Blessed Mother? I hope I am not passing through Utah when the second coming happens. I wouldn’t want to be in the middle of that catastrophe and mistaken for one of them. 😃
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Those topics have nothing to do with the thread.
 
wmscott said:
  1. That the Virgin Mary really wasn’t a virgin at all but had sex relations with their heavenly father to produce the Mormon version of Jesus Christ.
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Yes, that blew my mind too. But the way one LDS explained it was that Mary could actually be called a virgin even though she had sexual relations with a man because the man she had sexual relations with was an “exaulted” man.

Need to remember that LDS words and meanings aren’t necessarily words and meanings that both the non-LDS and the LDS person can find in a dictionary. IMO, there’s also a lot of “hair splitting” going on. There’s a very wide gulf between LDS beliefs and Christian beliefs. but that’s something kept “hush-hush”.
 
why_me said:
Emma, Joseph Smith’s wife had claimed that no manuscript was present. Also, no one to my knowledge ever saw JS working on a book. Do you know how much paper it would have taken to write such a book…and the pens and ink involved. Not to mention ink stains on the fingers since writing was not so clean as it is today? And here we have the problem. No evidence at all that JS was writing a book or that he made a lot of purchases of paper and ink.

Plus, how to find the time to write a book when one is working on the farm?? And in secret without the knowledge of the family??
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Hello Why me,

I realize this does not follow the topic per say, ( sorry for that )

After reading and posting a few times on this topic, I must say that ( even though I do not think the BoM as well as the " translation" of JS has historical or consistent Merit.
( quite the contrary)

I do commend you for all your efforts ( responses) that have been done in a respectfull and warm manner.

It seems to me , that given the obstacles and ( sometimes ) insults you have faced, You have, in my opinion, treated other posters ( me included ) as I think we should all treat eachother.

For that ( if nothing else ) I do applaud you

God bless,
Carl
 
why_me said:
Emma, Joseph Smith’s wife had claimed that no manuscript was present. Also, no one to my knowledge ever saw JS working on a book. Do you know how much paper it would have taken to write such a book…and the pens and ink involved. Not to mention ink stains on the fingers since writing was not so clean as it is today? And here we have the problem. No evidence at all that JS was writing a book or that he made a lot of purchases of paper and ink.

Plus, how to find the time to write a book when one is working on the farm?? And in secret without the knowledge of the family??
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would this be the same Emma who claimed there was no revelation on polygamy ad that it was all Brigham young’s idea? the same one who claimed the Utah LDs were all wrong and following a false prophet and started her own church?

apparently someone saw JS working on a book since emma, martinn harris and oliver all wrote about it. he called it a “translation” but all the descriptions are pretty much the same thing one would see if they were writing a book from scratch. it certainly required paper and ink. JS and emma certainly collaborated, oliver and harris may have been duped or may have been collaborators as well. rigdon certainly played a major role in later LDS “scriptures”

when did JS ever “work” on a farm? he and his family tried every other way of making money from peepstones, to teaching school but rarely WORKED a farm. that was part of why JS father in law had such a problem with him.
 
BartBurk said:
Common sense would tell you that Smith and Cowdrey weren’t going to insert a piece in the handwriting of Spalding in the middle of their Book of Mormon manuscript. I’m sure that manuscript was destroyed as soon as they were done using it. The naysayers of the Spalding Theory like to point to another manuscript by Spalding as proof a Spalding manuscript had nothing to do with the Book of Mormon, but common sense would tell you that any manuscript Smith and Cowdrey worked from was destroyed before the publication of the Book of Mormon. They weren’t dumb.

The Spalding theory makes the most sense of any theory regarding the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. Joseph looking into a hat and dictating the entire Book of Mormon is simply ludicrous.
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Not only that but the Mormons in possession of all the original documents (I believe located at BYU) purposely withheld making the original materials available to the inspectors and analysts. The handwriting analysts are a quirky lot and ALWAYS insist on original materials - NOT COPIES. All they had were photo copies of the originals and none of the analysts was going to make a definitive ruling on copies of originals since pen pressure and other information that forensic analysts use is lost when it is copied. The question is WHY have the Mormons always refused to cooperate with matters that challenge their faith. If they have nothing to hide they should start opening up records to the public rather than destroying evidence and claiming it was missing etc. Mormons have historically been very evasive about giving information out and there have been many forced resignations of key leadership in the “church” over evidence. My belief is that many Mormon leaders know in their hearts that the whole thing is a sham of JS and are too ashamed to admit it and are afraid of causing social devastation on so many of their family and friends and are basically on a lame horse they do not now know how to get off of without shaming themselves and millions of others; not to mention mock all the people who have died and lost money over the Mormon controversy. The entire religion has been in controversy from the time the first manuscript was written. Mr. Smith was bankrupted and had all kinds of money problems. Nothing makes any sense or holds up to logic and scrutiny.

For example - where did the stone crypt go that contained the gold plates? It would be easy to radio-date that material to see if it was as ancient as they claim. When asked to produce the evidence all we get is a lame excuse “it washed away out of the hill from erosion and was lost”. What utter balderdash…

James
 
CentralFLJames said:
Not only that but the Mormons in possession of all the original documents (I believe located at BYU) purposely withheld making the original materials available to the inspectors and analysts. The handwriting analysts are a quirky lot and ALWAYS insist on original materials - NOT COPIES. All they had were photo copies of the originals and none of the analysts was going to make a definitive ruling on copies of originals since pen pressure and other information that forensic analysts use is lost when it is copied. The question is WHY have the Mormons always refused to cooperate with matters that challenge their faith. If they have nothing to hide they should start opening up records to the public rather than destroying evidence and claiming it was missing etc. Mormons have historically been very evasive about giving information out and there have been many forced resignations of key leadership in the “church” over evidence. My belief is that many Mormon leaders know in their hearts that the whole thing is a sham of JS and are too ashamed to admit it and are afraid of causing social devastation on so many of their family and friends and are basically on a lame horse they do not now know how to get off of without shaming themselves and millions of others; not to mention mock all the people who have died and lost money over the Mormon controversy. The entire religion has been in controversy from the time the first manuscript was written. Mr. Smith was bankrupted and had all kinds of money problems. Nothing makes any sense or holds up to logic and scrutiny.

For example - where did the stone crypt go that contained the gold plates? It would be easy to radio-date that material to see if it was as ancient as they claim. When asked to produce the evidence all we get is a lame excuse “it washed away out of the hill from erosion and was lost”. What utter balderdash…

James
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As I understand it the originals were made available to the handwriting experts. The best proof the theory has been debunked is that in the latest edition of their work, “Who Really Wrote the Book of Mormon?”, Cowdrey, Vanick and Davis have dropped the claim about Spalding and the 12 supposed pages in his handwriting.
 
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