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Detailed response to CES Letter, Book of Mormon: Difference between revisions
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|claim=The document claims "Many Book of Mormon names and places are strikingly similar to many local names and places of the region Joseph Smith lived." | |claim=The document claims "Many Book of Mormon names and places are strikingly similar to many local names and places of the region Joseph Smith lived." | ||
|answer= | |answer= | ||
*{{Answer}}The original idea behind this proposal was that Joseph picked up these place names and locations from a map in order to create his Book of Mormon geography. However, once it becomes apparent that the ''locations'' are in the wrong place, critics who support this proposal then fall back to the claim that the locations of the names actually | *{{Answer}}The original idea behind this proposal was that Joseph picked up these place names and locations from a map in order to create his Book of Mormon geography. However, once it becomes apparent that the ''locations'' are in the wrong place, critics who support this proposal then fall back to the claim that the locations of the names are actually ''unimportant''. After the geography is thrown out, we are simply left with a list of names that Joseph supposedly found on a 19th-century map. However, once it also becomes obvious that many of the place names that were allegedly located on a 19th century map ''did not exist'' at the time that Joseph was dictating the Book of Mormon, the entire theory falls apart. Of the few that actually ''did'' exist, some of these names represent extremely small, distant sites about which Joseph almost certainly could have had no knowledge. So critics rely on names which are in the wrong place, which didn't exist during Joseph's time, and which were too small and distant for him to be aware of. The final blow to this theory is that they also overlook the Biblical source for their American "parallels," which are far more likely and plausible than giving Joseph an encyclopedic knowledge of North American place names. Even if critics insist that Joseph forged the Book of Mormon, isn't the Bible a far more likely source for these names than obscure hamlets hundreds of miles away, which did not appear on a map, and most of which didn't even exist with those names at that time? | ||
*{{Incorrect}} Out of 345 Book of Mormon names, the list of 28 presented by the author is ''seriously'' reduced when one eliminates the Biblical names and those which did not exist on any map at the time that the Book of Mormon was published. | *{{Incorrect}} Out of 345 Book of Mormon names, the list of 28 presented by the author is ''seriously'' reduced when one eliminates the Biblical names and those which did not exist on any map at the time that the Book of Mormon was published. | ||
*{{antispeak|mutually exclusive}} The author, in the next section, presumes that the name "Moroni" was derived from the capital city of the Comoros Islands, or from "treasure stories" about Captain Kidd. In this section, he asserts that the name "Moroni" is derived from the town "Monroe, New York," which was founded in 1818. | *{{antispeak|mutually exclusive}} The author, in the next section, presumes that the name "Moroni" was derived from the capital city of the Comoros Islands, or from "treasure stories" about Captain Kidd. In this section, he asserts that the name "Moroni" is derived from the town "Monroe, New York," which was founded in 1818. | ||
Revision as of 16:48, 2 March 2014
Response to "Book of Mormon Concerns & Questions"
A FAIR Analysis of:
[[../|Letter to a CES Director]] |
[[../Book of Mormon Translation Concerns & Questions|Book of Mormon Translation Concerns & Questions]] |
The absence of evidence is not proof. Here’s one small example:
Matthew Roper in a FairMormon Blog on June 17, 2013, writes about a criticism repeated many times over the years about the mention of steel in the Book of Mormon. In 1884, one critic wrote, “Laban’s sword was steel, when it is a notorious fact that the Israelites knew nothing of steel for hundreds of years afterwards. Who but as ignorant a person as Rigdon would have perpetuated all these blunders.”8 More recently, Thomas O’Dea in 1957 stated, “Every commentator on the Book of Mormon has pointed out the many cultural and historical anachronisms, such as the steel sword of Laban in 600 B.C.” [9]
We had no answer to these critics at the time, but as often happens in these matters, new discoveries in later years shed new light. Roper reports, “It is increasingly apparent that the practice of hardening iron through deliberate carburization, quenching and tempering was well known to the ancient world from which Nephi came. ‘It seems evident,’ notes one recent authority, ‘that by the beginning of the tenth century B.C. blacksmiths were intentionally steeling iron.’” [10] In 1987, the Ensign reported that archeologists had unearthed a long steel sword near Jericho dating back to the late seventh century B.C., probably to the reign of King Josiah who died shortly before Lehi began to prophesy. [11] This sword is now on display at Jerusalem’s Israel Museum. The museum’s explanatory sign reads in part, “The sword is made of iron hardened into steel, attesting to substantial metallurgical know-how.” [12]
—Elder D. Todd Christofferson, "The Prophet Joseph Smith", Brigham Young University-Idaho Devotional, September 24, 2013.
- Response to section: "What are 1769 King James Version edition errors doing in the Book of Mormon?"
- Response to section: "What are these 17th century italicized words doing in the Book of Mormon?"
- Response to section: "The Book of Mormon includes mistranslated biblical passages that were later changed in Joseph Smith’s translation of the bible"
- Response to section: "DNA analysis has concluded that Native American Indians do not originate from the Middle East"
- Response to section: Anachronisms
- Response to section: Archaeology
- Response to section: Book of Mormon Geography
- Response to section: Hill Cumorah
- Response to section: "'View of the Hebrews' compared to the Book of Mormon"
- Response to section: "The Book of Mormon taught and still teaches a Trinitarian view of the Godhead"
Response Section
"What are 1769 King James Version edition errors doing in the Book of Mormon?"
"What are these 17th century italicized words doing in the Book of Mormon?"
"The Book of Mormon includes mistranslated biblical passages that were later changed in Joseph Smith’s translation of the bible."
"DNA analysis has concluded that Native American Indians do not originate from the Middle East"
Anachronisms
Archaeology
Book of Mormon Geography
Hill Cumorah
"'View of the Hebrews' compared to the Book of Mormon"
"The Book of Mormon taught and still teaches a Trinitarian view of the Godhead"
==Notes