Mormonism and Wikipedia/Three Witnesses/Introduction

The FAIR Wiki Defending Mormonism by providing well-researched answers to challenging questions within a faithful context

A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia: Mormonism and Wikipedia/Three Witnesses A work by a collaboration of authors (Link to Wikipedia article here) Three Witnesses, Introduction

Testimony of the Three Witnesses

Note: This page serves as either an index for or a review of claims and/or responses to attacks on LDS Church made by this online work. The work reviewed is the product of an online collaboration of various authors of varying degrees of faith or skepticism. FAIR has noted particularly bad scholarship related to the research contained in this particular work and/or considers significant elements of this work to be "anti-Mormon" in tone or content. The name Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. Wikipedia content is copied and made available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

An analysis of the Wikipedia article "Three Witnesses"  Updated 9/28/2011

Reviews of previous revisions of this section

• December 2009—
  A review of this section as it appeared in Wikipedia in December 2009. (Link)

Introduction

From the Wikipedia article:
The Three Witnesses were a group of three early leaders of the Latter Day Saint movement who signed a statement in 1830 saying that an angel had shown them the golden plates from which Joseph Smith, Jr. translated the Book of Mormon and that they had heard God's voice testifying that the book had been translated by the power of God. The Three are among the eleven Book of Mormon witnesses, of whom the remainder were the Eight Witnesses who affirmed that they "saw and handled" the plates.

FAIR's analysis:

•  Correct, per cited sources
  

From the Wikipedia article:
The Three Witnesses were Oliver Cowdery, Martin Harris, and David Whitmer, whose joint testimony, in conjunction with a separate statement by Eight Witnesses, has been printed with nearly every edition of the Book of Mormon since its first publication in 1830. All three witnesses eventually broke with Smith and were excommunicated from the church he had founded. Harris and Cowdery eventually rejoined the church, and to varying degrees, all three continued to testify to the divine origin of the Book of Mormon.

Wikipedia footnotes:

• In 1838, Joseph Smith called Cowdery, Harris, and Whitmer "too mean to mention; and we had liked to have forgotten them." B.H. Roberts, ed. History of the Church (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1905), 3: 232.

FAIR's analysis:

• For a detailed response, see: Did any of the Book of Mormon witnesses ever recant?
• For a detailed response, see: Did Oliver Cowdery admit that the Book of Mormon was a hoax?

Mormonism and Wikipedia

Articles on this subject

• For an overview on this subject, see
  • Mormonism and Wikipedia: The Church History That "Anyone Can Edit", Roger Nicholson, Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture, Vol. 1, 2012. 151-190
  • "Wiki Wars: In battle to define beliefs, Mormons and foes wage battle on Wikipedia", Michael De Groote, Deseret News, January 30, 2011.
  • "Something Wiki This Way Comes: How collaborative editing is changing the face of online LDS apologetics", R. Scott Lloyd, Church News, August 8, 2011.
  • Something Wiki This Way Comes: How Collaborative Editing is Changing the Face of Online LDS Apologetics. A close look at the challenges and history of editing LDS topics in a Wikipedia. This is a 2011 FAIR conference presentation by Roger Nicholson, in PDF format.

FAIR's Wikipedia Article Reviews

• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "Martin Harris" (Link)
• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "Oliver Cowdery" (Link)
• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "First Vision"—
  Current review is based upon Wikipedia revision dated 9/17/2011. This article has undergone moderate improvements in its use of sources since our last review. The article still contains a substantial amount of original research based upon primary sources, with the intent to disprove the vision and highlight perceived discrepancies between vision accounts. Believing scholars are labeled "apologists" in an attempt to diminish their credibility. (Link)
• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "Joseph Smith"—
  Current review is based upon Wikipedia revision dated 9/3/2011. This article has undergone substantial improvements in its use of sources since our initial review in 2009. Most of the citations are now accurately represented. (Link)
• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "Golden plates"—
  Current review is based upon Wikipedia revision dated 9/21/2011. This article has undergone only minor improvements in its use of sources since our last review. The article contains a large amount of original research on the part of the wiki editors. (Link)
• A FAIR Analysis of Wikipedia article "Three Witnesses"—
  Current review is based upon Wikipedia revision dated 9/28/2011. This article has been constructed in such a way as to discredit the witnesses by emphasizing any perceived contradictions in their various statements regarding their encounter with the gold plates. (Link)

Copyright © 2005–2013 Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research. This is not an official Web site of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The content of this page may not be copied, published, or redistributed without the prior written consent of FAIR.

We welcome your suggestions for improving the content of this FAIR Wiki article.

Sites we recommend: Mormon Scholars Testify: Messages of faith from scholars who belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints