Dan Vogel wrote:I wasn’t criticizing you for your opinion of the Book of Mormon, only for confusing that opinion with the intention of the author. You were apparently doing that because you were trying to harmonize the Book of Mormon with Miller’s memory of humorous stories in Spalding’s MS. You seemed to be arguing (1) the Book of Mormon is humorous, and (2) the Oberlin MS is not humorous. The apparent conclusion being that the humor is in the conjecture missing Spalding MS and the Book of Mormon. You now seem to be backing off your position on the Book of Mormon, so perhaps you might admit Glenn had a point when he said Miller’s description wasn’t accurate for the Book of Mormon.
I said a couple of things, that humor is dependent on perspective of the individual and context of the story and how it is presented. That the oberline is not particularly humorous, it is light hearted at the beginning and one might argue someone could find that humorous in a few parts, but other than that the majority of the Oberlin is not humorous. I said that one could argue the Book of Mormon has lots of humorous parts. Then I brought up the Laban story because I knew that one Conneaut witness had mentioned,therefore if true it was in Spalding's story. I said that story someone could view as humorous, that it could be perceived as monty pythonesque, particularly since I had in mind the scene from monty python..which involves chopping off body parts and yet is consider highly humorous. If someone was told that a scene chopping off body parts could be made humorous without knowledge of the monty python scene that would be difficult to appreciate possible. So what I was saying was that Miller was the only one to mention humor, we don't know his perspective or sense of humor, we don't know exactly what spalding wrote or how he presented the story. So it's possible that he found the "ridiculous' in spalding's stories humorous. And for myself, I found the ridiculous in the Book of Mormon humorous. As an example, it's supposed to be etched onto metal and written in a language to reduce the writing and yet so much of it is superfluous, excessive unnecessary writing about literally nothing of any importance..that's humorous..in the sense that it is so ridiculous. I never thought that the Book of Mormon writers were trying to write a comedy.
Once again I don't see a moral value being taught. I don't think it's better that a person die because someone thinks their beliefs are all important, and more important than others'.
Again, you are imposing your opinion on the Book of Mormon. Certainly, you must admit there are grey areas in the study of ethics and morality. I’m not asking you to agree with the Book of Mormon’s author, only to appreciate the dilemma confronted by Nephi. Nephi at first resists the command to kill Laban, protesting that he has always kept God’s commandments. In response, the Spirit issues the argument/command you find objectionable. The key here is that God commands Nephi to break the commandment. I would suggest that this is analogous to Joseph Smith’s moral dilemma—should he (like Nephi) cross moral lines and pretend that he got possession of gold plates, which he battled evil spirits to obtain, and keep his family and others from perishing in unbelief? Does the ends justify the means?
This is my impression Dan. You started out with the belief J. Smith wrote the Book of Mormon and then you rationalize what you can from the Book of Mormon to fit in with that initial belief.
A recent situation happened in our family which is analogous. My husband had a rash in February. In March we both we're seeing a new family doctor at a meet & greet type meeting. My husband told the doctor that he had a rash, that it was systemic based on the evidence, that he'd had this sort of rash before and in the past was given corticosteroids. So this new doctor prescribed what he wanted.
My husband went away for 2 weeks came back the rash was much worse, he had a doctor's appointment for him on Monday but couldn't wait and went to a walk in clinic. The doctor there immediately diagnoses without any hestitation .. scabies. So my husband doesn't believe this. He goes to the family doctor on the Monday, the doctor gives him another prescription of corticosteroids. Now at this point I'm noticing some small itchy bumps and I tell my husband I think the second doctor is right but my husband thinks I'm wrong and I'm simply paranoid about a few bumbs. So 2 weeks goes by his itch is subsiding, it appears to be clearing up, and every time I mention bumbs he pooh hoo's me as being paranoid.
So a day after he's finished taking corticosteroids the first thing I said to him in the morning was "how's your rash?" I knew he had scabies despite his denial and that he'd still have that rash. Added to the fact that now my rash was much worse. He finally admitted and appreciated the doctor who saw him the second time had the right diagnosis.
The second doctor had no preconceived ideas planted by my husband for a diagnosis whereas the first had. The first had been informed that this was an occurrence my husband had before and my husband talked with authority. So it would have been better if my husband instead of saying anything, had let the first doctor diagnose.
So that's a long story. But my impression is you are doing the same, perceiving this story of Laban, in a preconceived framework that Smith wrote the Book of Mormon and this passage in it, to justify any immoral behavior on his part..as the means justifying the ends. You are looking at the evidence as a means to bolster your preconceived belief that Smith wrote the Book of Mormon. I do think that if Ridgon were the main writer your theory would fit..but I think J. Smith was an opportunist by nature well before the Book of Mormon came along. And example of his opportunistic nature was polygamy which he used his authority for his own selfish ends, not as means to a religious end. The way I see Smith's polygamy as encouraged for other men, not as he himself practiced, is that it was not only a disregard for the rights and feelings of women, that it treated them as slaves, but as well as breeding machines/cows to produce more young play things for sexual pleasure ...that the older men could trade amongst themselves. And I think that's what Smith had in mind.